There has to be a glitch. Or maybe someone tampered with the cameras. Anything to make this make sense. I type in the next date and fast-forward again, my hands trembling.
There she is.
Elena.
Looking side to side before slipping into Andrei’s office.
My breath catches, and my fingers pound out the next date. Then the next. And the next. Every single time, it’s her.
My head spins. Denial claws at my gut, but the evidence is indisputable. She’s the one who has been leaking everything: the locations of my warehouses, shipment details, Andrei’s personal information—mypersonal information—blueprints, schedules, even details about Sophia and my family. No one else entered that office during those times.
My hands tremble, my grip tightening on the computer until my arms ache. How the hell am I going to handle this? She isn’t some random stranger I can interrogate with my usual methods. This is Elena.
“Did you find anything?”
Sophia’s voice startles me. I didn’t even hear her sit down. Before I can stop her, she gasps, her hand flying to her mouth as her eyes lock on the zoomed-in image of Elena on the screen.
“Don’t—” I start, but it’s too late.
My head snaps toward Luca and Andrei, who are already striding over, alerted by Sophia’s reaction.
“Did you find the guy?” Andrei’s voice is sharp, expectant.
My body refuses to move, my throat locked. How the fuck am I supposed to answer that? How do I tell my brother that his wife—the mother of his child—betrayed us? Betrayed him?
Andrei loves Elena in a way I’ve never seen before. This will destroy him.
I squeeze Sophia’s hand, grounding myself. If the roles were reversed—if I saw Sophia’s face on that screen—I don’t know what I would do.
“Is it someone we know?” Andrei presses, trying to grab the computer from me. My grip tightens, refusing to let go.
“Let go, Maxim,” he grunts, tugging harder. “What the fuck? Let go.”
Sophia places her hand over mine. Her voice is soft but steady. “Let him see it.”
I exhale a shaky breath and release my grip.
Andrei takes the computer, his movements sharp and impatient. The silence in the room is suffocating as he stares at the screen. His head jerks back slightly, his brows furrowing in disbelief.
Then, his eyes widen.
He vigorously shakes his head, as though denying what’s right in front of him. “Is this shit real?” he whispers, the question more for himself than anyone else.
His face twists, anger, and pain bleeding into something cold and lethal. With a guttural scream, he hurls the laptop across the room. It crashes against the wall with a violent thud, the sound reverberating through the air.
Sophia flinches beside me, her body trembling as silent sobs shake her frame. She isn’t crying out of fear; she’s crying for Andrei, for the raw, devastating hurt written all over him.
I tighten my hold on her, my own chest aching with the weight of his pain. If I could take it from him, I would do so in a heartbeat. But this is a storm Andrei has to weather alone.
For a long moment, he doesn’t move. Then, suddenly, he turns to me. His eyes are bloodshot, his face a blotchy red.
“She’s mine,” he growls, his voice low and venomous.
And then, he storms out, slamming the doors behind him.
THIRTY-TWO
SOPHIA