Page 3 of Devil's Retribution
“Who knows what motivates a person? You can look through the information yourself, if you ask me, your brother found out something he shouldn’t have. You know all billionaires are dirty in some way,” Dimitri pinched the bridge of his nose. “They always know a guy who knows a guy. They always owe money to people they shouldn’t or hop into bed with guys like us for help pushing a deal through, and then hop right out again when it’s time to keep up their end of the deal. But the difference between them and us, is that a spoiled, rich piece of trash like Graves doesn’t have any integrity. He’s never seen consequences for his actions so he just figures he can do whatever he wants, and never pay for it.”
“If you’re right,” I muttered, impatient for that laptop, desperate to see what Dimitri had gathered. “If you’re right, then Graves is going to see plenty of consequences.”
Plenty indeed. Dear God was that bastard going to pay.
Chapter 2
Viktor
Once Dimitri had gone, Tolya, Alexei, and I gathered around my laptop to take a look at what he had left for us. Whoever his computer man was, he was amazingly thorough. He had been monitoring internet traffic for mentions of Leon Kozlov. It had taken him years, but he had finally gotten a hit. And what a hit it was.
Charles had been communicating with Leon prior to his murder, about what, was unclear as the message made reference to another conversation. But it was obvious that Leon had information on Graves that he was threatening to tell someone, Graves had tried to buy his silence, but my brother had refused, saying it was a matter of honor.
That gave me pause, what had my brother discovered? Whatever it was had ultimately led to his death, as just days before Leon’s murder, Graves had been communicating with local mercenaries. A significant amount of money had changed hands between them via overseas banks.
Once we’d gone through enough to know what we were dealing with, the three of us exchanged horrified glances. Alexei was especially upset. “Are you kidding me? This guy was using unencrypted, non-anonymous emails and texts to hire mercenaries? How in the hell didn’t he stumble into a government honeypot along the way and get popped?”
I stared at the evidence. Charles might have thought he was being sneaky, but now that we had caught up with him, his blatancy and stupidity stunned me.
It probably shouldn’t have. The news was full of the antics of billionaire manchildren ruining businesses, families, and entertainment venues while convincing themselves that their ignorant, impulsive decisions were actually brilliant. Charles had to have numerous employees across all his businesses, and every last one of them was probably living in fear of the next bad decision by their sixty-something brat of an owner.
The paper trail more than proved Dimitri’s suspicions. By the time we got through it all, I was seething with triumphant rage. Finally, I could put a name to the source of my loss. Finally, I could avenge Leon’s murder.
But not everyone was on board with my plan to do so.
“Graves is single, paranoid, and spends most of his time flying from helipad to helipad—from his super-secure penthouse to his businesses and back again. No social life to speak of. No way of grabbing him in transit.” I tapped my lips with a finger. “That means we have to draw him out.”
“How?” Tolya’s blunt features were tense with frustration, we were all feeling it. We were inches from having Leon’s murderer in our hands, but first, we had to get past his damn security.
“He has a niece, his late sister’s child, and grandnephew. They’re his only family.” I pushed aside my distaste for such tactics and plowed on. “We take them both, put them in a secure location, pretend it’s a kidnapping for ransom. When he comes out from behind his palisades to pay up, we grab him.”
“Woah! Wait a minute.” Alexei put his slim hands up in a pleading gesture. “You’re talking about kidnapping an innocent woman and a kid.”
“Yes, I am,” I replied impatiently, trying to ignore the growing horror on his face, or the way Tolya shifted in his seat. “Not harming, not interrogating, just taking them and holding them for a few days. Just long enough to draw our Mr. Graves out into the open.”
“Who is this woman?” Tolya asked. “How old is the kid?”
“Emma Graves Martinez. She’s a psychiatrist working for the Smithfield Children’s Center downtown. And the kid’s five.” I brought up one of their photos together, a very pretty, smiling woman with golden-brown eyes and hair, almost too curvy for her sensible skirt suit. She and her uncle sat together cozily at someone’s wedding, smiling and laughing with each other like they were as close as parent and child.
On her other side sat her son, Nick, maybe four in the photo. Small, with black hair and blue eyes like my own, engrossed with the little action figure he had brought with him. Cute as hell, just like his mom. There was something about him that looked a little familiar, but that might have been my imagination.
“Graves raised her and her sister after their parents’ death. The sister died a few years ago, so those two are the only close family he has.”
“She has a doting billionaire uncle and she’s still working full time? Weird,” Alexei was still frowning. I could tell he was going to fight me on this, and I didn’t blame him. If there had been another way, I would have gladly taken it. “I don’t like it. This isn’t us, Viktor. it’s really going way past what we normally do when civilians are involved.”
I scowled at him. “So you think I should waste the lives of our brothers throwing them against his security measures instead? I told you, the woman and child will not be harmed.”
“And if Charles doesn’t cooperate?” Tolya stared at me pointedly in a way that made my anger threaten to boil over.
“He’ll cooperate,” I snapped in a tone that permitted no disagreement. We were going through with this, even if my lieutenants had qualms about it. Even if I did.
And I did. But it didn’t seem like we had much choice.
“I want a man on Emma. I want her every move watched. Get an idea of her schedule, her habits, when she picks up her kid from preschool, everything. We need a chance to grab her with a minimum of drama or potential harm.”
Alexei shook his head mournfully. “Boss, the kid’s five. Even if it doesn’t wreck her, it will sure wreck him. Can’t we find another way?”
My anger rose and I glared at him. “Do you have a workable idea for a better way to handle this?” I said in a deceptively soft voice. “Because I’d love to have a plan that doesn’t involve traumatizing kids, but we seem to be short on ways to do that.”
