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“But one of his men recognized me. Or he recognized Mama. He called me Nataliya.”
“Lots of people knew your Mama when we lived in Russia, printsessa. She was…” He shakes his head.
“She was what?”
For the first time since I saw him in New York, I see a flicker of emotion in his eyes. “She came from a very prominent family. She was the most beautiful woman in Moscow. She was highly prized amongst many.”
“Why did you both come to America?”
He looks behind me into the distance. “We were running from some people who wanted to kill us. Your Mama did a terrible thing.”
I blink at him. My mom was the kindest, most gentle woman I’ve ever known. What could she have possibly done that would have made them run so far and for so long? “What did she do?” I whisper.
His eyes dart back to me. “You look so much like her, printsessa. One day soon, you will marry into a good Russian family and make me lots of grandbabies,” he says with a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
“I don’t want to get married or have babies, Papa.”
He laughs softly. “Do not be ridiculous. I already have your husband in mind,” he says as he stands from his chair.
“What?” I frown at him as he reaches out his hand to me.
“He is from a good family.” He looks down at his outstretched hand as if to emphasize that I haven’t taken it. “And do not worry, I won’t tell him that you have been with any of those Irish pigs.”
The anger that has been bubbling beneath my skin for the past five minutes suddenly erupts out of my chest. “I did not endure two years being the plaything of the Wolf for you to marry me off to some man I’ve never even met,” I shout.
“Jessica,” he hisses, and something about the way he looks at me makes the blood freeze in my veins. “You will do as you are told.”
I am about to reply that I won’t when Marfa walks into the room. “Dinner is ready, Sir,” she says quietly.
“I have business to attend to. Jessica will be eating alone,” he snarls and then he strides out of his office, leaving me watching after him in a daze.
I sit at the dining table eating the delicious soup Marfa has prepared. Peering around the room, there is no doubt that the place is beautiful. It is full of antique furniture and enormous windows with thick, dark wooden frames. It should feel warm and full of character, but it has no soul. The staff here walk around the place like they’re afraid to speak. Nobody ever calls my father by his name, referring to him as Sir or Boss. There are at least a half a dozen bedrooms, but only two are occupied as far as I can tell — mine and my father’s.
Every day dozens of Bratva men come here and meet with him, leading me to suspect he’s high up in the organization. I should be doing something more. I should be finding the Wolf. But my father refuses to allow me into any of his meetings or to share any of the information he’s learned about the elusive assassin during these past years. I mean, if he was aware the Ryan brothers were reaching out to the Wolf to hand me back, then he must have heard some whispers about where he might be.
Thoughts of the brothers bring a lump to my throat. I swallow a mouthful of soup as tears prick at my eyes. I am so lonely here, yet, I never felt lonely in their huge penthouse. From the moment I arrived, they made me feel welcome. Why would they let me get so close if they were just using me? It makes no sense.
I place my spoon on the table as a wave of tiredness washes over me. I can’t seem to think straight lately. I need to shake whatever bug it is that I’m coming down with so I can refocus on finding the man who slaughtered our family — with or without my father’s help.
Chapter
Four
CONOR
Liam kills the engine of the SUV as we pull up in the side street opposite Alexei Ivanov’s mansion in Connecticut. From the outside, it looks like a fortress, but thanks to Shane’s contacts in the State department, we’ve managed to get our hands on a copy of the original blueprints of the property. Blueprints that reveal the hidden passageways that were made when the house was first built back in the 1920s.
“Are you sure we shouldn’t just blow the gates off and fight our way through there?” Mikey asks as he peers out of the window into the darkness.
“No,” Shane replies with a look of warning at our younger brother. “We need to do this with as little noise and disruption as possible.”
“But you don’t where she is. Or if she’s even in there?” Mikey sighs. He’s annoyed that he has to wait in the car and can’t get in on the action.
“Which is exactly why we don’t need to be drawing any attention to ourselves,” Shane snaps. “If she’s not there…” He doesn’t finish the sentence and I know it’s because he can’t bear to. He is as desperate to get Jessie back as we are, and although I imagine some of his motives are the same as ours, I recognize that he also wants revenge. He has a murderous look in his eyes that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
“So, we wait here while you two break in, find Jessie, knock her out and bring her back to the car through one of the secret passageways?” Liam asks, doing what he does best and trying to diffuse the growing tension in the car.
“Do we really have to knock her out?” I groan.
