18. Vadim
VADIM
By the time we leave the hotel, Sloane has stopped referring to herself as my captive only because she discovers she’s not the only one.
Camille is coming with us, and so is the copilot from the flight.
Neither of them is pleased about it.
I had Anton arrange transport for all three because until we know exactly when the tracker was placed in Sloane’s bag and who had access to the aircraft before departure, I’m not allowing anyone connected to that flight to disappear into an airport terminal and become impossible to monitor.
Camille had access to crew areas, the copilot had access to flight information, and Sloane carried the device itself, which means all three remain part of the investigation whether they appreciate the distinction between protection and detention or not.
Sloane appreciates it least.
“Where are we flying?”
She asks the question in the back of the car while we are still several minutes from the airfield, sitting beside me with her recovered phone in one hand and a small paper cup of coffee in the other.
“You will know when we arrive.”
She gives me a long look. “You realize repeating that answer doesn’t make it less annoying.”
“It remains accurate.”
“You could tell me the country.”
“No.”
“The general direction?”
“No.”
“A continent?”
“We are remaining in Europe.”
She turns toward the window. “How generous.”
I almost smile.
What continues to surprise me is that she is not frightened.
She should be. She knows enough now to understand that the men around her are not merely private security, that the attack last night was directed at me, and that whoever planted the tracker used her belongings to make it possible.
She has also spent the morning discovering that I’m perfectly willing to control where she goes until I have answers.
Yet fear is not what I see when she looks at me.
Annoyance, certainly. Curiosity. Suspicion. Occasionally enough desire to become inconvenient. But very little fear.
Camille is different. We meet her at the airfield just after sunrise, and the change in her is obvious the moment she climbs out of the vehicle that brought her.
She still looks immaculate because years in private aviation have apparently trained her to survive disaster without allowing her blouse to crease, but there are shadows beneath her eyes and a tension around her mouth that was not there yesterday.
She checks the perimeter twice before walking toward us, and when a security vehicle moves suddenly near the hangar, she flinches.
Sloane notices immediately. She leaves my side without saying anything and goes to her.
Camille takes both of Sloane’s hands. “Oh, thank God.”
“I’m okay.”
“I heard what happened with Warren after they moved me away from the aircraft, and then the shooting started, and I couldn’t get back to you.”
“You were supposed to stay down.”
“I know, but—”
“You’re okay. I’m okay. That’s enough for now.”
Camille nods, though she still looks shaken.
I’m unexpectedly relieved that Sloane has her.
The airfield we use this morning bears very little resemblance to the one we landed at last night.
This is not a commercial private terminal with polished lounges and ground staff moving between aircraft.
It’s a narrow secured strip outside Bucharest used primarily by diplomatic flights, government contractors, and a handful of private operators willing to pay for discretion.
There is one access road. Two gates. Armed guards at both.
Every vehicle is searched before it enters, including mine, because I have no interest in discovering another tracker after takeoff. Anton has already swept the aircraft twice, and my own security team performs a third check before anyone boards.
Sloane watches all of it. “You do this every time?”
“Not quite this much.”
“I was going to say it seems exhausting.”
“It is preferable to being shot.”
She looks toward the dressing beneath my shirt. “You would think that would make you follow medical advice.”
“I followed enough of it.”
“You left the hospital.”
“The doctor discharged me.”
“After I forced you to go.”
“Yes.”
“That should probably be recorded somewhere.”
I look at her. “You are becoming very pleased with yourself.”
“I saved your life twice yesterday.”
“It was very foolish of you,” I say, remembering her throwing her body on me. Why would anybody do that, if their goal was to take me out?
“You’re welcome.”
I leave the argument there because Camille is close enough to hear it and is staring between us with an expression I can’t interpret.
The aircraft is smaller than mine, chosen precisely because we are not filing the flight under any of my usual companies.
There is no bedroom, no elaborate dining area, and no polished luxury designed to impress guests.
The interior is functional and comfortable, arranged with twelve leather seats and enough range to take us where we need to go without refueling.
The pilot is one of mine.
The former copilot from last night is not flying. He boards after Camille and looks as though he has not slept at all.
His name is Daniel Hartmann, something I should probably have learned before last night considering he has served as relief pilot on several flights for my aviation company.
He is Austrian, early forties, competent, and currently offended that I have prohibited him from entering a cockpit until the investigation is complete.
“You know I had nothing to do with Hale,” he tells Anton as he comes aboard.
“Right,” I say, not impressed by his excuses. He’s still responsible for anything that the man might have inflicted on Sloane.
Sloane, who is already helping Camille settle into a seat, looks over. “He didn’t know what Warren was doing.”
Daniel looks at her with obvious gratitude. “Thank you.”
Anton gives Sloane a look.
She gives him one back.
I intervene before the aircraft becomes a courtroom. “Sit down, Daniel.”
He does.
Sloane mutters, “You really do say that to everyone.”
“I told you.”
Once we are airborne, the tension inside the cabin gradually changes.
Camille remains nervous during takeoff, gripping the armrests whenever the aircraft shifts, and Sloane notices before anyone else does. She moves into the seat beside her after the seatbelt sign goes off and spends most of the first hour talking quietly to her.
I can’t hear everything.
I don’t try.
There’s something about watching Sloane comfort another person that interests me more than it should.
She doesn’t tell Camille to calm down or insist nothing will happen.
She simply stays beside her, occasionally touching her arm, asking questions about ordinary things until the conversation moves away from the attack.
Eventually Camille laughs. The sound is small, but it’s the first time she has looked remotely like herself since arriving.
I catch Sloane looking toward me afterward. There’s no smile on her face, but something softer passes between us.
I look away first.
Daniel joins them after a while, apparently deciding that being questioned by Anton is less appealing than sitting with the women.
He apologizes to Sloane. “I should have noticed Hale was drinking earlier.”
“You weren’t responsible for him.”
“I was second in command of the aircraft.”
“You were flying it while he was wandering around doing whatever he wanted.”
Daniel looks at her for a moment. “You are remarkably forgiving considering what happened.”
“I’m not forgiving him.”
“I meant me.”
She gives him a tired smile. “I’ve had enough people deciding I’m responsible for things other people did.” Her eyes move toward me when she says it. There is absolutely no possibility that is accidental.
I pretend not to notice.
Several hours pass without incident, which is almost disappointing after the previous day. Sloane sleeps briefly, curled sideways in her seat with her head against the window, then wakes when Camille gets up to use the lavatory.
She looks around, and her gaze finds me.
I’m working through messages on a secured tablet across the cabin.
She unfastens her belt and walks over, settling into the seat opposite me. “Can I sit?”
“You have asked after already sitting down.”
“I’m adapting to your management style.”
“That is concerning.”
She looks through the window. Cloud cover has broken beneath us, revealing a patchwork of green fields, villages, and narrow roads. “How much longer?”
“Twenty minutes.”
“To wherever you refuse to tell me we’re going.”
“Yes.”
She studies me.
After a minute, she says, “Are you always like this?”
“Like what?”
“Secretive.”
“Yes.”
“That was immediate.”
“It’s an easy question.”
She looks out of the window again. “Do you have your men waiting for us there?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Is it like, a special place for you?”
The question makes me look up. “Why?”
“Because you said we were going somewhere secure, and people usually feel safest in places they know.”
“That is a reasonable conclusion.”
“So?”
“Yes.”
Her eyebrows rise slightly. “You do.”
“I said yes.”
“How about your parents?” she asks. That feels like a very big pivot.
“You don’t have to worry about that,” I say.
“Please.”
“No, they passed several years ago,” I say.
“Siblings?”
“Some family.”
She waits.
I don’t elaborate.
“You are exhausting,” she says.
“I’ve also heard that before.”
“You still haven’t actually told me who you are.”
“I told you my name.”
“That’s not what I mean.” She shifts in the seat opposite me, drawing one leg beneath the other, and lowers her voice even though nobody in this aircraft is under any illusion that our conversation is private.
“You admitted you’re not just a businessman, which was already fairly obvious after Bucharest, but then you took my phone, had your men search through my things, told me I wasn’t allowed to leave, and put me on another aircraft without telling me where we were going. ”
“You are here for your protection.”
She gives me a look. “I’m sure kidnappers everywhere find that wording useful.”
“You are not kidnapped.”
“Can I leave?”
“No.”
“There seems to be a vocabulary problem here.”
Despite myself, I almost smile.
She catches it. “This isn’t funny.”
“No.”
“Then tell me.”
I lean back in my seat.
There are several reasons not to. The less she knows, the easier it would be to separate her from this life once the problem with the tracker is resolved. At least that’s what I have been telling myself.
The problem is that almost nothing about Sloane feels temporary anymore.
She has already seen too much for another vague answer to accomplish anything.
“My family has been involved in organized crime for generations.”
I watch the sentence settle.
Then her eyebrows draw together. “What kind of organized crime?”
“The kind where specifying individual crimes would take longer than the twenty minutes we have left in the air.”
Her eyes widen slightly. “You’re serious.”
“Yes.”
She glances across the cabin at Anton, then Marek, then Iosef before looking at me again. “All of you?”
“We’re part of the Bratva,” I say.
She sucks in a breath. It’s such a simple motion. There is no way she’s pretending, or is this a part of a bigger web she has already spun around me? I hate that I can’t tell the difference, not when it come to her. This woman has quite literally robbed me of my good fucking sense.
She’s watching me wide-eyed. “And you’re like their leader or something?”
“Sort of,” I say.
“Oh, now you remember modesty,” she says. “Jesus, what have I gotten myself into. Actually wait, I already know—Russian mob. Great, just great.”
Her attention drifts to the city beginning to appear beneath the wing.
The landscape changes gradually as we descend, villages giving way to larger roads and low neighborhoods spread across rolling ground.
Apartment blocks rise beyond older districts filled with trees, while church domes and newer glass buildings punctuate the skyline.
Sloane leans closer to the window.
The landing is smooth. My men are already waiting when the aircraft taxis away from the runway, although this time every member of the ground team knew the location only after we were within minutes of arrival.
Anton has become obsessive.
For once, I approve.
Sloane waits until the engines shut down before turning toward me. “Can you now tell me where we are?”
“Chi?in?u.”
She repeats the name carefully. “Moldova?”
“Yes.”
Camille looks toward us from across the cabin. Daniel does too.
Sloane looks through the window at the black vehicles and armed men already waiting beyond the aircraft. “Why here?”
Because this is the center of the Chernovar Bratva, the place where my family built its power, and where Viktor Petrov would have to be suicidal to come after me openly.
I stand and reach for my jacket.
“Welcome to my home.”