The Black Wolf (In the Company of Killers, #5)(32)

My cell phone rings—Izabel’s and Nora’s heads turn simultaneously to look at me when they hear it, because it could only be someone from the Moretti mansion calling this particular number.

I answer on the third ring.

“Yes, this is Niklas Augustin,” I say into the phone to Ghita Moretti. “It’s good to hear from you so soon. Yes”—I nod here and there, listening to Miz Ghita’s pitch, telling me the rules and being her typical authoritarian self so she feels like the one in control. “Yes—No the time is perfect. I will be there. Yes, my girls will be joining me”—(does this bitch ever shut up?)—“I will see you then—of course I’ll be bringing cash. Good day, Miz Ghita.” I run my thumb over the phone screen to end the call.

Nora and Izabel look surprised—I admit, even I’m a little surprised.

“I didn’t expect to hear from her this soon,” I say, setting the phone on the coffee table in front of me. “They want to meet with us tonight at ten—money talks.”

“And so do threats,” Nora chimes in.

“But that’s in three hours,” Izabel says, looking slightly concerned.

“What’s the matter? Starting to feel like you should?” I taunt, grinning at her.

She shakes her head, sighing, annoyed with me. “Will you ever grow up, Niklas? You’re impossibly…you’re a jack-ass.”

I get up from the sofa so I can get ready.

“Get it all out here,” I tell her as I pass, heading toward the closet where ‘Mr. Augustin’s’ suit hangs. “Remember, play your role, Izzy, and play it well or we don’t make it out of this alive.”

“You should have more confidence in her,” Nora speaks up. “I agree with Izabel—you should grow up; stop treating her like—”

“Like a girl who needs some sense knocked into her?” I cut in. “I’ll never accept Izzy as an operative—and you know as well as I do that she has no business doing this shit.” I point my index finger at Nora and then myself, back and forth. “You and me, we’ve been doing this for how long? Oh, that’s right—since we were children. She should be living with that woman in Arizona, going to the f*cking bars on Friday nights, getting the shit f*cked out of her by lazy twenty-four-year-old wannabe rock stars; hanging out with her girlfriends, feeling each other’s tits in their exploratory phase—not working for a billion dollar assassination organization, with little to no experience, going on missions like this one that’ll only open old wounds and cut new ones—she’s not ready, and she never will be, so shut your f*cking mouth before I shut it for you.”

“I’m standing right here, you f*cking *!” Izabel steps right up into my face; her eyes are blazing with indignation; her jaw moves as she grinds her teeth.

She starts to say something, surely in argument to the things I just said, but she calms herself, and it surprises me, confuses me even—I’d never expect anything less from her than a fight. Instead she takes a deep breath and says cool and composed, “Let’s get ready—this is a multi-million dollar job,” and then she walks away, disappearing around the corner as she heads into the room adjacent to the main room where her wardrobe is.

Nora and I just stand here for a moment.

She looks at me. I look at her.

“What are you doing, Niklas?” she asks suspiciously, in a quiet voice so Izabel doesn’t hear.

“What do you mean?” My hard gaze never wavers.

Instead of elaborating, Nora shakes her head as if she knows something I don’t and then moves toward the bathroom, walking past me.

I reach out and grab her wrist, stopping her.

“I asked you a f*cking question.”

In a flash, Nora’s hands are around my throat and a ringing bounces around inside my skull as she shoves my back and head against the wall.

“And I’m not Aya yet,” she growls, pressing her body against mine—(I’m loving the shit out of this, so I let her)—“so you should probably mind that tongue of yours, or I will cut it out for you.”

I smile, trying to ignore that my breath is being cut off by her hand. She releases me slowly and takes a step back, but her dark eyes never leave mine, challenging me to piss her off some more, which I certainly intend to do later. The game is on, you crazy, beautiful bitch—and here I thought this game I’ll be playing with Francesca Moretti was going to be the most interesting thing about this mission.

Two hours later, the three of us are dressed and ready to head out. Miz Ghita insisted that a car pick us up at the hotel, which means that Miz Ghita can kill three birds with one stone: know the location of where we’re staying, control how and when we arrive and leave the Moretti estate, and leave us without our privacy to and from the estate because the car we’ll be chauffeured in will absolutely be bugged, and everything we say and do in it will be watched and recorded.

We slip into our roles the moment the door to our suite opens.

A black car picks us up in front of the hotel. I sit next to the window with Izabel next to me and Nora on the other side of her. There is only one other man in the car with us—the driver, who is probably more than just a driver.

Nora sits with her back straight, her eyes lowered, her hands folded delicately in her lap, her long, graceful fingers—minus the missing one I already have the perfect excuse for—partially hidden in the folds of the smooth fabric of her little dress. All of her makeup is gone—no crimson red lips or dark eyes—but she is quite stunning still. That’s what a buyer would want: a woman who is more beautiful without makeup, who is disciplined and frail and small. It kind of blows my mind, Nora’s transformation from manipulative, murderous banshee to a delicate, submissive little doe. She is good. I may not like her, but I have to admit she is good at what she does. And she was right—she’s a fast learner.