Page 242 of Mile High Ruin

My fingers curl once. “You had her hide the tracker.”

“She hid the tracker in the plane first,” he says. “Not in Sloane’s bag.”

That answer isn’t what I expect.

He sees it and looks pleased. “The tracker was first placed on the aircraft before Bucharest, inside a service panel that nobody on the crew would check. It was enough to give Petrov the landing window. After the shooting, I had Camille move the blame where it would be most useful.”

Sloane’s hand touches my back. Only for a second. Then it falls away.

Iosef continues, almost conversational. “She opened the seam in Sloane’s bag and placed the device there after you returned it to her. It wasn’t elegant, but everyone was panicking, Hale was dead, you were bleeding, and your men were looking outward for the threat instead of inward.”

“What about Hale?” I ask.

Iosef’s expression barely changes. “Unfortunately, Hale was just collateral.”

The attack on Sloane in the aircraft had not been part of Iosef’s plan. Hale was a vile man who found his own opportunity, and then Petrov’s men killed him because the tarmac didn’t care who deserved what once bullets started moving.

Collateral.

I want to break Iosef’s face for that word alone. But I wait. Because he’s talking, and men who talk usually want something more than death.

“Why?” I ask.

Iosef’s smile fades a little. “Because you made us small. For years I kept the numbers balanced while you played king. I cleaned your money, buried your losses, grew assets no one else even knew existed, and every man around you still looked through me as though I was a clerk who happened to sit close to power.”

“You were trusted.”

“I was used.”

“You were paid.”

“Money is not the same as authority.”

Unlike Petrov, this isn’t some twisted form of revenge.

“I offered Petrov information,” Iosef says. “Not everything. Never enough to make myself disposable. Just enough to weaken you and make him dependent. Petrov wanted revenge. I wanted the structure that would remain after both of you tore each other apart.”

“You thought you could inherit my house?”

“No.” He smiles again. “I thought I could build a better one from the pieces.”

Sloane’s voice comes from behind me, shaken but clear. “And Mila?”

Iosef’s eyes move to her. I hate that. I step slightly, blocking more of her from him.

“She was never meant to vanish,” he says. “That became inconvenient.”

“You told them I took her,” Sloane says.

“I encouraged the conclusion. You made it believable by running,” he says.

“And the attack at my house?” I ask.

“That wasn’t me, but my hunch is your sister did it,” he says. “Sneaky little thing, it was the perfect timing to get away. If Camille hadn’t gone psycho and tried to attack me after getting spooked, I might have stopped that.”

“You’re sick, and twisted,” Sloane says.

Iosef cocks his head. “Maybe, but you know what I’ve realized? I don’t need you, just as I don’t need Petrov. I’ll become a king by my own right.” He cocks his gun at me. “And I’ll do it by burying you and your precious little toy.”