Page 57

A name popped out at me, and I stopped. “That can’t be right.”

“What?” Anika’s chin pressed into my shoulder as she leaned past me to look. “I don’t know what the hell I’m looking at. I don’t know any of these people.”

“We do.” I frowned at the screen, flipping back and forth between the name I’d spotted and the alias that went with it. “Yvelt is on this list.”

Maksim’s head snapped up. “Yvelt Richton?”

“Who’s that?” Anika’s gaze ping-ponged between us. “Someone had better explain right fucking now.” Her voice pitched high at the end, and she leaned into Roman’s side, the first hints of hysteria making her breaths go ragged and sharp.

“Yvelt is our financial adviser. Has been for decades.” I swallowed the absolute rage and focused on the low simmer. “He was supposed to be recovering from surgery that night. We’d spoken to him multiple times that week, and he assured us he was healing and would be back to work soon.”

“Oh.” Anika’s brows furrowed. “But it was a masked ball. Maybe he just didn’t want you to know he would be there.”

“No.” Roman shook his head. “We’d made sure he had an invitation and he turned us down. He would have let us know if he’d changed his mind.”

One more string unraveled. We were beginning to see just how deep Sokolov had planted people into our lives. If he could get to Yvelt, someone we’d trusted with our money for years, he could get to almost anyone. And we hadn’t suspected a damned thing.

28

ANIKA

Kirill copied Yvelt’s credential and sent it through their secure network before I had time to much more than form a thought. My brain was fuzzy, my thoughts scattered as I tried to make it all make sense. Fuck that. Sense didn’t matter. What we did with the information did.

“I want every address he’s used since the masquerade.” Kirill’s fingers flew over the keyboard, opening windows faster than I could follow. “Homes, offices, hotels, mistresses, doctors. Check the hospital where he supposedly had surgery too. If the bastard bought himself a bandage and spent the night at the masquerade, I want the receipt.”

Roman pulled a second laptop closer. “I'm severing his accounts.” His keystrokes pulled up a spreadsheet. “And his access.” Each command killed another green light on the security board.

Maksim moved to the end of the table with his phone pressed to his ear, sending armed men in four different directions without wasting time threatening any of them.

I stood in the middle of the activity clutching Kirill’s whiskey. Was there any way for me to contribute?

I searched my memory and found nothing useful. The ballroom had been full of masked strangers, and everyone except the three men Alina sent me to meet became expensive wallpaper I had admired but not looked at twice. Yvelt could’ve stepped on the hem of my gown, and I still wouldn’t know his face.

“His primary residence is empty.” Kirill shoved his phone beneath Roman’s nose, nearly knocking it into his face. “Two vehicles are gone. Staff claims he left yesterday morning and didn’t provide a return date.”

Roman didn’t glance at the screen. “Money began moving out of his private accounts three days ago. Small amounts through ordinary channels. Nothing large enough to trigger an alert.”

“He knew we were getting close.” I swallowed a mouthful of whiskey and regretted it when the burn hit my empty stomach. “Or Sokolov warned him.”

Maksim ended one call and immediately started another. “Bring the household staff in separately. Yvelt stays alive when you find him.”

Kirill lifted an eyebrow.

Maksim ended the second call, and his voice dropped to one that sent goosebumps popping on my arms. “Temporarily.”

I'd known this was the reality of their world. Known it but did my best to hide from it. No more.

Roman stripped the last of Yvelt’s permissions from the system and sat back. He should’ve looked relieved. Instead, he stared at the dead access panel as if he expected the man to reach through it and take another piece of their lives.

“How bad is this?” I set the glass down and pushed it away before Kirill lost what remained of his drink. “Not the amount he could steal. How much did you trust him?”

They stayed silent too long, not looking at me or each other but simply staring at the computer screens.

Kirill closed the laptop with slow, steady hands and sat back with his spine straight as a board. It was the most still and controlled I'd ever seen from him, and that frightened me. “He was there before we became what we are now.”

Roman dragged a hand down his face. “He knew which accounts were real and which existed to attract attention. He helped build the walls around everything we own.”

“And we handed him the bricks.” Maksim placed both palms on the table, head bowed while he listened to the report coming through his earpiece.