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She hated the knowledge in his smile, the feeling that he knew exactly how he affected her.
“As you wish.” He held out a hand. “We’ll work together. For now.”
She looked down at his outstretched hand. “You want me to shake on it with my husband?”
He stared at her. “Unless you’d prefer another method of sealing the deal.”
She swallowed against the lust that spread through her center at the insinuation, then took his hand and shook. “Partners. For now.”
He turned to face the doors as they reached the penthouse floor. “And what do you intend to bring to our partnership, wife?”
The elevator doors opened onto the penthouse.
“I have some ideas.” She stepped from the elevator without waiting for him.
25
It had been both a disappointment and a relief to hear that Tolya Sakharov had left Prague. He’d sent no word to Lyon about their conversation, and Lyon could only assume the man either didn’t have any information yet or didn’t plan to help him at all.
He didn’t want to think about the third option: that Tolya might turn against him, that he might feed information back to Russia.
By the time they were back on the jet and headed for Chicago, Lyon wondered if the whole trip had been an exercise in futility.
On the other hand, he was glad for the opportunity to put some space between him and Kira. He’d brought her to Prague because he didn’t entirely trust her alone in Chicago, but she’d flipped the script on him, had somehow turned the trip into an interlude that, if not exactly romantic, had been passionate and unsettling.
How did she manage to keep putting him off balance?
He didn’t like it, but he recognized the wisdom in her position. She was right: they couldn’t afford to be enemies. Not with Musa out there, trying to kill Lyon, and Russia pulling invisible strings on the bratva.
He spent the evening of their return catching up with Alek. There was no word on Musa’s whereabouts but word had leaked — probably by Musa himself — that he’d taken a shot at Lyon. Lyon’s leadership grew weaker every day that went by with Musa still alive.
After a tortuous night’s sleep during which he’d fantasized nonstop about paying a visit to Kira’s bed, he got up before the sun and went for a run. He showered and dressed, then met Alek in the parking garage.
“Morning,” Alek said as Lyon slid into the passenger seat of the SUV idling at the curb. “Where to?”
Lyon started to say the warehouse, then changed his mind. “Ludis.”
Alek put the car in gear, but Lyon had caught the look of surprise on his friend’s face. Lyon hadn’t been to the club since Kira had given it to him as a belated wedding present. It was meant to be a substitute for Samara, the restaurant Musa had burned to the ground during their turf war, but by the time the dust had settled, Kira was gone.
Then, Ludis had been a symbol of what they’d once had. What he’d believed they had.
What they might have had.
But it had been selfish to stay away. His men needed a more enjoyable place to gather, someplace other than the warehouse, which didn’t lend itself to relaxation.
“Any progress on the locations we discussed last night?” Lyon asked.
Alek shook his head. “I expect to hear more today.”
Lyon nodded. Musa was like fucking Elvis: sightings of him had been recorded all over the city.
Lyon didn’t put much stock in any of them, but he wouldn’t be lazy, wouldn’t take anything for granted. He and Alek had split the potential locations up between the men in Lyon’s inner circle, assigning each of them a place to scout.
Lyon hoped to rule them out by end of day, and he was already working on a list of other possibilities — places with a connection to Musa, childhood homes and neighborhoods, teenage haunts, favored hangouts.
Some were more obvious than others, more likely than others, but Lyon didn’t care. Musa was the biggest obstacle to Lyon’s unchallenged leadership of the bratva. He would turn the city upside down until he found his rival.
They pulled up outside of Ludis. Lyon surveyed the brick building: the simple entrance, paint peeling from the wood door, the tacky sign with one of the letters burnt out.
