Page 46 of The Sins of Saint (The Sins of Saint 3)

Her heels clicked across the deck, her back toward me a clear sign that our conversation was over. I was utterly unprepared for her surprisingly hostile reaction. She was hurt by Saint acting as if she was no longer needed. I understood that, even though I knew he meant well by telling her she could now do all the things she had always wanted to do but couldn’t because she felt obligated to be there for him. His heart was in the right place. Unfortunately, hers was wounded.

I remained on the deck for a while, allowing the New York sun to beam down on me, my pores soaking up some vitamin D. The noise of traffic and the sounds of a bustling city were all around. It didn’t bother me since I grew up with it. But after experiencing the peace and tranquility of life on The Empress, I could understand how Elena could feel annoyed and overwhelmed by it all.

I sighed and craned my neck while closing my eyes against the sharp and bright rays of the sun. Clearly, Elena felt the same as Saint about his father’s role in his mother’s death. She didn’t admit it in so many words, but just by her reaction, it was clear on which side of the argument she stood. But to me, it didn’t make sense. I still couldn’t wrap my head around Saint’s father murdering his wife and making it seem like a suicide. I hardly knew the man, but I looked into his eyes that night when he coaxed Raphael into thinking they were on the same page, the result being that both Elena and I lived to see another day.

Wait.I opened my eyes and straightened.Elena.

Elena was there that night, bleeding out on the bathroom floor. When I told Saint’s father that Elena was there, he seemed surprised—worried, even. And after Saint had shot and killed Raphael, his father stuck around, lingering in the background until…until Elena was safely escorted out by the paramedics.

No. I shook my head. I was overthinking this. Of course, he would be worried about Elena. She was his dead wife’s sister.

“God.” I pulled my fingers through my unruly curls, frustration gnawing at my spine.

“Mrs. Russo.”

I jolted when James’s temporary replacement appeared next to me.

“Jesus, Viktor. You frightened me.”

“I apologize, Mrs. Russo. I was asked to hand deliver this to you.”

He held an envelope out to me, and I frowned at him. “For me?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I took the envelope with my name on the front, no address. “Who—”

But Viktor was gone, the door leading to the house easing closed.

“Weird man,” I muttered to myself as I pulled a piece of paper from the envelope.

My gut twisted into a thousand knots when I realized who signed that R at the bottom of the piece of paper. Russo. Mr. Russo.

What the hell was he doing here in New York, and why would he want to see me? Better yet, how the fuck did he get to Viktor?

‘Know who you friends are. And know everything there is to know about those who aren’t.’

It was useless to try to figure out how these Russo men knew fucking everything. It was like a game of chess between them, always trying to think three moves ahead. But Elena was right. When I couldn’t make sense out of something, it consumed me. It was like spending hours building a puzzle and finding out at the end that one piece was missing. One tiny missing piece that made it impossible to complete the picture, and it would drive you fucking insane. Now it seemed like Saint’s father held that one final piece, and he was giving me the opportunity to find it. But if he was the devil as Saint claimed him to be, he couldn’t be trusted. What if this was a trap? What if he was using my curiosity to lure me out from under Saint’s protection? Everyone knew curiosity killed the cat. No matter what I thought, there was still a war raging between them—it was the reason I ended up here in the first place.

I had to ignore it.

I had no other choice.

Saint was my husband and believed his father was a threat, and so should I.

I tore the piece of paper into tiny pieces that fell on the white tablecloth, my mind reeling with questions and the prospects of finding answers. But it was too risky. There was no answer worth risking the sliver of happiness Saint and I finally managed to find beneath all the chaos.

I picked up every single piece of torn paper and walked to the edge of the deck, staring down at the streets below. This was all part of the chess game between Saint and his father, and now that I was no longer Saint’s pawn, trusting his father might have me end up being a pawn for the opposition.

The New York breeze picked up, and I opened my hand, allowing the pieces of paper to blow from my palm, the wind carrying it past the windows of nearby buildings. It was like watching the puzzle pieces I needed blow away.

Two hours.

The Greenwich Hotel.

A chance to find out if my gut instinct about Mr. Russo was far off…or spot on.

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