I stood, and she stood with me as if her body had mirrored mine without asking her first.
“Another way?” I said. “You marry me, or we’ll meet in court.”
“Sir, I’ll double the money. Triple it. Just—”
“We’re done here, Inna Grace.” I walked to the door as I pulled out my phone.
I didn’t need to say anything more. She would come to me herself. She just didn’t know it yet. I had enough ways to move a woman like Inna without touching her. She was already deeper into this than she realized.
I stepped out of the office with my phone already pressed against my ear.
Cole stopped me before I could get two steps down thecorridor. He waved at me from the seat. It was a wave that belonged at a birthday party, not outside an office where I finished rearranging his sister’s life. I walked toward him anyway.
“Boss,” Akim answered.
“Send an invitation to Iker for the auction,” I said, watching Cole grin at me as if we were old friends. “Make it personal. He shouldn’t miss it.”
“On it.”
Inna stepped out and walked to where Cole and I were. She grabbed her brother by the wrist and walked off at a pace that said everything she didn’t say while inside. She held her shoulders tight, and her walk showed she had lost but wasn’t ready to admit it out loud yet.
“Also, track my wife’s phone,” I said into the phone. “She looks like she plans to run away. I will handle the casino tonight.”
“Alright,” Akim responded, and I hung up.
What I needed was Iker. He would walk into tomorrow’s auction and see Inna standing next to me, wearing a million-dollar necklace and my name on her finger. He would approach me. Men like Iker always approached what they couldn’t explain. I get Iker, and Zachary would be mine to destroy slowly without him knowing.
Everything was in place. One plan, one auction, and one stubborn woman who still thought she had options.
Chapter Ten
Inna Grace
When Mum left, I barelyfelt it. Her absence folded itself into the rhythm of our days without leaving a visible mark. When I was young, Mum was always busy, and Dad filled every gap she left. She once disappeared for six months. Dad said it was work. She came back, and I believed him. When she disappeared for good, I kept believing it was work until it was just the three of us. Nobody said her name anymore.
Cole never knew her. He never asked, and nobody offered. The strangest part was that there were no photographs of her anywhere in the house. I began to forget her face slowly, the way you forget the details of a dream the longer you stay awake.
But when Dad disappeared, I felt it. The quiet hope that one day Dad and I would find Mum all went out. What was left with me was Cole and the responsibility of making sure he ate and lived.
When I refused to jump off that building a month ago, I decided to climb mountains for Cole. I meant it then. I would still do that, but this was different.
It was different to marry a complete stranger who looked as if danger were his second name. If he owned a small café and drove an old car with a broken air conditioner, I could have talked myself into it. But this man owned a building that reflected the city in itself. He sent lawyers to doorsteps before breakfast, carrying fake documents. And now he wanted me to stand in front of a room full of people wearing a $20 million necklace. I would be a target painted in diamonds around my neck.
I came to the bar because I needed to think. Thinking at home meant staring at the same four walls that had watched me spiral for the past two days. I needed somewhere with noise and drinks that could make you forget reality for a moment. But the problem was, I wasn’t supposed to drink.
I had two options, and neither of them was good. I had to marry him, as he said. Or find a man in this bar willing to pay enough for me to clear Dmitri’s money and walk away from the mess. I had scanned the room twice already. It was the middle of the day, and the pickings were thin. Nobody was looking at me anyway, which was its own kind of answer.
The marriage option sounded better, partly because of Cole, who had been grinning at Dmitri as if they had known each other from a previous life. Cole didn’t warm up to people easily, but something about Dmitri had him showing every tooth in his mouth.
I didn’t know what Dmitri actually wanted: me, or Cole, or both of us.
I looked down at the glass margarita sitting in front of me and immediately saw Cole’s face in it. It was the universe’s subtle way of reminding me I had left a nine-year-old alone in an apartment to sit at a bar and contemplate my life choices. He was fine. He was nine, not four. But the guilt sat there anyway.
There was also gastritis. The doctor warned me againstalcohol. One glass and I would be looking at a hospital visit. I could not afford to get drunk. But I really needed this drink.
A burst of laughter drew my attention down the bar. Two women sat at the far end, leaning into each other, polished from head to heel. One said something close to the other’s ear, and they both looked at me. My eyes narrowed.
I glanced down at myself. Still wearing jeans and the Coca-Cola shirt advertising a brand that had not paid me a single cent.
