34. Anastasia
“I’m glad you’re here, but I also wish you weren’t,” I say to Rhett.
I sip my water again as we sit hand in hand at the usual table I meet Jacob at in the rooftop restaurant.
“Would it make you feel better if I dyed my hair as a disguise?” Rhett muses.
My eyes rove over him, trying to imagine brunette, black, or red in place of his silver-blond hair.
“Absolutely not,” I decide.
He knows my anxiety is that he’ll be seen by the wrong person. I don’t know what I’ll do if law enforcement gets ahold of him. It would cause far worse friction between my dad and me. I wouldn’t care what kind of crazed person it would make me look if I defended someone who, to my parents and everyone else, is a fraudulent criminal they’ve concluded could have been part of Gregory’s setup to assassinate my father.
“We’re being careful.” Rhett consoles me, slipping a hand over my bouncing knee. “Rix has eyes everywhere, and we’re diligent before going in anywhere.”
I nod. I know this, yet I can’t smother my nerves.
Just then, my already racing heart leaps at the sight of Jacob strolling in wearing a gleam of excitement as he assesses both Rhett and me while making his way over.
“As much as jealousy plagues me, I have to admit, there’s something satisfying in seeing two undeniably suited pieces back together.”
“I wasn’t sure if you would come,” I say. Time to pull on my mask of composure.
“We still have an ongoing concern, darling. I would be hunting you instead had you no sense to meet me here.”
Rhett’s fingers flex on my thigh, and my hand slips over his as if it might calm him. I can practically feel him straining against lunging for Jacob.
Jacob orders a glass of white wine. Then his gaze flicks to Rhett. “I still don’t see what Lanshall and Ana see in you personally, but you’ve caused quite a bit of trouble for all of us, Kaiser.”
“Then I’m doing my job,” he replies calmly.
“I lost a lot of money because of your interference at my gala last winter. It’s brave of you to be here right now.”
Jacob leans back arrogantly in his chair when his wine is served. His cool eyes on Rhett simmer with dark intent. “As I hear, you’re about to gain far more than you lost in this new alliance with Silas Balenhaizer to take down Lanshall, so I guess we’re even.”
Jacob’s chin tips up slightly. “Not yet,” he says, but he drops that topic for now when his attention returns to me. “I want to meet with Silas again for my own peace of mind. You two have done enough, and it’s time for the adults to take over.”
“You wouldn’t have him without me,” I say.
“If not your hand in marriage, what did you offer him to keep his interest in this?”
I expected the interrogation, and I keep myself as straight and confident as he is. “He has an interest in someone in Alistair’s network. We happen to have a connection to her.”
“You expect me to believe the infamous Silas Balenheizer would risk his name and resources on this for a no-name, no-advantage woman?”
My jaw clenches at the amusement lining his tone as he speaks about Kenna though he doesn’t know her. His observations have some merit—at least to someone as cold and power-hungry as Jacob.
“He doesn’t just get her. He wants Alistair’s network. All his assets. She just happens to be a keen motivator for it, and she belongs exclusively to Lanshall himself right now,” Rhett says.
I know it disgusts him to speak of Kenna like this too, but it’s the only language Jacob will understand. Given Silas’s name, he would expect ruthlessness and for Kenna to be nothing more than something to be used like those women Jacob tried to sell.
“I see,” Jacob says, taking a sip of his wine.
I’m finding him hard to read right now. He’s debating something, harboring a hidden triumph, and I can’t figure out what it is as he looks between us with a ghost of a smile.
“Silas has extended an invite to Lumina for you,” I say.
That grabs his attention. “I had my doubts about you, Anastasia, but you seem to have gotten everything you wanted.”
“Not yet,” I say. “I want Alistair Lanshall dead, and he’s ours to do away with when that time comes.”
Jacob nods. “Agreed. As a celebration of our alliance, I want to extend my own invite to you all, and I hope Silas will accept too. I have a new venue opening, a gentlemen’s club, on the south side next month. I’d like you two to be my guests of honor.”
A few heartbeats of silence pass. Of course we don’t want to attend the opening of something that is no doubt going to be used for nefarious means. It goes against everything Rhett stands for, and I realize that’s why Jacob wants us there. It’s the equivalent of getting Rhett to kneel for him.
“We’d love to,” I say.
On the contrary, Rhett’s expression is scarily firm and resistant. Jacob only delights in it.
“Excellent. And I would like to send you a gown to show my utter appreciation.”
“You don’t have to?—”
“I insist.”
I smile tightly. He won’t take no for an answer. I wonder what would happen if I disregarded his choice of gown, but the mere thought rattles me. I can only think it’s another way to sink Rhett lower so he can bask in the sight of me in his chosen clothing.
“Thank you,” I force out.
Rhett’s breathing is deep and calculated. His eyes pin Jacob with so much loathing I’m afraid he could break and ruin this.
“Why Allie?” he asks, so cold it licks a chill down my spine.
“Alyra DeVerre had a buyer who came to me personally before I knew she was part of your adorable little crime-stopping efforts,” Jacob says. “It had nothing to do with you at first. Until she slipped up in her search for the jewelry. I had to wonder how she knew about the earrings that were destined for her. I wondered what you would do if you were forced to choose which woman to save.”
Rhett’s other fist tightens until his knuckles turn white. “I’m going to fucking kill you,” he says, so low and deadly.
“We have to let bygones be bygones, Kaiser. Don’t want to risk the safety of your girl and your network threatening me like that again.”
I know a storm has to be crashing in Rhett’s mind to keep his words at bay because we’re walking on very dangerous ground.
It’s not a threat; it’s a fucking promise.
We have to keep smart and composed. Jacob is the one we’re luring into our trap. His words are crafty and maddening, and it’s hard to be convinced they mean nothing.
We will win this time.
“Do you know what happened to her?” Rhett asks tightly.
“Unfortunately, no. I got my payment for her before Maddox Cuvier was killed. I have no interest in what follows.”
“Doesn’t exactly look great for business if your buyers turn up dead,” Rhett accuses.
“You’re right. But there is nothing linking me to his death. As I hear, it was amateur work, and it’s still an open case with the might of the DeVerre law firm breathing down law enforcement’s necks, as he was one of their managing partners. I wouldn’t risk that kind of press and recklessness.”
I get a really bad feeling with this insight. Rhett told me of his suspicions that Liam could have interfered, but I found the idea outlandish.
Liam Forbes ... capable of killing a man, and how the hell would he have gotten her out himself? I know he still has feelings for her even after many estranged years, but I still can’t picture him capable of this.
Yet at the same time, I’m hopeful for it.
Even though I’m not sure how to save him from the mess he’s in because of his father and what they might condemn him with too, and now, if he could be pinned for murder ... Oh god.
I’m starting to feel lightheaded, and I take a longer drink of water. Maybe Rhett can sense my rising panic as he shifts forward, preparing to leave.
“Enjoy your time at Lumina. I can’t say I’ll look forward to seeing you again, but I’ll tolerate it.” He stands, linking our fingers and pulling me up too.
“Piss me off, Kaiser, and I won’t mind earning favor with the president instead by turning you in and saving his damsel of a daughter who fell for a fraud and a criminal.”
Anger boils in me at that threat, but our backs are against the wall right now.
We don’t look back as we leave.
In the car I can’t console Rhett’s tangible anger with my head spinning on Liam.
“He has a house,” I remember suddenly. “I don’t know exactly where it is, only that it’s very remote and his parents never knew about it. No one did. He bought it after shuffling money from his trust into another account for years and passing it off as material expenses.”
“Liam?” Rhett inquires, and I guess this works to distract him too.
“Yes. He wanted a placed no one else knew about, and I always wondered why.” I bite my lip, closing my eyes with the wave of guilt that passes over me. “Now I can’t stop wondering how bad it was for him. If Gregory or Matthew were abusing him—if not physically, then emotionally. If he was so lonely or worried that he thought he might need to hide someday, and I didn’t see it.” I shake my head, turning angry at myself. “That’s a lie. I did see it, I just never questioned it deeper.”
“Whatever was going on with him and the Forbes is not your fault. You were a great friend to him. That was clear.”
“A great friend would have seen past the surface,” I mutter.
Rhett doesn’t speak, but he takes my hand, and that’s enough.
“Do you think it would be in D.C.?” he asks gently.
I try to think back to that long-ago conversation when we’d dreamed about the future. “He spoke of Boston,” I recall. “He said he grew up there until he was sixteen. I don’t know if that’s where he’d want to go back to, but it might be a start.”
“He wouldn’t have used his own name if he wanted it to be untraceable. Xoid is good, but we have barely anything to go on.”
My phone rings, and I dip my hand into my pocket for it. “Shit. It’s my dad.” I pick up with a forcibly cheerful greeting, but he rambles right over it. His speech is fast and panicked, but also relieved, and I try to focus on the actual words. “I’m fine. What are you talking about?” I try to cut in.
“Your apartment, Ana. Your mother and I stopped by, and it was a wreckage. We’ve been worried sick.”
I blanch, not considering the state Alistair’s guys might have left my apartment in, nor that my parents might come by.
“I didn’t know,” I lie, and it burns my throat like acid. “I-I decided to take a break away. Some spa resort just outside the city. I’m safe. I promise.”
Rhett’s expression is pulled together in concern and question.
“We’re coming to get you,” Dad says.
“Don’t. I’m okay here and have no idea what happened there. Likely some thieves watching the apartment realized it was empty and decided to see if there was anything of value in there.”
I scrunch my eyes, propping my elbow on the car door and holding my head. It hurts to lie to them so badly, but the truth would be catastrophic.
“At least tell me the resort,” he says.
“Lakomora,” I say. I’ve been there once. I’m terrified he might go there regardless. “But I check out tomorrow.”
“Then I’ll arrange you a stay at one of our hotels in the meantime, and I’m assigning you a guard.”
“I don’t need one,” I protest.
I want to scream with how unfair this is. That I have Rhett back and he’s the best protection I could have, but my dad would have him arrested and be utterly outraged at his fraudulent death on top of his credentials now.
Rhett rubs my thigh, and while I want the comfort of him, I’m in pain that he’s my secret.
“I’m not arguing with you on this,” Dad says firmly.
He’s changed so much. We both have, and this friction between us cuts deeply. When he assigned Rhett last year he fully sympathized with my resistance to having a guard, and we talked a lot. Now he doesn’t negotiate. I get it—his job is more intense than ever. The threat against his life and mine was real once, and there could be far more out there with a vendetta against the president.
I want to disappear again, shrink slowly back into who I was before I met Rhett—one who would have hidden from the world rather than face it.
“I’m texting you with the details, Ana. Go there tonight, and your guards will be there.”
I don’t answer, just hang up, because I think my voice will crack.
“We’ll work through this.” Rhett tries to comfort me.
I watch the buildings zip by, and all I want is to go back to the warehouse apartment. “It’s not fair,” I whisper. My throat becomes too tight for anything more.
“I’ll try to find a way to sneak by them,” he says.
“I want to go home. To our home. After these past few torturous months, we’re owed that.” I swipe away a resentful tear.
“We’ll have endless months to come.”
“Of secrets and lies and sneaking around.”
The stretch of silence weighs heavy between us.
“What can I do?” he asks, pained.
“Take me home.”
I think he’s going to sigh and tell me how my safety is too important and that my father is right. He doesn’t. Rhett squeezes my thigh.
“Okay, baby.”