AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I can see it on her face: she’s a good kid, a principled one. Which is probably why seeing me down here is so hard for her to process. But she also loves Uri. Which is another reason this is hard for her to process.
She and Lev—they’re both just children.
“Listen to me: this is not your battle to fight, okay?”
Her nose wrinkles up. “What kind of person would I be if I just left you down here? I mean, they’re gonna revoke my feminist card.”
I smile as I put my hand over hers. “How about this? If I ever need help, I’ll ask.”
She arches her eyebrows. “Yeah?”
I nod. “Pinky swear.”
52
URI
Nikolai is waiting for me by the front door when I walk in. Judging from the harrowed look on his face, he’s attempted to spend some time with Lev.
“What happened?”
He bristles defensively. “What makes you think something happened?”
“Your shirt is wet and you have a constipated look on your face.”
Nikolai rolls his eyes. “I tried to get Lev to come swim with me. He took the suggestion personally.”
“Lev doesn’t swim. You know that.”
“We need to push him a little more. If he can step outside his comfort zone, then maybe—”
“Maybe what?” I demand. “He can be normal? He can be like any other twenty-two-year-old?”
Nikolai holds up his hands. “You know what? Never mind. What happened with the surveillance run today?”
I swallow my irritation and take the pivot. “Stepan and I caught Boris leaving his hotel in an armored truck with a full team. He went from there to Midtown and that’s where we lost him. He’s clearly scared.”
“And prepared.”
“He’s just delaying the inevitable. That’s all it is.”
Nikolai nods. “I might actually have an idea for how we can bring forward the inevitable.”
“Do tell,” I say, chucking my keys onto the foyer table.
“The littlekiskain the basement.”
I freeze. “What?”
Nikolai’s watching me a little too carefully for my liking. There’s a glimmer in his eye that he only ever gets when he feels like he’s about to be proven right.
“She’s been noticed, brother. Something you should have expected when you decided to parade her all over the city. I’ve got it on good authority that Sobakin is planning on targeting Alyssa now. Clearly, he thinks she means something to you.”
“She doesn’t.” The words fly out of my mouth without hesitation.
“Then you won’t have a problem using her to draw him out.”
I have to try very hard to control my expression. “You want to use her as bait?”
