Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 57779 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 231(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57779 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 231(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
“Nah,” Nero interrupts. “You don’t have any say in these negotiations. She’s going to tell you what she wants, and you’re going to give them to her as you should have done the past fourteen years. Do I make myself clear?”
Roy’s Adam’s apple bobs up and down before his head follows. “Yes.”
Nero looks disappointed. He has a bone to pick, and Roy’s scrawny legs are far too skinny to make a meal from. “Good.”
After butting his gun at Tasha’s temple, Nero releases her from her restraints so she can sign the paperwork we had pushed through in a hurry.
Her signature is messy but close to the one on her driver’s license.
Roy’s is far messier.
It demands a stern threat. “If you try to make out these documents are fraudulent, I’ll let Nero bring you back here, but I’ll ask him to place the feet of his chair on your crotch instead of your toes.”
His next two signatures are easily readable. They match the one on the marriage certificate I plan to shred the instant these forms are processed through the courts.
After pulling me behind him to shelter me from any more harm from these two lunatics, Nero gives them their marching orders. They scramble for the exits, their movements remarkably fast considering the circumstances of their detainment.
Once Tempy’s barks alert us to unwanted guests in the street and her dislike of Roy, Nero turns to face me.
I smile like my insides aren’t twisted up in knots when he says, “Now our second game of chase can begin.” He drags me forward before brushing his mouth over my kiss-stung lips. “This one will be nowhere near as fun as our first foray but just as rewarding.”
20
NERO
“Anything yet?”
Nikolai cusses like a fifteen million wholesale loss isn’t a drop in the ocean compared to what he has in offshore accounts when I shake my head. I understand why. The investigation into the missing coke isn’t about the money. It is the respect he’s endeavoring to return to the Popov name, and the stigma that he isn’t a man you should mess with.
“And not from a lack of surveillance. Roy and Tasha haven’t left our sight for a single second. If they know where the goods are, they’re keeping its location under wraps.”
Miranda helped me convince Nikolai that she was not a part of the sting that stole the equivalent of fifty million in street value from him by using the same investigative skills that’s kept me out of trouble the past twenty-five years.
She’s trusting her gut.
“I think we need to cast the net further. It is someone close to us, but maybe they’re not as close as I once believed.”
I hate the words the instant they leave my mouth. My gut got me to where I am, but I can’t continue waiting for Tasha or Roy to make their move.
The more time I spend on them, the less time I have with Miranda.
I haven’t touched her in days, and it is fucking killing me.
“Or perhaps we should bring them back and force them to speak.”
Nikolai doesn’t seem opposed to the idea. His curiosity and impending nuptials are the only things keeping his head in this game.
“You still think it’s them?”
I half shrug, half nod. I’m the most indecisive I’ve ever been.
There’s only one thing I am certain about.
“It wasn’t Miranda. That is the only thread of certainty I have.”
Nikolai mutters something under his breath about me being snowed under before he sits on the chair behind his big desk and pulls a cigarette out of a pack.
While lighting it, he speaks around the plumes of smoke its lighting inspires. “My ahren believes the same. She thinks you’ve got yourself a good woman. But…”
I could kill him for the delay.
“She knows how far a good woman will go to protect the man she loves.” I’m lost as to where he’s going with this. Thankfully, Nikolai isn’t a man to tiptoe around anything. “Could Miranda have stolen the coke to force you to face the truth on what you truly want?”
I pfft. And here I was thinking I did a good job at hiding my infatuation with my neighbor.
When Nikolai arches a brow, demanding a verbal reply, I say, “No—”
“Her wholesaler collects goods from the same docks we use to ship stock to the Yurys. She’s done the run with him previously. She’s smart as fuck. It wouldn’t take much for her to put two and two together.”
His attempt to soothe my matchhead short temper with compliments is pointless. “She didn’t do this. She wouldn’t.” I ball my hands, fighting like fuck not to turn our worded exchange into a physical one. “She would tack her husband’s dissected balls to the wall for me, but she wouldn’t…” My words trail off when I recall the last time I mentioned someone’s nuts being tacked to a wall.