Page 83 of Reaper's Desire

That sharp pang cuts through my chest again. "Okay."

"And we're not lovers." Her voice doesn't waver on the word, but I see the way her jaw tightens. "What happened in the hotel room… rooms—that was a mistake. Moments of weakness. It won't happen again."

Every part of me resists that thought, but I nod. "Okay."

"I don't want to know about your past. I don't want to hear about the people you've killed or the jobs you've done. I don't want your confessions or your guilt or your attempts to make me understand why you do what you do." She's building walls now, brick by brick, and I can see her retreating behind them. "You're a tool I'm using to stay alive. That's all. And when this is over—when we've stopped Vivienne and dealt with the contract, and I'm safe—you disappear. You don't contact me. You don't try to explain or apologize or make things right. You just go."

I nod once. "I'll go."

She stands, crossing to where I'm standing and extending her hand. It's a formal gesture, businesslike and cold. I take her hand, feeling the warmth of her skin against mine, and shake once. "Deal," she says.

"Deal." It feels like shaking on my own death warrant… but then again, I did that the moment I chose to save her instead of killing her.

We stand there for a moment, hands clasped, and I can feel the desire that still burns despite the betrayal. The love I feel for her that she'll never know about, never acknowledge, and never return.

Then she pulls her hand away and steps back, putting distance between us again.

"So what's the plan?" she asks, her voice steady now. "How do we stop her?"

22

JULIAN

"Come here," I say, gesturing to the chair beside me at the small desk. "We'll look at all of this together."

Isabelle crosses the hotel room slowly, her arms wrapped around herself like she's trying to hold something in. Or keep something out. She sits down beside me, and I force myself to focus on the screen.

"This is Vivienne's primary account," I say, pulling up the first document. "The one tied directly to your father's business holdings. Look at the withdrawal pattern over the past three years."

Isabelle leans forward, her eyes scanning the numbers. I pull up another document. "But that's just the primary account. She has access to three other family accounts, and she's been moving money through all of them. Look at these transfers. And she's spending like crazy. Look at these bills."

The numbers are staggering—designer clothing purchases running into six figures, jewelry from Cartier and Tiffany, private jet rentals. Hotel suites in Paris, Monaco, Dubai. Spa treatments that cost more than most people make in a month. "She's living like she has unlimited money," Isabelle whispers."But she doesn't. This is—this is my father's money. My family's money."

"And she's running out. When she does, your father discovers what she's been doing. And there will be consequences." I pull up another document. "Your stepmother came from money, but her family lost most of it in bad investments before she married your father. She's been living beyond her means her entire adult life. She's desperate to maintain a lifestyle she can't actually afford."

An encrypted email pops up on my laptop, and I scan it, glancing over the text. My eyes widen. "Vivienne used an intermediary. A broker who works for this mafia family and specializes in placing contracts for clients who want to maintain distance from the actual crime. My guess is the Capetti family owes your father a favor and agreed to help connect her with this broker, which is why I couldn't get out of the contract. My failure would have reflected badly on them." I pull up a series of financial transactions sent over with the email. "Three months ago, Vivienne made a wire transfer of five hundred thousand dollars to an account in the Cayman Islands. The account is registered to a shell corporation. Two days later, the contract on you went active."

Isabelle moves back to the desk, leaning over my shoulder to study the screen. I can feel the heat of her body and smell her perfume, and I have to force myself to focus. "That's not enough," she says quietly. "A wire transfer to an offshore account—that could be anything. It's not proof."

"No. But look at this." I pull up the screenshot I was sent of an email to the broker, with instructions to place a contract on a female target in New York, early twenties, from a wealthy family. The client wanted it to look like an accident or a random crime—nothing that would draw attention back to the family.

"That's me," Isabelle says, her voice barely audible. "That's describing me… but it could describe a lot of other people, too."

"Yes, but here…" I pull up a phone record showing multiple calls between Vivienne's personal cell phone and a number registered to one of the broker's front companies. "She called him six times in the two weeks before the contract went active. And she's called him twice since then—once two weeks ago, and once two days ago."

"Two days ago." Isabelle's hand comes up to her throat. "That was right before?—"

"Right before the assassin in Prague." I close the laptop and turn to face her. "She's been checking on the contract's progress. Making sure it's still active."

Isabelle sinks back into the chair, her face ashen. For a long moment, she doesn't say anything. She just sits there, staring at nothing. "She really wants me dead," she finally says. "The woman who's lived in my father's house, with me, since I was twelve. She looked at me across the dinner table and smiled and made small talk, and for some amount of time now, she was planning to have me murdered."

"Yes."

"For my trust fund." Isabelle laughs, but there's no humor in it, just a hollow, broken sound that makes my chest ache. "I always knew she didn't like me. The way she looked at me, the coldness in her voice, the way she talked to me, the things she said. But I thought it was just... I don't know. Resentment. Jealousy. I never thought she'd—" She stops, shaking her head. "I never thought she'd want me dead."

I reach out without thinking, my hand covering hers on the desk. She doesn't pull away, and I take that as permission to keep touching her. "We're going to stop her," I say quietly. "We're going to end this."

"How?" Isabelle looks up at me, and there are tears in her eyes now. "How do we stop her? She has money, connections, and access to people like this. What do we have?"