Chapter 496
496
Adrik
Viktor walked in my office, looking quite serious, even for him. “Boss, the DA just called. He’s ready to
prosecute Dr. Moretti. They went through the files we gave them from Sal in much more detail than we
did. Eric can bring charges against Sal as well.”
I thought for a moment. “I’m not sure I want that happening. If Sal has made his own deal, his fate
might already be sealed. I want to talk to Battista to see what he knows about Sal’s deal first.” I inhaled,
tapping my fingers on my desk as I thought about how everything needed to happen almost
simultaneously and we still didn’t have a solid n. “Tell Eric he can have Dr. Moretti, but I want to wait
on Salf now.”
Ivan had walked in, shortly after Viktor. “Giving him the doctor will buy us just a little bit of time. The
information we get on everyone else could look like it came from him, if we y it right,” he said.
“That’s what I was thinking, too. I think we can link Henry to Sal and make it look like the doctor is the
one that exposed that connection,” I said. “I’d like to meet with Eric and Doug one more time before we
actually hand over the doctor. Are they still being followed by Henry’s people?”
Ivan nodded his head. “I say that loosely. His people are not very good, but they’re still watching both
Eric and Doug. There’s several ces that we can easily get you to where you can meet with them
without anyone seeing.”
“Let’s see what Battista has for us, then set something up to meet with those two in person. If I hand
that sack of s*it over to them, I want to know he’s going away for the rest of his life. I don’t want to have
to find him again and tie up their loose ends. That’s just going to p*ss me off.”
Sephie walked in right as I said thatst sentence. “Nobody wants that. Especially not how that you’re
all murdery and s*it on a regr basis,” she said, smiling widely as she walked to me. “Andrei can kill
people with his thumbs, you can now kill people with one look.”
I pushed my chair back, opening my arm for her. She was still grinning at me as she leaned down and
kissed me sweetly. It never failed to surprise me how much her simple gestures helped me rx and
melted the stress away. I pulled her into myp wrapping my arms around her, suddenly not caring one
bit about anything but
her.
“I’ll let Eric know. Battista should be here in a few minutes,” Viktor said, looking at watch. “Stephen is
already downstairs waiting for him.”
“Thank you, Viktor,” I said, pulling Sephie closer to me. She leaned back against me hugging my arms
around her waist. “What have you gotten into this morning?” I asked, my mouth against her ear.
“Not much. Just making ns for world domination with the Wonder Twins. I really feel like this n
might be the one,” she said as seriously as she could manage.
Ivan chuckled. “If it’s you and Misha nning it together, at least we know it’ll be entertaining.”
She pointed at him, saying, “right? Thank you!”
Iughed at her antics, loving the short breaks she always managed to provide to my tay that made
everything a little brighter. “Do you still have a weird feeling about Battistaing today?” I asked her,
brushing her hair away from her shoulder let my fingertips brush her neck lightly, loving the sparks I
could clearly feel from her as I did.
“I do. I don’t think it’s necessarily bad. I might just be nervous from thest time he requested our
services,” she said.
“Did Andrei, Misha, or Stephen get anything else about it?” Ivan asked.
“No, not that I know of. The Wonder Twins are wary, much like me, but it’s nothing specific.” We all
heard the elevator doors ding. “That’s Stephen,” she said.
“You need to teach me how to do that,” Ivan said.
She giggled. “I will dly teach you how to do that if you agree to spar with me at least once a week for
the foreseeable future,”
Ivan had smiled more than I’d ever seen him smile since I met Sephie, but the smile at stretched
across his face when she asked him to spar with her more was maybe thergest smile I’d ever seen
on that man’s face. I could feel how happy it made him. “Deal,” he said. I could also feel how happy itPublished by N?v''elD/rama.Org.
made her when he
agreed.
“Not gonna lie, I love the fact that my fiancée is giddy over being trained to be a better fighter right
now,” I said right before Stephen walked into the office with Battista. Shortly after, the Wonder Twins
and Viktor walked in, closing the door behind them.
The mood turned slightly more serious once Battista was in the office. Once he had greeted everyone,
we got straight to business. “Battista, how did you find out
about Ricardo and Martin’s deals?” I asked.
He sighed. “It’s aplicated answer, but the very basics are that we have a psychic that gets notified
by whatevermunicates with her when another deal is
made.”
“You don’t know whatmunicates with her?” Sephie asked.
“No, she refuses to reveal how she gets the information,” Battista said.
“How long between when deals are made and when she finds out usually?” I asked..
“I’m not entirely sure. I don’t think I’ve ever asked that question. Why are you asking
“Because Sal made a deal. We don’t know specifics, but it wasn’t that long ago that he did it. I don’t
know if he made a deal with a lower-level demon and that’s why it hasn’te up on your radar or if
it’s so new that your psychic hasn’t been alerted yet,” I said.
“Actually, I was going to bring that information to you today. I thought I was going to tell you something
you didn’t know. I should’ve known you’d all know already. How did you find out?” he asked.
“Dario said Sal told him about it after it happened, which is somewhat surprising. I don’t know how
much these guys are talking about these things among each other, but it seems like something you’d
keep to yourself,” I said.
Battista thought for a moment, then said, “maybe this is alling from Ricardo. Maybe he knows he
needs more help than he’s found.”
“Can your psychic find out what kind of demon Sal made his deal with? Ricardo and Martin are going to
need to be dealt with differently than everyone else, because of their deals,” I said.
“Differently how?” Battista asked. I knew he was going to want to know the details. asn’t sure I was
ready to tell him about my level-up yet.
Thankfully, Stephen is quick on his feet. “Because the demons they made deals with are so powerful,
we have to change tactics with them to be effective. It’s going to be much nicer for us to know
beforehand if we need to change tactics with Sal as well.”
“We need to take precautions in order to protect ourselves. Knowing beforehand gives us the upper
hand, if you will. Which is why we would appreciate notice if you ever need our services for one of your
associates again. That was not a fun day for any of us,” Sephie said. Battista could tell by her tone that
she was not joking around.
“My apologies, Sephie. I didn’t know the extent of his crimes beforehand. There were plenty of us that
had our suspicions, but no one knew for sure until you guys exposed him,” he said.
“I understand. Just let us in on the suspicions next time,” she said. I saw Ivan wink at her, knowing she
was trying not to get too irritated thinking about that day and everything she’d seen.
“You have my word that you will know what I know from now on. It never urred to me that you guys
would need to take precautions, but now that I do know, I will make sure you know everything that I do,”
he said, apologetically.
I knew we greatly benefited Battista, especially in matters of business, but I also got the impression that
he genuinely liked us. He seemed to like my father as well. As much as anyone could like that man.
They’d been friends for years, but I never realized the extent of their rtionship until recently. My
father had been helping out behind the scenes for much longer than I was aware of. It was an intriguing
side to Vitaliy that I never would’ve known about, were it not for Sephie.
“What are your ns for taking care of Ricardo and Martin?” Battista asked.
“Honestly? We don’t have any yet,” I said, chuckling at Battista’s shocked expression