“No,” I say. “It’s inconvenient for you.”
Her expression doesn’t change. “You are tired. Grief made you vicious. Relief has made you foolish.”
“She was shot.”
“I heard.”
“Did you?”
I step around the desk slowly. My side pulls with every movement, the wound from Dmitri’s bullet still wet beneath the bandage. I ignore it.
“You told me your man followed Anya,” I say. “That he saw her enter the warehouse. That he left because he thought it was a clandestine affair.”
Larisa’s mouth tightens.
“There was no man,” I say.
Her fingers shift on the cane.
Small. Enough.
“It was you.”
She laughs once, dry and cold. “You are tired.”
“Yes.”
“You’re wounded.”
“Yes.”
“And relieved. That’s a dangerous combination.”
“No,” I say. “Dangerous is what happens when people think I’m fucking stupid.” I move closer. “You shot her, didn’t you? When Dmitri wavered, you took the chance.”
“That coward hit another like an idiot and made a run for it,” Larisa says, venom curdling her voice. “I couldn’t let the bitch get away with it. For you to be free, she had to die.”
I almost hit her. But she’s still a woman. I control my anger, focusing on the pieces of story she hasn’t given me yet.
“You watched her leave the house.”
“I wasn’t in your house.”
“No. But you still had eyes here.”
She doesn’t deny it.
“You knew she had received the messages from Sergei’s phone,” I continue. “You knew she would go because she still cared whether her father lived or died. And you knew I would not be home in time to stop her.”
Larisa looks toward the window.
Outside, the estate is black and quiet. My men are still at the hospital. The house feels empty in a way it never has before.
“How did you do it?” I ask.
She looks back at me. “Do what?”
“Bring Dmitri into your fold.”