“Right. From what we know of Linda, her father was David’s brother, so that’s how she got her job. Her brothers were too young to take over, so her old job has to have fallen to another one of the cousins now that she’s in the wind. Outside of the Eatons, Linda was the only one with a view from the top of the mountain.” She was thinking out loud, but they all seemed to be following along. “Now all we need to figure out is two things. Who took Linda’s place, and what’s the most important thing to Nicola Antakov?”

“What do you mean?” Abigail asked.

“Is it the return of her throne or her family?”

“That’s easy, her throne.” Abigail didn’t hesitate. “She couldn’t have given a crap about us.”

“The problem with your argument is Sadie.”

“Even I don’t understand that one,” Finley said.

“Sadie is about to turn eleven in a few weeks, right?” Abigail and Finley nodded. “Nicola has years to teach Sadie the business, or at least it will seem like years, but it’s over in a blink. In Nicola’s game, it has to be finessed. To be successful, Sadie’s education has to start early.”

“How can you teach a child to want that?” Abigail asked.

“Easy, by stripping away her humanity. All Nicola needs is you out of the way.”

“Over my dead body,” Abigail said with venom.

“There’s going to be a dead body—it just won’t be yours.”

✥ ✥ ✥

Emma lay still with her head on Cain’s chest, and she seemed to be listening to her heartbeat. “Are you sure you don’t want to wait until we all get home? What can you and Remi do in a couple of days?”

Cain moved her hand up from Emma’s butt to her neck. “I need some answers about what happened with Josh, and going alone will give me a jump on the guys outside. You and the girls will be fine, and you know I wouldn’t leave you behind if it wasn’t something I had to do. If I can, it’ll be a day, and I’ll be back.” She was loyal to the people who were loyal to her, but her family came before all that. Getting answers would give her a way of ridding herself of any problem that could threaten her family. To do that she’d walk through hell and back.

“Try for that. I’ve been looking forward to this vacation, and I don’t feel good about letting you out of my sight.” Emma pushed up and looked at her. “Promise me you’ll be careful. I know you don’t take crazy chances, but don’t take shortcuts because you want to make something happen.”