I slam him against the wall, my forearm pressed to his throat. The impact rattles the expensive artwork hanging there, and I feel the satisfying give of flesh beneath my pressure. "Tell me where she is. Now."
"Or what?" Abram's voice is strained but still mocking. "You'll kill me? Then you'll never find your precious wife. Never know what happened to her and that bastard growing in her belly."
Lev moves closer, his gun now pressed directly against Abram's skull. "I'll make you talk. I'm very good at making people talk."
"I'm sure you are." Abram's pale eyes shift to Lev, and his grin widens with vicious satisfaction. "But first, let me share something interesting. About your girlfriend. Irina."
I feel Lev tense beside me, see his jaw tighten with barely controlled rage.
"I've been fucking her for months," Abram continues, his voice casual despite the gun at his head and my arm crushing his windpipe. "Every time you thought she was shopping or visitingfriends, she was in my bed. Screaming my name. Telling me all your secrets."
The trigger cocks with a sharp click. Lev's finger tightens, and I see murder in his dark eyes. But I shake my head once, sharp and commanding. Not yet. We need information first. Revenge can wait.
"She's quite talented, your Irina," Abram says, his voice taking on a storytelling quality that makes my skin crawl. "In bed and in betrayal. She's been feeding me everything. Roman's security protocols. His financial vulnerabilities. His shipping schedules. Every piece of intelligence I needed to destroy him systematically."
My mind races through implications, through the months of attacks and sabotage that suddenly make perfect sense. Irina. Lev's girlfriend of five years. The woman we trusted, who had access to everything, who we never suspected because she wasLev's.
"Everything has been going to plan," Abram continues, his pale eyes gleaming with triumph despite the precarious position he's in. "Destroying Roman's businesses. Fracturing his alliances. Exposing his money laundering operations to federal authorities. Making him look weak and incompetent."
He glances at the Moscow delegates, and his voice takes on a bragging quality that makes my trigger finger itch. "I even managed to get you here. All the way from Russia. My intelligence, my strategy, my execution. That should show you just how much more worthy I am of being Pakhan than this soft American."
The delegates' expressions remain hard, unimpressed by his boasting. But Abram doesn't seem to notice or care.
"But then," his voice drops, becomes almost regretful, "you had to go and ruin everything. You had to get your bitch pregnant."
The word ignites something primal in my chest. My fist connects with his jaw before I can stop myself, the satisfying crunch of cartilage breaking beneath my knuckles. Blood explodes from Abram's nose, spraying across his expensive silk shirt, and his head snaps sideways from the force.
He laughs harder, the sound wet and gurgling through the blood. "That's it, Roman. Show them the monster you really are. Show them you're no better than me."
I think about Eva and imagine her terrified right now, bound and helpless, wondering if I'll find her in time. The image makes rage flood through me so powerfully, I can barely see straight.
"We couldn't have your heir growing up and trying to take over," Abram continues, his voice thick with blood and satisfaction. "Or those still loyal to you fighting on the kid's behalf. An heir complicates everything. So we had to eliminate the problem."
My vision blurs at the edges. "What have you done?"
"What needed to be done." Abram's pale eyes meet mine, and I see genuine pleasure there. He's enjoying this. Enjoying my pain, my desperation, my helplessness. "Irina is with your wife right now. In a warehouse. Taking care of the situation."
I hit him again, this time in the solar plexus. The air whooshes from his lungs, and he doubles over, gasping. But he's still laughing, that mechanical sound that makes my skin crawl.
"You're too late, Roman." Blood drips from his mouth, staining his teeth red. "By now, Eva is most likely dead. Your heir with her. Everything you love, gone. And it's all your fault for being weak enough to care in the first place."
The words detonate in my chest like a bomb.Too late. Dead. Gone.
No. No, she can't be. I just found her. Just admitted I love her. Just started building a future with her. She can't be gone. Our child can't be gone. The universe can't be that fucking cruel.
But looking at Abram's satisfied expression, at the triumph gleaming in his pale eyes despite the blood and pain, I know he believes what he's saying. He thinks Eva is already dead.
My phone is in my hand before conscious thought catches up, already dialing my security chief. "Track Eva's phone. I need her location immediately."
"Already on it, Boss." His voice is tight with urgency. "We've been trying to reach her for the past hour. Her phone's GPS shows she's at an abandoned warehouse in the industrial district. Sending you the coordinates now."
The address appears on my screen, and I'm already moving toward the door. Lev is right behind me, his gun still drawn, his expression carved from stone. The Moscow delegates are saying something, their voices raised in what might be protest or approval, but I can't hear them over the roaring in my ears.
The drive to the warehouse passes in a blur of rage and terror. Lev drives with terrifying speed, weaving through traffic, running red lights, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. Neither of us speaks. There's nothing to say. We both know what we're racing toward, what we might find when we get there.
I think about Eva's body, about the way she feels beneath me when I'm inside her. The curve of her hips, the swell of her breasts, the way her brown eyes go dark with pleasure when I make her come. I imagine never touching her again, never hearing her gasp my name, never watching her belly grow round with our child.
The thought makes something break in my chest.
