The Secrets We Hide (The Four #2) - Becca Steele Page 0,53

because of the Alstone Holdings deal?” I guessed. He glanced down at me quickly, biting his lip, before his gaze flicked away.

“Yeah…” He trailed off, shuffling a bit in his seat.

“Cade?” I twisted around to face him, bringing my hand up to his cheek to get him to turn to look at me, running my thumb across the light stubble on his jaw. “Are you keeping something from me?”

He shivered, muttering, “Your hand’s freezing.” With yet another sigh, he finally met my eyes, his expression shuttered. “I confronted Granville. I couldn’t let it lie. He fucked with you and me, and he needed to know that was unacceptable.”

Oh. “When was this? What did you do? And why didn’t you tell me?” I tried to keep my voice even, but I was getting kind of fed up about being kept in the dark.

“Snowflake…I can’t stand that look you’re giving me.” He scrubbed his hand across his face. “It was at the ball, and I only hit him once, as much as I wanted to pound his fucking face in. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to cause any more trouble between us, not when I’d only just got you back. Then things have been going really fucking well between us, and…” He shrugged helplessly, his mouth twisting, and I swung my body over his to straddle him.

“Cade.” I kissed him, threading my arms around his neck, and he pulled me to him, burying his face in my shoulder. “Look at me a minute.” I waited until he lifted his head and his eyes met mine. “I know you, and honestly? I think you’ve been really restrained with the whole James thing. I’ve been expecting you to retaliate, and I’m actually impressed and shocked that you only hit him once. Of course, now I know about the thing with Joseph and his brother dying, I understand why you didn’t do more. What I’m kind of sad about is that you kept secrets from me.”

“Fuck. I’m sorry. No more secrets.” He wrapped his arms more tightly around me, kissing my head softly. “Not from me, anyway.”

Yeah. Maybe not from him, but I had the feeling there were a lot more secrets to reveal, before we got to the bottom of whatever was going on with my mother.

“Mercury’s online.” Weston’s words cut through the silence in the room.

Finally. I put down the playing cards in my hand, making my way over to the computer.

“For fuck’s sake, I had a really good hand,” Cass muttered from behind me. Mercury had sent Weston a message earlier to say that with the new information on Vasily’s name, he needed a bit longer to gather intel, so we’d been playing poker to pass the time.

“Even so, you know Z would have won.” I cut a look at Zayde, still sitting at the table, a large pile of poker chips in front of him. As I caught his eye, the corners of his mouth tipped up in a tiny, satisfied grin.

Sitting on Cade, I focused all my attention on the computer screen as the words appeared in the chat box.

MERCURY: No intel on Andromeda, total dead end. We have info on the rest - sent you Vasily Ivanov’s dossier. Someone went to great lengths to hide info on him & Petr. Short summary: cousins, both part of the Belarusian Strelichevo crime syndicate. Streli sigil is on the sovereign ring you sent me photos of. Connections with larger criminal gangs in Russia & Poland.

NITRO: Thanks. Any connections with Alstone Holdings other than Petr’s employment?

MERCURY: This is where it gets interesting. No record of Vasily connection so that’s a dead end. BUT I hacked Petr’s accounts. Large quantity of money paid in and out, both transactions this month. Traced the account numbers. Offshore accounts. Couldn’t get much info but I have names of the account holders.

We waited, staring at the screen, watching the blinking cursor. My heart was racing. Eventually Weston started typing, none of us able to wait any longer.

NITRO: ???

MERCURY: Sorry. Out: Nikolay Stravinsky. Right-hand man for Mikhail Strelichevo aka big boss man.

In: Christine Clifford.

TWENTY-TWO

After that piece of evidence, we knew we needed to speed the fuck up with our investigations. Today’s job—distract my dad and Christine while West planted the trackers on their cars. Winter knocked at the door, and it was opened by Allan, my father’s long-time butler.

“Allan.” I nodded as I passed, and he returned my nod, inclining his head at me, and gave