38
Damien
I’m talking to the Ivanov twins when my gaze falls on Leon. The disturbed look on my brother’s face alarms me at once.
“Please, excuse me,” I tell my guests and move toward Leon.
A desperate expression descends into my brother’s eyes as he meets my gaze.
“What’s wrong?” I ask in a lowered voice.
“Lucia.”
“What happened to her?” Anxiety wraps around my throat at once, choking me. “Is she hurt?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t know. She’s missing.”
“What?”
“I’ve already asked the guys watching the CCTV feeds to find her,” he says in a low, grim tone. “It’s already been half an hour and they’re yet to locate her.”
“Shit!” I curse. “Where’s Mikhail?”
“He’s in the dancing hall,” Leon says. “He’s still unaware of what’s happened.”
“Did you check her room? What about Lilja? Does she know?”
“Lilja’s been with the fucking Rossis all evening,” he mutters darkly. “She hasn’t seen Lucia since we separated.”
“Fuck.”
My mind whirrs. With all the guests here, we can’t carry out a full sweep of the ground floor rooms.
“Tell them to search every place on the upper floors,” I instruct. “In the meantime, I’m going to find out about the people who’ve come here and left. That should help.”
“Excuse me, Mr. Volkov,” an unfamiliar female voice calls out uncertainly.
Both Leon and I turn around. A young woman with large brown eyes stares between us with fearful eyes.
“Yes?”
Her gaze falls on me and immediately, she recoils. She swallows hard, struggling to get over her revulsion of me. “I’m Emilia,” she blurts. “I’m Antony Marco’s daughter. We came together but now, I can’t find him anywhere. Could you help me, please?”
Leon and I stare at each other and back at the timid woman before us.
“Wait here,” I tell her. Grabbing Leon’s arm, I drag him to a quieter corner.
“Tell Mikhail to keep an eye on things here and come meet me in the security room,” I tell Leon. “We should start with finding out what happened to Marco.”
“Yeah,” he mutters darkly. “I’ll kill him if he’s touched her. I swear to you.”
I nod and head out of the room.
The surveillance room is located in a secluded section of the manor. Our men fill the chairs, their gazes locked on the numerous screens in front of them. Live CCTV footages play out before them, helping them monitor our estate with over a hundred guests gathered here.
“Search for Antony Marco,” I command one of the men who comes forward to greet me.
“Yes, Sir.”
He walks away and instructs a group of men to bring up some CCTV footages. While they dig through the feeds, he speaks to someone through his radio gear.
A few minutes later, he comes back to me.
“Antony Marco has left,” he says. “His chauffeur picked him up an hour ago. There was a woman with them as well. We’re guessing it to be his daughter, Emilia.”
“No,” I reply in a grim tone. “Emilia’s still here.”
Walking forward, I move over to the corner where the CCTV feeds are reversed to follow Marco’s progress through the halls of the manor.
My gaze falls on one of the feeds where he’s walking with a staggering gait in one of the hallways.
“Follow him,” I command the guy before me.
Marco lurches forward and comes to a halt before a woman in a luxurious gown. Even though the hallway is dark, I recognize Lucia immediately.
Marco is clearly drunk in the footage. Lucia, however, speaks to the man and ends up asking him for his jacket. To my surprise, she even puts it on and lets the man lean on her for support.
What the hell is she doing? As far as I know, she’s never met Marco before.
“Follow them,” I say, keeping my gaze fixed on the flatscreen.
Lucia keeps her face buried in Marco’s chest. His long overcoat provides an extra layer of concealment, helping her cross the entrance hall without inviting any attention.
The cameras positioned outside the manor’s gate reveal her helping Marco in the back of his car. She climbs in after him and before my very eyes, drives away.
“She fucking escaped,” Leon’s whisper sounds next to me. “Fuck! I don’t know whether to be impressed or fucking pissed. She fooled all of us.”
“Yes,” I say, watching the car leave through the gates of the estate. “She’s the perfect actress.”
“She turned us into such fucking fools,” Leon says through gritted teeth. His amber eyes shine with cold rage. “We never learn, do we?”
“Our reputation will take a hit as soon as Callum broadcasts the way she escaped us,” I say, my mind thinking about the consequences immediately. “The whole world will be laughing at us.”
“Fuck!” Leon shouts, drawing everyone’s attention on him.
“Let’s get out of here.” Grabbing him, I force him out of the surveillance room.
“Get off me!” Leon shouts, throwing my arm off.
“Calm down,” I say in a commanding tone. “We don’t want any of our guests to know what happened. They’ll think we’re fucking idiots.”
“They won’t be wrong. We were always a bunch of idiots when it came to Lucia. I can’t believe we let her fool us into thinking she’s sweet and innocent. She was just playing us so we’d let our guards down. The moment we looked away, she ran back to her brother.”
I shake my head. “This is not over. We’ll get her back,” I decide. “And when we do, she’ll wish she’d never met us in the first place.”
“I’m going to skin her bastard brother and force her to watch as he screams,” Leon promises, his eyes burning with rage. “I won’t spare her again. She’ll learn what it is to break a Volkov’s trust.”
A deep ache settles inside me despite the rage flowing through me. I let her under my skin and trusted her when she said I didn’t disgust her.
Nothing ever hurt me as much as Lucia’s betrayal. I can’t believe we’ve let her hurt us once again. “She’ll pay for breaking our trust,” I vow. “This time we won’t show her any mercy and she’ll know who we truly are.”
Ready for the next part in Lucia’s story?