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That information was going to shake Daria’s world apart.
And his, too.What a mess.He quickly ate the eggs and the extra toast she put on his plate. Thanking her between bites, he glanced at his watch. It was 0845. He had fifteen minutes. Jamming the food down, he gave her a look of regret.
“I’m sorry I have to leave you.” Because he didn’t want to.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of things around here while you’re at the meeting.YOUjust be safe, all right?” and she reached out, touching his hand curled around the mug of coffee.
“I’ll be fine.”
“What does it mean when Korsak calls you ‘Golden Boy’?”
“It means I’m favored. It’s status. Power.”
“Then he’s afraid you’ll usurp him and his position as leader of the team?”
“That’s what he thinks, but I don’t have a clue as to what the Don thinks.”
Shaking her head, she gave him a longing look. “Last night… it was wonderful sleeping beside you, Nik.”
“Yes,” he rasped gruffly, pushing the emptied plate aside. “I woke up with you in my arms.” He traded an intent look with her. “You are my heaven. This,” and he gestured all around himself, “is my hell.”
“I know,” Daria said gently, seeing the stress and regret in his eyes. “I have your back. You know that.”
“I do.” He stood, leaned over and kissed the top of her head. “I will be back here as soon as I can.”
The apartment became silent and empty after Nik hurriedly left. Daria sat there sipping her cold coffee, frowning. Hell, she’d rather have a sniper rifle in her hand than do this damned undercover work. She wasn’t good at it, didn’t know the rules and conventions of it. That left Nik carrying her as a responsibility, too. The man’s shoulders were going to break. She saw so much in his turbulent blue eyes as he left. He desired her. Wanted her. Yet, the activity level around them had shot through the roof, and there was no time for anything else right now.
Getting up, Daria went to the kitchen and cleaned up. She would retrieve her sat phone in a few minutes and check in with Jack Driscoll at Shield Security. There was no use bitching about being undercover. It was a done deal. Maybe he had some information for her. She had the sat phone number of Sergeant Mace Kilmer, but wouldn’t contact him unless ordered by Jack. Everything ran through her boss to her.
Chewing on her lower lip, Daria washed the dishes and put them in the drainer in the other sink to air dry after rinsing them off. What was Don Pavlovich going to tell Korsak’s team? How brutal a murderer was he? Pavlovich hadn’t risen to the top of the Mafia to become boss unless he was just as ruthless as Korsak. He might be more polished, smoother, but a monster lurked beneath his skin, too.
CHAPTER 14
Daria’s breath caughtas Nik opened the apartment door mid-afternoon without knocking first. She met his dark, hard gaze as he nodded hello in her direction, shutting and locking the door behind him. Standing in the kitchen, she said, “What’s going on?”
Nik laid his medical ruck on the floor near the door and came into the kitchen, rolling his shoulders. Leaning his hips against the counter, he watched her peel purple-skinned potatoes over the sink. “Bottom line? Pavlovich and his two security guards who are actually much more than that, grilled the hell out of Korsak on the drug numbers. He was sweating. I’ve never seen him so subservient before.” Pushing strands of hair off his brow, Nik lowered his voice. “I don’t think Pavlovich likes him personally very much, but as long as Korsak gets the numbers he’s wanting, he’ll let him continue to run the team.” He gave her an apologetic look. “And tomorrow morning, we’re taking off for the jungle. Korsak didn’t mention which village we’re going to, dammit.”
She put the potatoes aside, rinsed her hands and dried them on a nearby towel. Turning, Daria crossed her arms. “You’re still trying to get Korsak kidnapped?”
Grimly, he nodded. “Unless the CIA or Sergeant Kilmer tell me to back off, yes. Pavlovich changes nothing as far as I’m concerned. Kilmer and his marauders, as they call themselves, are ghosts. They’re good at snatching people.”
“But under Pavlovich’s nose?”
He heard the rising concern in her husky voice. “Yes.”
Rubbing her brow, she said, “We need to sit down, Nik. Tell me everything? I had a sat phone call with Jack earlier today and I need to share that Intel.”
They moved to the couch, sitting down close to one another. Daria curled up in one corner, a leg beneath her. “Langley thinks Pavlovich is asserting his rights to the territory, making sure the five teams in this area remain loyal to him. They still want Korsak to be taken. They don’t want Pavlovich because he’s too high on the food chain and it would alert those above him, which they don’t want to happen.”
“Makes sense,” Nik muttered, leaning his elbows on his thighs, frowning. “These two guards, Oleg Laskin and Pyotr Lukin, are Pavlovich’s right and left hands. They hide their power, what they do, and how much they know. But it became very clear to me, during the interrogation of Korsak, that they knew everything about the operation down here.”
“What does Pavlovich want?”
He snorted. “More production of coke, of course.”
“Can Korsak pull it off?”
Shrugging, he muttered, “It’s complicated, Daria. Korsak was sweating bullets, telling them that, to raise the production to that new level, more coca plants had to be planted by local farmers. It would take at least five years for those bushes to get big enough to start picking enough leaves off them to fulfill the kind of quota Pavlovich wants to achieve.”
