Page 50

50

ROMAN

“ A ll of them said yes?” Dimitry is poised on the edge of my desk, swinging his leg and grinning. “So we’re up and running.”

“Not exactly. We’re entering the most dangerous period now. During the investment phase, Mercura will be at its most visible. This next month is when we’re at the greatest risk of discovery.” I glance around uneasily. “I don’t even like talking about this here. Let’s keep those discussions for the lab.” I glance at my phone. “Which is where I need to be as soon as possible, to give Pavel the good news. You coming?”

“Absolutely.” He jumps off the desk.

I give him a sideways look as the elevator drops to the basement. “No more errands to run for Abby?”

“Nope.” He gives me a shit-eating grin. “All done, but thanks for checking in on me.”

I hold up my hand, and Dimitry throws me the keys to the Maybach. I’m in the mood to drive. I’m fired up after the meeting, adrenaline from the danger and the win flooding my body. What I really want is to drive straight back to the penthouse and fuck Lucia until neither of us can breathe, but I’m guessing she’s still dress shopping with Ofelia. I glance at my phone. Still no message.

Is she seriously that busy that she forgot the launch was today?

I swallow my unease and direct my frustration where it’s more useful. “Tell me.” My voice echoes around the concrete parking garage. “What the fuck is so important in the United States to keep Nikolai out of the country for so long?”

Dimitry grimaces as he folds his bulk into the passenger seat. “Why don’t you call the little prick and ask him yourself?”

“I’d prefer a little more information gathering before I do that. Has Gregor said anything?”

“Gregor’s too busy trying to juggle Pillars, the girls, and Nicky’s gambling rooms to worry about what Nikolai’s actually doing. All he said is that Cádiz is playing a round of showcase matches with the Southern States Soccer league. The team has based itself in Florida, which is probably why the little fuck is hanging around. Plenty of girls, booze, and parties.”

Plenty of fucking Orlovs, too. I tap the steering wheel uneasily. Not to mention the Guapa is currently docked in Miami.

“You think he’s up to something?” Dimitry’s always been able to read me too easily.

I shrug. “Maybe.”

“You know both Nikolai and Mikhail went to college in Florida. That’s the reason we met Mikhail in the first place. Nicky is probably just hanging out with his idiot rich-boy friends, showing off the football club he thinks he owns, and flashing his gangster credentials around.”

“Probably.”

Except it’s Miami.

Dimitry gives me a curious look. “Care to share your thoughts?”

“After we’ve spoken to Pavel.”

He shrugs. “Suit yourself.”

“ S o it’s good news.” I grin around at the tech kids, all of whom whoop and high-five. “But I don’t need to tell you how intense the next month is going to be. If you thought the last couple were hard, then stock up on the soda and pizza, because the next one will be one all-night session after another.”

I’m not sure what it says about the geek squad that they all look positively happy about that.

Dimitry catches my eye, and I suppress my answering grin with an effort. “Go on, then,” I say genially. “Fuck off. Get to it.” I catch Mickey looking at me hopefully. “Fine,” I say, casting my eyes skyward. “You too.”

“Hey, Mickey.” Pavel halts the kid mid-flight and hands him a memory stick. “I want you to run that trojan again, see if you can make sense of that pattern you found. Use the operations center so it’s secure.” He nods at the room where the tech kids are currently clustered, all congratulating each other on the fact that they now get to play with Mercura in real time.

Mickey’s eyes light up. He takes the stick like he’s been given the keys to the Maybach. He barely looks at me in his haste to hit his laptop. Pavel has kept Mickey focused on unraveling the trojan and tracking Lars Andersson. The Petrovsky part of the story I’m doing my best to keep him away from, aside from the bare bones of Darya’s identity.

Mickey loves Lucia. I’m not keen to fuck up that dynamic.

“Thanks,” I say when he’s gone.

“Yeah, well.” Pavel looks disgruntled. “Mickey should actually be the one telling you this, since he tracked it down. It’s starting to get awkward, boss. That kid is smart—very smart. It’s hard hiding things from him.”

“It was your idea to involve him.”

“That was before he started to find shit I didn’t see coming.” He casts side eyes at Dimitry, then back to me.

“Dimitry’s up to date on Lars Andersson.”

He nods, but raises his eyebrows significantly.

Oh, fuck. That means there’s some kind of crossover. Still, Dimitry’s going to need to be briefed anyway.

“Keep going,” I say curtly.

“Well okay, then.” Pavel brings up a school class photograph. “Guess who attended boarding school in London at the same time as Lars Andersson?” He points to a face, then enlarges the photo.

“Is that Alexei fucking Petrovsky?” I stare at the screen, something hard and unpleasant growing in my chest.

“I’m afraid so.” He clicks again and brings up a digital record with the school logo. “And, predictably, if I might say so, it gets worse.” He points to the screen. “Alexei and Lars roomed together for two years. Quite the buddies, it would seem.” He pulls up an array of photos, each of which shows the young Alexei and Lars in a variety of scenarios. “Rowed in the same crew. Ran cross-country together. They even visited one another’s houses—here’s a photo of Alexei celebrating Lars’s thirteenth birthday with Lars’s parents, in Stockholm. The last photo of them is this one in the Old Collegian ’s magazine. They were both fourteen at the time.” It’s a photograph of the two grinning boys in school uniform, showcasing the school’s new computer lab. “It was this photograph that Mickey found, and how he tracked the association in the first place.”

Pavel gives me a worried look. “I know you wanted him to focus on Andersson’s movements, but there wasn’t much I could do once he found the connection. He’s like a dog with a bone once he gets hold of something.” I can hear the admiration in his tone.

I don’t like Mickey knowing any of this, but I can deal with that later. I tilt my chin at the screen. “Go on.”

“Barely a month after that photo, Sergei Petrovsky had his first stroke, and Alexei was pulled out of school and brought back to Miami. He never went back, for obvious reasons. Two years after that, Lars got his first software deal and left the school also. There’s no further record of contact between the two—until the sale of the Guapa. Like I said, the yacht was officially bought by a shell company in the Caymans. But Mickey tracked the money, and the company is an Orlov front, like we thought.”

I just grunt. That much is obvious.

“Lars Andersson boarded a flight from Sweden to Italy a couple of days before the yacht changed hands. The next time he used his passport was in Spain, at the Madrid airport, when he flew back to Sweden.”

I can feel Dimitry’s eyes on me. I try to breathe deeply. “So despite having sold the Guapa , Andersson remained aboard it all the way from Italy to Spain. Including when it refueled here.”

“And he wasn’t alone.” Pavel casts me a wary glance. “According to the flight manifests, Alexei Petrovsky flew into Italy on the same day as his old buddy Lars.”

“ Pizdozh .” I glare at the screen.

This is bad. Really fucking bad.

Dimitry frowns. “But why would Orlov send Alexei in person for the Guapa ? Don’t rich assholes usually just pay a skipper to move their yachts?”

“That’s the fucking billion-dollar project question.” I drum my fingers on the back of Pavel’s chair. “However Alexei managed to get there, clearly the scheming little fuck was planning to meet up with his buddy Lars.”

“It looks like it.” Pavel glances at me. “I think you can safely assume that buying the yacht was Alexei’s idea, one he somehow got the Orlovs to buy into. The real question we need to be asking is why?”

“That’s not the question,” I say tightly. “We have one of the world’s best tech experts aboard the most high-tech yacht in the world, in the company of a man with very questionable loyalties. Despite the reputation English boarding schools have for rampant homosexuality, somehow I doubt that Alexei Petrovsky and Lars Andersson were fucking each other in the sunshine.”

“ W hy would Alexei Petrovsky be working with Andersson to bring you down?” Dimitry shifts restlessly as the car winds down the mountain road in the darkness. “He hates the fucking Orlovs. If he wants his sister back, wouldn’t he befriend you?”

“Not if he thought he could use me to get his family back.”

His eyes widen. “You think he’s coming after Mercura? Planning to trade it to the Orlovs for his father and sister?”

Among other possibilities.

“I think there’s a chance.”

I depress the accelerator as we hit the steep curves, leaning the car into the corners.

“Holy shit.” Dimitry gives a low whistle. “What a clusterfuck.”

“Yup.”

I’m glad I sent Mickey home earlier with Luis. I need time to think this shit through.

“There’s a loose cannon the size of Lars Andersson potentially trying to fuck us,” I say grimly, “right when Mercura is at its most vulnerable phase. And Alexei clearly knows Lucia is in Spain. When Ryder found Lucia in that public bathroom during the parade, he claimed he could get a message to Alexei. He also told her, and I quote, that Lucia is ‘trusting the wrong people.’”

“Yeah, you told me. But since when do you trust journalists?” Dimitry’s tone is dismissive. “This Ryder fuck is a little mudak who wants to stir up trouble. For all we know, he’s not even in contact with Alexei. Why would you believe a single word he says?”

Because he knows more than he should, about too many things.

But I’m not getting into that, not even with Dimitry.

There’ll be time to deal with Ryder and his theories once Mercura is safe. For now, what matters is securing the future, not digging up the past.

And if protecting Mercura means having to kill Alexei Petrovsky, then I’ll do it.

Whether he’s Lucia’s brother or not.

I speed the car up. I feel restless and reckless.

There’s a storm coming.

I can fucking feel it.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll get to the bottom of whatever the fuck is going on. But tonight, I need to let off some steam. I definitely need to stay away from Lucia until I’ve got this thing under control.

“Hey.” I give Dimitry a sly grin. “Remember that vodka we used to drink, back in Miami?”

“Graf vodka?” He laughs. “God, I haven’t drunk that for years. And it was the best, too. Why don’t they stock it in Spain?”

“I’ve got a bottle stashed in the penthouse.” I shift gears and go even faster. “Whatever else is going on with this Andersson shit, I got Mercura off the ground today. Fancy a celebratory drink?”

“Seriously?” He raises his eyebrows. “I thought you’d be celebrating a bit . . . err . . . differently.”

So did I.

But ruthless prick though I might be, I’m not entirely sure even my poker face can handle making love to Lucia while I’m contemplating putting a bullet through her brother.

“You in or not?”

Dimitry shrugs. “Abby will be working until the early hours. Hell, yes, I’m in.”