Ruby Fever (Hidden Legacy, #6)(15)

“Are you sure that’s what you want?”

Alessandro took a step forward. His voice promised violence. “Leave.”

Konstantin sighed and took a step back. “As you wish. I did my best. I hope neither of us has any regrets.”

He turned and walked up the stairs. Alessandro followed him.

“What the hell?” Leon muttered.

“I have no idea.”

Moments passed, dragging on.

Alessandro returned, picked up Linus like he weighed nothing, and slung him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. “Let’s go.”

Leon took point. Alessandro followed, and I brought up the rear. In seconds, we crossed the house and moved to the garage. Four armored vehicles waited on the concrete floor. I pulled the keys to a Duncan Arms Stormer off the key rack and started the engine with the remote. The huge white SUV roared in response. Of all the custom vehicles Linus owned, this was the best armored. It could withstand a mine detonation and a full blast from one of Linus’ turrets for ten seconds. Only his exosuits provided more protection.

I got behind the wheel. Alessandro loaded Linus into the backseat.

“Do you want me to ride with you or to follow?” Leon asked.

“Follow,” Alessandro said. “We may need a second vehicle.”

The only reason we’d need a second vehicle was if the Stormer were disabled.

Leon opened the garage door and jogged to his Shelby Cobra. Alessandro climbed into the passenger seat. Orange magic sparked, and a Duncan Arms rifle appeared in his hands.

I guided the massive vehicle around the driveway to the gates. We turned right on the one-way street, following Leon, made a U-turn, crawled over the first speed bump, and headed out of the subdivision.

“Sasha?” I asked.

He swore in Italian, too fast for me to follow.

“Who is he really?”

“Exactly who he says he is. The second son of Grand Duke Leonid Berezin, who is the younger brother of Emperor Mikhail II.”

“Alessandro, you are not giving me a lot to work with.”

He glanced at me, his eyes dark. “He has two brothers. His older brother is earnest, uncomplicated, the perfect heir of a Grand Duke, not too bright, not too dumb. His younger brother is a brawler, subtle like a bull on meth. Konstantin is a hedonist, who drinks, womanizes, and parties. You see what they want you to see. These are the roles they have been assigned. It’s not who they are. They are not men. They are wolves in human skin who guard the Russian throne. His presence here means the highest level of the Imperium is involved. He has a mission, and he will kill whoever interferes with it.”

“Can he kill us if we interfere?”

“One-on-one, I can take him. It would be a hard fight. But it wouldn’t be one-on-one. The Imperium would never send him here alone. He wasn’t lying. He might just be the Emperor’s favorite nephew.”

“None of this sounds good.”

“Yeah.”

“Could he be the one who attacked Linus?”

“I doubt it. Killing a Warden would be an act of war. At the very least, it would create a massive political mess. If he’d done it, he would’ve distanced himself from it. Instead, he presented himself complete with a grand entrance. No, my money is on Arkan.”

Before his life as an assassin kingpin, Arkan had been an agent for the Imperial Intelligence Service. The Russians let him retire instead of killing him, because they considered him too expensive to take out. Arkan had Luciana murdered, Linus had been attacked, and now a Russian prince was here with offers of assistance. All of this fit together somehow, but anything I thought up now would be pure speculation. We had to revive Linus.

We merged onto the Southwest Freeway. I picked up speed. “Is he still breathing?”

Alessandro turned around in his seat to look at Linus. “Yes.”

Leon’s vehicle slid behind us.

Linus had never mentioned any ties to House Berezin. As far as I knew, the Texas Warden had no interaction with the Imperium. We were a strictly domestic law enforcement agency.

I couldn’t lose him. He wasn’t just my mentor or my boss. He was a member of our family in everything except name. Arabella adored him, Nevada respected him, I relied on him. He was one of the cornerstones of my world. When I was in trouble, Linus would help. When I needed encouragement, he would offer it. When I needed a swift kick in the butt, he would deliver a scathing lecture.

I had taken all of this for granted. In my head, Linus was untouchable and eternal. Now he was an old man dying in the backseat of his car, and I couldn’t do a thing to help him.

Someone had hurt him. That someone would pay. I would hunt them down no matter where they went.

I told my phone to call home. We needed a medical team, a security lockdown, and a family meeting.





Chapter 4




I walked into my office, lowered the blinds with the remote, plunging the room into shadow, sat behind my desk, and took a long, deep breath.

Linus had been installed upstairs, in one of the numerous spare bedrooms of the main house. Dr. Patel, our House physician, was with him. The medical team inserted an IV, cleaned him, and checked him for additional injuries. There were none. All the blood had come from one epic nosebleed.

The prognosis wasn’t good. Linus was in a comatose, vegetative state. An MRI or CT would tell us nothing. We needed a positron emission tomography scan to evaluate his brain’s metabolism. Only the PET scan could predict if Linus would recover awareness. We didn’t have a PET machine on premises. Transporting Linus to a hospital was out of the question. Whoever tried to kill him might decide to finish the job, and a convoy would be a lot more vulnerable than keeping him here behind sturdy walls and constant guard.