Page 70 of Ruthless Daddies

My eyes follow her until she disappears around the corner, and then I glance at Alice. She’s still standing tall, but there’s a flicker of hesitation in her eyes now.

“What was all that about?” I ask, crossing my arms and leaning against the wall.

Alice shakes her head, her gaze flicking away from mine. “I think she’s hiding something.”

“What?” I say.

“I’m not sure…well, never mind.”

“Never mind? Alice, if you heard something, you need to tell us,” I say.

She meets my gaze briefly before looking away again. “I don’t want to jump to conclusions but I would want to see who she was talking to just now. She seemed very jumpy when she saw me.”

Her words don’t sit right with me.

Svetlana thinks with her tits more than her brain, and she’s always been more of a nuisance than a real problem. She can’t possibly be a threat.

“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Nikolai’s voice pulls me from my thoughts, his tone light but curious.

I glance at him, shaking my head. “Nothing,” I lie.

He doesn’t press, which is rare for him, but I’m grateful. My mind is too tangled to make sense of everything, and the last thing I need is Nikolai digging into it right now.

As soon as he and Alice walk away, I pull out my phone and scroll through my contacts, my thumb hovering over one name in particular—Karpov, my private investigator. I’ve kept him on retainer for years, and he’s proven reliable more times than I can count. If anyone can dig into Svetlana’s sudden shift—or anything else brewing beneath the surface—it’s him.

The phone rings twice before he answers. “Karpov,” he says, his voice clipped.

“It’s Dmitri,” I say, keeping my tone low. “I need you to keep tabs on Svetlana.”

There’s a pause on the other end. “Already on it,” he says, his voice careful.

That catches my attention. “You have something?”

Karpov hesitates, and that hesitation tells me everything I need to know.

“If you had news,” I snap, “why didn’t you call me before?”

There’s a beat of silence, and then he clears his throat. “Because…because it’s delicate.”

Delicate? Fear. That’s what it is. He’s afraid.

I lean back against the wall, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Spit it out,” I say, my patience running thin. “What did you want to say?”

Another pause, and then: “It’s about Elena.”

My chest tightens. “What about her?”

“She was seeing someone,” Karpov says finally. “During her marriage.”

The words hit me like a fist to the gut. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“It’s not just a rumor,” Karpov continues. “I’ve been piecing things together, looking into her movements before her death.There are records—hotel stays, private meetings. It wasn’t just a fling, Dmitri. It went on for a while.”

I can feel the blood rushing to my head, my hands clenching into fists. “And you didn’t think to tell me this sooner?”

“It’s not just that,” Karpov says quickly, as if sensing my rising anger. “There’s more.”

“More?” I snap. “You’d better start talking, Karpov, or I’ll make sure you regret wasting my time.”

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