Page 1 of The Perfect Kiss
Prologue
Davian
“Davian, you’re kind of crushing me.” The sound of Reyna’s voice barely registered when it finally hit me that I was still on top of her.
“Shit, princess. I’m sorry,” I said as I rolled off of her and pulled her body close to mine. “Better?”
“Much.” She pulled on my arm draped over her waist and brought to her lips, giving my hand a sweet kiss.
If only everything thing around us could be like this moment. Relaxed, content. Pure bliss. Glancing at the digital clock on the nightstand, the time read 5:30 p.m. Emotional exhaustion must have taken over both of us for us to remain unmoving, me on top of Reyna, for three hours.
A light knock came at the door, tearing me from my paradise. “Davian. It’s Patton. I think you might want to come down to the computer room. We found some information on McCall.”
As much as I would have loved to stay like this with Reyna in my arms, I didn’t want to leave Patton waiting. “Give me a few minutes. I’ll be right down.”
I walked over to the bed and sat close to where Reyna was lying. “I’m sorry, princess, but duty calls.”
“I get it, Davian. It will only take me a minute to get dressed.” Reyna uncovered her body, ready to get off the bed. I didn’t know what to tell her, but the information had to do with Crosby, and she deserved to know what Patton had found. “Okay. We will go together.”
It took us only a few minutes to dress before we headed out of the bedroom and went downstairs. Patton piqued my curiosity, and I couldn’t wait to find out what he had found on Crosby McCall.
When we got to the computer room, Patton was sitting at his workstation, focusing on his computer screen. Before I reached him, I asked, “What did you find, my friend?”
He pulled out the chair next to him and patted the seat with his hand, which was his way of telling me to take a seat. Taking him up on his offer, I slid in the chair and tried to read the document he had pulled up on his screen. It looked legal as far as I could tell—a court document, if I had to guess, based on the filed stamp in the right corner.
As I read the document, it blew me away. “I didn’t see this coming,” I mouthed, running my hand through my hair.
I focused so hard on the document that I forgot that Reyna was standing behind me. “Davian, please tell me that Crosby and Rui aren’t related.”
The document we were looking at was a court order filed in Illinois to have Cheslav Salko’s name legally changed to Crosby McCall. It was filed twenty years ago. No wonder we had a hard time finding information on Crosby McCall; he had changed his name. “Patton, did you find any other information to show how Crosby and Salko are related?”
“I knew you would ask, so I searched for Cheslav Salko. You won’t believe the information you can find on the dark web if you know what to look for.” Patton closed out the court document and pulled up another file.
Patton brought up an image of an older man and woman standing next to two men in their twenties, if I had to guess. As I stared at the screen, there was no doubt that the man on the older man’s right was Crosby, and the other man next to the woman was Rui Salko. The photo didn’t prove they were related until Patton moved his mouse to the slide bar enough to come to the next photo. It was a news clipping with a caption below written in Russian. “I take it you were able to translate the caption under the photo.”
“Yes, sir. In a nutshell, the Russian government awarded Cheslav and Rui Salko, the sons of Cesar and Irina Salko, an educational grant to participate in a student exchange program in the United States.”
“Fuck. McCall and Salko are brothers. I didn’t see that one coming.” I was beside myself, trying to wrap my head around this unexpected information. “Now that we know their relationship, we can’t let either one leave that warehouse.”
I twisted my chair to face Reyna. Sometime during the madness, she had pulled a chair from one of the other workstations behind me and taken a seat. The look on her face was one of disbelief. Knowing that the man who had adopted you was related to the man who held you captive would be hard for anyone to believe. It had to be a shock for her since she experienced what a monster Salko was. I rolled my chair toward her. It broke my heart seeing her this way.
When I took her hand in mine, she looked up at me, torment evident in her eyes. “I know learning about Crosby is a lot to take in, but we will get through this. No one loves you more than I do,” I reassured her as I wrapped my arms around her. Everything she had been holding in spilled, and the floodgates opened.
∞
Everything was going as planned. Patton got word from four of his military buddies that they were all in. There was no reason they wouldn’t have been, especially with the nice salary I was providing. Zach, Mitch, Tyler, and Stone, all of which carried impressive credentials, would be an asset toThe Societyteam.
We spent hours going over the plan and the job duties of each man. By the time we finished, every man’s responsibilities were etched in their brains, ensuring no mistakes. Mistakes weren’t a possibility if this plan was to work.
It was showtime, but before I left, I had to reassure Reyna that I would be back to kiss her good night. She clung to me so tight, and it took everything I had not to hold her close and forget about the meeting. I had to let her go, but before I did, I validated with 100% certainty that I would return. “Nothing is going to happen to me. I won’t let it. After all, we have a wedding to plan.”
There was a faint smile on her face when she looked up at me. “Promise?”
“With all my heart.” I meant every word as I lowered my head and kissed her passionately on the lips.
In the state she was, leaving Reyna was one of the hardest things I had to do. I had no right to make the promise I did. Even though we put every safeguard into place, there was still that small chance that something could go wrong.
There were eight men, including myself, piling into two SUVs. Calvin offered to stay behind to make sure the women were safe. We had all the firepower we needed with one less man stowed away in the back of both SUVs. As we drove away from the warehouse, I went over the plan in my head. Marcus, Patton, and Stone would head inside the warehouse with me while the rest of the men remained outside. Zach and Mitch would take their positions on the roof while Tyler and Axe positioned themselves out of sight in front of the building. The only visible entrance to the warehouse was the metal door or the over-sized garage-like door, which required a remote or code to open. The only other access was the secret door on the roof, which also required a code. Another safeguard.
