Serving Leo [Book 4 of the Stavros Series] ✔️

11

"I'll love you 'til the end."

For some reason those old words are the only words I could hear as he pulled me towards the staircase. I'm numb, I'm in shock, I'm confused. I don't know how many excuses I have but I need to find one to justify the fact that I'm letting Adrik Krupin lead me away.

For three years I loathed the man with an arm around my waist. I had dreams about murdering him and I even thought about it when I was awake as well. I fantasized about ruining him from the inside out.

But before that I was madly in love with him.

He was everything to me.

I could never put into words how much I loved him but I know that he has three freckles on his right knee, he has a scar on his right eye brow from falling off his bike in the third grade, he likes taking cold showers because he loves the way his body feels electric, and he doesn't like science because he thinks that it can't describe everything. He wishes he was born in a simpler era where there were princes and knights and castles.

He wanted to be a king.

And he was one.

As much as I despise to say it, once you give your heart to someone you can never get the whole thing back, even if he killed my brother.

I hadn't even come to my senses yet when we reached the door with the burly man standing in front of it.

He stood in front of the entrance, his full figure blocking it. The thing was that even though Adrik was as tall as him but not as big around, he still could get through the man. The man didn't know that though until it was too late.

"Where do you think ya going with the chick," the man said, growling at Adrik with glowing eyes. It was a fight between two animals in the animal kingdom. But the man thought that he was the lion when really he was the gazelle. "She's mine. I'm paying for her."

"Paying," Adrik asked, his Russian accent as strong as ever.

"Yeah paying," the man said, growing more impatient. "I've been waiting for her. Hand her over man."

One second.

Two seconds.

Three seconds.

"I'm not letting her go again," Adrik seethed.

One second.

I came back to my full senses when I heard the bang of a bullet escape a barrel. The man fell backwards like a stone through the air. His blood painted the door behind him like an artist's masterpiece.

It was Adrik's masterpiece.

I screamed through my hand that I had pressed to my lips absentmindedly and stumbled back, away from Adrik who lazily tucked his gun back into the waist band of his pants.

He didn't care about the noise, he didn't care about any witnesses. This was New York in the year 2040 where murder was as common as breathing.

And of course he was Adrik Krupin, a man who grew up with a crime family as old as America was around.

If there would be any witnesses besides me he would kill them. Perhaps he'll end up burning down this whole building instead to make sure.

Maybe he'll kill me.

"Let's go cupcake. We have much to talk about," he said easily, reaching out for me.

"Ivory," a voice called out from down the hall.

I spun around to see the dark figure of Leo Stavros emerge from the shadows. His eyes landed on me first, then Adrik behind me, and finally the dead man on the floor.