Trace adds quietly, “And that makes him untouchable.”
“No, he isn’t,” I scoff. “Watch me. Now I want to crush Orlov more. The Bratva are vicious, but I’ve met Yuri Volkov. I don’t think he’ll approve of his bastard son Kosta drugging and beating a wife, one with documented mental problems.”
“I agree with you. But you can’t break into Black’s mansion to take her from them. It’s too fortified, it’s a labyrinth,” Trace says, turning the laptop toward me and running the pointer across the blueprint on the screen. “I don’t even trust these plans. They don’t include that basement prison you mentioned. If you breach the house, there are too many places that can trap you. You’ll never make it out of there.”
“Fuck.” I put my head in my hands.
Trace’s phone rings, and he nods before answering it. “But I sent the trackers there to spy. Find an angle I’m not seeing. Alo?”
Blade’s face appears on Trace’s phone with Jett at his side. A bit of a surprise since Jett moved to Shane’s guard detail a few weeks ago. Eventheyget to spend Christmas together.
“Is Rhys back?” Blade asks.
“I’m here, Blade. What do you have for me?”
“We’re in Ashbourne now,” Blade says, flicking snow from his jacket. “One of their idiot guards got drunk and chatty in a pub. Said Black’s team is moving Fallon and Kosta in a motorcade tomorrow morning. They’re taking her to City Hall in Manhattan.”
“City Hall?” My stomach drops at the expediency of Black’s plan. “To get married?”
“Why else do people go to City Hall?” Blade says grimly.
“Then we wait for them there.” I push off the stool. “Blow Kosta’s head off when he steps out of the car!”
“We can’t storm City Hall,” Trace grumbles. “Too many cops who will shoot first and check IDs second.”
Everything is quiet for a minute, then a clang from the stove turns both Trace and me around.
“Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Just run the bloody motorcade off the road!” Mum barks, icing her homemade cinnamon buns.
Trace scrubs a hand down the back of his neck. “That’s not a bad idea.”
“No.” I shake my head, hating that plan more. “Fallon can still get hurt. They can throw her out of the car.”
“They won’t do that,” Trace assures me. “Kosta needs her to get close to his father. Black’s been holding out to align with the Bratva. He is giving his daughter to them in exchange for their exclusive contract.That’swhy Black hasn’t bent the knee to anyone.”
“Trace, she’s the only thing in this world that—” My throat locks. I can’t breathe around the thought of her body shattered on the side of a highway, tossed like a bag of trash. “I can’t lose her.”
“With them on the road, it will level the playing field,” Trace says.
Shea-Lynne stares at us, her calm expression impressive and terrifying. “Level playing field, my ass. I’m calling Kieran right now.” She takes out her phone to call her brother, the head of the Irish Mob in Astoria. “My brothers will help box them in.”
Trace nods. “I’ll talk to Griffin, too. There’s no way he won’t summon the entire empire.”
“If we’re stealing a bride from KostaVolkov, we are starting a war with the Bratva,” I mutter.
“The plan must be complete annihilation.” Trace moves his fingers across the laptop, summoning other resources. “They won’t even know it’s us.”
“Now let’s eat.” Mum carries a frittata skillet of scrambled eggs past me. “We need our strength for tomorrow’s take down.”
It’s the kind of thing she said before rugby matches when we were kids.
But when I glance past Mum, I notice my father sitting in the living room armchair, silent and looking worried.
“Dad?” I call out to him. “What do you think?”
Everyone stops moving and waits for him to respond.
Dad’s gaze drifts to Trace, then me. “I was relieved when you lads went to work for the ministry, not this bleedin’ mob business.”
