Page 95 of Blind Devotion
Bauer sucked in a shaky breath. “Is this why Gaspard Barrot is dead? He refused to step back on what you believe is yours?”
“It is mine.”
I didn’t see the advantage in correcting him about Barrot. I quite enjoyed the fear quivering through each of his limbs. Barrot did mess with what was mine, but it had little to do with FinTech. From the pictures Thibault showed me, Barrot suffered greatly before his death weeks ago.
“It always amazes me how similar all you pompous self-righteous idiots are,” I said. “You never understand how the game works.”
“How’s that?” he asked hesitantly.
“You don’t fuck with me.” I rose from my seat and pocketed my knife. “Now, you want to sell your business. I want to buy your business.” My gloves squeaked as I flexed my fists. “But by all means, challenge me some more. I’m in the mood to spill some blood.”
By the time we made it back to the hotel, I was no less agitated. This was supposed to have served as a tension release, but Bauer gave in easily, too easily. Not a gram of fight in his weak frame. It was tedious. I should have stayed home and thrown javelins and shot balls until my arms shook instead of traveling to Germany. When Erel informed me this morning, after my argument withPersetta, that Bauer signed a letter of intent to sell FinTech to another third party for the second time in a month, I jumped at the chance to settle this once and for all.
I stared aimlessly at the lined-up bottles in gaudy lit-up displays behind the hotel bar, nursing a gin on the rocks. This day just needed to end.
A woman sat down on the stool beside me. I raised an eyebrow at her. Every other barstool stood empty.
“Do you always drink alone?” Her sultry timbre in English, accentuated by her German accent, did nothing for me. She leaned toward me, the off-the-shoulder straps of her fitted dress allowing a generous view of her cleavage. “Or is this your way of asking for company?”
“Not interested.”
“Oh, come on, handsome.” Her hand grazed my neck, trailing down my spine. “Buy me a drink.”
The shock and pain from her touch hit me full force. I twisted around and grabbed her wrist.
She hissed.
“Touch someone unwilling again, and I’ll cut it off.”
The fear in her dull brown eyes was immediate. She snatched her hand back and scuttled away, her body trembling. No fire, no push back. She was nothing likema tigresse. No one was. Tessa was that one-of-a-kind woman men spent their whole lives searching for. I couldn’t let her slip through my fingers.
I sighed and gazed up at the pointless over-embellished crown molding and coffered ceilings.
Telling Tessa the truth about what happened between us was unavoidable. She wasn’t going to drop it. If I continued to keep it from her, the wedge between us was going to grow and grow until it swallowed us whole. The problem was that I had yet to find an immediate solution to keep her chained to me when she found out. I hated not having a solution. Long-term, I hoped tohave her tied more strongly to me before revealing anything. A wedding ring on her finger. A baby in her belly. Come to think of it, we needed to discuss her IUD.
I swallowed down the last of the gin, sucking air between my teeth from the burn. There was no world where I didn’t stay with her. If she left France, if she tried to leave me, I’d follow. Nothing came before her, not anymore. Not the Milieu, not the duty to family, not my pride.
I dropped money on the bar and left, cranking my neck from side to side, still reeling from that woman’s touch. Stepping out of the elevator to my floor, I pulled my phone out and turned it on—we never left them on during missions—with the intention of calling Persetta, only to realize she had no phone. She had never needed one. Either I was with her or she was with her bodyguards, whose numbers I had. I dialed Erel instead.
“About time.”
“It’s handled.”
“Tell me that means something different than it did with Persetta.”
“Funny guy.”
He chuckled. “At least this is finally settled and put to bed.”
“We’ll need to come back by Thursday to notarize the contract, but after that, the Milieu will have officially expanded into tech. Any problems at any of the docks?”
“None. Quiet day, even for the gangs. But catch this, Franc and his team identified several prominent Bratva members landing in Nice earlier this morning before boarding another flight.”
I froze in front of my door, keycard halfway out.
“Which Bratva?”
“Leontyev’s.”
