Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 100416 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100416 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
She loved it.
Rustling on the line brought her back to the present and then Cillian was there, faintly breathless. “Keira. I was sorry to miss you earlier.”
“Me too.” She didn’t ask what he’d been doing. He wouldn’t tell her the truth even if she had. She cleared her throat. “I need a favor.”
“I’m listening.” Once upon a time, Cillian was the impulsive party boy brother. He’d grown up a lot in the last three years, and his business voice was almost as good as Aiden’s these days.
She took a careful breath. “I’m assuming that I’m on speakerphone.”
“You’re assuming right.”
There was nothing of the brother she adored in his words, but she’d expected as much. By calling, she was putting herself firmly in Romanov’s camp in a way that her marriage hadn’t. They could comfort themselves that she hadn’t had a choice in saying her vows, but that justification wore thin when she was calling and asking for an official favor.
No point in pussyfooting around. “One of our men was taken by Alethea Eldridge. He was tracking her and apparently got too close, and we need the last location on his cell phone in order to narrow things down and retrieve him.”
“What makes you think we won’t take that information and track her down ourselves?” This from Aiden.
She still didn’t look at Dmitri. It was hard enough to focus with him in the room, his presence soaking into the very air. “Because you’re going to give me your word that you won’t move until our men are in position. You have reason to hate the Eldridges just as much as we do—more after what happened to Charlie. I’m not interested in a pissing contest over who gets to carve the bitches up. My main priority is retrieving our man and ensuring they’re removed as threats.”
“You keep saying ‘we.’” Cillian cursed. “Are you one of them now, Keira? That didn’t take long.”
Her heart lodged in her throat, but none of her sorrow showed in her voice. “I married Dmitri. I would think that goes without saying. Will you help us or not?”
“What I—”
“Yes,” Aiden cut in. “Text Cillian the information he needs and he’ll track the phone. We won’t move unless it’s a coordinated effort, but we expect you to be transparent with your information.”
“Of course,” she lied smoothly. That call wasn’t hers to make, and Aiden should damn well know that. If he didn’t, it wasn’t her problem.
She finally shot a look at Dmitri and found him wearing a satisfied smile. He did this on purpose. He knew that nothing she promised would be binding, as long as he had some degree of reasonable doubt. Sneaky, sneaky Russian.
“In return, you will owe us a favor to be repaid at my choosing.”
“Deal, with the exception of demanding I come home. It won’t happen, and if you try to fuck with my marriage or my people, the fact that you’re my brothers won’t save you.”
Aiden cursed long and hard. “Damn it, Keira, if you’d just—”
“Thank you for the favor. I look forward to hearing from you.”
Keira ended the call. “What’s Mikhail’s cell number?” She typed out a text to her brother as Dmitri rattled off the information, but her mind was a million miles away—or two hundred, to be more accurate. She hadn’t missed the reservation in Aiden’s tone—or the fact that Cillian hadn’t spoken much after initially answering the phone. She’d made her choice, for better or worse. Dmitri over her family. She could comfort herself saying it was a choice she’d made to protect them—and it was the truth—but if she wanted to step into the role of partner, she needed to do it in full.
Which meant she had to let them go.
Something must have shown in her expression, because he studied her. “That was more difficult than you expected.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. It went swimmingly.” She might be willing to work with him while they figured this out, but that didn’t mean she was going to lay herself bare for his perusal. Fuck that.
The look on his face said he wasn’t about to let it go, so she acted before she could think too hard about what she was doing. Keira stood and shrugged off the robe—his robe—letting it fall to the floor to pool around her feet.
Dmitri inhaled sharply, and his gray eyes seemed to swallow up the light in the room. “You can’t dodge hard questions forever, moya koroleva.”
“I know. But I’m dodging them tonight.” It was easier to rattle off the words with a confidence she didn’t feel when he was looking at her like that. She took a step toward him, and then another.
His lips quirked even as he raked a look over her from the top of her head to her toes. “We tried this already, and it went poorly.”