Page 16

“Yes. If he'd grown a spine, we would have heard about a report five years ago.”

I keep going because if Father paid a doctor and a cop, he probably paid the council too. He wouldn't have risked one without the other. I find it under a different name, a “security assessment” billed to a council member—Victor Petrov—who sat at that table in September and voted for Natalia’s wedding like the past had never happened. He turned a fucking blind eye to this knowing what he was doing to that poor girl. The dates line up, and the amount is large enough to keep a man from asking why Ivan Sokolov died a martyr.

I stare at the three payments until the screen blurs. My own blood thought to protect self instead of doing what's right. Had I been the man in charge, I'd have gone to the council immediately, denounced my wicked son, paid their penalty, and used it as a lesson to any man who followed me that the code is there for a reason. What we really got was a bunch of malarky bullshit that might very well lead to other men thinking they can go after wives and children and get away with it.

Maksim swears under his breath. “That's enough for an inquisition.”

“It is enough to prove he lied to all of them.” I feel like putting my fist through the monitor. He knew and he paid to make sure no one else ever knew, and then he let the Bratva spend five years killing each other over a version of that night he invented.

I download the files to a drive I brought and photograph every page Maksim found. I put the paper back in the same order and close the folders, and I leave the chair the way I found it. If he looks at the cameras in the hall, he might see that we came in here, but he'll never know what we looked at.

“Wipe the recent documents list,” I say.

Maksim does it while I shut the computer down and wait for the screen to go dark. We stand there a second in the quiet house, and I have to unclench my hands before I reach for the door. Rage makes me want to be so impulsive and go after everyone involved, just to defend Alana's honor, but that wouldn’t make me any better than Ivan or my father. I have to do this the right way.

“He buried it,” I say. “And he didn't even do it well. How stupid." Maksim falls into step beside me again as we head out of the office toward the front door. He's seen me angry and he knows this isn't like any other time I've been upset.

“What now?”

“Now we get out of this house before Alexei comes home and starts asking why I'm in Father’s office.” I pocket the drive. “You don't mention this to anyone. Not Andrei or the men. If Father finds out we were in these files, he'll do more than just destroy evidence."

“And the council?”

“Not yet. I'm not walking into that room with copies and a speech until I know Alana has what she needs on her side. If I go first, he'll call it a tantrum. If we go together, they can't wave it off.”

We walk right out the front door like we belong there, and the hide-a-key goes back under the stone. And in the car, I sit with the drive in my fist and stare at the estate until Maksim starts the engine.

I feel even more certain, every day that passes, that we have to stop that wedding and set things right. Alexei might be willing to inherit this stained legacy, but I'm not content to let that happen to him. He'll fight demons from it the rest of his life. And I might not be the leader of this family going forward, but that's no way for a leader to live.

12

ALANA

The car pulls up with its lights off, and I see Dimitri's silhouette behind the wheel. He leans over and pushes the passenger door open, and I climb in quickly, pulling my coat tight around me. November air bites at my cheeks, carrying the promise of winter in its teeth, and snow is already starting to fall. It makes a flicker of hope spring up that somehow, a massive snowstorm will cancel the wedding.

"We need to move," he says, and there's an urgency in his voice that makes my stomach tighten.

I glance at him as he pulls away from the house, keeping the headlights dark until we round the corner. His jaw is set, his eyes checking the rearview mirror like he thinks someone is following us.

"Something wrong?" I ask as I buckle up.

"My father's men have been watching your house for two days," he says, adjusting his mirror to see better. "I spotted them yesterday, and I'm just making sure they're not following us."

I twist in my seat to look through the back window, but the street's empty behind us. "Your father knows?"

"Or my brother. It doesn't matter which one gave the order." He accelerates onto the main road, the engine purring as he gets up to speed. "We can't risk leading them to what we're doing. They'll just try to scramble and cover it up more, make us look like idiots."

I nod and face forward, watching the city lights blur past. We drive in silence for a few miles, but Dimitri's eyes keep flicking to the mirror. I see the tension in his shoulders, the way his knuckles pale against the steering wheel. He's taking this pretty seriously, and I'm not sure how to feel about that. Maybe I should feel confident he's on top of things, or maybe I should be frightened.

"We've got a problem," he says quietly.

I look back and see headlights in the distance. They hang back just far enough to avoid suspicion, but they never disappear despite the turns we take. It makes nausea crawl up my throat. God, why can't this just be easy?

"We're being followed."

Dimitri's jaw tightens as he weaves through a maze of side streets that grow narrower and darker as we leave the city behind. The car behind us matches every turn, never falling back, but never closing the gap. They're good at this, and it makes me feel sick to my stomach. This was just supposed to be a quick drive around the block to discuss whatever it was he found.

"They know," I mumble, picking at the hem of my coat sleeve. If his father knows, it means my father will know very soon. Then what will I do? He knows I was digging around Dr. Babich's office for files. It's only a matter of time before he figures out I'm trying to use what I found to stop that wedding.