He didn’t answer her. His fingers continued moving in her hair. His heart beat a little faster, thudding against his chest.
“Of course, that’s what you have to do. Someone has to get to the truth. That’s what you meant when you said you weren’t that much different from the men who killed my parents, isn’t it? But you’re wrong, Timur.” She turned onto her stomach, propping herself up on his chest so she could look into his eyes. “You aren’t like them at all.”
“Baby.” He couldn’t look at her. He refused to lie to her.
“No, you’re not. You’re trying to protect your brother and Evangeline. And me. Probably everyone. You aren’t killing someone for money or for personal gain. You aren’t following some crazy man’s orders to hurt someone as much as you can just for revenge or some sick, twisted perversion of what a lair should be.”
There was Ulisse and what he’d like to do to the man who had betrayed them all. Still, what was the point of finding his woman, being given that gift, if he didn’t actually become a better man? That was up to him. She saw him this way. As the white knight charging up on his white steed—or in his case—leopard—to save the day.
“If I were to question these men, Evangeline won’t like it. She’s become …” He was at a loss for words. He didn’t express how he felt often and certainly not about his brother’s wife, but she had somehow become special to all of them. Mitya and Sevastyan as well. He didn’t want to disappoint her or have their relationship strained. “She did something for all of us we never thought possible. Somehow, our leopards calmed in her presence. None of us had one shred of hope that such a thing would ever happen, but it did. Not just for Fyodor, but for all of us. You do the same, at least, that’s what the others told me, but none of the other female shifters do that. Evangeline was our miracle. Hurting her would be …” He trailed off.
“I understand,” Ashe said. She rubbed her chin on his chest. “Still, she has to be protected, especially from these men. They would hurt her more than any other. She loves that bakery, Timur. If they used it as a distribution center for opium, it would break her.”
“It isn’t going to happen,” he told her.
She laid her head on his chest. “When do you have to talk to them?”
He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got some business to take care of. Drake is getting her brothers here first. I want to clear them so Evangeline knows they aren’t in any way trying to hurt or use her.”
She smiled. He felt her warm breath right through the weave of his shirt. “You came back to check on me and on Godiva.”
He decided to be honest. “I came back because I needed to be with you, even if it was for just a few minutes.” He didn’t care if that made him too vulnerable.
“Whatever you need, Timur.” She pressed kisses up his chest to his throat. “I am very much in love with you, as shocking as that is to me. I want to be whatever you need.”
“You already are.” He knew if he asked her, no matter that she was sore, she would let him have her. She’d welcome him, actively and without reservation, participate no matter how rough he got. She would slide down his body and give him a blow job if he asked her, and she’d do that all while looking up at him as if she adored him. “I needed to hold you, baby. Just feel my arms around you.” That was the truth and his voice rang with honesty.
Ashe smiled at him and once more settled her head on his chest, ear over his heart while both arms went around him. They lay together for at least ten minutes, before she drifted off to sleep again. He held her for another ten after that.
Temnyy, can we leave them for a little while? He knew his leopard would feel precisely where Godiva was in her heat cycle.
For a few hours, Temnyy conceded reluctantly. His mate might be sleeping, but he didn’t like being away from her where he couldn’t get to her quickly, especially after the challenge from the outsider the night before.
Timur almost wished the cat had told him differently. He moved out from under Ashe carefully, whispering to her to go back to sleep when her lashes fluttered and she made a soft sound of protest. He stretched after he stood, staring down at her the entire time. His woman. She was soft, and yet she had pure steel running through her. She would stand with him and she’d do whatever it took to protect their family. She was the right choice.
• • •
NO crime boss ever really thought they were going to get hit in broad daylight, especially if they knew, as Ulisse did, that they were under surveillance by the Feds. The team had spread out, each coming in from a different direction. They were good at disguise and blending in with neighborhoods. This one was upscale and gated. Ulisse had neighbors and he made certain to fit into the neighborhood. His yard, a very large one, was well manicured, with wrought iron gates and cool green foliage surrounding the huge home.
His electricity had been giving him problems on and off for the last hour, appearing to short out. When the call went out, the household was assured that a truck would arrive within a two-hour time period. Just shy of that, it rolled up to the parking area, the logo perfectly displayed, and two men jumped out, both dressed in overalls and carrying two boxes containing tools. Both wore baseball caps with the logo of their place of work. At the door, they presented their ID to the security guard who asked for it. They were let inside.
Six minutes later, a carful of kids, teens living in the neighborhood, sped through the streets as they did every day after getting out of their private school. As they came around the corner just in front of Ulisse’s neighbor’s house, another vehicle came around from the other side. The two cars collided. As they were going at a good rate of speed, the crash was loud. A horn got stuck, airbags deployed, girls screamed and chaos ensued. The driver of the other car leapt out and confronted the driver of the teens. Neighbors poured out of houses.
Outside cameras were pointed in the direction of the wreck. The doors of the surveillance van parked down the street opened, and two men rushed over to see if they could help the crying victims. The front door of Ulisse’s house opened and the two men in overalls emerged from the house and walked back to the truck. Both men got in and the truck was started, but they seemed to be looking at the accident with some surprise. After a couple of minutes, three security guards emerged and went up to the truck. After a brief conversation, they waved and walked across the street to the dark sedan that had been parked there for the last couple of hours. They drove away.
“What the fuck, Timur? Couldn’t Fyodor just call me without all the melodrama?” Ulisse demanded.
Timur sent the traitor a small shrug. “You know him. He’s secretive. That’s how he stays alive. Besides, he was worried about the threats his informant heard against you. Whoever it is has a plant on your security force. We find out who, you can take care of it. In the meantime, you have the two you absolutely trust.” He glanced in the rearview mirror to make certain the car followed. Rodion was in the car with the two men.
“Your text caught me by surprise,” Ulisse admitted. “Although, come to think about it, I’ve interrupted conversations between a couple of the newer soldiers. I walk into the room and they stop talking immediately. If it’s one of them I’ll cut off his cock and feed it to him.” He glared out the window. “Emilio actually had the balls to ask me to incriminate myself because he thinks I might be informing the Feds. He got hit twice. I’ve got a lot riding on his shipments getting through. He better not be behind this.”
“I doubt if Emilio would take on someone of your caliber, Mr. Mancini.” Timur added a little bit of deference to his voice. Just enough. He wasn’t a man given to speech and Ulisse didn’t know much about him. Timur always made certain to fade into the background when the heads of the various territories were in the same room with Fyodor.
Ulisse nodded. “Elijah maybe. He’d have the balls, but not the reasons.” The man fell silent until they entered a warehouse. As soon as the car behind them entered, Timur indicated for the crime boss to get o
ut of the truck. “We’re switching cars. The Feds can track both these vehicles through the city and if we want to bring anyone to you, we don’t want a trail of cameras picking up your every move.”
“Clever. Fyodor thought of everything.”
Timur shrugged. “He’s a careful man and a good businessman. A man to have on your side.”
Ulisse threw him a quick glance as if trying to discover whether or not Timur was trying to convey something to him. Timur wasn’t looking his way, but sent a quick meaningless smile to the two security guards with Rodion. They were already at the black SUV with tinted windows. Timur slid behind the wheel and Ulisse got into the front passenger seat. Rodion took the very back seat with the two security guards in the middle seat. Essentially, if Timur gave the signal, Rodion would kill both guards instantly. He hoped that wouldn’t happen as he didn’t want to drive around with two dead bodies in the car.
He drove as sedately as possible until Ulisse accused him of driving like an old lady. Again, he just shrugged. “We don’t give cops reasons for stopping us.” The car swept up the drive leading to the Arnotto mansion. Ulisse looked out the window. “You have a massive amount of security and fire power.” Everywhere he looked a man was stationed with a semiautomatic visible.
The crime boss stepped out of the car, his two guards flanking him immediately. Timur led the way around the house toward a side entrance. “I’m not to take any chances with your life. There’ve been too many attacks recently so I stepped up security on Fyodor, and now, with this threat to you, he wanted it doubled.”
He led the way down the hall to the small, hidden door leading to the cement rooms down below them. It was cool in the hall and he led the way, staying in front of Ulisse while his two guards stayed right behind him. “This meeting room is protected. Elijah has one in his home as well. No way can the Feds record a word, no matter how good their equipment.” He walked right into the first room and turned back to face Ulisse.
Ulisse’s smile faded and a dark scowl took its place. “What the fuck?”
Behind him, Kyanite kicked the door closed, stepped behind the guard nearest him and slit his throat. Rodion did the same with the second guard.
Ulisse tried to pull a gun, but Timur stepped into him and slapped him so hard it rocked the man backward. Timur followed and repeated the slap a second and then a third time until Ulisse was against the wall. Timur spun him around and slammed him face-first into the concrete wall. He was leopard strong and every slap, his grab and the way he shoved Ulisse, took its toll on the man. Timur patted him down, removing weapons and brass knuckles and his cell phone. Only then did he turn him around and, grabbing him by his shirt, forced him to walk to the chair bolted to the floor in the middle of the room.
“I don’t like traitors.” Timur spat on the ground at the crime boss’s feet. “I don’t like that you sold out my family thinking Lazar would give you a better deal when he sent you young girls to sell. There’s not much about you I do like, so if I were you, I’d tell me whatever I want to know immediately, because I know more ways to hurt you then you can imagine.”
“You’re making a mistake …”
Timur shook his head. “I don’t make mistakes. You got greedy. You wanted to be Elijah Lospostos. You wanted his power and the respect the council gives him. They give him respect because he doesn’t sell out his friends the way you did. Lazar Amurov is my uncle. I’ve known him since I was a boy. He’s cruel and vicious and loyal only to himself. He would have eaten you alive.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about …”
Timur’s slap knocked out two teeth. Ulisse nearly choked on his lies.
The crime boss could only stare in horror at the bodies of the two men he’d brought with him, the only two men who knew who had sent him a message. Fyodor had texted him that an informant had said there was a threat against him and one of his security guards was involved. He was sending Timur to get him. Tell no one else, especially his guards, other than his most trusted. Bring them with him. It had been that easy.
Fyodor opened the door and stepped through. He glanced down causally at the two dead men and then walked around them to pull up a chair opposite Ulisse. He was a good distance away so as not to get a speck of blood on his clothing. His silence made Ulisse turn even whiter, his eyes rolling in his head.
“Tell me about the Tregre brothers. Beau and Gilbert. How did you get involved with them?”
“Fuck you, I don’t know …”
Timur punched him, three to the face and several more to his gut. He used half the strength the leopard gave him, but that was harder than any human could hit. He stepped back. “I could go at this all day. A week. A month. I haven’t gotten started. I have my tools laid out, drills, the electrical shock, that’s always fun. I know you’ve seen the results. I can pull all your teeth. That’s fun for you as well but you’ll still be able to answer me. Have some fuckin’ dignity.”
Ulisse spit blood over and over. He sat up slowly. “They came to me. They were the ones who came to me. Said they had a sweet deal going and wanted to expand. I heard them out. They made sense.” He spat more blood.
“They brought you the opium, and you sent it out of the country. To Lazar. You already had the pipeline to him through the trafficking. No one traffics without Lazar’s fingers in it somewhere,” Timur said. “So, you used that same pipeline.”
He nodded. Coughed. Spat more blood. “I think you broke something in me.”
“How did you get the idea to sell our family out to Lazar?”
“I asked Beau why he didn’t take such a sweet deal to his son-in-law. Evangeline is his daughter, so why didn’t he go to Fyodor instead of me? I wasn’t going to get caught in something Fyodor wouldn’t touch. He said there was family trouble in Russia and Fyodor wouldn’t do business there.”
Timur glanced at Fyodor to see his reaction. “You just took it on yourself to point the finger at us?”
“I told Beau that I did business with Lazar Amurov and that Lazar put out feelers, that he’s got them all over for Mitya, Fyodor, you and the others. Beau mentioned to me that sooner or later someone was going to tell him where you all were, which is true.”
“Why would Beau say anything at all to you about the family? All he cared about was the opium getting through.”
He spat again and tried to look at Timur through his swollen eyes. “Both Beau and Gilbert liked to be paid bonuses. I didn’t get the opium unless I supplied them with girls from time to time. They knew Lazar supplied the girls to me because the girls told them.”
Timur’s stomach dropped. He couldn’t imagine what Fyodor was feeling right at that moment. Evangeline had escaped from this family of vile leopards because her grandfather had a reputation of hurting, even killing, women. Now, if this was true, and Ulisse couldn’t possibly fool a leopard—which meant it was—her father and uncle were the same.
“Did they supply Lazar’s hit team with scent-blocker?”
Ulisse frowned. “They gave me something to give them, yes, but it didn’t make any sense to me. Said no one would know they were there. They had the entire floor plan of the house drawn out and said a window in the den would be left unlocked.”
Timur glanced at his brother. Beau and Gilbert had come to the house with Ambroise, but they hadn’t taken a tour of the house. Ambroise had been the one to ask and be shown around the house with Evangeline. Had Beau or Gilbert left the poolroom long enough to find and unlock a window in the den without being seen? His team would have escorted them if they’d left that room.
“How many snipers did Lazar send after us?”
Ulisse shook his head, groaned and coughed again, this time gurgling. “He doesn’t want any of you dead. Not before he gets here. He had a few men here and then sent more after …”
“After?” Timur prompted.
“Just fuckin’ kill me, you bastard,” Ulisse said.
Timur stalked to the tool chest and brought it b
ack to place it on the floor near Ulisse’s feet. “You make me have to get this shit out, I’m going to use it on you,” he threatened. He kept his tone as cold as ice and just as casual, as if he didn’t care one way or the other.
Ulisse swore in his native language, but when Timur started to open the toolbox, he shook his head. “After I told him about Fyodor and Evangeline.”
“What about them?”
“How he was so gone on her. He sent the others after that. He told me she wasn’t to be killed, none of you were.”
“So why the snipers?”
“I’m telling you, there were no snipers.”
Timur heard the ring of truth in his voice. If Lazar hadn’t sent snipers then Anton Lipin had acted against orders. Why? He spent the next half hour repeating questions and circling back to the sniper, but it was clear Ulisse didn’t have any more information for them.
He spent another hour getting the exact pipeline Ulisse used to send girls to Lazar and how he got the ones from Lazar. From there he needed to know if Emilio was involved with trafficking or if he was part of the conspiracy to take down Fyodor. Ulisse’s face was smashed and unrecognizable by that time and he wasn’t capable of lying. Emilio wasn’t a part of any of it. Ulisse hadn’t wanted to cut him in.
Fyodor finally nodded, and Timur didn’t hesitate. He slit Ulisse’s throat and moved tiredly away from the man who had been a crime boss a good part of his life.
“Now we know for certain Evangeline’s father and uncle are up to their ears in this mess. If anything, they created it. They went after her bakery and sold us out to Lazar.” Pulling off his gloves, Timur tossed them onto the floor where blood pooled.
“I don’t know how I’m going to tell her. She was so happy her family came to dinner last night, particularly her brothers.”
“We don’t know if they’re in any way involved.”
Fyodor heaved a sigh. “You’re going to have to find that out, Timur.” He hesitated. “I’d like to question them myself.”
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