Page 136 of The Payback

“Shh,” I say, putting a finger to my lips. Tonight we sleep, holding onto one another and reassuring ourselves that we’ve made it out.

Me, Nik, and Dimitri—or should I say, Devon, as Interpol renamed him in exchange for his cooperation. Though, fuck knows, I will never call him Devon. He is and will always be my Dimitri.

Bella lets out a little snore, and Nik sighs next to me. “Great. Two of them.”

I cover my mouth with my hand, stifling the laughter within me.

CHAPTERFORTY-NINE

Eleanor

“I can’t believeyou’re kicking us off your private island! It’s not like you’re expecting anyone else!” I shout over the wind as the yacht motors away from the island.

“Shut up and say thank you!” she yells back.

“Thank you for watching Bella!” I call.

“Not for that! For that!” she points at an island in the distance, and I roll my eyes. I wouldn’t put it past Olivia to drop us on a random island and putter away on Max’s fancy-ass yacht, cackling all the way home as she marooned us.

“What is that?” I ask warily, preparing myself for anything because this is Olivia, and her version of normal is not everyone else’s.

“Your new home.” She grins widely, her face stretching and her excitement palpable.

“What?”

She shakes her head and looks forward, shielding her eyes from the morning sun.

Dimitri and Nik are below deck with Bella and the other guys. They complained I hogged my girl all morning, but it’s not like I could resist. She’s my child, and I missed the hell out of her. Apparently, we needed the full contingency for our little outing today.

We reach a wooden dock that looks brand new. There’s a dark roof poking out from the trees, along with a pathway leading through the sand and towards the foliage masking the house.

“Olivia?” I ask. “What did you do?”

Casually, she replies, “I bought you an island. Now we can be next-door neighbours. The house was finished about three months ago, and we’ve been slowly bringing over furniture and clearing out your apartment in Lyon, so all of your shit is here. It took forever, but we can blame the government regime change in the country for that. They put an embargo on certain imported products, and it took a while to get the fridge stocked with your favourites.”

Olivia keeps talking about the house at the island’s centre, but my brain has stalled completely.

“YOU WHAT!?” I shriek. “My house? My job? What am I going to do when I go back to work?”

“You’re not,” she replies like it’s obvious.

My eyes bug out so hard they almost fall out of my head.

“Oh, come on. You can’t tell me you’re looking forward to riding a desk for the next six months with a partner you don’t know when you can come to work for me instead.”

“I’m not a thief! No offence, I think it’s cool what you do, but I can’t do that. I have a child to look after!”

My voice is shrill and shrieky, but I can’t help it. It’s not like there’s anyone on this little spit of land to bother with my volume.

“I don’t need you to steal shit. I need you to manage us. You love organisation and keeping things in order. So, organise the incoming requests and background check the people who hire us and-or the jobs they hire us for. Keep us in line so we can focus on the job and not all the background shit that takes ages because we procrastinate. Keepusin order.”

“I- I...” There are no words. Idolove the research part of the job.

“Pay is evenly split between whoever works the job. Even percentages across the board, I have health and dental in your onboarding plan for you and Bella. The guys can work with us or not. Dimitri has enough money to live a thousand lives and never run out.”

“His assets were forfeited in the deal,” I counter.

“Nice try,” she says. “Not the offshore accounts he put in your name right after you got married. There’s plenty to live off of. The question is, do you want to do that here with us?”

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