Page 18 of Disguised as Love

“Is Malik in there?” I asked.

She hesitated.

“Let Ilia and me clear the room at least.”

She nodded, opened the door, and walked through. A canopied bed draped with heavily brocaded curtains sat on a raised platform above the marble floors coated with thick Persian rugs. The walls were layered with tapestries and art, just like the entry and the hallway. Their golden frames gave way to a sea of windows with drapes drawn closed against the twilight outside, darkening the space. The fire flickered from an ornately decorated fireplace so large I could almost walk into it without bending, giving off the only light in the room.

Raisa made her way through the gloom to a lump buried under the velvet and satin bedcoverings. Ilia and I took in the corners, opened doors that led to a bathroom the size of my entire condo’s living space in New York City, and a closet that was double that.

“Mamochka, I’m here,” Raisa said as she sat on the bed, running a hand through a thick tangle of blonde hair that matched her own.

“Raechka?” The voice was choked and strangled. Dazed, as if coming from a dream.

“Yes, Mama. It’s me.”

“He’s gone…Raechka…gone. What am I to do?”

Pain tore from every syllable. I remembered that pain. Remembered hearing it in my mother’s voice. Remembered the sense of helplessness I’d felt, and suddenly, the room seemed stifling. Suffocating. I headed for the door, and Ilia followed me as if he, too, could not bear the sound of the grief.

I shut the doors quietly behind us as my heart pounded and my throat closed.

I hadn’t slept in almost two days, I was being assaulted with memories and feelings from a time in my life I hated with every fiber of my being, and I was tempted by a woman who’d stepped in front of a gun for me. If I stayed in the oppressing air that hung over the Leskov mansion, I was going to lose it. I needed to escape and feel the cold wind on my body. I needed to clear my damn head and call my team.

“Don’t leave until she does,” I growled at Ilia, and his eyes narrowed.

“You are not my boss. I stay because she needs protection, not because of you.”

I didn’t care why he stayed. I just needed him to do so. I was damn sure I couldn’t trust him for long, but if I didn’t leave and regain my sanity, I wasn’t going to be any good to anyone. I was going to end up flying home in a body bag, or worse, end up at the bottom of some dark river, never to be found.

I returned to the top of the grand staircase and was grateful to run into Liola because she showed me to a room that was almost as grand as Manya’s, even if it was half its size. I didn’t bother unpacking. I just unzipped my duffel, pulled out my sweats and sneakers, changed, stuffed my various phones into the hoodie’s enormous pocket, and headed out the front door.

I ran at a pace that was perilous in the half-light, traveling first down the long drive until I reached the gate and then running along the property’s fence line. It was cold, but not freezing. The sky looked as if the sun had barely set or was about to rise, even though it was one in the morning, and it allowed me to take in the lay of the land. The estate had perfectly sculpted gardens, an enormous pond stretching at least an acre, and a line of trees that blended into the natural wilderness beyond its borders. When I turned the corner that would bring me to the backside of the mansion, it was to find a gently sloping hill leading down to the icy water of the Gulf of Finland.

I stood at the shore, gasping for breath after pushing myself across the uneven terrain, and watched as a freighter slowly trolled toward the unseen ports of St. Petersburg in the strange twilight. My body was exhausted, not only from the lack of sleep and the tense moments of the last twenty-four hours but from the years of pounding it had taken. After the karate and hand-to-hand combat my father had trained me in, the wrestling I’d found as a teen, and the years of conditioning I’d experienced as an agent, my bones and muscles sometimes felt as if they were those of a sixty-year-old man instead of someone in his mid-thirties. How long could I continue this? How long did I want to when music had always beckoned to me more than athleticism?

In the last few months, I’d felt the child inside calling me to return to the things I’d once loved. The lyrics and keys. The rhythms that beat their way through my soul.

I rubbed my hands over my face. I had to fucking focus.

I’d purposefully stopped in this open space at the shoreline because there was no chance of me being overheard here. I pulled out my mafiya-issued phone, realizing I’d missed a text from Gennady.

G: Bring her to me.

My stomach twisted into knots. What the hell did Gennady want with Raisa? What did he want so urgently that he hadn’t wanted her to go home to her grieving mother, but straight to him? Who was he afraid of that he’d come scuttling back to Russia in order to present her to them? My gut said it was Rurik Volkov, the unspoken ruler of the Russian bratva. But this felt like more than just a play for the millions her technology represented. This felt…desperate.

I didn’t have the time, budget, resources, or information to tackle Volkov. My charter had been clear all along. Stop the guns coming into the U.S. and going to the South American drug cartels by shutting down Leskov. In the process, hopefully, send Isamu Yano scuttling into the open from his hiding place at the Leskov’s and arrest him for murdering Tsuyoshi Mori on U.S. soil.

Not only was Volkov not part of my assignment, but he was also damn near untouchable. He had politicians, law enforcement, and businessmen in his pocket who could and would do anything to shield him. What we’d done to bring down the Kyodaina looked like child’s play compared to what it would take to knock Volkov from his underworld throne. And if I was honest, we wouldn’t have done more than nibble at the corners of the Kyodaina if it hadn’t been for Tsuyoshi Mori turning on his own people.

Sometime in the last three years, I’d become jaded. I’d lost faith in our ability to make real change?to stop the criminals. They grew up from the ground faster than we brought them down, and they’d remade themselves into highly intelligent economists, doctors, lawyers, and professors instead of brute enforcers. Years of fighting against crime syndicates who only burrowed deeper into society, blended more into legitimate businesses, and hid their cruelty and assassinations more cleverly was wearing on me.

Instead of responding to Gennady, I threw the phone on the rocks near the shore, stomping on it for good measure until there were only pieces left that the sea took out with it. I pulled my FBI phone out, dialing instead of texting. Nolan’s tired voice greeted me on the other end.

“What do you got for me?” I asked.

“Ilia Popov’s jacket is thin. Worked for the Chechens for a while. Was left for dead after a car bomb went off outside Moscow, and it seems Leskov brought him back to life. That dragon tattoo of his covers more than one scar from the bombing. He was personal detail for Petya until he sent him to his daughter a year ago. We believe we’ve traced him to a tidy little account in Switzerland that Leskov arranged. It has enough money in it to pretty much ensure he can’t be bought by someone else, but you know these types. Money is their only god, and they never have enough.”

Nolan spoke the truth. We’d never encountered a member of the mafiya who wouldn’t trade their own mother and their soul for more cash. There was an old saying: the house is burning, and the clock is ticking. It basically meant to stay on top, you had to keep making money every minute, and it had been my experience with the mob no matter their nationality.

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