Retribution (23 page)

Ryan sat down, crossed his
legs and relaxed back in the chair, though he was completely alert.
He was ready for anything and he didn’t trust Peter’s calm demeanor
especially since he heard him screaming in the hall minutes
ago.

“My men went back to the
house and it was blown to bits—ashes! There were firemen and cops
everywhere so they couldn’t get near it,” Peter stated while
sweeping his arm to the men in the room

Ryan’s expression gave
nothing away as he looked at them. They nodded to indicate that
Peter was right. Well, he knew that. He resisted a
smile.

“I’m thinking that after
your escape, they got rid of the evidence and relocated.” He stared
at him for a moment. “Is that what happened Ryan?”

“I grabbed your daughter
and we tore out of there like our asses were on fire, if that’s
what you’re asking. I didn’t stay behind and ask what they intended
to do after I escaped.

Peter’s face reddened. “I
don’t need your sarcasm. With the mood I’m in, I’ll fucking shoot
you despite what an asset you are to me!”

Ivan chuckled.

“Shut up Ivan, you’ve been
useless to me lately. I should shoot you too!”

That shut him
up.

Ryan remained unaffected.
“It was standing when Miss Nickolov and I left.” Well,
technically.

The older man crossed his
arms. “And how, exactly, did you manage that?”

Ryan didn’t
answer.

“I mean, how did you
possibly escape a house full of armed men? You were obviously
outnumbered.”

“I’m not working with them
Mr. Nickolov, if that’s what you are getting at. I certainly didn’t
shoot myself.” He heard Ivan make a noise of disbelief under his
breath. As usual, he ignored him. “As it is, they weren’t as smart
as they thought they were. I’m smarter.”

Peter was frustrated and
just about ready to explode. He was looking for someone to blame.
He turned around and faced the window with his hands on his hips.
These outbursts he’d been having were uncharacteristic for him, but
he was not in control of his empire like he used to be. If need be,
he would tear the city apart looking for these people that kept
threatening his family and are destroying his business.

“
If this was your family,
Mr. Casey, how would you handle it?”

He thought of Georgy, and
his wife and kids. “I’d kill them. I’d kill them all,” he answered
truthfully. “I would leave them to rot for the crows.”

Peter felt himself smile.
He couldn’t help but like this man. “You understand.”

“I understand what family
means. I would kill for them, I would avenge them, yes.” This was
quite an ironic conversation and Ryan had some serious trouble
suppressing his rage.

He turned and faced Ryan.
“If you understand this, then you know how important mine is to
me.”

You mean, money, power and
more money
, Ryan thought to himself. It
was hard not to let the sardonic smile spread across his face.
Peter cared about nothing else. However, he didn’t get where he was
by being stupid. This was leading to something. “I’d appreciate it
if you got to the point Mr. Nickolov.”

Peter released a breath and
nodded. He took his seat behind the desk and sliced an arm through
the air. “I worked very hard for this. I can’t have some amateurs
destroy what I have.”

“I have told you before.
I’m no assassin.” And he was certain that the men Anna was working
with were not amateurs.

Peter kept talking as if
Ryan didn’t say anything. “I have a big shipment coming in tomorrow
night by boat. The last two were hit. I lost millions. I need you
to lead this one. I need you there for the transfer.”

“I’m not a mercenary Mr.
Nickolov and I already told you my terms of hire.”

He pounded his fist on his
desk and his complexion turned ruddy again. “I don’t give a fuck
what you said. You singlehandedly took out those bastards that had
my daughter When half a dozen of these idiots couldn’t find their
dicks!” he waved a furious hand toward Ivan. “I need you to stop
these sonsofbitches from destroying my empire!”

“I won’t do it.”

Ivan took a step toward
him. Ryan felt it rather than seen it, but he called him on
it.

“One more step Ivan and I
will gut you like a fat fish,” he said in an even calm voice. The
deadly undertone was apparent. His eyes never left
Peter’s.

Ivan’s face distorted into
rage and he took another step.

Peter held his hand up and
Ivan stopped. He actually looked impressed at Ryan’s instincts.
“Jesus, you keep surprising me.” He nodded at Ivan, who looked fit
to kill, but stepped back. Then he returned his attention back to
Ryan. “I’ll double your salary.”

“I’m still not
interested.”

Peter’s jaw clenched and
his face was beginning to turn red again. “Fine, what is it you
want? How much?”

I want you dead, all of
you
. “There is no price. I’m here as your
daughter’s security. I informed you before, I’m no
assassin.”

“Everyone has a price. I
could have anyone look after her in my crew, and cost me less than
an eighth of what you charge. I only hired you to make her happy,
and she’s still miserable towards me. I wonder if you’re even worth
it Mr. Casey.”

Ryan took a deep breath for
patience. “You forget. I saved her life twice.” He finally shifted
his eyes to Ivan. “Could you do that?”

“You’re damn rights I
can!”

“Can you?”

“Yes!”

“I remember you on the
floor cowering with a dead woman when gunfire broke
out.”

Ivan lunged at him then and
Ryan moved quickly out of the chair, stepping aside and using the
large man’s own hefty weight to toss him to the floor with a
grunt.

“Enough!” Peter snapped.
“Ivan get up. You’re making a fool out of yourself.” He shifted his
attention to Ryan. “You are going to lead that transfer, or I’ll
find whatever family you have, and slaughter them. Don’t think you
know me Ryan.”

His threat didn’t affect
him at all and there was a reason. “I have no family.”

Peter looked taken back.
“That’s all you have to say?”

He shrugged.

“Does anything scare you,
at all?”

Ryan met the man’s eyes
unwavering. He didn’t answer his question. Instead he gave him
reasoning. “If you pull me off of your daughter they’ll grab her
again and use her against you. The way they keep taking her is to
show you that they can get to you. Soon you’ll be getting pieces of
Katya in the mail. Media attention will be through the roof next
time, and the cops will look further than just a kidnap murder. The
police are already suspicious because of Ivan’s long list of petty
crimes following the shooting at the boutique.”

“You son of a—“

“Shut up!” Peter shouted at
Ivan. “Did they tell you this?” he asked Ryan.

“In a matter of ways. The
police are already questioning the attention you’ve been drawing
this past month. It’s only a matter of time before they move in.
All of those political assets you think will help you, won’t.
They’ll break ties with you as soon as they realize the risk to
their own careers. Now, I can make a suggestion on how to deal with
these people, but I will not, under any circumstances waste my
talents on a drug transfer.” His eyes assessed Ivan, who looked as
though he wanted to shoot him. “You have plenty of men that can
accomplish that without me. I’ll only be another gun.”

Peter swore and turned away
for a moment. “You are a stubborn prick, but you are definitely not
just another man.” He stared out the window for a while, in
thought.

There were feet shuffling,
throat clearing and obvious impatience from the men in the room as
they awaited Peter’s decision.

“Do you think we can catch
them?” he asked after a moment.

“Yes. I’ll tell you
how.”

He turned back around,
facing Ryan. “I should kill you. God knows I want to just because
you’re so damn smug. However, you are right about the media
attention and protecting my Katya. For once, I’m going to listen.
Maybe it will change the outcome. If this doesn’t work, I’m going
to slice you into pieces and feed you to the sharks.” He took a
seat behind his desk again and waved an arm. “So talk.”

“Clear the
room.”

“What?”

“You want to know how, and
I want to help you. It’s just you and me.”

“No damn way!” Ivan
protested.

Peter stared at him in
thought, then he nodded. “Do as he says.”

“Boss—”

“Dammit Ivan, get
out!”

Ivan grumbled, and waved a
furious arm to the other men scooting them out of the room. After
the door closed behind them, Ryan started talking.

It was several hours later
that Ryan returned to his room. Katya was dressed in a casual denim
short navy skirt and stylish top. She was waiting in the chair of
his room that he usually occupied late at night. She stood abruptly
when he entered and was ringing her hands.

“Ease your worries. I’m
fine.”

She embraced him. “I can’t
help it. After everything I’ve discovered over the past few weeks,
I’m scared all of the time.”

He gripped her shoulders
and eased her back away from him. “I need you to stay focused. Stay
strong for me.”

She took a deep breath and
nodded. “I will. I’ll use every ounce of strength in me to keep up
the pretense.”

He smiled, “that’s my
girl.”

“I don’t know how much
longer I can do this though.”

“You have strength Kat.
More than you think.”

She shrugged. She certainly
didn’t feel all that strong after what she’d gone through. She also
never had the opportunity to find out exactly what was in her. She
always obeyed whatever her father asked of her; the private
schools, the social functions. The degree she was working on was
the only thing she managed to insist on from her father, and didn’t
seem to care that she was doing something with her life. “What did
my father want?”

“Me to help him with a drug
transfer.”

Dread coursed through her.
“You aren’t!”

He shook his head. “I have
a suspicion that someone close to him is feeding information to
your sister. I gave him a way to help figure out who it
is.”

“How?”

“Don’t worry about that
right now. Your father has asked to speak with you before
breakfast—alone.” She turned white and her bottom lip started to
tremble. “Kat, listen to me. If you go in there looking like that,
he’ll know that something’s wrong. He’s a very smart man. You need
to use what happened to you to calm yourself. Remember who he
really is and concentrate on that. Use the anger and hate you have
toward him. You need to lie convincingly.”

“I don’t want to do this. I
may seem tough at times, but he does frighten me.”

“He doesn’t care about your
emotional state, remember that. He’s fishing for information. So
he’ll be looking for things in that area. You tell him exactly what
I did. You didn’t hear or see anything, that they kept you in a
cell. He also doesn’t know that I called in the drone. He’s under
the impression that they blew it up to hide evidence after we
escaped.”

She took a deep breath and
nodded. She could do this. She had Ryan’s confidence in her backing
her up.

“Come, I’ll take you down
and wait outside.”

“Thanks.” She followed him
out the door and stopped at the top of the stairs. There were
people everywhere in the foyer and her father’s men were at the
door patting them down as they entered. “What—?”

“Your father’s big shindig
is tonight,” he answered while watching the action. They had just
started to arrive when he left Peter’s office.

“Oh gosh, I completely
forgot. I thought he might cancel it.” She started down the stairs
with Ryan close behind her.

“Well, I think that’s
reasonable that it slipped your mind considering what you’ve been
through.”

“If he still goes through
with it, you’re coming, right?” she spun to face him at the bottom
of the stairs. “I can’t do this without you.” There was clear panic
in her eyes.

“First of all, you can.
Secondly, I’m not letting you out of my sight, so yes,” he affirmed
quietly. The fear drained out of her expression and was replaced by
relief.

“Do you have a
tuxedo?”

Her answer was a wry
smile.

“Why am I not surprised.”
She laughed softly as she turned around and walked to her father’s
office. As per usual two men were standing outside of it. The door
opened at that moment and her father was shaking hands with the
event planner that he usually hired. This was one person Katya was
happy to see. She was actually a very smart woman, and very
friendly. She smiled when she saw her.