The Apple of My Eye -Kaz Brekker (Complete)

Chapter Fifteen

BROKEN PARTS OF SOMEBODY'S LIFE

Jordan's hiding spot was surprisingly good, even to Laura.

Behind the second sofa, there was a coffee table, tall enough for Jordan to squeeze herself in and sit down there, two sofas and several chairs covering her. To make sure there was nothing visible, the only table cloth (which was eaten by moths and with holes) was put underneath Jordan to hide her feet from the small opening there was in the sofa.

Laura was probably looking completely mad, jumping up and down, lying on the ground and doing the weirdest positions to make sure there was no way anyone could see Jordan. And then she made sure to remember her to be very quiet and very still; no answer came and Laura smiled to herself.

It took almost another half an hour for footsteps to be heard outside.

"Boss!" Bosco said, sounding excited.

"Open the door," said the familiar voice she hated and made her gut turn; Pekka Rollins.

"There's something you ought –"

"Is she dead?"

"No!"

"Then I don't care. Open the door," Pekka insisted.

"Yes," there was a pause. "Sir."

Oh, Lucas hated Pekka almost as much as she did. Would he let her leave if she had the chance? Would he help her run?

The door opened and she got up from the small ball she had been sitting in against the wall. She raised her chin and looked down at Pekka.

"Ah, the Tigress!" he said, a sigh of delight with her presence.

He walked into the room and looked like he always did, but his hair usually bright red was just the boring black. That made Laura raise her eyebrows.

"I thought it was a wig," she admitted.

"No, I dyed it, but it clearly wasn't effective," he answered.

"Careful, that bitterness doesn't sound healthy."

"Neither does running away from the engagement your father had for you," Pekka said, smiling. "Did you miss him at all, Miss Laura Gusarov."

She winced with her surname. She hadn't used that in years, she had settled for one of the most common surnames in Kerch before taking the name Holt and, now, the name is back and she had just been associated with it.

"That's not my name anymore," she said, pretending not to care.

"Is it not?" asked another voice in a very bad Kerch.

A man was walking in.

What a dramatic entrance from someone so cold and discreet, thought Laura as she watched her father walking into the room with the disgusted look he usually had.

Her father couldn't be more different from her if he tried, with blonde hair and blue eyes, but now he had a crooked nose. Laura almost smiled, knowing it had been her doing that broken nose from years ago; one good kick had hit him in the face and she had thanked her older sister mentally for the 'younger-sibling-move' she had forced to learn to fight her sister when her mother and father were away: sit back and kick several times as hard and as fast as you can.

"No, it's not," Laura answered, flawless Kerch.

"Be a good girl and change to Ravkan, yes?" her father said, her old tongue making a comeback in her life once more.