Why?
Why would he betray us?
Nausea hits as bile rises up in my throat when he moves to the side and the man I grew up calling Dad stands in the middle of our kitchen.
“Hello…Trouble.”
Chapter 48
CASPER
The meeting room is quiet as the woman looks at me. Tears line her tired eyes. I feel for her, especially given the four-month-old baby she’s holding. Ludo’s a chubby thing with bright blue eyes and dark blond hair.
“I don’t know anything else,” she says in her strong Russian accent.
Shiny blonde hair falls in front of her face when she looks down at her son. The way she looks at him, it’s obvious she only wants to protect him. I can’t fault her that.
“Vanya, is there any detail that you might have overlooked? Maybe you think it doesn’t matter?”
“I am not ignorant,” she spits at me. “Everything matters.”
A tear rolls down her cheek while she bounces the little boy on her knee. Taking my phone from my pocket, I approach things differently. Maybe if she feels more comfortable with me, she’ll share whatever she’s holding on to.
“My daughter is two months old.” I put my phone down in front of her with a photo of Grace from earlier today. She’s wearing a little black dress with white tights and cardigan. “Her name is Grace.”
“She’s beautiful.”
“Like her mother.”
A glimmer of light softens her face before she says, “I have told you everything I know.”
I nod, because as much as my gut tells me there’s more to her story, the sincerity in her eyes is unmistakable. Rather than push her, I go through all the information she told us. Most is nothing new. From the sound of things, she was nothing but a rich man’s toy.
“I’m sorry,” she tells me when I extend my hand to help her up from her seat. “I wish I could help you more. Tomasz put me on so many planes and boats. Here and there…everything is a blur.”
“I understand.”
We walk out of the meeting room towards the lifts in silence, the little boy sitting happily in his buggy, looking around as though the office is sensory overdrive.
I’m about to help her into the lift when it occurs to me that all the information she’s given us is all business; there aren’t any real physical details.
“You said that he put you on boats and planes.”
“Yes.” A confused furrow draws her face when I take her bag from her.
“Can you come with me?” I wait for her to follow as I head towards the larger meeting room where we’ve set up all the information we have.
The large floor-to-ceiling window on one side of the room frames the darkening sunset as I hold the door open for Vanya to enter. Freddie looks up, stare narrowing on her as though he’s studying her every move.
“Can you pull up the satellite view for the Georgia-Turkey coastline?” I ask him, pulling out one of the chairs around the large boardroom-style table for her.
Vanya doesn’t sit though. Parking the buggy, she walks to the wall of photos and stops in front of Tomasz’s image at Heath House.
“Why is she in here?” Freddie mutters under his breath, pulling up the coastline I asked him to.
“Zoom in, and angle it so that it looks like a view from the sea.”
“Like from a boat?”