Chapter Twenty-One
“This does not feel like a great plan.” And if Krish was saying that, then it was probably an understatement.
Sejal belted the robe around her middle. She was dressed underneath, but she’d pushed the legs of her sweatpants—well, his
sweatpants—up so she appeared naked under the robe. To make her look more vulnerable, he guessed.
“Viktor and Alexei have been sitting in that room for an hour, and we need to get this show on the road. I don’t think they’ll
be dumb enough to break into our room. They must be wary that it’s a trap. Our best bet is to bait them.” She picked up the
empty ice bucket. “Besides, they’ve already played this game once before.”
Krish was still almost certain that had been Cobra, not Alexei, who had tried to choke him out, but it didn’t really matter
right now. “I don’t love that you’re the bait.”
Sejal adjusted the towel she’d wrapped around her head. “I seem to have a face that makes people want to kidnap me. Let’s
use it to our advantage.”
“But are you going to be okay? If they put a pillowcase over your head, or something?” He thought of how panicked Sejal had been that first night in her apartment. Her trauma didn’t need to be exacerbated any more than it already had been on this trip.
“You’re talking about my kidnapping PTSD? I think so.” Her smile was wry. “I’ve been convinced that actual therapy would be
a good thing for me to try, but in the meantime, I’m trying to look at this whole experience as a haphazard form of exposure
therapy.”
“You don’t think they’re dumb enough to break into our room because they fear a trap, but you think they’re dumb enough to
believe that you’re wandering around a hallway getting ice alone when they’re after us?”
Her smile was shark-like. “Yeah. ’Cause they think I’m dumb.”
It was a twisted logic, but one that kind of made sense. Krish exhaled, and spoke into his phone. “Cary, you ready?”
“Yes, sir,” came the guard’s reply.
Krish put the phone in his pocket without turning it off. He grabbed his gun and turned the safety off. He hoped he didn’t
have to use it, partially because he didn’t actually want to hurt anyone, but mostly because he didn’t have a silencer, and
the last thing they wanted was the cops descending on them.
Sejal paused with her hand on the doorknob. “Remember. Go for Alexei if possible. Viktor won’t risk him getting hurt.”
“Yup.” Krish followed her out the door. Like most hotels in this city, the floors were huge. He ducked behind a corner near
the room Cary had identified as Alexei’s while Sejal sailed past it, whistling.
While she was briefly out of view, the door opened silently. Viktor’s head poked out, then back in. It was a quick peek, but
long enough for Krish to see that there were scratches all over Viktor’s face and his hand was bandaged.
Good. Hope you feel every single bruise and cut from that car.
Krish tucked himself farther into the shadows and checked in on his heartbeat and pulse. Calm. Steady. He might be in over
his head, but he was real motivated to keep treading water. The alternative, letting these assholes win, wasn’t tenable. You got this.
When Sejal walked by again, sure enough, the door opened, and Viktor emerged. He caught up to Sejal and slung his arm around
her neck, hauling her up short. The ice bucket tumbled to the floor. She stopped struggling and hung limply in Viktor’s arms
when the villain pressed a gun against her temple. “Nice to see you, Sejal,” he said, loud enough for Krish to hear, and started
dragging her back to the room.
She had told him to neutralize Alexei first, but Krish couldn’t risk her safety in anyone’s hands but his own. He pulled the
phone out of his pocket and hissed into it. “Cary, get the door and the man inside.” Without waiting for confirmation, he
bolted out of his hiding spot. Behind him, he could hear the thud of Alexei’s room door slamming open. Cary would hold Alexei
in place until they could get there.
Viktor froze when Krish placed his gun against his back, right between his shoulder blades. “FBI. Raise your hands, nice and
slow,” Krish said in a low voice, trying his best not to sound like he was on a bad drama.
Viktor’s hands slowly went up, releasing Sejal, and Krish took the gun from his right hand, made sure the safety was on, and
tucked it into his waistband.
Sejal spun around, her hand massaging her throat. “You okay?” Krish asked gruffly. That wasn’t what he wanted to ask. He wanted
to press kisses all over her throat.
But that would not be a very badass-FBI thing to do, so he refrained.
“I’m fine,” she assured him. The towel had been knocked off her head and her hair was mussed, but she did look fine. Exposure
therapy, indeed.
There was a light in her eyes as it moved over Viktor. Satisfaction. “You’re getting predictable, Viktor. Can’t resist assaulting
a person fetching ice, eh?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
Krish couldn’t see Viktor’s face, but Sejal frowned. It cleared quickly, though. “Let’s rejoin Alexei and get this chat over
with, shall we?”
It was dark in the room, a lamp lit near the couch. A brown-haired man, who Krish presumed to be Alexei, backed up, hands
up, eyes wide. Cary stood in front of him, hand steady on his weapon.
Viktor went to stand next to his employer and faced Krish. Viktor didn’t look surprised to see him. “You,” he spat.
“Me.”
“You tried to kill me in that car.”
“I wouldn’t have killed you,” Krish said, glacier smooth. “I merely wanted to incapacitate you.”
“You destroyed my vehicle.”
“If it was a rental, I hope you got the supplemental insurance.”
“Thanks, Cary, for the assist,” Sejal said. “And please thank your friend in building security for turning the hallway cameras
off for a few minutes.”
“Not a problem.” The stoic, giant guard handed her a gun. “I took this from the little man.”
Alexei squawked. “Hey!”
Sejal might not like guns, but she handled this one like a champ. She patted the guard’s arm. “Please wait outside. We’ll signal you if we need you.”
Cary nodded and left, closing the door behind him.
Viktor’s lips tightened. “Your boyfriend is FBI, Sejal?” he sneered. He might as well have said, Your boyfriend is a cannibal.
“He is indeed,” Krish said. He sounded much more certain about it than he had when he’d tried to fool Sejal, so that was good.
“Keep those hands in the air, Viktor.”
Sejal searched him, while Krish quickly searched Alexei, finding another gun at his ankle and a knife in his pocket.
“You work with the feds now,” Alexei whined. His cheeks were florid. Women probably found the criminal handsome. Alexei had
a strong face and body, but his muscles came from the gym, and he clearly skipped leg day. He was all arms and traps.
“No. He works for me.” Sejal cocked her head. “I told you, Viktor, who I was.”
Alexei frowned. “Who are you?”
“Cobra.”
Alexei barked a laugh. “Fuck off.”
Krish gave a thin smile. “I still say we should just kill them.”
Alexei stopped laughing.
“No, no,” Sejal replied. “We’re going to extend Alexei some professional courtesy and resolve this as quickly and cleanly
as possible. For old times’ sake.” She paused. “But if it’s not clean, we have our men right outside the door and all over
this building. If we don’t walk out of here, you two won’t make it out, either.”
Krish gestured to the couch with his gun. “Have a seat, friends. Keep your hands where I can see them.”
Once they sat, Krish came to stand in front of them, in the light.
Alexei’s expression changed from anger to surprise as he surveyed him. “You look like—” He shook his head. “What did you say your name was?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
An ugly smile spread over Alexei’s face, and he relaxed. “Sejal, you fool. This is the agent who sold you out. Called me out
of the blue a little over a week ago, told me exactly where you could be found. Your aliases, too. It cost me a small fortune,
but it was a nice, fat file.”
The air strangled in Krish’s throat. No. “What?”
Alexei snapped his fingers. “You have distinctive eyes. Anand, right? You have another snake in your midst, Cobra.”
Krish tried to regain his composure. He couldn’t focus on his brother now. He had to get through this, and then he could properly
think it all through.
Avi. How could you do this?
Sejal cleared her throat. “I told him to do that.”
Alexei and Viktor both swung their eyes back to her, giving Krish, she hoped, a moment to recover.
Jesus, Avi. No wonder everyone had found her around the same time. Alexei and Krish had been operating off the same intel.
Funny enough, as pissed as she was at Avi, she was more worried about Krish. His face had turned ashen under his natural skin
color.
“Why would you do that?” Alexei demanded.
“Heard you were looking for me. I wanted to get our inevitable confrontation out of the way. I set all of this up, obviously.”
That was a silly lie, but Alexei might believe it. He apparently didn’t think she was very smart.
To think Sejal had been honored when Alexei had dated her, way back when. She’d grown up with a father who chased money and power. Of course she’d assumed that was what she needed in a man. But Alexei had turned out to be weak and untrustworthy. “So what do you want from me?” she repeated.
“I want what’s mine.”
“What’s what?”
“The password.”
She squinted at him. “What?”
“I know you took it. I’ll admit, I was surprised you had the balls, or the ability to pull it off, but you did it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The necklace,” Alexei enunciated. “With the password.”
Wait a minute. Talk about déjà vu. “The password. To a crypto account?”
“So you suddenly do know what I’m talking about.”
“Yeah, I know,” she said slowly. “What do you know about it?”
“I know that that’s my fucking money. I couldn’t access it while the others were still alive, but it’s mine, I earned it.”
Alexei leaned forward aggressively. He stopped when Krish gave a warning growl.