Page 40 of Keeping My Enemies Closer: Pt. 2

Marcelle immediately began shaking her head.“No...no, that...that wasn’t me.”

“What’d I say about insulting my intelligence by lying?”Aurora sighed.“You’re not very bright, are you?”

“But...but on the news...it said...they said that it was two masked men,” she screeched brokenly.“I...I wasn’t there.I swear...I had...I had nothing to do with-”

“She’s irritating me,” Aurora announced, cutting off Marcelle’s ramblings.

I placed a kiss on the side of Zoya’s head before stepping forward to take over, which was a simple motion to establish ownership.As the person in charge of the auction, Aurora had made her objections clear, and now it was my turn to take over.

Stopping only a couple of feet away from where Marcelle was tied to the chair, I slid my hands in my pockets as I broke the news to her.“You need to shut up and listen, and I meanreallylisten.Unfortunately for you, the two men who you hired to rob Zoya talked too much.Instead of just going about their business once they realized that there was no money in the house, they’d chosen to force the issue, exposing a lot more than what they should have.”

“Amateurs, really,” Aurora remarked disappointedly.

“So, not only did they mention the money by a specific amount, but they also mentioned how Zoya should have gotten her money that night, something that only people participating in the auction would know,” I went on.“If that wasn’t stupid enough, Zoya heard one of the men on the phone with you when he thought that she was still unconscious, further proof of how you were involved.”

“But-”

“Shut the fuck up,” Aurora snapped, making Marcelle’s head rear back and making me grin.“Didn’t he instruct you to fucking listen?”

After a second, I said, “Plus, since Zoya had entered the auction under the name Montana Hughes, there was only one way that these men could have possibly made the connection, Ms.Jensen.Now, since I didn’t tell anyone, and since Zoya didn’t tell anyone, that leaves only one other person.Again, as my sister-in-law pointed out, it wasn’t all that hard to connect the dots.”

“No, no, no...”she chanted, a sob on her lips.“It...it’s not like that...I...I didn’t do this.I swear, it wasn’t me.They...someone else must have told...told them.Someone else from the...from the auction.Maybe they noticed her...her from the diner or something.”

If it weren’t for Zoya, I’d be happy as hell that she was denying her involvement in the shooting because Aurora really was a craftsman at her job, and this woman really was too stupid to live.

Chapter 21

Zoya~

Listening to Marcelle lie had my blood boiling.I felt incensed that she was trying to blame the auction on me, regardless of how I had agreed to do it.She’d been the one to come up with the idea, and she’d been the one to admit that she hadn’t wanted to go to the auction alone.

As for the robbery, Kasimir had laid out all the connecting factors for her, and she was still trying to deny her part in all of it.

Yeah, screw that.

Stepping forward, refusing to be just a bystander, I asked, “And this imaginary person from the auction, how would they know my address when I used Montana’s ID, Marcelle?Even if they had recognized me from the diner, how in the hell would they know where I lived?”