“The autopsy, the photos. They even tested some pieces of corpses that had flown off in the explosion.” I rubbed my temple, stunned and almost disoriented with the way my world was turning upside down in a flash. “They catalogued it all. They scoured the scene and gathered the evidence to show that he was dead.”
“There was never any surveillance footage that could have shown where he could have left, either,” Alexei said.
Stefan Rossi shrugged. “I get it. I’d be in denial too. For fuck’s sake, it was almost twenty years ago.” He pointed at the papers. “But those don’t lie.”
I lifted my gaze sharply. “We’re not calling you a liar, either.”
He acknowledged that with a tip of his chin. “You don’t have any grounds to try that line with me, as far as I can tell. When you showed up at my uncle’s place and were asking around whether Gregori could’ve lived, I was off in Greece. But that showed your interest. Your doubt. Once I got back and I got in touch with your team, they gave my guys a little more to poke around with.” He shrugged once more. “So, I figured I’d send that contractor on a wild goose chase. He’s been sniffing around one of my nieces, and I ain’t sure if he’s good enough for her. But he’s fucking done it now. He tracked this motherfucking zombie of yours and came home with the receipts attached. Milan. Moscow. Budapest. Some training camp outside of Ostrava, and then down in Port-au-Prince and Caracas.”
“Your contractor tracked him that far?” Maksim asked.
“No. And yes. This smartass tracked him around Moscow, but he hacked into databases and used facial recognition to get even further.” He scratched his chin. “Go to the back,” he said of the packet he’d given us. “He got close enough to track him in Caracas, just yesterday.”
A heaviness settled upon me.
We no longer had to wonder if Gregori was alive.
We had confirmation.
Stefan was right. Anyone could stage their death. Especially in our world. Bending rules and skirting the law were expected.
But this wasn’t something we’d dropped the ball on. I had been younger, too, when this happened, but I remembered how thoroughly my father had followed up. He’d had the role of Pakhan thrust upon him too soon. He’d had to adapt quickly as a solo leader without brothers and cousins like I did now. On his own, he’d held his ground and led. Due to how close the betrayal had hit, he’d obsessed over making sure that Gregori wouldn’t threaten him or his next generation again.
“He couldn’t have done this on his own,” Maksim said.
We were all rocked by this revelation, this confirmation of our worst fear realized. Lev looked like he was stuck in an ugly trance. Alexei concentrated, muttering under his breath. Viktor and Nikolai studied the papers.
“Someone had to have helped him,” Maksim said as he looked at me. “For as thorough as Father was after that incident…”
“Maybe, maybe not.”
Stefan nodded, agreeing with me. “The only way we even got close to finding him was through those aliases your men gave us to work with.”
I raised my brows. “Not my men.” I cleared my throat. “Mywife.” Pride rose up inside me that I could have a claim on that intelligent creature. It was thanks to Elena and her thorough investigation of the financial records she was most familiar with that we could even have those aliases to use.
“Good thing you snatched her up, then,” he mused dryly. “I asked that contractor to see what he’d dig up with those aliasesshe had, and here we are.” He smacked his hand on my copy of the papers. “But from my understanding, those aliases weren’t consistent. They weren’t used back when Gregori set that bomb to go off. Maybe he ran off on his own and hid for a while before he started being active again.”
“The timing’s not going to matter now. He could have done this on his own and waited to start on a plan. He might’ve had help that very day and schemed with others to build up a network,” I said. “All that matters now is that he’s fucking with us at all.”
He already seemed to be starting, interfering with our finances through Morovov Financials.
I didn’t want to know what his game was.
I had no time for it.
I never would.
“I agree,” Stefan said. “Whether he had help back then isn’t relevant now. What does make me suspicious is the name of someone who’s been spotted with him.”
Viktor held up the papers and pointed at one image. “Him?”
Stefan nodded. “Yusef Antonov. He’s former military with old familial links to the Soviets. It seems to my intelligence team that he’s acting as Gregori’s right-hand man.”
I stared at the image, prepared to take this intel to Elena and see what could match with what she’d discovered.
Stefan Rossi wasn’t in a rush to leave, staying to discuss this discovery with all details he could provide. He was an informed associate, and he wasn’t interested in any danger on his side of the country. Having him share this with us proved howsolid of an ally they were, despite the distance between our territories. While my brothers and cousins and I went through a range of emotions, our reactions based in anger, suspicion, and annoyance, one clear conclusion was obvious.
None of us were pleased about this threat.
