Page 118 of Rebellion

That wasn’t what he’d been expecting the other man to ask him.

“She told you, huh?” Oleg said, his head lolling to one side. It was so battered and bruised that he could barely see out of his eyes. “Didn’t think she had balls to.”

“I bet that pisses you off,” Anisimov said. “You were probably hoping to drop that on me, huh? I know it all. That you blackmailed her into dating you. That you faked a video of me and told her that it would go to the cops if anything happened to you. But you didn’t think that would be enough to keep her under your control, did you?”

“Figured she might take her . . . chances with the cops. Since you have so . . . many in your pocket.”

“Hmm, so you threatened to reveal that she’d been duped by this guy called Mike while in college, with whom she had a relationship, but who had actually been sent to spy on her and then nearly killed her.”

What the fuck?

Anisimov eyed Colm. “I wondered if she had told you. I’m beginning to learn that Sofia keeps too many secrets and takes on too much.”

“She does it to protect everyone around her,” Colm told him.

The other man nodded with a slight frown. “She had a boyfriend in college I knew nothing about. He bribed her guard not to tell me. It turns out he was sent to get whatever information she had about my business. When he discovered that she knew nothing, he crashed the car they were in but made it look like her guard was driving. Even put his body in the driver’s seat. When she woke up, he told her to keep quiet or, next time, he’d return to finish the job and wouldn’t spare her. That he was certain that I wouldn’t like that she’d betrayed me by getting into bed with the enemy.”

“But she didn’t know,” Colm said. It wasn’t a question. He was confident that she couldn’t have known. Sofia would never betray her cousin.

“No, she didn’t know. But she should have told me.”

“She’s afraid to lose your love,” Colm said. “To disappoint you. Sofia keeps her emotions and thoughts guarded out of fear of rejection.”

Anisimov grimaced. “I am coming to see that I have made mistakes with Sofia. Those are things I will rectify.”

“The . . . two of you . . . make me vomit,” Oleg managed to get out between pained puffs of air. “You gonna . . . hug . . . kiss.”

“You need to shut up,” Colm snarled, walking up to grasp hold of his face and squeezing.

“I need him alive for some questions,” Anisimov said mildly.

Colm stepped back.

“Oleg, Oleg, we can do this the hard way or the easy way,” Anisimov told him. “Either way, you die, of course. But you can die without any more pain.”

Colm growled, but Anisimov didn’t turn to look at him.

“Just answer my questions and it will be a quick death. I promise.”

“Your promises mean . . . nothing. You are terrible Pakhan. Others . . . would be far better.”

“Others? Like who?” Anisimov asked. “Who are you working with, Oleg? Someone had to have told you what happened to Danill. You weren’t around then. Someone let you onto the estate to kidnap my cousin. Who was it?”

Oleg grinned. “You want to know... I not tell you.”

Anisimov stepped back and Colm moved in. By the time he finished, Oleg was barely conscious.

“Who is Mike or Rafe Ramirez—or whatever the fuck his name is? And how did you find out about what he did to Sofia? Why were you blackmailing her? Who are you working with?” Anisimov demanded.

“It too . . . late now. They have her.”

What the fuck? Who had her?

“Who has her?” Anisimov asked in a low voice.

Viktor stepped forward and set a case down on the small table in the room. He then pulled out a drill and turned it on. The noise seemed to shake Oleg.

“Who has her?” Colm snapped. He pulled out his phone to call Sofia and saw the missed message from her. He opened it.

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