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Hans probably didn’t realize just how much information I knew about him and our family’s operations. Since he’d never gotten his hands on the information in Rafe’s safe, he could only guess what we had on him. Maybe that could work to my advantage. If I could draw him out, maybe we could trick him into incriminating himself in some way. The idea of being anywhere near Hans again made my skin crawl, but it might be the only way to ensure that he was put away.
My hand went to my abdomen. If he and Jakob weren’t put away, they would always be a threat to me and my unborn child, their own niece or nephew. I shuddered at the thought. Whatever fears I had would have to take a back seat when it came time to bring them down. This was about so much more than my personal history with them. It was about keeping my child and the man I loved safe. I looked over my shoulder.
Rafe was devoted to me. If I didn’t come up with a way to end things with my brothers once and for all, he would put himself at risk to protect me.
But I would have to be careful and strategic. Leaving Rafe wasn’t an option. I understood that now. If I left, he would follow. There was no place I could go where he wouldn’t track me and nothing strong enough to keep him away. Especially now that I was carrying his baby. Rafe would only endanger himself more, trying to find me.
Which meant that I would have to come up with a plan to draw my brothers out that didn’t involve drawing them away from New York.
CHAPTERTWENTY-EIGHT
Rafe
The next day, I wasn’t sure how things would proceed. Now that I knew Diana was carrying my child, everything took on a different meaning. Part of me wanted to scoop her up and hide her away somewhere safe, but she’d never go for that. No, my little tigress wouldn’t care for being caged.
Hell, she’d probably shoot me if I even tried it. I grinned. Her feral side was a surprising turn-on. I loved that she was gutsy enough to take on anybody even if the man in me wanted to protect her from everything that could possibly harm her.
But from the moment we’d woken up, Diana had been relaxed, if a little shy. After another bout of vomiting that she assured me was normal, I’d brought her some hot tea and crackers in bed. Everyone else was busy, and we pretty much had the place to ourselves. It was odd for me to not be actively working right now. I was used to keeping busy, but Noah hadn’t assigned me any new cases lately. I knew he was probably trying to give me some space to figure out things with Diana.
After lunch, Diana was walking back to the hallway that led to our room. I grabbed her hand.
“Let’s watch a movie.”
She bit her lip. “Is that okay? No one else needs that room?”
“No, everyone is out on cases. It’s just us here.”
She relaxed slightly at that, obviously not comfortable in the penthouse just yet, something I hoped would change with enough time.
“Okay, that’s fine. What do you want to watch?”
I led her to the sofa in the living room, getting her comfortable and covering her legs with the throw blanket on the back of the couch that I was sure had been Lucia’s doing. Then I picked up the remote.
“Let’s see what we’ve got here.”
Noah had pretty much every movie channel available, so I was sure we could find something.
We were just past the opening credits on a popular new horror movie when Matthias appeared in the doorway to the living room.
“Hey, can I have a word?” He looked at me and raised an eyebrow.
I knew then that whatever he was about to say must concern Diana. “It’s okay. You can talk in front of her. It’ll save me the trouble of relaying it all to her later.”
Diana stiffened in my arms. No one had said anything directly, but I could read her feelings clearly. She wasn’t sure who to trust or whether the others trusted her. Truthfully, I wasn’t sure if Noah or any of the team had reservations about helping Diana, and I didn’t fucking care. They would give her the respect she’d earned or else.
Matthias looked between us uncertainly but then shrugged. “I have news about the Jewel of the Sea.”
Diana sat up so fast she almost bashed me in the eye with the back of her head. “You found it?”
Matthias shook his head. “Unfortunately, the news isn’t that good. I didn’t find it, but I was able to confirm that it was sold on the black market a few years ago. There was a corresponding increase in ORUS financials right after the sale.”
“So it was Orion who stole it,” I said.
“It looks like it. Not that we didn’t already know that. It’s unlikely that anyone but an ORUS-trained operative would have been able to pull off a heist of that level without leaving a trace. But still, now that I’ve confirmed the sale, we have a starting place for tracing the stone’s movement. The buyer was in Romania. That’s something.”
“Yes, it’s something.” Diana put her hands over her mouth. “I thought that I’d resigned myself to it being lost forever. You’d think it wouldn’t be such a huge deal since it’s been gone so long. But it’s the last thing I had of my mother’s.”
“We’ll get it back for you, baby. No one can trace the untraceable like we can.” I kissed the top of her head softly. I would figure out what needed to happen to get that stone back. Just because Diana wanted it.
