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Dima told me the plan was my father’s idea. When I got back to Miami, I found out it was all a lie, a power play. Dima swore up and down to Dad that he told me to go to Olek with different terms and that I went rogue, just as he’d expect from Luka’s assassin protégé.
Dad bought his line of bullshit. He was so angry that I’d put our family at risk, he didn’t listen to a damn word I said. I remember Dima’s smug face and shit-eating grin. He’d won and I lost.
I never got a chance to tell Dad my side of the story. And days later, he and Dima were killed at Valentina’s wedding. He died without ever knowing the truth about what happened that night. He died thinking I put our entire organization in jeopardy, that I went against his orders. He died thinking I defied him and the family.
“The feeds I have show you walking into his building and into his private office.” The muscles in Hadeon’s neck cord. “We always suspected the Brotherhood 7 was responsible for his death. A couple of months ago, someone anonymously emailed me the security clips that prove it. And now that we know the truth, no alibi in the world can save your ass from what we’re gonna do to it.”
A chill lifts the hairs on the back of my neck.
Those feeds might put me at his office that night, but they can’t show me killing the guy since I never made it inside those walls. Someone fucked with the clips. Somebody who knew the truth and knew I was there to take the fall.
“What the hell is going on?” Another tall blond guy walks down another set of stairs behind Hadeon. I recognize him from the pictures I’ve seen. Petro Moroz, the smarter of the two imbecile brothers. He has whom I can only guess is Larysa’s baby in his arms. His face twists and he pulls a gun from his jeans when he sees me.
Larysa gasps. “Don’t you dare even think of firing a gun while you’re holding my baby.”
“I’m just supposed to let him shoot you guys?” Petro yells back. “Where’s the fucking Pack and Play thing?”
“You can’t stick her in the Pack and Play so you can have a goddamn shootout! My God, what is wrong with you?”
The yelling around me fades to silence when I look at the baby. My eyes are drawn to her like a teenaged guy seeing tits for the first time. Blonde curls glimmer like gold under the hallway lights. She shifts her chubby body, twisting in her uncle’s arms. My lungs squeeze out a strained breath when she stares curiously at me.
Her dark eyes pierce my soul, instantly shattering any disbelief that this is my kid.
Fuck.
I’m looking into a mirror…like, twenty years ago.
Everyone always said my eyes looked like my mother’s.
And this baby has identical ones. Same face shape, same nose, same lips.
A chill lifts the hairs on my prickled skin as a reminder that someone wanted this for me — a woman to love, a baby of my own.
Someone who is here right now and sees the exact same thing I do even though I don’t want to acknowledge it, someone who also knows denying the glaringly ugly truth would be futile.
Double fuck.
“Damn,” Petro mutters, taking a second to look between us. “She wasn’t lying. Daniela looks just like him.”
“Yeah, well, even if he knocked her up, it doesn’t mean he couldn’t have gotten to Tato before or after…” Hadeon’s lips twist into a grimace. “Whatever the hell happened between them.”
I somehow manage to drag my eyes away from the baby and fix my glare on Hadeon. The truth is glaring, but my alibi is damn tight, especially since Larysa was practically comatose after our escapades and all the booze she’d been guzzling. “You mean all the fucking?”
“Stop saying that. Or I’m gonna put a bullet in your brain, you motherfucker.”
“Sister fucker, actually. In this case, anyway.” An evil smirk lifts my lips. “Tell me what the security clips show.”
“The same car you drove to the meeting showed up at his office later that night. I had the license plate number on record, just in case. The feeds have you walking into the building and into my father’s office with a gun in your hand. Someone heard the gunshots and called for help. Then the car disappeared before the cops showed up. That’s all I needed to see.” Hadeon squares his shoulders.
“Not possible. I didn’t go to your father’s office after my meeting with him.” I stick to my story, silently cursing my power-hungry dead brother for fucking me beyond the grave and sending me into the lion’s den.
“The pictures we have tell a very different story,” Petro hisses.
“I’m not the one who killed your father. It was Arseny Siderov who pulled the trigger.” I don’t need an alibi. Arseny bore his soul to my brothers months ago when he had a gun to his head. Only problem is, now he’s dead and there’s no way to get him to admit to the truth. It’s our word and their bullshit surveillance footage against a dead guy’s truth.
Fucking fabulous.
“Arseny Siderov,” Hadeon repeats.
