“Judging by the others we’ve seen, I would not call this extensive damage,” Andrei said.
“Can Kostya be ready to help you tonight? Headlights off this time,” Ivan asked.
Viktor simply nodded. “I say we look at everyone. Viktor can fix as many as possible tonight without drawing too much attention to it. We can come up with a plan on how to tell Trino everything later,” Ivan told us all.
Adrik steered the normal conversation toward Trino’s security team, giving the rest of us time and space to go through everyone else in the room. Everyone checked out, much to my relief. I was beginning to get slightly paranoid at the constant betrayals we couldn’t seem to get away from.
The longer we talked, the more relaxed Emilia got too. She laughed along with everyone, she gave Trino a hard time a few times, and she seemed to be more at ease than when she first arrived. She whispered something to Trino at one point. He looked to me, asking where the bathroom is.
I stood up, along with Ivan and Andrei. “I can show her,” I said. While she had been relaxing, she was once again petrified that Ivan and Andrei had stood up with me. I laughed. “Don’t worry. They’re just very protective of me. They’re much nicer than they look.”
King of the UnderworldSephie
As we walked across the floor to the bathroom, Emilia very shyly asked me, “how long have you known Trino?*
I thought for a few minutes, glancing at Ivan and Andrei. “I actually don’t know the answer to that question. I’m terrible about keeping up with information like that. Like six months or so? Sure, that seems right.” I said, shrugging my shoulders.
She laughed. “We’ll go with that,” she said as she walked into the bathroom. I waited outside with Ivan and Andrei. Most everyone in the office had gone home for the day, but there were still a few overachievers still working ban and Andrei both put themselves between me and anyone left in the office without me having to say anything.
Ivan said, in Russian, “I haven’t seen anything on her. I also don’t have my usual murderous rage when it comes to chicks around her.”
“If ever there was a glowing endorsement, that should be it,” I said, laughing.
“She needs Viktor, but otherwise, I think she checks out. So far, everyone in the office has checked out from what I can see. Although I think we need to have a discussion about how much Keith hearts Stephen,” Andrei said
I giggled. “I caught that too. Like maybe a little stalkery, even. Does Stephen still hang out with him?”
“When would he have time? He’s always with us now,” Ivan said, his sly grin curling up one side of his mouth,
“And this is how Keith came to ha te us all so he decided to revenge move to Colombia,” I said as Emilia walked out of the bathroom. Her eyes were little wide when she heard us speaking Russian. “Don’t worry about that either. We were actually making jokes. Russian is just such a coarse language that anything sounds like a threat.”
“You could say the same for Spanish and Italian, honestly. My neighbor is Arabic though. They win the prize for harshest language ever,” she said as we walked back to the office. “You might have a point there,” I said, laughing quietly. Adrik’s eyes landed on mine as we walked back through the door. Since he couldn’t see that my eyes changed, I pushed my warmth to him.
We heard Ivan laughing in our heads. “I can feel you two being f**king adorable right now,” he told us. I glanced at Ivan, completely surprised he could feel that and also apologetic he could feel that. “Don’t apologize, princess. I think I’m just extra sensitive to you both right now. It’s not a normul occurrence,” he told us.
I climbed in Adrik’s lap, wrapping his arms around me as Ivan sat down on the couch with us, I did catch Trino kissing Emilia’s hand as she sat down next to him. It was a very sweet moment. One that was short-lived, as Adrik asked, “have you heard anything on Martin?”
Trino sighed, then cursed in Spanish. I don’t know why his cursing tirades always made me laugh, but they did. I think it only served to increase his anger each time, but I just couldn’t help myself. He finally said, “he’s still trying to take over while I’ve been gone. There are some pendejos that are working with him now, but some have stayed loyal to me. There are more that have stayed loyal to me in my network than are working with him, which is advantageous to their survival rate.”
“And what of the Mexicans?” I asked.
A devilish grin stretched across Trino’s face. “That’s where it gets really good. Since he switched sides, they’re trying to work with him again. But now he won’t work with them. My people tell me he’s severed ties with Sal and Ricardo. Something about him not getting payment he was owed. He’s du mb enough to think he can take over everything on his own.”
We couldn’t help but laugh. “We’re the reason he didn’t get that payment. We put her on a plane with a new ID so no one could find her,” Ivan said.
Emilia’s eyes went wide. “You’re talking about him getting paid with a girl?”
I laughed. “It was not our idea. We’re the ones that stopped it. Her godfather was the one that arranged it, for the record. We’re very pro-not using any humans as payment for anything.” Trino cursed again. “Giana was the payment? Really?” he asked.
We all nodded. “Martin wanted in on Lorenzo’s human trafficking. He threatened to kidnap and sell her if she didn’t obey. She was payment for something happening in the city, but we never got that detail. She’s safe now. As long as she’s smart, no one will ever find her.” Adrik said.
Trino sat in stunned silence for a few moments, clearly shocked that Martin was capable of such things. He finally looked at Adrik, anger clearly visible on his face. “I’m going to enjoy killing him.”
Adrik felt me tense, but he just chuckled. “Yeah, so about that. It’s slightly more complicated than that.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.