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When I get to the seedy little café designated as our meeting place, I nod at the man at the register, and go straight to the back of it. I run up the threadbare carpet on the stairs and knock at one of the two doors on the first floor.
“Come,” Thorne calls.
As I open the door I see him rising from one of the armchairs and come towards me. He looks troubled.
“What’s wrong?”
“Vasilly is dead.”
“What?” I explode.
“He was murdered last night.”
I blink with shock. “How?”
“Stabbed in his room.”
“Stabbed in his room?” I echo blankly. In my mind I can still see him, nervous, but determined to do his best. He offered me Vodka that he had brought from Russia. We sat together for five minutes drinking and talking. A good man. And young. So young. He has a family too. A wife and a little girl. Then we shook hands and I left.
“They’re coming for you,” Thorne says.
I nod. I already understood that.
“Who did you tell?”
I can’t think. I don’t want to think. “Tell?”
Thorne scowls. “Who knew you were meeting him?”
“No one.” I swallow hard. “Only the girl. Only Raine.”
A shadow passes his eyes. “Then it is her.”
I shake my head. “No. It is not her.”
“I’m sorry, Konstantin,” he says softly. “I will start to make preparations. Do what you have to.” Then he goes to the door and opens it. I stand in the middle of the room and listen to his footsteps die away. My hands clench into fists. There must be another explanation. There must be. And yet, I know, just as Thorne did, that there is no other explanation.
My first instinct was right.
She was always the honey trap. Always.
I just made the mistake of thinking with my dick.
Raine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGwIaL0jOUg
Think Twice
* * *
We’re still sitting at the kitchen table eating the sweets and delicacies I brought back from Amalfi and talking about all the things I had seen when my phone pings with a text from Konstantin.
I’m on my way to your apartment.
Call me when you get outside.
I spring out of my chair instinctively.
“What’s going on?” my mom asks.
“He’s coming here and he wants me to go outside and meet him.”
“He, as in Konstantin?” Maddy asks eagerly.
I nod blankly.
“Well, ask him to come up then,” Mom says.
“Yes, ask him to come up. I want to thank him myself.”
I nod, but distractedly. My antenna is up. Something is not right. I knew something was not right from the moment he got that phone call as we disembarked from the plane. I leave the apartment and run down the corridor. I call the elevator and can barely stand still while I wait for it to arrive. When it comes, I rush inside and jam my hand on the button with the faded G printed on it.
I stare impatiently at the lighted floors as the old elevator slowly makes its way down. As soon as I get outside I call him. To my surprise, he is standing about ten feet away, watching me. I run up to him. His eyes are so cold and distant I come to a dead stop a few feet away from him.
“What’s wrong?”
“Let’s walk,” he says.
We walk in silence until we get to a small playground. He turns towards me.
“Vasilly is dead.”
My jaw drops with shock. “The Russian hacker?”
There is absolutely no emotion in his face. “Yes.”
“How?”
“Murdered last night in his room.”
“How can that be? You met him last…” Suddenly it dawns on me. “He was murdered after you left him.”
“No one else knew about my trip, about my meeting, except you.”
I take a step back in shock. “What? You don’t think I had anything to do with it. How could—” I stop suddenly. I can feel the blood draining from my face.
“Who did you tell?” he asks, taking a step forward. I can see hope in his face. He thinks I’m going to give him a name. He thinks I’m innocent. He wants me to be innocent.
I can no longer hide what I have done. “I didn’t tell anyone about the trip I swear, but I’m not innocent.”
The light in his eyes dies. They stare at me listlessly. “Tell me what happened.”
I freeze. This was not the way I intended to tell Konstantin of my secret, but here this was it. The moment of truth was here.
“I wasn’t at the auction by chance. I was paid $50,000 by a woman on behalf of her client to be there. All of the girls you saw that night were paid by her. We were paid to be there and if we were picked by you we had to switch one of the paintings in your office. I was told that the painting had sentimental value to someone important and you had stolen it and he wanted it back. I know it sounds like complete nonsense to you, and it does to me too now, but at that time I was desperate for money. I would have done almost anything to get the money to save Maddy and it seemed like such an innocent simple thing to do. What harm could it do? You have to understand, Konstantin, I didn’t know anything about your secret project or the kind of man you were. I just thought you were another selfish billionaire. I was stupid.”
