She smiled and pressed close to him. “I’ll tell you, but first you have to kiss me.”
His hands landed on her hips, intending to nudge her backward, but her words stopped him. He figured at this point, she was doing this for the conference room camera. Probably hoping to cause Kira the same pain she was in over losing her shot at the princess-cut diamond ring.
He figured she’d say anything to get him to kiss her, but she happened to have said the one thing that would work.
She couldn’t know who he was or what he was after. No one outside of NSWC and FMV knew exactly what happened on the base last Tuesday. The shooting was attributed to a lone gunman and Kira’s name was nowhere to be found in the news reports.
But he couldn’t be obvious, or she’d wonder why he was eager to know her secret.
He stroked a thumb along her jaw. She was a beautiful young woman. Young being the operative word. “What’s your game here, Nadia?”
He was sick at the idea Kira would see this. It would bring back Apollo’s betrayal and the hurt of seeing him with Staci. But this was the job they’d both signed on for. He had to see it through.
“She can’t have him. He’s mine. For years, I have waited. She shouldn’t have come. I warned her.”
The text Kira received her first night in Malta. Nadia was the source. Freya had the number. Now she could match it to the phones connected to the villa’s Wi-Fi.
“You should be asking me to take her away, then, instead of trying to seduce me.”
“Grigory will never let you take her. He made a deal.”
“She doesn’t belong to Grigory. Or Luka. Or Reuben or even Aleksandr.”
“Do you think she belongs to you?”
“I wish. But no. Not even me. She’s not property. You are not property.”
“Ha! I have been property my whole life.”
He feared that was true.
“You should quit this job. Find another. Move out.”
“My passport is Russian and in the hands of my employers. I’m here at their whim.”
That was probably illegal, but he had no idea what Maltese laws were regarding household staff and foreign workers.
He leaned down and brushed his lips over hers. “What did you do, Nadia?”
“Nothing bad. I sent a message for Reuben, using Aleksandr’s computer.”
He kissed her again, lingering a moment longer. He whispered, but the earbuds would catch his words for the team in Virginia. “For Reuben? Why for him?”
She pressed her mouth to his and slipped her tongue between his lips. He responded lightly, then pulled back and waited for her whispered answer, delivered directly into his earbud microphone. “He promised me if I sent the message, she wouldn’t come. But it had to be from Aleksandr’s computer, or it wouldn’t work.”
He moved to press his lips to her ear. “What did the message say?”
“Gibberish. Something about German children or chocolate and a small stream.”
Kinder—the last name of the gunman—meant children in German. It was also a popular brand of chocolate made in Germany. He’d bet money that stream and creek could be used as interchangeably in Russian as they could in English. Little Creek.
He slid a hand down her back and over her butt, hating the action, but he needed to keep her on the hook as he asked the last question. “When did you send this message?”
“Monday? No. Tuesday. Why does it matter? She is here. Reuben lied.”
No. Reuben hadn’t lied, but he had failed.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Reuben dropped down on the plush bench across from Kira. Her portrait was behind him, and she faced the painting along with her hostile brother. It was strangely comforting to have it in the room, as if their mother was with them too.
“You wish I’d stayed dead, but now that I’m alive, you might as well use me to cut a deal with Grigory, is that the idea?”
“Make lemonade out of lemons…silver linings. Choose your cliché.”
She was the lemon and the cloud. That was fine. She wasn’t exactly thrilled with his renewed presence in her life, but strangely, he scared her less than Luka did.
Her thoughts about Reuben were beyond complicated.
“This is all surreal,” she said, deciding to be honest. “I remember you. I remember us. You were a good big brother. I wish you’d told me at the gallery on Friday instead of playing games.”
“But you always loved my games.”
“I was three.”
“Closer to four.”
