“Papa!” I run over and kiss him on the cheek, then take his hand and lead him into the room. “I’m so happy to see you. Thank you for coming all this way.”
“For you, I would fly to the end of the world.” He cups my face and gives me a wink, then turns to Carlo and his sons. “Hello, my friend. Thank you for inviting me into your city.”
“Thank you for coming,” Carlo says as the two men shake hands. “My son made it clear that what he and Nadia have to tell us is very important.”
“It is,” I assure them both as we all take seats. I glance at Carmine, giving him a silent nod to go ahead.
“As you all know, Nadia and I were vacationing in Europe. A little holiday after discovering that Richard was responsible for killing Armando and several others. We thought the situation was settled with Rich’s death.”
He glances at me, and I pick up the story.
“However, while we were in Paris and strolling through a cemetery, we discovered we were being followed.”
I recount the incident with the man in the mausoleum and how we handled it.
Carlo laughs, much to my surprise.
“I apologize. I know it’s not a funny situation, but you hid the body in a crypt? That’s just priceless.”
My father chuckles with him, and I continue.
“A couple of days later, we moved on to Cannes, and within about forty-eight hours, we picked up on another tail. He was at the pool when we were there. At the same restaurants as ours. You get the idea.”
I glance at Carmine, and he continues.
“We devised a scheme to catch him. And we did. But this time, when we told him that Rich was dead and asked why he was following us, he said that Rich wasn’t the one who gave the orders. That it went much higher than that.”
Papa and Carlo share a glance.
“Do you know what that means?” I ask.
“It means this goes deeper than we thought,” Papa says with a long sigh. “And someone tried to kill my daughter. Whoever is behind this will die.”
“Who was Rich working for?” Carlo wonders aloud.
“We’re going to fucking find out,” Rafe says.
Chapter 17
~Carmine~
“For a doctor, your husband sure kept a lot of files at home,” Nadia says to Annika. We’re in Annika’s home, in various areas of Rich’s old office, poring over paperwork. He had tons of files, and every piece of paper has to be looked at.
“He wasn’t a fucking doctor,” Annika snaps back. She’s sitting cross-legged on the couch, her dead husband’s laptop in front of her as she tries to break the passcode. She sighs and leans her head back on the sofa. “Sorry. I don’t mean to sound like a bitch. I wish I could figure out this password.”
“For not a doctor, there sure are a lot of patient notes here,” I muse as I open another file and frown down at medical information on someone named Samantha Briggs. “I would think it’s illegal to have patient information at home.”
“It is,” Annika assures me. “It’s also illegal to pose as a doctor when you aren’t. I’m so fucking mad at him.” She stands and paces the office. “I wish he was alive so I could punch him in that smug face and then kill him myself.”
“While I understand—and agree with—the sentiment,” Nadia says, “that won’t help us today.”
“I don’t even know what we’re looking for,” I reply and toss a file on the growing stack.
“Sorry I’m late,” Ivie says as she hurries into the office, then promptly stubs her toe on the doorjamb. “Ouch! Son of a bitch.”
“I swear, you need to wear Bubble Wrap,” Nadia says, shaking her head. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. That hurt.” Ivie sits and rubs her toes. “I tried to get here sooner, but traffic was a bitch. So, how can I help? What can I do? Annika filled me in on the whole mystery at hand.”
I turn to Annika and raise a brow, but the woman only shrugs. “She’s my best friend, Carmine.”
“I’m totally trustworthy,” Ivie assures me. “I can help you look through the house or something, but I likely won’t know what I’m looking for.”
“That makes four of us,” Nadia says. “None of us knows what we’re looking for, but we’ll know it when we see it.”
“Something out of the ordinary,” I reply. “Names, numbers, notes that are vague or even incriminating. That would be convenient.”
“I’m trying to get into his computer, but the fucker locked it down pretty solid,” Annika adds.
“How about this?” Ivie says. “I’ll make you all a late lunch and help out wherever I can.”
“I need a break from this,” Annika says and tosses the computer onto the cushion beside her. “I’ll help you, Ivie. We’ll be back in a few with sustenance. Maybe I’ll be more productive if I’m not hangry.”
The two women leave the room, arm in arm, and Nadia sighs across from me.
“I guess it’s a good sign that she’s hungry,” she says, still staring at the doorway. “She looks a little better than she did when we left here a few weeks ago.”
I want to disagree. I think Annika looks horrible. The anger and hatred are festering inside of her. She has dark circles under her eyes, and she’s lost a lot of weight in a very short time.
But I don’t say any of that because Nadia is worried enough, and we have plenty on our plates.
“Carmine.”
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“We’re not going to find anything in these medical records. I don’t even know why he has them here or what he used them for. But this isn’t the answer.”
“I agree.” I rub my hand down my face. “I’ve been trying to reach my brother to see if he’s had time to tinker some more. I’d like to have Rich’s phone here so I can do some digging, but I can’t reach Shane. He won’t answer his damn phone.”
“Maybe he’s still out of the country,” she suggests.
“It would help if he’d answer and tell me that.”
Annika and Ivie return with a tray full of sandwiches and chips, soda, and water.
“I’m starving,” Annika says, taking a sandwich and some chips for herself. “Eat up. There’s more in the kitchen if you’re still hungry.”
“This is enough for an army,” Nadia says and bites into a sandwich.
I try to call my brother again, but it goes straight to his voicemail.
“Son of a bitch,” I mutter and then pin Ivie with a stare. She blinks and looks behind her.
“What?”
“I know you talk to my brother. Have you heard from him?”
“Shane?”
“Yes, Shane. Where the fuck is he?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugs and then says it again. “Honest, Carmine, I don’t know. I haven’t heard from him in a few days. He said he had some work to do and that he’d be in touch. Not to worry.”
“Yeah. That sounds like him.”