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“What do you think? It’s getting riskier for her to keep this up.”
“She doesn’t seem too worried.” Levi shrugged. “I think she’s been coming at Lauren hard for so long, she’s not going to give up—not when she’s so close to getting what she wants. We need to make searching the area our number-one priority. Ash has a team, but I’m going to bring our whole staff out here. It’s going to be a manhunt.”
The fact that he was throwing every asset available at the task made me feel better—his firm was one of the best in the country for a reason. Due to circumstances beyond his control we’d fucked up today, but I still had every confidence in him. “Can I help?”
“About that. I’ve been thinking,” Levi said, but he didn’t say anything for a minute. “I know you want to help. But we all have our special gifts, okay? You isolated the stolen plate number using an equation—that’s something I couldn’t have done. In fact, I’m going to hire a new tech guy who can do shit like that all the time, because it really came in handy…”
“Were you about to make a point?”
“Yes. About your ability to contribute. You can help, but you should stay out of the line of fire and behind a computer, where you belong—and please don’t punch me for saying that. I mean it as a compliment.”
“Right.” All the fight had drained out of me, though, so I waited to hear what he had to say.
“I’ve done some research, but I’m wondering, what do you actually know about Zhao?”
I shrugged. “Probably not a lot more than you. She’s in her early forties, she graduated at the top of her high school, undergraduate, and graduate classes, she’s divorced with no kids, and she started Jiàn Innovations a few years ago. They’ve been successful in the Chinese market, but she’s made it clear that she wants a bigger piece of the global economy. Other than that, I know she considers herself above the law in China. She’s said repeatedly that she is helping to rebuild Shenzhen, and that her government has no interest in having her extradited.”
“And those seem to be the only details available,” Levi agreed. “But I’d like to know more. I’d like to know about her background, her ex-husband, and how her company got to where it is today.”
“So you want me to do your research, like some unpaid intern?”
Levi shrugged. “I want you do some more digging, and then use your superior intellect to help piece together more about her character. She must have some sort of weakness—but we’ve been letting her run us in circles, and we haven’t been able to find it. You and Lauren have been so busy playing defense, you haven’t had the opportunity to consider an offense.”
“Like what?”
“You’ll think of something.” Levi patted me on the shoulder. “Dad always said you were the smart one. Let’s see if he was right.”
Chapter 17
Lauren
Bethany met me at the house that morning. There were dark circles blooming like bruises beneath her eyes. “You look how I feel,” I told her.
Bethany gave me a tired smile. “You look worse than I feel.”
“I’m not surprised.”
“Have you heard anything?”
“Nothing after Li Na texted me and basically told me that she’d kill Hannah if I messed up again.”
“I’m so sorry.” Bethany squeezed my shoulder.
I nodded. “Let’s get to work so I don’t go crazy thinking about it.”
“I didn’t get as far as I wanted last night, so we really need to buckle down. Can we set up in Gabe’s office?”
“Of course.” I motioned for her to follow me down the hall. “He wants us to stay here for security purposes, anyway. It’s fine for today, but I need to get to Paragon later this week and hold an employee meeting.”
“Does everyone know what’s happening?”
“Everyone knows I’m working on some sort of deal with Li Na. And the board knows what the details are, of course.” I grimaced, remembering what Gabe had told me. “Which reminds me—someone on the board leaked the news to our international distributors, trying to throw the sale. With everything else going on, I forgot to mention it.”
“Someone on the board?” Bethany looked shocked. “Who?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“What’re you going to do?”
