Every time I glanced at her, she was looking out the window, and that gave me the chance to really take her in.
But then her eyes met mine. It was too late to look away. So I didn’t. And she didn’t, either.
“Is this the part where you kill me?” she inquired, her eyes like daggers even though her voice was calm.
I smirked.
“Not yet,” I answered.
If I had expected my words to scare or frighten her, I would have been surprised again. She just gazed at me steadily like she was silently asking me to go on.
“I don’t need to explain to you that the Lobanov Bratva is behind our charity organizations and legitimate businesses,” I started. “Arkady, your father, has been siphoning money from these foundations. At first, they were just irregularities that didn’t necessarily point to funny business. But we discovered it was none other than Arkady. He recently siphoned a large amount, so you see, I decided to have a sit-down with him to discuss repayment terms.”
“And you hear he’s out of town,” she chipped in. Her expression wasn’t that of someone who had just realized what a mess they were in, but that of someone who was coming to understand something.
“Yes,” I affirmed. “So you, his daughter, are collateral.”
“I’m not my father’s accountant,” she answered, rolling her eyes. “This isn’t going to go the way you’re thinking, I can assure you. You’ll regret this stupidity.”
The certainty in her threat made me laugh.
“What do you mean by ‘regret it?’ You think your father will come save you?” I questioned. “I think not. You seem to have too much faith in the old man.”
I didn’t expect her to burst into sad tears—she had proven not to be that kind of girl, all right. But her reaction wasn’t what I would have anticipated, either. She laughed back.
“I don’t need my father to save me,” she declared. “You’ll know the mistake you’ve made the second this plane lands.”
As she looked out the window, I went back to the work I was doing on my laptop.
**********
“Fuck!” I muttered as I got out of the jet ahead of Liza.
I stared at the headline again as my phone continued to load many more articles.
Roman Lobanov kidnaps Russia’s Princess of Philanthropy.
“Boss,” Stepan called as he came to my side. The urgency in his voice told me he just saw what I was seeing.
I was about to answer him when my phone vibrated with a call.
Viktor.
“Where the fuck are you?” he questioned, his voice low with the clear indication of anger.
“Manhattan. I just landed.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing? And tell me why you didn’t consult anyone before going to kidnap the Markova girl. The news is all over; even the US media is picking it up. This could sink us.”
I messed up.
I couldn’t say anything to my older brother because he was right.
But, as Liza went ahead of me on the runway, a plan came to mind.
“I have a plan,” I told Viktor. “I’ll set this right, brother.”
As the call ended, the cars arrived, and we got in. Liza was beside me in the backseat of the second car.
