“The investigations are complete. We were here to bring justice to Nao Yamamoto. Where is Ryuu?”

There was something in Maxence’s voice that had Mariko turning pale and Stefano feeling like an old man, tired of always being right. “We don’t know,” he said. “Why?”

“Osamu Saito trained Ryuu as a shadow rider and used him as an instrument of revenge against the Yamamoto family. He began taking their companies apart by hacking in and stealing research and selling it to the highest bidder. He proved to be extremely good at industrial espionage. He also managed to transfer most of Nao’s personal fortune into an account he’d set up for himself offshore.”

Mariko stepped back, away from Taviano and Stefano, shaking her head. Taviano made a move to slip his arm around her, but she stiffened and stepped back farther. “That’s impossible,” she whispered. “My brother’s bones were broken and twisted. He couldn’t ride the shadows, as much as he wanted to.”

“You’re certain Osamu trained him?” Stefano asked, already knowing the answer. The International Council would never have sent the French riders if they weren’t 100 percent convinced that they had all the facts.

Maxence nodded. “I’m afraid so, Stefano. Ryuu and Osamu are behind the attack on your family. They used the money Ryuu stole from the Yamamotos to fund the mercenaries. We traced the money back to the account Ryuu set up. They also targeted the Yamamotos. Sango Yamamoto was pushed onto the tracks. Witnesses said another woman was with her. We believe that woman, from the description, was Osamu.”

Stefano shook his head. “Osamu had to have been totally insane.”

Maxence agreed. “She had been courted by Daiki Tanaka when they were young, but at the last minute he backed out. There is a small trail that leads us to believe she began plotting revenge on him. Certainly she was known to say things against Daiki to her friends and her sons. We believe she tracked Marie down and killed her. She was in the same small town at the same time as Marie’s death, and that’s just too big of a coincidence for us to swallow.”

Taviano moved closer to Mariko. She was pale, her eyes looking like two bruised flowers pressed into her head. At his movement, Stefano glanced back at Taviano. Somewhere, in the house, Ricco was hunting right at that moment. Ricco and Stefano had been worried that Ryuu was involved somehow. To what extent they didn’t know, but nothing about the kidnapping made sense.

Stefano wanted Taviano to get his hands on Mariko. She was a very intelligent woman and she was going to realize that along with the Ferraro family, her brother and Osamu had targeted her. The moment Ricco realized who was in the passageway, his expression had turned murderous. He would want to protect Mariko before anything else, not realizing that if he killed her brother, she might not ever forgive him.

“We do our own investigations and our findings differed from the police’s when it came to Isamu’s suicide. We kept those findings secret, but we knew he wasn’t alone when he killed himself. More than likely Ryuu put a gun to Osamu’s head and forced Isamu to kill himself to save his sister. He just hadn’t realized that his sister was bent on revenge.”

“Do you think Dai knew his wife was behind those deaths?” The last thing Stefano wanted was for one of the French riders to come across Ricco killing Ryuu. He tried to stall them.

Maxence shrugged. “Everyone knew he loved her, and yet he killed her. He wouldn’t have killed her unless he knew there was no other way out. He had to know the moment the International Council launched an investigation into the deaths of the Tanaka family that we would uncover Osamu’s conspiracy to take down all the families involved.”

Stefano sighed. “If Dai knew all along and did nothing, he was as guilty as she was.”

Maxence nodded. “Agreed. We found evidence that the Ito family was next in line for the pair to take down. All along Ryuu had been pretending to help Nao. Nao was obsessed with Ricco. From the evidence we gathered, he admired Ricco. He began pitting himself against Ricco by trying to outbid him for various items they both collected. Ricco’s collection came first, but Nao was determined to rival it. During that time, he trusted Ryuu and gave him access to his computers without realizing it. That enabled Ryuu to begin his destruction of the Yamamoto empire.”

Stefano’s investigators had known someone was stealing from Nao Yamamoto and that his personal assets as well as companies were slowly being drained in a variety of ways. “Ryuu changed the compound for the making of casings for the race cars, didn’t he? That was Yamamoto’s company.”

Maxence nodded again. “We believe he made certain that your brother’s car received the bad casing. He’s been watching your brother for a long time.”

“Ricco worried for years that someone was entering his house. He made certain no one, not even a rider, could.”

Maxence’s eyebrow shot up, but he didn’t comment on that bit of information. “Ryuu killed Darin Salsberry. His body is in one of the hall closets. We’re certain that Ryuu is somewhere in this house. He could use the passageway without fear that Darin would stumble onto him. My brothers are hunting him as we speak.”

A small sound of distress escaped before Mariko could stop it. Not her brother. He wouldn’t do this. He would never conspire to kill an entire family, just wipe them out because Osamu told him to. Would he? She pressed trembling fingers to her lips and took another small, gliding step back away from the men and toward the passage where Ricco had followed Nao’s killer.

She could not believe that Ryuu would do this, but a part of her was already recognizing the red flags she’d chosen not to see. The many times Ryuu had laughed when Osamu had shamed her. He’d come to her room later and tell her he was sorry, it was just that Osamu looked so funny with the broom, bashing at her as if she could sweep her under a rug. Although his laughter had hurt at the time, she’d allowed him to coax her into smiles after.

There were so many incidents growing up that she’d overlooked because she’d needed to believe Ryuu loved her. Someone had to love her. Now he was somewhere in the house with Ricco after him. Ricco. Her heart stuttered. Ryuu could kill him. Ricco had a gentle heart. He might hesitate because Ryuu was her brother. How would she feel if he killed Ryuu? She didn’t know. Her normally calm mind became utter chaos.

She turned and dashed for the passageway. She didn’t care if the French riders were angry at what she was doing. She had to find her brother. She needed answers. She needed to know that he hadn’t done these things and Osamu hadn’t turned him completely against her. Fighting back emotions that threatened to overwhelm her, she raced down the passage, looking for shadows that would tell her which way they went.

Ricco sprinted down the narrow passage after the shadowy figure he knew was Ryuu. He had begun, almost from the very beginning, to worry that Mariko’s brother was involved. When she had lost the trail and then the investigators had said there was no trail, he had looked at the surveillance footage of the hotel cameras himself. He and Stefano. Neither had said one word of their suspicions to Mariko. Ricco had wanted to be wrong. He’d even sent up a prayer or two, and he wasn’t a praying man.