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“Why?” Jake asked the two men.
Drake shrugged. “I could have any number of enemies, but Joshua, not really. This had to have begun some time ago, so it isn’t any of Nikita Bogomolov’s crew. Sasha, Nikita’s son, is included in our association, although loosely at this point. He still has to prove himself in order to come fully into the circle. So, for us to have a common enemy, that would narrow it down significantly.”
“Is it possible Joshua was just a convenient entry to follow into the States?” Fyodor asked.
“Anything is possible,” Drake conceded.
Mitya shook his head. “It feels too personal. Joshua? Any ideas? Who do you have for an enemy?”
“As far as I know, no one,” Joshua said. “But I do originally come from Louisiana and the lair that Drake runs. I can’t imagine that anyone there considers me an enemy, since I left when I was a toddler, but I suppose it could happen that someone harbors resentment.”
Mitya shook his head. “This originates in Borneo.” He said it with absolute conviction because he believed it. “Something happened there.”
Joshua raked both hands through his hair. His gaze shifted to Drake. Mitya fought to keep his features an expressionless mask. There was something that neither man wanted to say or admit. He waited to see if Joshua was really with them or if they were all being played. His gaze shifted to Sevastyan. His cousin had caught that look as well, and he was waiting. Mitya had the feeling Sevastyan could turn violent in a heartbeat—and would.
“The only thing I can think of, I’m not very proud of,” Joshua said. “No matter how I explain it, I’m not going to come out looking good on any level.”
“It isn’t necessary to explain anything,” Drake said.
“I disagree,” Joshua said. “If everyone is in danger here, and it’s because of something I did, they need to know about it.”
Drake shrugged. “It’s up to you, Joshua.”
Joshua reached for his coffee cup and turned it around idly as he searched for the right place to start. “We had come to know most of those who made it a practice to kidnap tourists or members of very wealthy families. We knew which ones would give back the victims the moment the ransom was paid, and which ones wouldn’t. For most it was simply a business, like any other. We negotiated, paid the ransoms and retrieved the victims. A straight business transaction. If it was a group who preferred killing the victim, we raided and took them back.”
Mitya knew Drake still ran a crew in Borneo for that purpose, and another in South America. Just because he wasn’t there didn’t mean the practice of kidnapping had ended.
“There was a rumor that five strangers had entered the rain forest. They hit a village and took two young girls. They set fires in the village, an unusual thing when they were going to ask for money to get the girls back. I tracked them, but I was a couple of days behind. As I followed them, I began to have suspicions that they were leopard.”
He took a sip of coffee and when he looked around the table, there was rage in his eyes. “What they did to those girls were some of the worst things I’ve ever seen. I’m not going into details, but by the time I found them, the girls were in a catatonic state. I lost it. I’m not going to lie. I completely and utterly lost it. Those five leopards are dead, burned and buried so deep no one will find their ashes. I took the girls back to their village, but honestly, I wonder if both might have been better off buried with those men.”
There was silence. Mitya frowned, going over Joshua’s short rendition of the encounter, trying to find something that didn’t add up. “Only those in that village knew you went after the girls, is that correct?”
Drake shook his head. “There were men in my organization who knew I sent him. The villagers certainly knew. As for those leopards’ families, we didn’t know where they came from. We had no idea. Questions weren’t asked. They were killed.”
Mitya was watching Joshua when Drake was explaining. Those blue eyes held so much rage that Dymka reacted. Those leopards hadn’t just been killed. There was more to it than that. Five men to his one. Joshua was no pushover. He appeared cool and easygoing. He had a killer inside of him that struck when called on. Mitya hoped the others realized that.
Jake drummed his fingers on the table. “That doesn’t give us a lot to go on. Drake, can you make inquiries as to what happened to those girls? What happened to the families of those girls? Where is everyone now?”
“This is fuckin’ thin,” Mitya said. “You have no idea where those five men came from, whether they were related, or anything about them.”
Joshua shrugged. “They had accents that would have put them from South America, but they spoke perfect English to one another. All five of them used those little girls, but two of them were the ones that did the torturing. The others didn’t so much as look up when the girls were screaming, so it was a common practice. Clearly, they’d seen it done before. None minded that the girls were bloody and broken, they used them anyway. That suggested they’d been together for some time, doing similar practices.”
“You didn’t get the impression they were related?”
“They could have been, but I didn’t stop to look to see if they had similar features. I took them apart. To me they weren’t human, shifter, or anything but vile scum. I might have been a little insane,” he admitted, and rubbed at his temples as if he had a headache.
“I would have done the same,” Fyodor admitted. “They would have died slow, and they would have died hard.”
Timur nodded and looked at Gorya. Gorya turned away from them. Sevastyan didn’t make a statement, but he looked at Mitya. Mitya knew Sevastyan would have done far worse to those men than Joshua could ever conceive of doing.
“We aren’t saints here, Joshua,” Mitya said. “Any of us. The bottom line is this: We have an enemy, all of us. He wants to sow suspicion between us, which, I’ll admit, I was buying into. They have infiltrated Joshua’s family. Jake’s as well. We have to be very careful now, because when we bring anyone new in, they could be a potential Amory.”
“Ania pointed out that he doesn’t have an endless supply of shifters,” Sevastyan added.
Mitya nodded. “She’s right. They don’t, any more than we do. We’ll get it out there that we found the notebook. That way, they won’t have a reason for continuing their attack on Ania or her house. I think they’ll back off for a while and then come at us from a different direction.”
“That makes sense,” Drake agreed. “And it gives us some time to investigate. This thing with Joshua is the only tie that is between us that I can see. I did help with the investigation into the Bogomolov family, but I had little to do with it. I can’t see that being a connection, especially when these sleepers have infiltrated a couple of years ago.”
He looked at Jake. “I’m sorry we brought you into this. I thought I could keep you away from the worst of it.”
Jake shrugged. “We knew there was that chance. In any case, we have the notebook, not anyone else. No one’s seen it, so at least for now, my name is still not connected, more than loosely as your friend, to any crime family. Eli is in the clear as well. He’s nowhere in there, because Amory left my house before he came on board. He had a recruit, he clearly states that, but the recruit hasn’t figured out what’s going on.”
“Most likely because you’re a paranoid son of a bitch and you don’t let anyone near your office. Amory was patient and worked his way up to security in the house,” Drake said. “Be careful not to let on that anything is different, Jake.”
“That may not be true,” Mitya said. “There’s a possibility that a copy was made of this notebook and sent to the Caruso family. Antosha drove from New Orleans to Houston and made a delivery. Most likely he glanced at the notebook and didn’t read it. Whether the Caruso family read it or it was stolen before they could, who knows, but we have to assume they read it.”
“Great. We’ll have to figure out a way to do damage control,” Drake said. “Watch your six, Jake.”
Jake gave him a look and then stood up. “Need to get home to my woman. Now I’m really paranoid.”
He took two steps and then the world seemed to come apart. A blast shook the house, hard enough to send nearly everyone to the floor. The sound was deafening. Windows exploded, sending glass in all directions. Gunfire erupted. Sprinklers went off as flames licked up walls. The small meeting room was intact, but no one was going to wait for another explosion.
19
“GET the women in the safe room!” Fyodor shouted and hit the button under the table so that the wall opened up to reveal an array of weapons as well as gas masks.
Mitya got to his feet, wishing he could see his woman. “Need to know she’s all right,” he said. “Sevastyan?”
Sevastyan stuck his head out of the room. The hallway was pure chaos. Through the doors opening to the great room, they could see a hole in the outside wall. Surprisingly it wasn’t as big as it had sounded, about four feet high and three feet wide. Smoke poured into the room along with dust and debris. Wood splintered, and great jagged pieces pointed toward the inside of the room like giant spears.
“Can that safe room stand up to explosives?” Mitya asked his cousin.
“Damn straight,” Fyodor said. “Made certain of it.” He was tossing weapons and masks to his cousins and the others in the room. “This has to be dear Uncle Lazar. He likes to make a big entrance.”
“Classic attack,” Mitya agreed. He’d seen his father do it a million times. He liked a big explosion to shock everyone, to kill as many as possible and then calmly follow up by entering the home and shooting everyone in sight.
The shock of the explosion would paralyze those Lazar attacked, making his appearance dramatic as well as terrifying. That wasn’t going to be the case. He thought he’d caught the cousins together and that they would be with their women. He had no way of knowing they weren’t alone, and each ally had brought their bodyguards with them.
There had been no one in the great room, so there wasn’t a single death. Timur was already directing his troops. He had the shifters all stay back, circling around. He wanted them to quietly take out any of Lazar’s soldiers they came across. Then they looked to Mitya. He knew his father and his methods better than anyone else.
“He will go after any woman or child. They’ll make certain you hear their screams. If possible, they’ll draw you out by dragging her in front of you and hurting her. Even raping her,” Mitya explained. “There will be another explosion soon. They’ll lob in gas, and he’ll come behind that one with his men. Do we have eyes on them? We need to stay away from the walls. If there are masks anywhere else in the house, tell our men the locations so they can get them. They’ll need them soon.”
He spoke to them as he slid weapons and ammunition into the loops on his coat, adding to his arsenal, but his gaze was on Sevastyan. He’d sent Vikenti and Zinoviy to check on Ania. Sevastyan gave a small shake of his head.
Mitya’s heart dropped. “Where the fuck is she?” he roared.
“She wasn’t with the other women when the explosion went off. She’d gone to the kitchen to get whatever had been prepared for refreshments. Vikenti and Zinoviy headed that way after her.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when another explosion ripped through the house, the shock wave even stronger this time. Mitya grabbed the heavy table for stability as the walls undulated and shook all around him. The blast was so loud, for a moment he could hear only ringing in his ears.
He felt desperate. He knew what Lazar was capable of. Worse, he knew Lazar would make Ania’s death slow and ugly, most likely uglier than anything Joshua’s killer shifters had visited on those little girls. Mitya had seen so many vile, depraved acts, so many types of torture in his lifetime, that the idea of his woman falling into his father’s sick hands made him crazy. For a moment he couldn’t think, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with the blast and ensuing chaos.
Sevastyan bumped him hard, and automatically, Mitya turned to follow him as his cousin led him out of the meeting room into the hall. The moment they stepped out into the hall, Kiriil and Josue fell in behind Mitya. Timur led Fyodor out, with Gorya right behind him.
“I put a tracker on her, Mitya,” Sevastyan said. “Take a breath, we’ll find her.”
“If that fucker touches her—” Mitya snapped.
“He won’t get to her,” Sevastyan assured over his shoulder. “She’s too smart for him, and she takes this shit seriously.”
The smoke bombs began hitting the floor, lobbed through the holes in the walls and broken windows. The men inside spread out, their gas masks protecting them as they slid into the shadows of Fyodor’s house. The room turned gray with fog and gas. The men were still. Waiting. Knowing Lazar’s men would come in shooting, expecting to find everyone inside disoriented, dead or dying. They thought they would have easy targets.
Mitya didn’t give a damn about them. He didn’t want to be stationary; he wanted to be running to protect Ania. He hissed at Sevastyan, who seemed to be staring down at his watch. He pointed up. Mitya slid the tiny but very powerful bud into his ear. It could pick up his whisper and deliver it to Sevastyan and any others who thought to use their radios.
“Where the fuck is she?” he demanded.
“I think on the roof. She’s definitely above us. Vikenti said the wall cabinet was opened and she must have armed herself and taken a mask. At least, there were several weapons missing, ammunition and a mask gone. He closed it back up just in case.”
Mitya took a breath, breathing in clean air while the room filled with tear gas. Fyodor was going to have a time cleaning the room. The blinds and furniture he could replace, but scrubbing all that wood and redoing the floors wasn’t going to be so easy. He tried to make himself think about that rather than the fact that his woman was out there somewhere and if she was spotted, Lazar would send every leopard he had to retrieve her.
Ania. Baby. Stay hidden. For me. I’ll let him skin my leopard alive if that’s what it takes to get you back. No self-respecting shifter would ever allow their leopard to take the brunt of torture or death. He meant it, though. He would give up his life in a heartbeat. He would take any torture Lazar wanted to hand out to him, and he would sacrifice his leopard for her. Dymka had already indicated willingness. The two of them would allow Lazar to do anything to them to keep Ania and Jewel safe. Mitya could barely breathe knowing Ania was out there somewhere unprotected. Dymka could barely restrain himself knowing Jewel was just as unprotected.
“She’s extremely intelligent, Mitya,” Sevastyan reiterated. “She didn’t defy you, she was caught off guard and she kept it together. She recognized the panel and she opened it. How, I don’t know, but she did it. She’s armed, and she’s got a mask. Her grandparents and parents trained her for any situation, and she knows we’ll come for her. She knows she just has to hold out long enough for us to get to her.”
Mitya couldn’t do anything about it yet. Lazar’s front team, his sacrificial pawns, were already moving toward them, coming in through the door that was down and the two holes in the side of the house. As a rule, Lazar sent that first team in to mop up. There were always five, and there were five now—crashing into the great room, guns blazing. These men weren’t aware of the fact that Lazar sent them in first because he considered them the most expendable.
Mitya shot the one bursting into the room and rushing toward the hallway. The man went down, gas mask and all, but twisted and rolled on the floor for a moment before rising. “They’re wearing vests,” he informed the others.
Calm had settled over him. Combat calm. He wasn’t the kind of man to yell and scream or get so agitated during a firefight that he lost it. Mitya was very centered, and the more chaos reigned around him, the cooler he was und
er fire. That stood him in good stead when directing his men. They were just as steady, following his lead. He took aim a second time, this time going for the head instead of the heart. As his enemy rose, trying to spray bullets into the shadows, Mitya squeezed the trigger once and watched him go down, this time to stay.
Sevastyan took aim at the second man nearest them. This man used his leopard to propel him to the center of the great room, his automatic spitting fire from one end to the other. None of those invading took aim at individual targets; that wasn’t their purpose. First, they mowed down everyone, wounded or not, and then followed up with a single bullet to the head to make certain.
Sevastyan’s target hadn’t hit a single person. There were no dead or dying in the great room. The room appeared empty. Sevastyan took his time, aiming at his opponent’s head and squeezing the trigger. The bullet went right through the gas mask and into his target’s eye. He went down, crumpling onto the floor, the automatic quiet. Timur shot a third intruder, while Drake and Joshua killed the other two.
Immediately, Mitya was on the move, rushing down the hall toward the kitchen, Sevastyan in front of him, Kiriil and Josue behind him. The kitchen was empty, but Dymka rose fast, catching her scent. She was at the end of her heat, but due to the continual interruptions, the cycle was lingering, drawn out a few more days. Jewel’s potent pheromones remained, calling to her mate. That meant every male leopard would be able to scent her as well.
* * *
• • •
ANIA didn’t like that Evangeline looked so pale. She was showing, the twin babies finally making their presence known. It wasn’t that Evangeline was big; she wasn’t. The illness had rendered her nearly unable to keep down food. Sometimes even water made her terribly sick. She’d lost weight rather than gained. Still, she never complained, not when Ania was around her. She looked tired, and Ania could see the worry on Ashe’s face.