“Not through Sidorov. Our link was severed when I asked him to intervene. The quickest way for you to ascertain what happened would be to set your overdue meet with Lorenzo Sambini.”
“A conversation?”
“Yes. Unless you plan to kill everyone you encountered that day.”
Cam swivelled back to Embry. “Can you live with that?”
Embry said nothing and his rage vibrated in the crowded space, sucking oxygen from the air.
Cam’s gaze hardened. “We’ll talk later.”
More silence. I didn’t mind it. I understood it—the anger blocking Embry’s throat. The worst kind of heat flooding his veins. Men who’d been complicit in putting a bullet in Cam still walked the fucking earth. But Alexei was right. Revenge was a volatile mission we couldn’t handle until we had a better view of the landscape. Patience was our strongest friend.
Maybe our only fucking friend.
Cam turned away from Embry, his habitual tell that he was done with a conversation. “We need that intel from the Crows as fast as you can get it.”
He addressed the room, but he meant me. Before Alexei, I’d been a one-man band. “It’ll take time,” I said. Nothing else came to me. I squeezed Alexei’s fingers again.Help me.
“With so many devices,” he said. “You will need someone listening all the time and somewhere they can do that without the masses knowing the operation exists. Your membership is still...”
“Corrupt.” I let go of his hand and rose to my feet, needing the view from the window to clear my head. Cam read me and stepped aside. I looked out over the yard that I could see from Embry’s sheltered window. “We can’t have a room full of listening equipment on the compound.”
“It is a laptop and some headphones, but I agree,” Alexei said. “You could use my flat.”
“No.” I shook my head. “No one catches your tail when you leave, but that would soon change if half of us followed you every night.”
“So? Let them come to my home.”
Alexei grinned.
I glared. “No.”
“It’s not happening,” Cam ruled. “We can use my house. Just means you bastards will have to come over for dinner more.”
“Dinner?” Rubi perked up. “You never ask us over for meals and shit.”
“I’ve been sharing myshitwith you since I was five years old, bro. I go home to get away from you.”
“Sucks to be you then. Seeing as you’ve benched me from everything else, I’m the only fucker who’s got time to sit in front of a computer all day.” Rubi spread his hands.
Cam rolled his eyes but didn’t argue.
Alexei stood. “I have an encrypted laptop you can use. Can I go now?”
“I never made you stay.”
Alexei walked out. Cam’s gaze lingered in the space he’d left behind before he seemed to shake himself.
His eyes found me. He took a breath, but as always seemed to happen in moments that made sense, a phone rang, shattering the spell.
It was the burner Nash monitored, the ever-changing number given out to business associates from rival organisations, friend and foe.
He answered as Cam held up his hand for quiet. “Speak.”
Whatever he heard made his fair brow tick up. He held Cam’s gaze. “Rocco,” he mouthed.
Tension flooded the room. Had they found the bugs already? Unlikely, given Alexei’s expertise, but they had an army we knew nothing about. Maybe they had an Alexei of their own.