Before she could reply the door came open and her father walked through. And he wasn’t alone.
Kala stood and Kenzie was right behind her because their unrufflable dad looked extremely ruffled.
Shit.
“Another attempt?” Kala asked, looking him over.
It had been a week. Things seemed quiet for about two weeks after they returned from Nepal, and then someone had taken a shot at her dad. He’d been in Deep Ellum at the time, so he’d chalked it up to angry hipsters—which did not track in any way. It was after a second attempt outside his office that her dad started to take things seriously.
Aunt Chelsea had been surprisingly peppy about reporting the news that there was a bounty on Ian Taggart’s head.
The person he had with him looked young. Maybe twenty or so. Maybe younger. She wore all black, though not tactical wear. She was in a black velvet jogging suit with the hoodie pulled up over her light blonde hair. Her mascara was running like she’d cried briefly but sucked it up. It gave her some raccoon eyes. She was pretty but hard. So hard for someone young.
“She tried to blow up my car. I just paid that fucker off,” her dad announced. “Alex is coming to take her back to the club where I will have a great time interrogating a child.”
“I am not child, and I was doing you favor, old man. That car is junk,” she said in a familiar accent.
Her twin’s eyes rolled. “Naturally, she’s Russian.”
“Ona chto, iz mafii? Iz kakogo sindikata?”Kenzie found herself surprisingly excited about dealing with a young Russian mob assassin. It gave a girl something to look forward to.
The young woman rolled her eyes. “Speak English. Your Russian is worse than this man’s.”
“She’s a delight,” her father announced.
“Is not. My Russian is perfect.” Kenzie had been speaking Russian for…as long as she could remember. Her mother hadn’t wanted to lose the language she’d fought hard to learn, so Russian was spoken often in their home.
“Sure. Perfect,” the woman said with a sneer. “I don’t belong to a syndicate. I’m college student. Here to soak in all the freedoms. This man is pervert. He tries to make me his sex slave.”
“Sure. I always go trolling the parking lots of luxury hotels to find infants to enslave,” her father said with a sigh. “Kala, sweetie, do you have some sedatives on you? I don’t think she’s going to go quietly. I don’t want to interrupt the wedding. Dare’s relatives are alreadyfreaked out since someone took a shot at me at the rehearsal dinner.”
She’d been there. They were Canadian. It was fairly easy to convince them it was nothing more than a rando Friday night in the US.
“Uh, no, Dad,” Kala said. “I do not carry around sedatives.”
“I do,” Lou said, grabbing her bag.
The young woman backed away.“Ne nado.”
Don’t. It was the first time she looked even slightly frightened.
“I can shut her up without putting her under.” She walked right over to the lovely buffet the hotel had set up. It had coffee and champagne and many, many pastries. Kenzie selected one. A big-ass croissant. She walked over to the assassin and shoved it right in her mouth. “See, now she can’t talk. But she’ll know we didn’t do anything to her.”
Kala sent her a grateful look. “Yes, she’ll remember.”
Their father sighed and hauled his quarry over to the chaise lounge that had so recently been the site of Kenzie’s brood. “Sorry, daughter. I didn’t think about that.”
Kala had lost an enormous amount of time wondering what happened to her when she was fifteen and drugged by a group of mercenaries. Not knowing had nearly killed her. She wouldn’t put anyone else through that if she didn’t have to.
The young woman sat, her hands tied behind her back. She didn’t want to know why her dad had been walking around with rope in his pocket. Nope. That was better left to the wind. She noticed their captive had started chewing her way around the croissant, and her eyes closed briefly. Like she was struggling. Or enjoying it. Could be either.
“She had a bomb,” her father complained. “She was on the ground trying to put it behind my wheel. How long has your mother been in there with Tasha?”
“Over an hour,” Kala replied. “Devi’s in there, too. Problem with the hem. She’s working on it but she could be out any minute, and you know she told you no blood on the carpet. I’ll go get the tarp.”
“You are not going to kill me.” The young woman was good.
She’d gotten through that croissant in record time. Surely someone had a ball gag. Like half the wedding guests were lifestylers. If one needed to restrain a suspect, this was the place to do it.
