“Thank you.” I sit on the chair next to him. “What do we have?”
He gestures toward one of the screens. “Three cameras were compromised.”
My gaze narrows on the security feeds. “Only three?”
“To the best of my knowledge, yes.” He scrolls through the feeds a few times, pausing and pointing out the issues with each one. “What I find surprising is that the system wasn’t hacked. Not at first, at least. To access these feeds, someone had to have done something from the house.”
I nod. “I suspected as much. Do you think Vasilii has someone on the inside?”
“I’d be careful jumping to a conclusion, but it’s the most probable explanation I can offer right now.” He cranes his neck to look at me. “Tonight’s attack wasn’t a coincidence. Vasili knew you wouldn’t be home. And I’m guessing he knew who would be.”
“So they came for her?”
He nods in agreement. “Those fuckers thought she was a weakness, and someone must’ve leaked that information to them. I don’t see why they’d target her otherwise.”
I nod slowly, rubbing my jaw as the pieces of the puzzle all come together in my head. Elena was the target of tonight’s hit, and Vasili marked her as a target because someone told him she was important to me.
The question is who.
“Don’t you think it’s high time you get rid of the girl?” Igor asks. “The war with Vasili is on. As long as she’s here, she’ll always be a vulnerability. She’ll be the death of you.”
My jaw clenches as I look at Igor. Fury burns through my chest like a forest fire, and if he weren’t my cousin, he’d be bleeding out on the floor right now.
“She’s my wife, and you donottalk about her like that.”
“She’s your prisoner, and you should know when to let go,” he counters. “You only met this chick when, two months ago? And you’re already willing to risk it all for her? What if she’s behind this?”
“Use your brain, asshole. She almost died tonight. What, she risked her life just for laughs?”
Igor shakes his head in disbelief. “It could be a ploy to win your trust. You were always careful. I spent just a couple of months away, and so much has changed.”
“You’re right. So much has changed.” My voice comes out rougher than I intended, but I don’t give a shit. I need to get this message through to him right here, right now. “That woman is the only light in the middle of all this fucked-up shit. I don’t care what or who I lose, but unless you want to lose your fucking head, you’ll treat her with respect because she’s family, now and forever. Do you fucking understand?”
He glares at me, the tension in the air growing thicker for a heartbeat before he sighs. “Ty psikh!”You’re crazy.
“Spacibo tebe, pridurok!”Thank you, idiot.
He flies up to his feet and plants his hands on his hips. “Let me remind you, if you end up dying because of her, I’ll kill her and bury her right beside your grave.”
After his heartwarming threat, Igor storms out of the security control room and slams the door behind him.
I let him go, since it’s an empty threat.
Despite his temper, Igor would never hurt a woman or child. It’s the moral standard we’ve lived by since we got initiated into the bratva as teenage boys, and it’s the moral standard we’ll die by.
I know Elena will be protected by my brothers even when I’m gone, and that gives me even more courage to fish out the rat sneaking around my place.
I review access logs, security authorizations, and shift changes for the last couple of days. Nothing in particular seems off until a minor adjustment on one of the cameras catches my attention.
Fifteen hours ago, the south perimeter patrol moved west, and I didn’t fucking authorize that change.
I pull up another report, and my stomach sinks. Everything’s different from the last time I checked, which was over a month ago.
There’s additional cameral maintenance, revised gate schedules, and temporary blind spots that couldn’t have gone undetected unless…
I turn to one of the men behind me. “Who authorized this?”
“You did, boss,” one of the men answers. He hurries to a stack of documents on the shelf, rummages through it, and pulls out a folder. “A month ago.”
