Page 43 of Disguised as Love

Fuck. Petya Leskov had dirt on Volkov. It must have been what had kept them at bay all these years. Leverage Leskov promised to use if they invaded his territory or went after his family. Maybe it was the reason Malik hadn’t been killed after the deal he’d tried to make with the Kyodaina in Connecticut without Volkov’s approval.

But it didn’t feel right that Volkov was trusting me with this tidbit. I was simply some low-level scum who’d basically kept secrets from Gennady. There was no reason for him to confide in me.

“I can see your wheels turning,” Volkov said at my silence. “Like the chess game last night, you’re looking for all your future moves. You think maybe the card has something you can use to call checkmate. But I already have you cornered because I’ve got your queen.” His eyes drifted down the hall in the direction Raisa had gone. “You are at a crossroads, Antonne. Down one path is a lifetime of fortune and power, but down the other is a hell you have never imagined even in your worst nightmares. It’s a simple task. Find it, bring it to me, and everyone gets what they want.”

He walked away, and I slowly let out the breath I hadn’t known I was holding. I’d thought my being here, pretending I was her boyfriend, would add a layer of protection to Raisa, and it had in some ways. I doubted Damien would have left her alone last night if he hadn’t thought I was lying next to her, but I’d also put her at greater risk because now they thought they could use her to make me do what they wanted. I kept saying it, because it was true?I was screwed. We were both screwed. I had to find a way out and soon.

But this also made it much clearer why they’d made themselves at home at the palace. They were searching it for the hidden card. A damn needle in a sea of artifacts that made up the mansion.

I made my way out the front with my mind whirling to find Raisa still fuming as she waited for me behind the wheel of a two-seater sports car. A car that would likely be dangerous on the winter roads in St. Petersburg but was perfect for the long days of summer. I slid into the passenger seat, and the tires squealed on the stone road as she tore off down the drive.

“You?” she started, but I stopped her with a shake of my head and a wave of my phone. I used the same app as I had the night before, running it along the dash and the side of the car. When it beeped, I grimaced and shoved the phone in her direction so she could read the “Device found” message.

She glared but turned her eyes back to the road.

I wasn’t sure who’d planted the bug. It could have belonged to the FSB, Volkov, Malik, or any number of U.S. and European agencies that had been watching the Leskovs over the years. It didn’t matter who left it. It only meant we couldn’t talk. I couldn’t ask about the item her father had given her. I wasn’t even sure I should. If she knew about it, would it put her at even greater risk?

Our silence was as telling as our talking to whoever was listening, so I moved to a safe topic. “Who’s Alexia?”

She risked a glance at me and then turned her eyes back to the road.

“You’re hurt,” she said, all anger removed from her voice, concern filtering in.

“It’s merely a scratch. Who’s Alexia?” I repeated, drawing her away from the tiny flesh wound because we couldn’t talk about it here. It was inconsequential at any rate.

She navigated through a stream of cars while hardly taking her foot off the gas. I was surprised at how good of a driver she was when she’d probably had little opportunity to get behind the wheel, being shuffled around by chauffeurs and bodyguards.

With another quick glance at my eye, she relented and said, “She owns a boutique in the Passage. You said you needed a suit.”

I lifted an eyebrow in her direction. I wasn’t going to spend my yearly salary on a suit, even though I could. My FBI paycheck was not the reason I did this job. I didn’t have to work if I didn’t want to. My famous mother and grandmother had seen to that. Although our wealth would seem like nothing compared to the sea of dollars the Leskovs lived with, in some ways, Raisa and I had grown up similarly.

Except, I’d killed a man at thirteen.

“Don’t raise your eyebrow and get your back up,” she said quietly. Her Russian accent had increased since we’d been back in her homeland. As if just hearing the language was drawing it out in her. “Alexia’s shop may be couture, but she’ll have something appropriate, unique, and affordable. She knows how to make great deals because she had to when capitalism took over in the nineties.”

I wasn’t going to debate with her contradictory terms of couture and deals. Instead, I held my breath as she cut off two cars to change lanes with a skill that continued to shock me. When we got to St. Petersburg, she navigated the traffic on Nevsky Prospekt with ease and pulled up to a valet stand in front of an unassuming building.

The Passage looked old but hardly glamorous on the exterior. That changed once you walked through the doors, where unassuming became luxury. The pitched glass ceiling of the mall let in the brilliant summer sun, casting the antique shops in a hazy glimmer that bounced off the lead-glass windows and the gold-trimmed doors. Every bench, every plant, every carefully placed item of décor screamed wealth and privilege.

We’d barely made it inside before Raisa turned into me, colliding in a way that made me wrap an arm around her waist to hold her steady. My body lit up, flames scorching through me even when her skin was buried under layers of clothes. Her hand went to my chest, leaving a brand, and she looked up at me with eyes that were wide and intelligent if slightly bewildered.

“Someone was following us. In the car,” she said quietly.

I shouldn’t have been floored that she’d noticed, and yet I was. “Yes, not just one person. Several.”

I’d noticed the tails easily enough, especially once we’d reached the streets of St. Petersburg. They’d been traveling at different distances but had kept close enough to make all the turns we had.

The doors of the mall swung open to admit a Japanese woman with short, spiky, bleached hair that bled into the paleness of her skin. She was of medium height and walked with a confident, cat-like grace, hinting at the wall of lean muscles hiding below her black-on-black-on-black outfit. She didn’t glance in our direction. Instead, she headed down several stores to a bench where she took a seat and sipped on a coffee while scrolling through her phone.

She’d been one of our tails. She’d wanted me to know she was there, because there was no way I would have seen Kaida Ito otherwise. She was too good at what she did. She was a ghost. A shadow. A breath of air you thought shifted around you. Deadly. Trained in so many different kinds of combat and martial arts she’d hardly have to flick a finger to kill someone if she got close enough.

I didn’t let my eyes linger on her. I brought them back to Raisa’s face and the wide eyes that looked like my favorite whiskey in this light. Honeyed and smooth. The sunlight reflecting off the glass made her hair a halo of gold.

“I’m surprised you saw them,” I told her.

She scoffed. “I’ve been taught to watch for them since I was a little girl.”

For some unknown reason, this irritated me. The fact that the easy comfort and safety of her childhood had been torn from her at such an early age. I’d at least made it to my teen years before my eyes had been peeled open.

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