24. White Holdings, LLC

Mary Varvara Bell's office was painted and upholstered as icy-white as the Russian steppes, and it was a long walk door through that tundraesque landscape from the hallway to the desk.

The empty desk.

Bell wasn't in her office.

But surely, she would be back.

She wouldn't miss the show.

Mary Varvara Bell'd had the hired goons transport her opponents to her lair to be killed before her.

Classic Evil Overlord mistake.

Blaze doubted she would go full Bond Villian and strap them to an unnecessarily complicated but ultimately escapable death-machine, but he could hope.

If she kept making mistakes based on arrogance, Blaze might get them out of there.

The shaved-head Koch Group mercenary jammed his hand on Blaze's shoulder, pushing him into a white chair.

He landed heavily because his hands were still tied behind his back.

Sarah was likewise dropped in a chair and glared up at the guy who'd manhandled her.

Later. Not now. Later.

Revenge was a dish best served cold.

And with a plan.

The bitchy mercenary said, "Wait. She here soon."

He stomped off, but his boot steps didn't leave the room. He lingered like onion smell by the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Manhattan, leaving Blaze to stare at Mary Varvara Bell's white enamel and glass desk.

Sarah whispered to Blaze, "We need to talk."

"Not here," he answered, though he didn't look at her. If she looked like she'd been hurt, he might kick this whole office to rubble, and he couldn't do that right now.

"But something was said, and there might not be a later."

"If there isn't a later, it won't matter, but we will leave here alive. Give me an hour. I know what she wants."

"You can't give them the—the things. There's a reason," she hissed.

His teeth gritted against each other, and his fists tightened in the zip ties. "I will ensure you survive, no matter what I have to do."

"But—"

"No more talking, kitten. I promise you'll be safe."

He couldn't fight his way out, not with the bullet wound in his leg that was still seeping blood that stiffened his pants leg.

There had to be a better opportunity. He just had to wait for it.

The white ceiling reflected on the polished top, a ghostly sheen floating on the transparent surface.

The bloodless office looked like the monochromatic decor in Logan's apartment overlooking Central Park.

The same bleached-bone esthetic.

Damn, Blaze should have known that Logan didn't have shit for fashion sense and someone else had decorated his apartment. He just hadn't thought a Russian mob boss would be the type to hang flat-white art and toss bleached-out throw pillows.

Blaze hadn't calculated just how giant Logan's mother-wound was, that he'd literally surrounded himself with Mary Varvara Bell like he was enclosed in her hollowed-out skull.

Or inside her frost-rimed uterus.

Creepy.

Then again, Mary Varvara Bell had swooped as soon as Sarah's mother had died, trying to fill that vacancy in Sarah's life with intentions to recruit her into the White Russians, too.

Insecure dictators installed family members in key positions because they thought they could control them. Family members in powerful positions was one of the warning signs of a tyrant.

Dr. Bell had one hell of an M.O.

Mary Varvara Bell strode into the office from a door off the side of her desk. As she was not the supplicant, she didn't make the long, humiliating walk to the desk of the queen. She wore a pale blue skirt suit reminiscent of glacial ice that matched her eyes.

Logan Bell, Tristan King, and Micah Shine followed her in.

God, Blaze would never forget the three of them holding guns on him. It haunted his dreams.

Logan wore a black suit and looked like a hole in the white room cut in space.

Twist wore a standard computer geek uniform, khaki trousers and a blue shirt, though pressed.

Micah had upgraded. He wore a closely tailored designer suit in dark blue with a lighter blue tie, a suit that had rich and dangerous written all over it.

Another puzzle piece locked into place.

Logan considered Tristan, Micah, and Blaze to be his brothers, as the four of them had assured each other they were brothers while they'd been at school. They kept track of each other. They'd come to each other's rescue. They visited each other in the hospital and made sure they were okay afterward.

Logan had learned how to rule a bratva from the Malefactor, his grandfather, and from Mary Varvara Bell.

He was stacking the White Russian bratva with his brothers.

Blaze would have bet all his Bitcoin profits that Tristan and Micah had been coerced into working for the bratva, just like they'd tried with Blaze.

The Malefactor had loaned each of them a substantial amount of money at zero interest as a start-up fund for their lives, but the no-interest loans had come with chains.

Dr. Bell had called in Blaze's loan with a demand for military-grade weapons to commit an atrocity because there was no other reason why someone would need military-grade weapons.

She'd probably demanded Tristan's and Micah's souls, too.

Or, they might have been bribed and were now true believers in the bratva way.

But Micah had texted him about the Koch Group mercenaries.

Interesting.

"Aunt Mary," Sarah said from beside him. "I don't know what Logan told you about me, but it's not true, I swear. He hasn't seen me since I was seven years old."

Mary Varvara Bell's eyes glazed over, and her gaze drifted toward the vast wall of windows overlooking Manhattan.

That wasn't going to work.

Blaze opened with, "I can have some of the weapons within a week."

Mary Varvara Bell turned to him. "Now I'm listening."

"My contacts in the US military and other countries' forces are rock-solid. I will procure everything on your list, but Sarah Bell needs to walk out of here now, free to go."

Dr. Bell pursed her lips like she'd seen a rat in her office. "We are only negotiating to settle your debt. Sarah Bell is a liability I am unwilling to tolerate any longer."

Damn, Blaze's negotiation plan had been the weapons for Sarah, but no plan ever survived first contact with the enemy. "She's not a liability. She's an asset."

Mary Varvara Bell pressed her lips together and chuckled silently, moving a few pieces of paper on her glass desk as she got over her mirth. "She's certainly not an asset for me."

From just beyond his shoulder, Blaze heard Sarah suck in a heartbroken gasp.

Blaze said, "You're making a mistake."

"I doubt that."

"Did you hear her just now? She's still calling you ‘Aunt Mary' and trying to salvage your relationship."

"She's trying to save her own skin."

"That's not it. Even though she knew you and Logan had betrayed her and were coming for her, she went to her farm. Family is so important to her that she was willing to risk her life to defend that farm because her parents had left it to her."

"People do all sorts of odd things when they perceive something has value."

"It wasn't the monetary value. Sarah stayed on the farm because she had a connection to her family through the land. That connection is what's most important to her. You inspired that loyalty in her, too. That's real value, Dr. Bell."

"I do not perceive that she has value."

"Then you don't see her, Dr. Bell. She is loyal in ways that I, even as a member of the tightest military outfit, the Navy SEALs, cannot fathom. If you win her over," which meant she had to stop saying shit like she perceived Sarah had no value, "she will do anything to remain loyal. She will defend you in a fight. She'll sacrifice everything that she holds dear to save you. She is simply the most amazing woman I have ever met."

"Again, unlike your friends Micah and Tristan, here, she does not add value to my organization."

Nevertheless, Blaze pressed on. "I'm responsible for her being involved in this at all. I dragged her into it when I was trying to pressure you."

"And that is why she will be eliminated."

Blaze had to knock that thought out of Bell's head right then. "But it didn't work. You didn't budge. Saving her was a wasted effort on my part, and it drew me out into the open. Sarah was a decoy. A decoy is valuable."

Mary Varvara Bell looked at him, tilting her head a little bit. "Go on."

He saw Sarah's head turn toward him out of the corner of his eye.

"She's been arguing with me this whole time that she wouldn't leave the farm even though she knew your mercs were coming to kill her. She said her community would protect her."

Bell snorted a laugh.

"Connections are the most important thing to her. She feels connections like you and I feel cold or see white," Blaze said, shrugging his shoulders and looking around at the stark room because his hands were still zip-tied behind his back. "If you let her go, she could be your most important asset."

"And you?" she asked.

"You're going to kill me, anyway. I know that. But if you let Sarah go, I'll get the weapons for you. The question is, do you want the weapons or not?"

"You aren't negotiating for your life."

"I wouldn't waste your time, but I'll give you everything wanted, guns and worse, if you leave Sarah out of this."

"Interesting." Dr. Bell leaned back in her chair and studied the white ceiling far above them.

Blaze caught Micah and Twist throw dark glances at each other.

Logan wasn't included.

Yep, Micah and Twist had been coerced into working for the bratva. They weren't converts to the cause.

"Yes, interesting," Mary Varvara Bell said as if she were continuing a conversation with herself, and then she straightened. "How about this: you give me everything I want and continue working for me, and Sarah's life is contingent on your good behavior."

Nope, dammit, Bell had gone in a different direction. "That's not the deal."

"It is now. Love makes you weak, you see, Lieutenant Commander Robinson. It reveals your flaws. That's why when you threatened Sarah to get to me, I couldn't let her live. I can't have a weakness that can be exploited." Bell's rehearsed smile chilled him. "But if she's your vulnerability, that's a different situation."

Ultimately, Blaze agreed to her terms because, as Bell had said, Sarah was his vulnerability, and he was responsible for her.

She would live.

But Mary Varvara Bell had one last barb for him. "If she goes missing, whether on her own or if you ferry her away somewhere, I will kill you, and then I will find her and kill her."

She gestured at Twist, Micah, and Logan, still standing behind her. "With our computer resources and manpower, not to mention our connections, it won't take us long to find her."

Dammit."I understand."

"Give your phones to Tristan King. He will install a special app he built for us to hear your calls and track your texts." Her laser-sharp stare told him that she knew everything. "We wouldn't want Rogue Security to get involved again."