Page 6 of Filthy Lies

“Wait!” The man thrashes against his restraints. “Wait, please! I only know what I was told. Your father, he ordered us to bring her to him. That’s all!”

I lean in close. “Why?”

“The baby. He wants the baby.”

Something cold and reptilian wriggles inside my chest. “Keep talking.”

“He said… he said the child is the true Akopov heir. That you’ve been compromised. That the American has turned you against your own blood.” His words pour out faster now in a frothing, desperate stream. “The plan was to take her somewhere safe until she delivered. Then he would decide what happens next.”

I straighten and wipe blood from my hands with a cloth Dimitri silently offers me.

“And where is this ‘safe’ location?”

“I swear I don’t know!” Tears mingle with the blood on his face. “We were just supposed to deliver her to the second team. But?—”

“But what?”

“There was a complication. Before we could get her to the rendezvous, we were ambushed. Other men, professionally armed. They shot Igor and Sergei and took the woman. I only got away because I was checking the perimeter.”

The ice in my chest spreads to my limbs.

“Describe these men.”

“Six of them, maybe seven. Good at what they did—like, military, you know? One had a scar here.” He tries to gesture at his neck despite the restraints. “They spoke Russian. One called another ‘Solovyov dog’ when they thought I couldn’t hear.”

Solovyov.

I’m about to ask another question when the door bursts open. Arkady strides in, face grim. “I need to speak with you. Now.”

I follow him into the hallway, leaving Dimitri to watch our prisoner.

When we’re alone, he turns to me. “Our informant in Brighton Beach just called. The Solovyovs are bragging about having the ‘Akopov bride’ in their possession.”

The concrete walls seem to pulse around me. “Where?”

“They’ve gone dark on the location. But they’re planning to use her as leverage. And Vin…” He hesitates.

“What?”

“She’s definitely in labor. They’ve called in a doctor from their network.”

I press the heels of my hands against my eyes until a whole galaxy of stars goes supernova behind my eyelids. Everything inside me wants to scream, to break, to destroy.

But I can’t afford to do that yet.

Arkady takes a deep breath. “We’ve looked everywhere, called in every debt, just like you wanted. But it hasn’t turned up anything usable. The Solovyovs have gone to ground with her in some black site outside our network.”

“There has to be something.”

“There is.” His eyes meet mine. “But you’re not going to like it.”

“Speak.”

“Grigor Petrov has resources we don’t. Intelligence networks in places where the Solovyovs operate that we can’t access.”

“No.” The single word shoots from my mouth like a bullet and kills the idea dead on sight. “Absolutely fucking not.”

“Vin, he’s her father.”

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