Chapter Twenty-One Seraphina
Chapter Twenty-One
Seraphina
I was determined to finally finish my morning cup of coffee. Fourth cup’s the charm. I looked up from my mug and over at Reed and Alex at the breakfast bar, eyeing me as if they knew exactly how Ryder and I had spent our time apart from them.
Alex lifted his cup, eyes meeting mine as he sipped his coffee.
Yeah, he was just like my brother. Probably a lot older, but still. That knowing little smirk he hit me with after he lowered his cup to the counter was proof of that.
And now I missed Joaquin. Not that I ever stopped missing him, but he was currently at the forefront of my mind, and I had to get through the rest of my story without crying.
“Lainey give you a hard time?” Ryder’s question did a bang-up job of stealing my focus. Well, more like the mention of his ex’s name. I’d rather think about some faceless woman than remember the pain of my past, though.
I really had no business being jealous of this woman, or the fact they still worked together post-split. And yet there I was, wondering what she looked like. How long they were together. And why in the world would she ever break up with a man like him?
“Of course she did, but we bought ourselves time. Not too much,” Alex answered as Reed opened his laptop. “So, you two didn’t finish without us, then?” He shot Ryder a lopsided grin, like there was some double meaning there.
Oh, we finished all right. Was I blushing?
I’d become a totally new person, or maybe a better version of my old self, ever since Ryder had walked into my life.
Almost too quickly, because my brain had yet to play catch-up with my body.
My heart was a confused pile of mush stuck somewhere in between the two speeds of fast and faster that my body was locked on to.
“We decided it’d be best for you to hear everything, too,” Ryder said, pulling off casual better than I could.
“Ah, okay, so what were you doing all that time? Dishes?” Alex’s comment earned him a less-than-discreet elbow from Reed. “See? He really isn’t a people person, not even with me.”
“ Especially not with you,” Reed grumbled without looking up from his screen.
“I’m not really a people person, either,” I let Reed know, and he glanced at me, giving me the slightest of nods. “So, um, where did I leave off again?”
I looked over to locate Ryder. He was standing alongside me with his back to the counter, an ankle crossed over the other, and a fresh cup of coffee in hand. “You told Ezra your real name and that your parents were killed, worried he’d figure out you weren’t Anna.”
“How’d you pull that off?” Alex asked, drawing my eyes back to him, and my stomach tightened at the brotherly reminder all over again. Same dark hair, eyes, bronzed skin, and, from what I could tell, humor.
Stalling, I blew on my coffee as if it were too hot, which wasn’t remotely the case.
“Well.” I lowered the mug, drumming my nails against the side.
“An enemy of my enemy is my friend.” There it was.
My so-called battle cry. My mantra. I’d let it loose.
Let them hear it the way I had said it last night in the fight club.
“I told Ezra that I changed my name and moved to Miami with one mission in mind: that I wanted to destroy the people who murdered my family, and I’d do anything to make it happen.
I told him I assumed we shared the same enemy, since I discovered his brother-in-law was the original target. ”
“Damn.” Alex pushed away from the counter and stood. “That’s brilliant.” He repeated his words in Spanish, adding a bit more flavor to them, and I couldn’t help but smile. “Hiding behind the truth. Smart.”
From my peripheral view, I spied Ryder standing tall without the support of the counter. I waited for him to speak, but when he didn’t, I took that as my cue to continue.
“I told Ezra what happened to my parents in Mexico and that the cartel murdered them while staying at Andrej’s place on vacation.
I let him know how his brother-in-law and my family were connected.
That my dad had been his accountant.” I relayed the facts fast, not wanting to walk down memory lane any longer than necessary.
“I asked him if he planned to seek revenge, and if so, I’d like to be part of it. ”
“I’m in awe. No other way to put it.” Alex tore a hand through his hair, pride that I appreciated in his eyes. At least one of them was impressed—because knowing Ryder, he was pissed.
Well, that was how I was gauging his quiet rigidness. He was probably having a coronary thinking about all the things that could’ve gone wrong with plan A. I mean, I was in plan-B territory now, so he wasn’t totally off base.
When I chanced another sideways glance at him, he was in the process of rubbing his chest with his free hand, eyes cast down on his mug.
“Clearly, Ezra agreed to the plan,” Alex said, sitting back down. “Risky assuming he would, though.”
“‘Risky’ is putting it mildly.” And there was my grumpy overprotector. Using the heel of his hand, he continued to push at his chest. I was doubtful the pain there was a result of heartburn from the coffee.
“I could tell Ezra would ...” I swallowed, knowing Ryder would hate what I was about to say next, so I looked away from him.
“... get off on the idea he knew damn well the cartel didn’t kill my family, and every time he looked at me, he’d relish in the fact I was working for the true enemy and didn’t know it. ”
Ryder abruptly turned and set down his coffee, and his hands landed on either side of his mug.
Now wasn’t the time for me to go to him and ease his worries. We had to get through this conversation to proceed to the next phase, which started with receiving that call at noon.
“Ezra told me he had no plans for revenge. He said nothing could be done about the cartel, but he felt bad that my family was killed by mistake because of his brother-in-law, and so, if I wanted a job with whatever name I chose to go by, he’d give me one.
” Yeah, right—felt bad. Sure. “I figured he wasn’t ready to trust me at that point, but I’d take what I could get. ”
“I’m assuming when you reached out to the DEA four months ago, that was when he’d started letting you in on the truth about his business?” Reed kept his voice low and matter-of-fact.
I nodded. “Every month or so of working for him, Ezra slowly trusted me more and more. Then one day, about five months ago, he told me if I was serious about wanting to take down the cartel responsible for killing my family, he had a plan. He said the only way to ruin them was to replace them. He said if I was truly willing to do anything it’d take to destroy the cartel, then I’d need to prove it.
And that’s when he lifted some of the curtain, showing me what he really did on the side.
He tested me to see how I’d react. The more I proved to him I was committed, the more he showed me the ropes.
Gave me real numbers to work with tied to the illegal drug trade he was running. ”
“That must’ve been damn hard to act like you didn’t know the truth about everything.” Alex frowned.
Especially when I wanted to throw up on him for the first several months. Well, that and stab him. “Yeah, and I realized I was in over my head, so I finally made the decision to reach out to the DEA. I explained to them the cartel didn’t kill my family, but Ezra or someone tied to him did.”
“Guessing you didn’t tell them how you infil’ed his organization by using your real identity?” Alex asked me.
“I let them think my story as Anna worked. I was afraid they’d say the risk was too great.”
“And it was too risky.” There was unmistakable frustration and concern in Ryder’s tone.
Did I need to remind him I was okay and standing there? No, because then he’d remind me if he hadn’t been at the party Saturday, I’d be dead.
“Um, so the guy I talked to at the agency said they were already onto Ezra but didn’t have definitive proof, but they did believe it was possible he was reporting to someone higher up, which tracked with what I’d suspected.
The goal became to find out who was in charge of the whole operation, and my personal goal was to establish who actually called the shots to have my family murdered: Ezra, his wife, or someone else. ”
“And speaking about his wife, what else do you know about Nina?” Reed with the question that time. “You said earlier you think she may be as powerful as her husband.”
I shared what little I knew. “Possibly, yes. As for her background, she doesn’t have any living blood relatives.
Her brother was it. Born in Russia. Their parents died when they were kids.
They’re only two years apart in age. They were raised by their aunt here in the US.
Nina’s thirty-four. Married Ezra three years ago. ”
“Maybe she’s a Russian spy and she’s working for the Kremlin.” Alex shrugged. “Hey, you never know. It’s possible.”
“Reed’s supposed to be the conspiracy theorist, not you.” Ryder pushed away from the counter, aligning himself next to me.
I let my hand fall between us, and our pinkies brushed. That little touch gave me back the life I didn’t realize I needed to help me get through this.
“ Theory implies a lack of evidence to determine proof,” Reed grumbled. “Anything I ever say is always based in fact.”
“Sure it is.” Alex’s smirk came and went fast. “It’s possible Nina has ties to someone over in Russia who scares Ezra into doing whatever she says, and they’re why he fears his wife.”
“The Russian theory isn’t too far-fetched,” I revealed.
“Nina’s made several trips to Moscow in the nine months I worked for Ezra.
It’s possible she’s even there now.” I set aside my coffee, realizing my java dreams of finishing a full cup weren’t going to happen this morning.
I was jittery enough from anxiety; I didn’t need to add insult to injury with caffeine.