I check Natasha’s phone and find he’s called again, and sent an answer to my text.
I’m sorry, it says. I didn’t mean for things to go sideways like that. Please give me a call, so I can explain.
Still nothing that completely clears Natasha.
I don’t type an answer. I’ll have to think of something I can say to bait him into revealing more, but first, I must do my homework, pulling on every thread I can find to unravel every secret Alex holds.
I start my cyberstalk. There’s not that much. His unmarried mother gave birth to him in Champagne, Illinois six months after moving to the United States from Moscow. No father is listed on his birth certificate, but he’s presumably Russian since she hadn’t left the country before her trek to the U.S..
She has the equivalent of a Master’s in Russian literature and taught Russian and Russian lit at the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana and now at the University of Chicago.
I can’t find any evidence that anyone pulled strings to get her a job, but she did have enough money to hire a lawyer to handle her immigration paperwork. I don’t find evidence of financial hardship, nor do I find any hidden caches of riches.
Alex’s cover story had been true, other than the false name he provided and the lie about his occupation. His undergrad was in criminal justice, and he was hired right out of college to work for the FBI. I’m surmising his fluency in Russian helped, especially with the rise in Russian mafiya cells across the country. They probably recruited him specifically to infiltrate one.
I get a sick feeling in my stomach when I admit the thought I’m trying to push away.
What if they hired him specifically to infiltrate us?
What do they want with Ravil? With us? Surely it’s more than taking down our weekly poker game although Nikolai does move huge amounts of cash as our bookie. He takes bets on all manner of things, online through dark web sites I have set up and in person.
I need to hack into the FBI, which isn’t the easiest task. Things are kept behind layers and layers of firewalls. But I’ll have to try. I set up some programs to start beating down the firewalls, then I move on to stalking my beautiful prisoner.
I sprout a chub just remembering what she looked like on her knees this morning, her berry lips wrapped around my cock. How she looked so damn willing. I was an asshole for letting her do that. The biggest mudak alive, but I’m finding it hard to be sorry.
Even if I can’t have Natasha, I don’t want to take that experience back. I’m glad I get to go to the grave knowing what it’s like to have watched Natasha come. God knows I’ve fantasized about it long enough.
I research the hell out of her mom’s trip to Russia, but everything seems totally above board. She’s staying with her sister in St. Petersburg. I see no evidence that she’s in hiding or has tried to disappear—not that anyone can disappear from me.
“Are you hungry?” The sound of Natasha’s soft voice makes my cock lengthen down my leg. I try to find some of my earlier anger toward her to shield myself against her allure.
“No,” I snap but make the mistake of turning to look at her. She freezes in the doorway where she’s holding a plate with two sandwiches, a mixture of shock and hurt on her expressive face. “Yes,” I change my mind when she starts to turn away. “Spasibo.” I thank her and hold my hand out for the plate, trying not to look her full in the face because I can’t stand what her beauty does to me.
I want to pull her onto my lap, nuzzle her neck, and soothe away all the harshness I’ve doled out to her, not just since Nikolai got shot but since she started giving me massages. Since she punctured the screen I use to keep a safe distance from anything emotional or sexual.
She looks at my screen over my shoulder, and I don’t bother trying to hide it.
“You’re stalking my mom.” She sounds offended.
“I told you I had to check out your story, amerikanka.”
She frowns at me. “And?”
I shrug. “I’m still investigating.”
I take a bite of the sandwich she made, expecting her to walk out, but she doesn’t. “Was one of these yours?” I ask with my mouth full, indicating the second sandwich.
She shrugs. “I can make another one. I didn’t know how many you’d eat.”
Gospodi, I’m such an asshole.
I hook my foot around the leg of the office chair Maxim had sat in and tug it closer. “Have a seat.”
Damn. Did I really just invite her to sit with me? What am I thinking? I’m already way too obsessed with my memories of her punishment this morning.
She takes me up on it, scooting even closer to look at my screen as she picks up the second sandwich. She holds it in both hands but doesn’t take a bite. “What would happen if you found out I did know about Alex?”
I whip my head around to stare at her. Her face is smooth, those sea-green eyes studying me. She seems wary but not terrified.
I narrow my eyes. “Why are you asking me that?”
She shrugs. “I want to know. Would Ravil… kill me?”
The idea sends a lightning bolt of fear straight up my spine, like the mere mention of someone killing her makes my body revolt. What would Ravil have us do to someone like Natasha? Would he order us to harm her?
No. In the few years my brother and I have been with his cell, I’ve never heard him give orders to hurt a woman, even if she’s trouble.
“Nyet.”
“What would he do?” She stares down at the sandwich she still hasn’t eaten.
I consider. Not so much because I think she deserves an answer but because I haven’t thought it through yet, and I should in case it happens. “We’d have to flip you,” I answer her honestly when I realize the only answer.
She takes a tiny bite of the sandwich and chews. “Flip me how?”
My gut churns as I consider the way we might flip her. We could threaten her mother. Throw them out of the building. Find anything dear to her and hold it hostage. There are a multitude of ways to use fear rather than violence. Ravil’s practiced at the art of theatre when it comes to making things happen. We don’t actually have to break that many laws—or that many fingers although that does still happen often enough.
But I couldn’t stomach any of those things with Natasha. No, there’s only one way I would allow her to be flipped, but it would require something of me that I’ve sworn I won’t give.
I turn back to my screen and lie. “Pressure points.”
She shivers. “Like what?”
“Enough questions, amerikanka.” I turn back to my screen, popping the last bite of the sandwich in my mouth.
“Why do you call me that?”
“Why do you think?” I say with my mouth full, playing the part of the asshole again. It’s the only role that feels safe with her. I close out the search on her mother and start down the path I’ve been most looking forward to: antagonizing Alex.
“Are you judging me?”
I stop clicking keys and look her way. “What? No. Because you’ve become Americanized? Of course not. You grew up here. I admire how well you fit in, that’s all. Nobody would even know you’re Russian, except for your last name.”
She sits back, finally digging into her sandwich. “I worked damn hard at it,” she says. “It didn’t just happen because I grew up here.”