Page 68 of The Brutal Arrangement

But is this true?

I didn’t want to take her word for any of this. I heard her, and I couldn’t forget what she had said.

“You told the person on the other line that you’d look into something. Then report it to them.”

She rolled her eyes, but even that gesture was a tired one. “Yes. You heard correctly. I told the director of the nursing home that I would look into why my mom’s bills hadn’t been handled. That’s what normal people say. Obviously, I’m limited in doing that. It’s not like I can just call Katerina and ask why she didn’t hold up her end of our deal.”

“Why not?”

She frowned. “What?” It wasn’t like she was trying to be sassy. She merely looked exhausted, exasperated and not handling this emotional upheaval well.

“Why can’t you call her up and ask her?”

Narrowing her eyes at me, she seemed to debate whether I was joking. “Because… you’ve made it clear the Kozlovs are the enemy and if I try any funny business, it’s my life on the line. I’m not that stupid.”

“Then what were you going to do? Just wait for her to contact you and say okay, try to divorce him now?”

She hung her head and shook it slightly. “I don’t know, Damon. I have no clue about any of this anymore. I thought I was making the best choice I could at the moment, a free clearance of my mother’s debts and care. I was wrong. I have…” She stood, not looking at me. “I have no clue what to think about anything anymore.”

Goddammit.

I wasn’t a fan of this defeatist tone she was using. I hated it. While I had a lot to learn about this woman, I was decidedlyagainst her sounding so… down. So broken, like she’d rather just give up.

“May I go to the bathroom? I want to take a bath and try to manage this headache.” She barely glanced up at me now, proving how little energy she had anymore.

“You’re dismissed.” It seemed like an idiotic thing to tell her, but I wasn’t going to get much out of her when she was so dejected. Pulling answers out of broken people wasn’t that hard, not for me. I was a master at torture, and most people couldn’t handle much pain before they cried and spilled all their secrets.

But mental pain? Anguish? When a person went numb and lacked the willpower to fight, it was over. Nothing could crack through that wall.

There was too much to explore, but not now. I’d follow up on every little thing she might be able to tell me about Katerina or Anton. She might have noticed something that didn’t seem like a big deal to her but could be a crucial clue for us to tuck away for later use.

I’d be asking her more, but she was too closed off at the moment.

After she left the room, I stood right where I was for several more minutes. Ruminating over all that she’d said—and hadn’t said—I was stuck in place to reflect on this woman I called my wife.

Deep down, I knew she was telling the truth. She was honest with the part about her mother, at least. I wanted to feel confident that she wasn’t lying about that, but I didn’t like not knowing all the details.

I sighed and left the room to seek out the proper men who’d be able to assist me with this matter. Not bothering to find a shirt, the better to give Lucy the illusion of privacy, I headed up to Maxim’s floor. He wasn’t there, off buying things with Sloane for their nursery, so I changed my route and went to the floor where most of the surveillance crew had their operations.

John was there, a coincidence, really. I checked with him about Nik and received the same old reply that he wasn’t revealing where he was yet.

“I need you to look into something else for me,” I said.

Telling him about Lucy’s claims didn’t feel like I was betraying her trust. She sat on telling me at all, so I didn’t let myself think I was doing anything wrong by sharing her secret motivation.

“Do you have a name?” he asked as he took in all the information.

“It should be on Lucy’s birth certificate,” I replied. I didn’t want to make the hunt for answers any harder for him, but he wouldn’t struggle getting through the databases to verify what she had told me. I also told him to check with the man in charge of supervising her cell phone use. That soldier would be able to direct him to the number she’d called about the outstanding nursing home debt.

“And she claims that Katerina paid into these accounts?” John asked, brows raised. “Because if she did, I bet she’s using something that’s covered up.” He shrugged. “I’m just pointing out that this might give us some details about more Kozlov finances in a way we haven’t been able to before.”

“Whatever helps.”

With him delegated to look into what Lucy told me about her mother and confirm her story, I left and knew this would weigh on my mind until I heard back from him.

The longer I fell into the pattern of getting my wife to submit to me sexually, the more I seriously doubted she’d have much intel to give me. Anton wouldn’t tell a mere maid all his secrets. And if Lucy was as quiet and meek as a maid as she was as my wife, then she would’ve been prone to staying out of the way and going unnoticed rather than calling attention to herself.

She still might have seen something. She could’ve overheard something.

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