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“Fuck. Fine, I’ll tell you what Armstrong is planning. Get that fucking thing away from me.”
Drago’s jaw clenched, but he stepped back and handed the torch to Maxim who turned it off. He stepped back toward Orlov and backhanded him with such force the chair he was sitting on tipped over. “You better watch your fucking tone, Andrei. Don’t think I don’t remember your first target was Katya.”
“Fucking women,” Orlov grumbled from the ground as blood dripped from his mouth to the floor.
Maxim reached down and pulled Orlov back up. “Start talking.”
I crossed my arms, knowing whatever Orlov was going to say was going to enrage me.
“Armstrong is planning on marrying Emmy to the son of Eduardo Martinez—”
“We already know that. When is the exchange happening? We need dates and details.”
Orlov’s eyebrows raised, as if he was impressed we discovered even part of Armstrong’s plans. “He wanted Emmy to be brought to a hangar at a private airport in Wheeling.”
“When?” I snapped out, my patience quickly unraveling.
Orlov’s dark gaze landed on me, opaque and full of loathing. “Next week. Tuesday.”
“How do we know you’re telling the truth?” I spat.
Orlov shrugged. “I guess you don’t.”
His attitude sent my rage into the stratosphere. I stepped forward and grabbed him by his shirt, the need to end him riding me hard.
“Wait,” Drago said, jerking me out of my haze. I frowned at him, barely holding back the fist that wanted to drive through Orlov’s smug, youthful face.
“I need to talk to you,” Drago said, then walked out of the room. I reluctantly released Orlov and followed him, slamming the door behind me.
“What the fuck, Drago?”
“We can’t kill him yet, Ivan. I hate to say it, but we need him. If things don’t play out the way on Tuesday, he’s our only direct link to Armstrong’s operation and he may know more than he realizes. Believe me, if Armstrong ends up making other moves, I’d be happy to jog is fucking memory.”
My jaw clenched so tightly, my teeth threatened to crack under the pressure. The thought of keeping Orlov alive for even one minute longer was infuriating, but I couldn’t argue the logic of Drago’s thinking.
“Fuck,” I hollered and punched my fist into the door, the skin now scraped and bleeding.
“I know it sucks, but if we kill him now, we’ll be much more blind with what Armstrong’s planning.”
I nodded. “You’re right. I fucking hate to say it, but you’re right. We have to keep that little shit alive until Tuesday.”
“Exactly. I’ll keep him locked down here. He doesn’t have any more allies that we know of, so I doubt he can make a grand escape like he did last time. Have you been in touch with Mikhail? Is he going to take responsibility if we act? While Armstrong is loathed, he does have allies and I don’t want to be dodging a bullet for the next ten to twenty years.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Yeah, he said he’d help.” I took a deep breath and continued. “He said he’d help if I go back to Moscow and work for him.”
Drago’s dark eyebrows jumped. “What? How is that going to work?” I knew what he was asking. How was that going to work with Emmy. I couldn’t bring her to Moscow with me and long distance would never work.
“I don’t know. I need his help to take care of Armstrong, but I can’t…live without Emmy.” I felt like shards of glass were sitting in my throat as I pushed out the words, the vulnerability of saying them eating me alive.
Drago nodded gravely, then grabbed my shoulder and squeezed in silent consolation. I knew how he felt about my sister—he understood my dilemma. “Maybe we take Mikhail’s help and sort all that other shit out later?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I can’t deal with that right now. I’m going to take off. If I see Orlov again, I’m going to cap him.”
“Fine, I’ll take care of it. You go deal with your girl.”
I walked out of the building, already considering the different ways I could convince Emmy to forgive me for hiding who her dad was.
Chapter 44