Page 64

Abby

“ I can’t promise I’m not going to kill this fucker,” Dimitry growls the following day as Rodrigo’s black sedan winds up the mountain road toward us.

“Try to restrain yourself.” I go for a light tone, but it’s an effort. I’m not looking forward to this meeting any more than Dimitry.

I’m certainly not looking forward to going back into SK. My every nerve tenses whenever I think of it, so I’ve been trying not to.

“It shouldn’t take more than a week to get the auction set up.” Leon joins us on the patio. “I’ve had half a dozen expressions of interest in the Fabergé egg already. But we need Rodrigo on site to insist the auction is held at SK. All of this falls apart without his cooperation.”

I can almost hear Dimitry grinding his teeth in frustration. I put a hand on his arm.

“We need Rodrigo,” I say quietly. “He’s the best chance we’ve got of getting us both inside that compound, and you close enough to Jacey to kill him.”

“Yeah.” His voice is heavy with sarcasm.

“I heard you both the first fifty fucking times.” He glances at me as the sedan parks beneath us.

His visible effort to soften his expression is almost comical, given the taut strain visible in every inch of corded muscle.

“I said I’d work with this idea, Skip. But I swear to God if this bastard so much as looks at you sideways, I’ll kill him. No questions, no discussion.”

I grip his arm wordlessly as Leon goes downstairs to open the door. There’s no point in trying to reassure Dimitry yet again. Getting him to a point where he’s prepared to even consider my proposal was a small miracle. We’re still a very long way from him actually agreeing.

Dimitry tilts his head sideways, listening intently to the footsteps on the stairs. I know he’s counting how many there are, just like I know he has weapons strapped beneath his clothes, and more hidden in the furniture that he thinks I don’t know about.

I’m well aware that the slightest provocation will end very badly for Rodrigo Cardenas.

I also know that if Dimitry kills him, our only chance of surviving this entire thing dies, too.

It’s an impossible situation. And it’s about to get much harder.

I take a deep breath and squeeze Dimitry’s hand briefly as we turn to face the newcomers. His fingers are like steel wire under mine, tense and ready to kill.

Rodrigo moves through the villa toward the patio, flanked by a man on either side, Leon following behind them.

Despite the oppressive heat, Rodrigo is wearing a two-piece gray suit with a black silk shirt opened at the neck beneath it.

Aviator sunglasses hang from the V of his shirt.

Dimitry, lethally still beside me, watches them come.

“Abby.” Rodrigo steps onto the patio, his face unsmiling as he looks at Dimitry, then back at me.

“When you agreed to our deal, I thought you understood the time sensitivity involved. I certainly did not expect to wait several days to hear from you. I definitely didn’t expect to receive a summons requiring me to visit you in person, potentially exposing myself to our friend at SK, whose triad minions, I should advise you, are beginning to ask some very awkward questions regarding our whereabouts. ”

“I assume you’ve lied to them?” My tone is calm enough, but my stomach is lurching like a wild sea.

“Of course.” Rodrigo’s eyes rest on my bruises, his mouth widening in an unpleasant smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.

“But we’d better hope they haven’t seen you since my handiwork faded or my story won’t hold.

” His eyes settle on Dimitry with a calculating expression.

“I told them I beat you so badly that you were in no state to travel, you see,” he says softly.

Dimitry, to my surprise, doesn’t betray his fury by the slightest muscle twitch.

He simply stares Rodrigo down.

But whatever is in his eyes must send a clear enough message, because after a minute of their visual standoff, Rodrigo spits to one side and turns back to me.

“So,” he says sullenly. “I’m here at your invitation, and with minimal security, as requested. Talk.”

“Please,” Leon says, gesturing at the outdoor furniture. “Sit.”

We do. Dao serves tea and politely withdraws.

“I know you,” Rodrigo says abruptly, glaring at Leon over his tea. “We met in Bangkok once. With my father.”

“We did.” Leon inclines his head. “At Sotheby’s. Juan and I bid on the same piece.” He smiles coolly. “Your father lost, as I recall.”

Rodrigo’s eyes narrow. He looks between the three of us. “What is going on here?”

Leon places a laptop on the table and turns it around to face Rodrigo. “You will receive this invitation in an email later today.”

Rodrigo barely glances at the screen. “I’m not exactly in the market for art,” he says curtly.

Dimitry interrupts, his voice flat and cold.

“I really don’t give a fuck what you’re in the market for.

” He taps the image on-screen, of a golden Fabergé egg featuring peacock feather layers on the outer shell.

“You’re going to accept the invitation. You’re also going to suggest, in the encrypted group chat, that the auction be held at the SK compound in Myanmar.

A week from today, you and Abby will attend the auction there together. ”

Rodrigo gives him an incredulous look. “In case you weren’t listening earlier,” he says sarcastically, “the owner of that compound is just a few awkward questions away from sending his killers for me, not to mention your girlfriend. Hosting an auction with us both in attendance is unlikely to be a priority for him.”

Although his hands are as smoothly manicured as ever, I can still see the raw patches on his knuckles from the frenzy of blows he rained down on me a few days ago.

He’ll have more scrapes on those knuckles soon enough.

I haven’t mentioned that part to Dimitry, and I don’t plan to. But I can’t go back to SK with faded bruises. Not if this is going to work.

They’ll need to be fresh.

I shiver and try to push the thought from my mind.

“It’s your job to make that auction a priority,” Dimitry is saying coldly. “And to suggest that it be held at the SK compound.”

Rodrigo’s eyes narrow. “And why the fuck would I do that?”

“Because,” Dimitry snaps, “in a few hours, you and Abby will fly to Myanmar so you can deliver her back into captivity. You are going to tell your host that you had such a good time ,” he continues in a scathing voice, “that you want to repeat it. This time, you’d like the added thrill of bidding for, and winning, a very valuable piece of art—while Abby watches you do it. ”

His disgust is palpable.

“If your host, or his minions, question your absence this week, you will say that after a man was seen asking about Abby in a Bangkok bar, a bomb went off nearby. You had some security concerns. Since you wished to enjoy your good time without interruption, you shifted the party to a private location.”

I don’t miss his contemptuous inflection, and by Rodrigo’s suddenly hard expression, neither does he.

“You’re giving a lot of orders for a hired gun, muchacho .

” Sitting back in his chair, he lights a cigarette and eyes Dimitry narrowly through the swirling smoke, his eyes lingering on the ink visible above his shirt.

“The bratva may tolerate subordinates giving orders, but in Colombia, the boss does not bow to the soldier.”

“Then it’s fortunate,” Dimitry says coldly, “that I no longer belong to a bratva clan and that neither of us are in Colombia.” He leans forward, hands clasped loosely between his legs, pinning Rodrigo with a hard slate glare.

“I’m the hired gun who is going to kill the man who murdered your father,” he says quietly.

“I’m telling you how that is going to happen.

You can agree to work with me—or you can die, here, on this patio. ”

There’s a sudden rush of movement as the men behind Rodrigo pull out their guns, aiming them at us.

Dimitry doesn’t move.

Nor does Leon.

I’m too terrified to breathe, let alone move.

“Those are very dangerous words, muchacho ,” Rodrigo says softly .

“Oh, I don’t think so.” Dimitry’s smile is chilling. He holds up a black remote control that looks like a gaming stick. “This entire patio is wired to blow. Shoot me, and you’re dead before you move a foot.”

Rodrigo sneers, his eyes shifting to me. “You wouldn’t kill your girlfriend.”

Dimitry covers my hand with his own. “It was her idea.” His unsettling smile widens.

Rodrigo’s men still have their guns up, but their tension is palpable. Dimitry, on the other hand, seems more relaxed by the minute. And that smile is downright unnerving.

Once, at a party months ago, some of Dimitry’s crew started reminiscing about an attack they pulled off during the war when Roman and Dimitry gained control of the Stevanovsky clan.

“And there was Dimitry,” Bryce had said, waving his beer around, “giving these fuckers his deranged madman grin, like he always does. They were so terrified they just dropped their guns and ran...”

I always thought the men exaggerated when they told those stories.

Until now.

Rodrigo eyes Dimitry warily. Then he nods at his men. They put their guns away. I don’t miss the beads of sweat on their foreheads.

“Smart.” Dimitry hands me the control. “Be careful not to hit that red button, Skip,” he says lightly.

“That one makes things go boom .” He pours more tea and sits back in his chair.

“We’re going to start with how we make sure our target believes your story.

Leon?” He gestures to the older man, who nods.

“There’s a yacht moored just off the Myanmar coast,” Leon says, “that belongs to a business acquaintance of mine. He’s kindly offered to let us use it.

” He nods at Rodrigo. “You will say that the yacht is where you and Abby stayed when you disappeared this week. We will fly you out to the yacht. Then you will contact SK and request to be helicoptered back to the compound, so your story stands up to any investigation.”

Rodrigo looks between us, frowning. Then he turns to me.

“We had a deal.” He scowls. “Which is the only reason I agreed to come here in the first place. There’s no need for all of this. I came for a name and a photograph. I will do the killing myself—”

“You won’t get close enough to even fucking try.” Dimitry cuts him off calmly. “Many have tried before you. None have succeeded. And if Abby doesn’t return to that compound ASAP, we will all lose the best chance we have of getting this guy into place to take him down.”

Rodrigo looks between Leon and Dimitry. “Even if he agrees to hold this auction at the compound, why are you so sure he’ll attend in person?”

“He will.” Leon sounds very definite. “The missing imperial Fabergé eggs are the unicorns of rare art. Of the fifty that were made, only a few are still missing. The man we’re looking for is rumored to have acquired one of the other missing Fabergé eggs.

A decade ago he bid for a collection of the lesser eggs, but lost to a Russian oligarch, Viktor, who will also receive an invitation to this auction.

Our friend will agree to hold the auction at SK not only because he plans to outbid Viktor, but because if by some chance he fails to do so, he will simply acquire the egg by force.

He will likely be careful to guard his identity, but the rest of the attendees will all be by invitation, which will narrow it down.

We will also specify that all bidders are required to attend in person rather than by phone or proxy, not an unusual stipulation given the unique nature of the item. ”

“If you don’t even know who this man is,” Rodrigo says, frowning, “how do you know what he bid on in the past?”

Leon’s mouth lifts slightly at the edge, though his eyes remain hard.

“I can list the sale date, price, and buyer of every piece of the Russian imperial treasure that has come to market in the last hundred years, Senor Cardenas.

Those who buy them do not hide in the shadows.

They make public press statements about preserving Russian heritage.

They loan to museums and then have entire wings in those museums named in their honor.

Or they build special cases in their mansions and invite wealthy friends to admire their taste.

“The man we are looking for is conspicuous not because of the many pieces he has acquired, but by the fact that nobody knows his name.”