Page 155 of Nothing More

He hadn’t bothered with a bag this time. Hadn’t showered downstairs; his hair was dry. It couldn’t have been more obvious that he hadn’t come from the gym, but her gaze stayed fixed on his face, and very deliberately didn’t track down to his snow-damp boots. She was accepting his lie, for whatever reason, and it didn’t even feel like a trap; was a tragedy instead.

“Yeah,” he said, voice tight and croaky. His lungs had gone mutinous again.

“I heard you talking. Everything alright?” Knitting of her brows, downward curve of her mouth, eyes big and brimming with concern.

He wanted to cross the hall at a run and kiss her.I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please don’t hate me, I’m doing it for all of us, I swear, I don’t want to get anyone hurt, but I just…I can’t…please…

“Just checking in with Maverick.” The lie sat metallic on his tongue; made him want to spit.

“Oh, good! He’ll have told you, then.”

Oh shit. “Yeah.”

“We’re already packed. I don’t imagine it’ll take you long, and then we can head out. Say, half an hour?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Brilliant.” She gave a nose-scrunch, a girlish narrowing of her eyes, turned and walked back into the apartment proper.

He was so fucked.

~*~

Earlier that day, back at the precinct, once Raven and Melissa had come to an understanding on what to say to the police captain, Raven had turned to Rob and then Shep in the conference room. “Boys, will you give us a moment?”

Both of them had looked at one another, frowning.

“I’m supposed to–” Shep had started.

Rob said, “We should really–”

“A moment,” Raven insisted, in a voice that had sent many an employee scrambling over the years.

When they were alone, Raven passed Melissa her phone, pulled up to the photo Tenny had sent her. Melissa had frowned at it a moment, and then her brows had jumped.

“Is this Toly?”

“Yes. And I can’t be for sure, but I’m willing to bet the man across from him is Mikhail Morozov. The head of the Kozlov bratva in America.”

Melissa had looked properly shocked. “Why?”

“I don’t know.” And the not knowing hurt; hurt badly. “He’s…well, I really don’t know.” She refused to believe he was turning traitor; somehow, he thought he was doing what was best, what would keep them all safe, and probably he still trusted his old mentor, even if, logically, he knew he shouldn’t. Gangster or not, he was still young. Hadn’t had his heart broken so many times that he was immune to old friendships and loyalties.

Melissa’s expression had firmed, resolute. “I don’t know Toly all that well, and I don’t know that guy at all – but if he’s the bratva Pakhan, then he’s leading Toly around by the nose, and Toly can’t see it because he’s nostalgic for old time’s sake or whatever.”

That was what Raven was afraid of. “Or he thinks he can handle playing both sides – maybe even thinks he’s pulling one over on his old friend.”

“Or…” Melissa let the rest of the sentence hang.

Neither of them wanted to say it:Or he’s betraying the club, on purpose, knowingly, and siding with his old associates.

Raven shook her head, slowly. “I can’t see that. Ican’t.”

“Me neither.”

Perhaps the truth was that Raven didn’t want to see it. But for now, she refused to think of him as deliberately harming the club. Orher. It was unthinkable.

“Whatever he’s thinking,” Melissa said, “I promise he doesn’t have things under control, not all by himself like this.”