Page 55 of Broken Embers

He shoots up from the bed, rushes to his duffel bag, and begins tearing through it.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking for the SD cards. Nadia and Valeska gave to me. They said there’s enough on there to give us leverage over the RMSAD, the General... and Ruslan Dragunov, Nadia’s older brother.”

My stomach knots. Guiltily, I slide out of bed and reach for my jeans. “You mean these?” I hold them up. “I found them when I grabbed your socks. They fell to the floor, and then I heard you coming out of the bathroom, so I panicked and shoved them into my pocket. I didn’t want you to think I was snooping.”

Oleksi stops in front of me and takes them from my hand gently. “It’s fine, Sabrina. No secrets, remember?” He kissed my forehead.

He sets them on the desk and pulls me close, kissing me softly. “You can snoop through anything I have. I love you. And once this is over, I want to get married to you.”

My heart stutters. “You want to marry me?”

He grins. “Of course. But not now. I want to do the whole sappy romantic thing when I propose.”

“I thought you hated that vanilla romantic shit.”

“I do. But only with you,” Oleksi tells me. “You’ve melted something inside me. Something I think froze over after my father nearly beat me to death because I didn’t believe in the same values he did.”

My heart slams against my ribs. I remember Radomir telling me about that. I lift my hand to his face, go up on tiptoes, and kiss him. “I’m sorry about your father.”

“Don’t be,” Oleksi says. “He was an evil man.”

“I can now say I can relate,” I tell him with a laugh. He kisses me again, then points to the chair. “Get dressed before I forget we need to check those disks.”

We settle on the couch in the sitting room of the suite, wrapped in a shared blanket. Oleksi loads the first disk into his laptop.

The screen flickers.

Nadia’s face fills it.

Oleksi. Sabrina. I told you I had a plan. This is it. Watch this to the end. You will understand why it will give you all the power you need. I will narrate as the scenes unfold, giving you some ideas on how to use the information most effectively.

Disk two is a copy, meant for my brother, Ruslan. Deliver it to him personally and ensure you are in the room with him when he watches it. He is the best person to approach to get your message not only to him, to ensure he doesn’t break the alliance when he realizes I’m gone, but also to get it to the General and the RMSAD.

My breath catches. Oleksi and I look at each other, startled, as the scene shifts and we see what’s on it. There is a lot of information, so we fast-forward until we see Nadia’s face again. She has a smug smile.I think that’s a checkmate for all of us.She pauses for a moment.Oh, and if you’re wondering why I’ve told you to take this to my brother first? Remember I told you that the RMSAD has a feared attorney and an enforcer who fixes messes—the attorney is none other than my dear older brother, and the fixer is his best friend and loyal subject, Konstantin Romaov.

Oleksi curses. “Fuck.”

“What?” I ask.

He grabs his phone and opens a photo. “I thought the man looked familiar, I just couldn’t place him.” Oleksi turns his phone to me, and I flinch at the picture of my sister with a tall stranger. “Remember this?”

I stare. My blood runs cold, and I nod.

“The man with your sister is Konstantin Romonov.”

My heart stops. “Then the RMSAD has her.”

We turn back to the screen, staring at it in stunned silence.

As the screen fades to black, an idea has formulated in mind. It’s something risky. Something bold. But it just might save my mother... and Tara and all of us.

Oleksi looks at me. “What are you thinking?”

But I don’t tell him. I know he would disapprove.

Instead, I say, “How are we going to use this to help us?”

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