“Our cameras were infiltrated seconds after I headed to P’s.” He peers at me beneath lowered lashes. “I assumed that was you. You often say only fools record themselves doing something incriminating.”
Our cameras are wired to the same network as the one protecting P’s, so his reply has credit. I would have cut the feed if I were given the chance. I was too busy nursing a throbbing jaw before coercing a fighter off the ledge of a skyscraper.
“Your girl smacked me in the face.”
Nikolai’s smirk is more smug than sorrow-filled. “She told me. You kinda deserved it.” With a jerk of his chin, he demands Nero to our side of the compound. I fell so far down the rabbit hole in my head, I hadn’t realized a handful of Nikolai’s highly-ranked soldiers had joined us. “Show him the printout I gave you.”
This isn’t a paper version. Nero is all about electronics.
“What does it say?” I ask after taking in a two-worded text in a foreign language.
“I have Ana,” Nikolai and Nero say at the same time.
Before I can ask who Ana is, Nero skims past a report of texts, calls, and internet usage for a date three and a half months ago—the same date of my ‘supposed’ accident—before he stops on an image of a woman who looks oddly similar to K. Her only downfall is her attractive face doesn’t make my pulse thud in my ears.
“She’s also owned by Achim,” Nikolai advises, his tone somewhat annoyed. He was all about the whores before he fell dick first in love, but even then, he never forced a woman to sleep with him. Just like me, his kink isn’t sex slaves. “He loaned them to Vladimir. Larks say that’s why he returned to collect them when I killed Vladimir.”
I jackknife back, shocked.
Nikolai killed Vladimir?
When I spot the truth in Nikolai’s humored gaze, I slump low in my chair. I thought only drugs could fuck with my head this much.
Who knew a tire wrench could cause so much damage?
After working through the truckload of information I’ve been bombarded with, I ask, “Did Achim take any of the other women?” I’m hopeful we’ll have a reason to respond. If Achim doesn’t own the women under his command, he doesn’t get to keep them. Point blank. That’s how things in this industry work.
My hopes get crushed when Nikolai shakes his head. “But…” He leaves me hanging on a knife’s edge for so long, sweat beads my temples. “He technically doesn’t own K anymore. I do.”
What. The. Fuck?
Hearing my silent question, Nikolai shoves a dirty piece of paper under my nose. I swear I’ve seen it before even with it being an industry I’ve never dabbled in. It’s a sales receipt for a woman named Kristina Svoboda. Nikolai paid one point two million dollars for her a little under four months ago.
“When did you say you and Justine hooked up again?” Now isnotthe time for jokes. I’m just hoping a little bit of playfulness will stop me from pinching my gun against Nikolai’s temple. He’s my brother, my best friend, but the violence roaring through me right now is so temperamental, not even he is safe if this document is legitimate.
The gun stuffed down the back of my jeans grows less heavy when Nikolai mutters, “I don’t pay for whores. Never have. Never will. But…” He lifts his eyes to mine. They’re the same dangerous pair I’m used to seeing. “I could pretend I haveifrequired.”
“You’d do that for me?” If I need any more clues on how fucked-up your brain gets when it’s smashed in with a tire wrench, I don’t now. Nikolai took me in when I was nothing but a homeless-looking rat with a wish to die. He’s already proved how far he’ll go for the men in his crew. It’s why he’s so well respected, and the very reason I have no intention to leave his crew any time within the next decade.
Not needing to clarify my shock, Nikolai stands to his feet. “Give me the night with my woman, then we’ll head out by dawn.” He shifts on his feet to face Roman. “Find out where they’re holding the sale. I want to go in heavy but quiet.”
Sale?
What fucking sale?
Before I can voice my concern, Nikolai returns his eyes to me. “We will get K out, but if she’s responsible for hurting myAhren…” His words trail off. He doesn’t need to say more. His eyes are very telling. K will be dead.
I’d be worried for her if I could feel anything over the thud of my pulse in my ears.
Twenty-Three
Sales Docket Number 12574
Achim Novak killed me. He strangled me until my lungs stop screaming for air, and my body went limp.
Then he revived me.
Now, I’m to be sold to the highest bidder.
