Page 34 of Warlord’s Empire

Radik led her out onto the balcony where they paused to look over the moon washed town before he escorted her to her room. He closed her balcony doors, separating them.

She flopped onto her bed, kicking the covers aside and stretching her overheated body out on the cool sheets. A smile curved her lips as her mind replayed every word and every touch as she drifted into sleep.

Chapter Sixteen

Leeza was angry. Possibly angrier than she’d ever been in her life.

No, not quite that angry. She’d been angriest when she’d burned down the house she’d shared with her ex-husband, but this was a close second.

After a week of searching for clues on Saskia’s whereabouts, Jozef and Havel decided it was best to send Leeza and Shaun home. Shaun had capitulated gracefully - of course she did, she was becoming a good little mafia wifey - but Leeza was livid.

When she said as much on the flight back to Prague, Shaun gently chided her, “There’s a difference between capitulation and graceful retreat.”

“There’s nothing graceful about being packed onto a private jet and sent home like a naughty child,” Leeza sneered, pacing. She shouldn’t take her mood out on her cousin-in-law, but Havel wasn’t there, which left Shaun as her only target.

“There was nothing left for me to do in Pretoria and I find it difficult to concentrate with all those Guard Dog personnel around.”

“They are a noisy bunch,” Leeza admitted, but added, “There’s no reason for me to go home though.”

“Don’t you have children?” Shaun asked, knowing full well it killed Leeza to be away from them.

“My children are fine.” They were being cared for by Shaun’s mother, Fatima, and Havel’s grandmother, Adeline, known affectionately by the family as Babi. Finding Saskia was the more important task. “I’m more useful in South Africa. What am I supposed to do in Prague?”

Shaun’s gaze followed her as she strode back and forth. They needed to buy a bigger plane so she could pace properly.

“We can do the same things in Prague as we can do in Pretoria, only our bossy husbands won’t be around to take over or curtail our search. You know, modern technology spans the globe. You don’t need to be in the same place your sister disappeared to look for her.”

Leeza’s very intelligent cousin-in-law was right. Though she didn’t have to be such a know-it-all about it. As much as Leeza had grown to love Shuan, she didn’t enjoy her annoying, smug tendency toward always being correct.

Leeza sat down across from Shaun, attempting to calm the anxiety threatening to eat her alive at the thought of Saskia in Radik’s clutches. “What do you suggest we do once we’re home?”

Shaun leaned forward, lowering her voice conspiratorially. “We’re going to start with Saskia and go from there. Find out who she was talking to, who she was friends with, what she was working on for the Prime Minister. We’re going to talk to everyone who’s had any contact with her. From there, we take the information and we pull in every contact we have from around the globe to track her down.”

Tears gathered in Leeza’s eyes and she nodded, swallowing. “Thank you,” she whispered, then cleared her throat and said again, “Thank you for being the calm one when I can’t seem to keep a single thought straight in my head.”

“You’re scared,” Shaun said reassuringly. “We all are, but you’re closest to Saskia. You know her best. I’m counting on your knowledge of your sister to help us. You might pick up on something the rest of us won’t.”

Leeza let out a breath and nodded. “You’re right. I need to keep my head.”

“You’re doing great.” Shaun smiled kindly.

Leeza didn’t agree but kept it to herself. She could unleash the boiling rage inside her once they found Saskia and she got her hands on Saskia’s captor.

Once they were home, Shaun organized them into tasks. Shaun would talk to the Prime Minister, as he owed her a favour. She’d performed life-saving surgery on him a few years earlier, removing a tumor from his brain. Leeza would check both Saskia’s suite on the Koba estate and her apartment in the city.

Leeza’s search of the estate suite turned up very little. Saskia kept her childhood mementos there including dolls, stuffed animals, pictures, boxes of old DVDs. There were some clothes, but most had been moved to her place in the city.

Leeza used the key Saskia gave her to get into her city apartment. It was her first time using it.

Regret mixed with self-recrimination as she stepped through the door into the small but bright apartment. It was a corner suite, located on the third floor of a four-story building. Though Saskia had lived there for over a year, Leeza had never been to visit.

There was always some reason or other to keep her away. With the children, it was easier to have Saskia visit her at the estate. Saskia never seemed to mind, but now Leeza wondered. Perhaps Saskia was just used to being treated like the least important member of the family, often overlooked.

Tears trickled freely down Leeza’s cheeks as she looked at the cozy, cheerful apartment that seemed to embody her sister.

Saskia was the most important member of the family. She was an innocent, and she worked hard to keep it that way. She refused to have anything to do with the crime side of the Koba family, instead educating herself and seeking employment outside of the family. Now she was gone and Leeza couldn’t tell her how fucking special she was.

“Enough!” It was time to pull herself out of her melancholy. If she wanted to find Saskia, she had to focus. She conducted investigative work for Guard Dog all the time, she knew how to do this.