Page 83 of Bombshell

“Because I prefer my sister without bullet holes in her,” I say flatly, “and because taking out one Koltsov will only attract the attention of his brothers. I’d rather deal with the source of our problem. Finding out who’s informing means we can make the whole problem go away.”

“Sutton can take care of herself,” Luca argues.

“Not everyone I care about can,” I explode.

“Well, we can, so I assume you’re talking about Adair,” he says. “Keep a close eye on her. It’s not like she can just opt out of your life. You’ve got enemies. You’re both going to have to face that.”

His advice might mean more if that’s all there was to it. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“It always is,” Jack says, not without sympathy.

“Look, I’m just saying we have options that don’t involve—”

“I have a daughter,” I interrupt softly.

“Like a...kid?” Luca blinks rapidly. It’s rare to catch him completely off guard. In this instance, I know how he feels.

“Adair was pregnant when I left,” I confess, feeling some of the weight of this mistake lessen by telling my friends. They listen as I run them through more details. When I finally get through what happened to Adair after she found out, they’re silent.

“Wow, I can’t…” Jack sucks in a breath. Then he does something I don’t expect. He claps me on my shoulder. “Congrats, man.”

The show of affection knocks Luca out of his stupor, and he grins foolishly. “I really thought I’d be the first one to discover I had a love child.”

“We all thought that,” I mutter, managing a small grin myself.

“Look, Jack’s right. Congrats. I know what family means to you.”

“So, I guess this means you’re sticking around here?” Jack guesses.

I nod. “But it also means I have to deal with the Koltsovs once and for all. Nikolai said something I didn’t understand before. I think he knows she’s my kid. So, that really only leaves me one option: remove the threat by any means necessary.”

“But if we can’t find the source…” Luca says.

“Any means necessary,” I repeat. “If it comes down to satisfying the Koltsovs concern that I’ll talk, there’s a pretty easy way to do that.”

“You wouldn’t,” Luca says.

“Yeah, he would.” Jack shakes his head, but there’s understanding in his brown eyes. He’s always understood sacrifice better than Luca.

“We won’t let you,” Luca says like this is a done deal.

I glance at Jack and he nods almost imperceptibly. If it comes to it, I can count on him to take care of it. If I have any say, I’ll put the bullet through my own brain before I force him to, but I’ll do it to keep Ellie safe.

“So, that’s why I went to Noah. Call it my Hail Mary.”

“And you actually got him to talk?” Jack sounds impressed, which is rare.

“Yeah, but he doesn’t have any clue what’s going on. He thought it was a Bratva rival or a foreign government, I think—he was stuck on the wrong detail.”

Luca and Jack look at me uncomprehendingly, and I realize I’m going about everything the wrong way. It’s harder to keep my head clear with my sister involved. She isn’t some faceless hostage. She’s Sutton and she likes crappy cereal and bad music and snow. “Noah received an anonymous email—”

“Email can’t be truly anonymous. Data has to be physically present somewhere,” Luca interrupts.

“That’s not the important part. The email said the sender had a video recording of our meeting with the Bratva at the Westminster Royal.”

“Bullshit,” Jack says, “No one could have compromised that meeting.”

“They checked me so thoroughly for weapons and bugs, I needed a cigarette after,” Luca agrees. “They don’t fuck around with that stuff.”