Page 46 of Deadly Protector
“Then we need to stop talking right now.” This was good news for Dimitri. If Irene Gorcyca didn’t know about this, then Dimitri had just validated that Ryba didn’t have his aunt’s go-ahead for this job. Which meant Ryba was trying to keep this from his aunt. All he’d have to do was threaten Ryba right back. He decided to push Ryba a little. “And if you walk away, I won’t tell Irene you approached me about a job in her territory, without her knowledge.”
Ryba sat back, his expression dark as he looked over at his friends, then at Dimitri. “No.”
Surprise punched through Dimitri. “No?”
“That’s right. You care about the widow too much. You can tell my aunt if you want, but bringing her into this will just get messy. For both of us. All it’ll take is a stray bullet and Zamira is dead. Gone. Her kids left without a mom.”
The little shit was right. Dimitri had to actively resist the urge to lunge across the table and choke Ryba out. Dimitri didn’t have much leverage because he cared too much for Zamira. Would do anything to keep her safe. And he couldn’t try and bluff when it came to her safety. So it looked as if he’d have to do this the hard way—to agree and then involve law enforcement. Or agree, then kill Ryba. Something he would only do if he was forced.
It could get messy but it was better than letting Ryba’s aunt get involved. He didn’t want to be on her radar in any way. “Then I want details. I’m not walking into a situation blind. There’s a reason I’ve stayed out of jail.”
The tension in Ryba’s shoulders loosened slightly as he sat forward, ready to talk. Just as suddenly, he let out a short curse, his gaze straying behind Dimitri.
Using the mirror behind Ryba, Dimitri glanced up and saw a man in a suit walking toward them. Because of the angle, he couldn’t see the guy’s face.
But as he got closer, Dimitri bit back a curse of his own.
Irene Gorcyca’s second-in-command.
Things had just gotten a lot more complicated.
