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"Diamonds. Look, Igno had a big-time deal going. Arms. Supplies. He was empire building. And that was the price. So he was going to pay the arms dealer in diamonds, which was what the crazy fool wanted. Dove, that's what she called herself, she hijacked his deal. Antonio had the diamonds. But mid-transport, they had a car accident. She swapped his diamonds for fakes. Same pouch, same everything, because I told her ahead of time what it was going to look like."
"So you made a deal?"
"The old man would have fucking bled me dry. It didn't matter what I did for him. So yeah, I made the deal. Our deal was she'd give me a cut."
"And did she?"
Lohman nodded. "Yeah. She gave me three of the diamonds. I stashed them because obviously I knew what to expect. I slowly used them to buy more property abroad. International kind of shit. Everything was cool. Igno was pissed, obviously, when Dove vanished. Years later, I’d worked my way up in the organization. I was one of the advisers, and he was still bleeding me, man. Still squeezing. And then I see Dove. I’ve got a kid, a girlfriend, not that Antonio knows anything about them. Anyway, I'm at a fucking corner shop, and there she is, walking around as if she's not bloody hiding.
“We both knew what we'd done, but neither one of us wanted any trouble. But then she finds me at my house. I had to sneak out to talk to her. She wanted to know if I'm going to tell Igno I saw her because she knew I still worked for him. But I had no beef with her. And if he found out what I had done, he'd be after my head. I told her such. She threatened me. I told her to fuckoff. And then she threatens my wife and kid if I ever told Igno that I had seen her.
Then she says she has some even better deal for me. Some kind of real estate deal. Something Igno wanted to buy, but the investors wouldn't let him have a cut. She said she'd give me a chance to get in on the deal. When I asked her how I was going to manage that because that takes big money, she said she’ll give me more diamonds."
I pushed back and started to pace. "So she helped you find an investment. Why?"
"Mate, I don't know. I thought maybe it was payment to shut me up. I was supposed to meet her a few nights later. Except when I went to pick her up, she was twitchy in a bad way. Real tense. On edge. She shoved me back in the car, told me to drive, and told me she needed something from me before she’d give me the diamonds. She had a pouch of them. A good lot that I was supposed to use to buy into this investment."
"Okay, what did she need you to do?"
"She needed me to plug a flash drive into one of the mainline computers for five minutes and then unplug it."
"Okay, that was it?"
"Yeah, and then she wanted me to find her a solicitor. Someone hush-hush who wouldn't say a word. I gave her a name. She gave me the flash drive and told me once I'd done it, I'd find the diamonds."
"And?" I ran my hands through my hair. He was killing me.
"And what?"
"And did you fucking do it?"
He wiped at his nose with the back of his hand. “Next time I went to Edinburgh, a pouch of fucking diamonds was in my post box along with the name of some bloke from Croatia who could make my money look clean. I used that to buy into this investment company."
"And you did it with the diamonds that she stole from Igno?"
He nodded. "I never saw her again after that."
"So you didn't kill her?"
He coughed. "Are you fucking kidding me? The woman was a fucking ghost. Sure, in the early days Antonio liked to send me out like I was the hammer. You know, beat people up, dispose of the bodies and shit. But her? She was that kind of spooky shadow that you hear about in your nightmares. I couldn't touch her. Then she vanished and I never saw her again."
"Then what the fuck do you want with Kaya?"
"The woman I saw at the auction was the spitting image of Dove. Younger, yes, but she looks just like her mother. All that pretty brown skin. You know, I’d never fucked a bla—"
Before I knew what was happening, I lunged myself at him and grabbed him by the shirt. "What the fuck did you say?"
"Easy, mate, easy."
"I'm not your mate."
"Fine. Fuck, sorry. Anyway, she looks exactly like her mother. I didn't know she had a kid, but it didn't take me long to figure it out. She looks about twenty, which would explain a lot about why Dove took off and he’s had a bounty out for Dove for twenty years. And there was a woman with her face. Right in front of me. I saw a chance to use her."
I cursed under my breath. "Fuck."
Lohman licked his lips. “And as for the other bird, Elise, Igno and her dad go way, way back. He owed Igno a lot of money, so he essentially sold her off to you to gain access to your company and pay the debt he owed. But she fucked up and didn’t start paying off quickly enough, so Igno had her dealt with."
I scowled. "Was it you? Did you place the bomb?"
