Page 43 of Silver Sinner

I can't believe it.

Seated in the car parked across from Layla's apartment, why the hell am I watching Trik Barsukov, son of Pavel Barsukov, walk down those metal steps?

He walks with a swagger, dragging one hand through his hair to free the bun at the back of his head. Limp, blond hair falls in straggles around his thin face and he quickly scoops it all up again, then he climbs into a waiting red sports car and drives off into the night.

"Why the hell is the Russian Badger visiting my girl?" The words are strained. Technically Layla isn't my girl, yet that's how I see her. In all the years I've known her, all the years I've sat in her diner and quietly haunted her footsteps with admiration… has she been Russian mafia? Have I truly been that blind?

"What do you want to do?" Moses asks from the seat across from me. "Wanna go talk to her?"

I should. I should storm up there and demand the truth from her until she tells me everything I want to know, but for some reason I can't move. My mind is at war with my body. My thoughts are eager for the truth while I just sit here, heavy and limp, staring up at her apartment until the single window, warmed with light, goes dark.

"No," I say finally. "Not yet."

"Then what?" Moses softly clears his throat. "Do you want me to talk to her?"

He would be more effective, free from the shackles of affection, but that thought also curls tight in my gut. "No. I want to know what we're walking into before I confront her."

"You want a deep dive?"

"Yes." I tear my eyes away from her apartment. "Get me everything you have on her."

Two days later, I stand on the balcony of my penthouse and gaze out over the city while Adrian sits next to me, lounging back with his feet up on the railing.

"Do you think it was a honeytrap?" he asks around the handful of nuts he's casually tossing into his mouth.

"Layla?"

"Yeah." He pops another nut and crunches. "Maybe she was onto you from the beginning."

"And wore me down over the years with stale coffee and bad steak?" I shoot him a narrow glance and Adrian shrugs.

"Maybe. You're softer in your old age. Maybe she was just waiting for you to mellow out."

"I resent that. I'm wiser, not softer."

Adrian rolls his eyes and, after tossing the last of the nuts into his mouth, stands. "Sure. Well, whatever you wanna do, if you can give me a crack at the Badger, that would be amazing. I fucking hate that guy."

"Me too."

Adrian clasps my shoulder and squeezes, then he heads into my penthouse and leaves me to the cool night air chasing away the lingering warmth from the day and the quiet rumble of car horns and engines rising from the city below.

It's been two days since I saw Trik Barsukov leave Layla's apartment, and the not knowing has been twisting me up inside. I always prided myself in being able to read people, even from a young age. I could see what they wanted, what they desired and how to make them tick. Maybe Adrian's right. I've lost my touch with age.

"Boss?" Moses' voice cuts gently through my thoughts and he joins me on the balcony. "Drink?" He offers me a glass of scotch before I can even think of refusing, which I'm about to do until I spot the electronic tablet in his hand.

Maybe a drink is needed.

"What did you find?" No need to beat around the bush.

Moses sighs deeply and leans on the metal railing next to me, gazing out over the city. "Honestly? Not a lot."

"Not a lot—as in her history has been wiped because she's part of the Russian network, or not a lot because she's a boring person?"

Each tap of Moses' fingers on the screen makes my heart lurch. "Layla Cross. She grew up in Oregon to a mother and father who couldn't hold down a job. Father was in and out of prison a couple of times. Layla's grades were pretty decent until she hit fourteen, then it was all downhill from there. Many teachers lamented that she was a bright student with home difficulties. She ran away from home at eighteen and from there, I was able to track her to New York. She hitchhiked all the way here."

"From Oregon?"

Moses nods. "Guess she had big dreams. And a desire to put as much distance between herself and her home as possible. From what I could tell, her parents didn't notice her missing for months and when they did, they called the school and the school had to tell them she'd graduated. They never filed a missing person's report or anything. Basically, they didn't care."