Page 126 of Hunt Me, Daddy

“And if he thinks killing me stops it?”

“Then he has poor reading comprehension.”

I gave him a look and he almost smiled.

“He will understand the timer,” Ivan said.

“Will he stand down?”

“No.”

The answer came too quickly.

I sat back. “No?”

“No.”

“Then why are we sending it?”

“To make him move.”

“You’re flushing him out,” I said.

“Yes.”

“And you didn’t think to lead with that?”

“You would have seen it eventually.”

I narrowed my eyes because he was right.

“Ready?” he asked.

I looked at Daniel’s folder beside the keyboard and my heart squeezed tight.

“No,” I said.

Ivan waited and I took a breath.

“But yes.”

We sent the message together.

The countdown began. For the first minute, nothing happened. For the second minute, still nothing. Ivan sat beside me, calm enough to be irritating and alert enough to be honest. I watched the screen because watching him felt too personal after what he had said, and because if I looked at Daniel’s file one more time, I might have to feel an emotion that was quickly becoming too large for the room. At four minutes and thirty-two seconds, the first alert came in.

Ivan leaned forward slightly. I did too.

Mikhail was moving assets. Fast. Messy, for him or maybe this was what panic looked like when filtered through a man who had spent his life making other people bleed.

“He is not standing down,” he said.

“No,” I said.

“He is trying to move the vulnerable assets before the next cycle.”

“That seems like the opposite of compliance.”

“It is.”