Page 48 of Sinful Betrayal

“With a certain ballerina?”

“What can I do for you, Mikhail?”

“I thought you’d want to know that Rosa finally got back to me about Lev.”

I sit up straighter. “What did she find?”

Rosa is Mikhail’s personal private investigator, and for good reason. She’s an absolute shark, and the fact that she’s taken months to track down the long-lost Koslov sibling means that Lev sure as hell didn’t want to be found.

“According to Rosa, Lev left Russia for the US five years ago.”

“Why don’t you sound happy? Surely, it’s a good thing that he’s at least in the same country as you?”

“Well, that’s the thing, she couldn’t find any evidence onwherein the US he actually is.”

“Seriously?”

“There’s no paper trail on him at all.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, fuck,” Mikhail grunts. “It’s a complete nightmare. Rosa literally couldn’t find anything else on the guy.”

I lean back in my chair as I rub my jaw as I try to think of what to do next.

The lack of paper trail won’t be a coincidence, but it makes our next move very tricky, considering it gives us nothing to go on.

“That means, either Lev is living completely off the gridorhe’s using an alias.”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

“Either way, he’s likely wanting to avoid Igor. From what Maxim said, the guy treated Lev like shit, so he probably doesn’t want to risk being found.”

Mikhail is quiet for a moment.

“Or… Igor is the one controlling him.”

“What do you mean?”

“We don’t know that Lev left Russia in order to escape Igor. If anything, Igor could have brought him over here to use as bait against us but is keeping him hidden until it’s the right time to use him.”

I curse under my breath.

“Maybe it’s time we paid one of Igor’s haunts a visit. He’s bound to have a weak link working for him and with any luck, with enough booze, they might be willing to share some privileged information.”

Mikhail hums. “It’s worth a shot. It’s not like we’ve got much else to go on.”

I end the call with Mikhail after deciding on a time and place.

I lean back in my chair and stare at my recent call log, my thumb hovering above Rosa’s name. Before I can talk myself out of it, I dial her number and put the call on speaker.

“What?” she barks.

“Rosa? It’s Anton Koslov.”

“I know who it is, dumbass, I’ve got caller ID.”

“I was wondering if you could look into someone for me?”

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