“Get what?” I said tightly. I could see how her legs were tensed: she was trying to distract us so that she could make a move.
“Ralavich didn’t turn me,” she said scathingly. “He created me.”
What?!
Christina smirked at Konstantin. “He found me, dancing at a strip club.”
Konstantin was shaking his head, unable to accept it. “No—”
“He gave me money and fancy clothes. He made me into your perfect woman, Konstantin. Sexy and glamorous and as cold-hearted as you.”
Konstantin had gone quiet, staring at her with raw hatred. She stepped forward and touched a perfectly-manicured finger to his lips. She whispered, but loud enough that all three of us could hear. “I wasn’t dumped by my boyfriend by the side of the road. I was waiting for you!”
I glanced at Konstantin, open-mouthed. Both of us were reeling. The woman I’d thought was innocent, the one I’d felt so guilty about impersonating, had been betraying him the whole time. And I, the one sent by the FBI to betray him, had wound up loyal to him.
Konstantin grabbed Christina and slammed her up against the wall. “Who’s going to be assassinated?” he roared. “Whose murder are you trying to pin on me?”
“Answer him!” I yelled. A hot, protective fury was washing through me. She’d played him from the very beginning, planned to bring him down...and yes, I’d started off doing the same—the irony wasn’t lost on me. But I’d fallen for him, whereas she never had. I was trying to put right my mistake; she didn’t display an ounce of regret.
Christina stared at him, impassive. “You think you can scare me? I work for Ralavich. If I talk, what he’ll do to me is far worse than anything you can do.”
Konstantin glared, but she was right. He’d never hurt a woman: he knew it and she knew it.
“It’s a quarter to one,” said Calahan from the doorway.
No! My chest closed up tight. It didn’t matter that we’d found her. The assassination was still going to happen. Konstantin would still be blamed: it was his word against hers and all the evidence still pointed to him.
“Is it Luka Malakov?” asked Konstantin frantically.
But Christina’s face didn’t move. God, I wanted to hit her! Konstantin was going to go to jail for the rest of his life.
“Is it Baroni? Is it Angelo Baroni?” demanded Konstantin.
Christina looked serene.
“Twelve minutes to one,” said Calahan, his voice grim.
It was all over. We’d lost. All she had to do was keep quiet and wait for our time to run out.
“Is it one of the other Malakovs?” asked Konstantin. “Vasiliy? Irina?”
I was watching her, just as I’d watched Konstantin for years. I’d spent weeks studying her, knew her face better than my best friend’s. And my weird, detail-focused brain noticed something. I’d been watching for guilt, that tiny flicker that would tell me Konstantin had hit the right name. But instead, I saw something else. A movement, barely a tremble of the muscles at the corners of her mouth.
She was trying not to smirk.
We were on completely the wrong track.
And once I knew that, and put it together with the fact it was Ralavich behind all this.... framing Konstantin for murdering a mob boss wasn’t... enough. Ralavich’s cruelty was beyond words and he went for excess. He hadn’t just killed Konstantin’s father, he’d slaughtered his entire family. The target of the assassination had to be someone whose death would be a game-changer. Their murder had to be something that Konstantin’s empire would never recover from.
There was something else didn’t make sense. One O’clock. Why had the assassin been so specific about the time? I’d been around Konstantin long enough, now, to know that mobsters weren’t that predictable. They were always racing around their empire to keep everything running smoothly. They didn’t have a daily routine, like—
I had a sudden memory. Not an image: a sound. A clock chiming one. A woman’s voice. I always shut myself in here at this time—
“It’s Carrie!” I screamed.
Everyone—even Christina—turned to stare at me. In that half-second of shock, she forgot to control her face. I saw the fear in her eyes: I was right.
Konstantin was frowning at me. “Your boss?”
I was almost panting with fear. “She eats lunch every day at one pm. Her office is walled in bulletproof glass!”
“No,” said Calahan. “That’s crazy.”
“It makes perfect sense! Carrie has had our team investigating Konstantin for years. He has the perfect motive to assassinate her. Add that to the emails and no jury is going to question it!”
“But why?” asked Calahan. “Why frame him for Carrie’s death, why not kill one of the other mob bosses? Ralavich could kill two birds with one stone.”
The implications were sinking in and they made me go weak and shaky. “Because…. Oh Jesus.” I turned to Konstantin, feeling sick. “If the FBI thinks you assassinated another mob boss, you’ll go to jail. But someone else gets promoted within your organization and it keeps going. But if they think you assassinated an FBI chief….”