SACRIFICE | MAFIA ROMANCE | SMUT

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Hunkered in sky-scraping commercial buildings, industrial units, departmental stores, theatres and bars and restaurants, I oscillated, hands clasped to the back of my head, scanning several departure routes.

Teeming with white-knuckled tourists, keen sightseers and aimless shoppers, London, the great city, all of a sudden, felt too small and discomforting.

Blood rushing in my ears, I lowered my arms, mentally lost in the bustling vicinage.

My heart beats so violently, so painfully.

I kneaded my chest with the heel of my hand, but the pulsation of my heart intensified.

The gravitational surge in my indistinct surroundings strengthened. I looked, hard, thoroughly. Although insurmountable and demanding, I listened to increasing intuition. It's too powerful, enthralling and compulsive. Dissatisfaction and disillusionment arose, subjugating grounds for hope and optimistic belief, a logical voice inside my head, uncompromising with his unarguable facts.

I darkened my eyes, soft winds brushing hair strands across closed lids.

Alexa Haines is dead.

Why is my heart beating so fast?

Why do I feel her closeness?

The blonde damsel evoked me with pleasant yet heartrending memories. I see and feel Alexa, vividly exhausting. Fallen tears, unresolved arguments, and pointless separations. Beautiful smiles, stolen kisses and whispered sentiments. I still feel her body shattering beneath me. Her hand on my back, head on my shoulder, lips to my jawline. I touched my mouth with almost investigatory fingers, the vodka on her tongue, pungent to mine.

I am losing my mind. I am grieving.

No, I am in love.

The gyrating surveillance camera surveying the shopping centre's layby square beckoned me. I don't know who that woman is or why I am so insanely invested, but I want possession of that footage.

I force through the rotational doors in coinciding with Brad. He calls upon me, throws his hands in the air, frustrated. I fostered angered mutism, powered up the escalator and sprinted amid throngs of shoppers to inconvenience the centre's security guards. I barged into the control room.

Seating and indulging pastries, three guards jerked gazes, one stood. "You're not—"

"I need access to surveillance," I interjected, pressing my palms on the partitioning desk. "All of it. Start from this morning too," I glimpsed at my watch, "five-thirty. Give me access to the stores, elevators, facilities, restrooms and car parks."

Momentarily stunned, the guard folded his arms, curving a thick eyebrow. "You do not have the jurisdiction for such imperious demands."

I will murder him. "Wrong." Fuming, I snatched the collar of his shirt, ripped him across the desk, his legs thrashing into monitors and telecommunication servers. "Do you know who the fuck I am?" His co-workers, frenetic yet slothful, jolted to their feet. "One more move," I warned, cocking the Eagle, ramming the barrel under this geezer's double-chin, "and I'll blow his fucking brains out."

Nate entered, closing and locking the door. He stationed himself like an impenetrable wall, black shirt tautening against his folded muscular arms.

I gave the guards a wicked smirk, fisted the guy's shirt collar and smashed his face against the visitors' desk.

Three minutes later, I walked away with cracked knuckles and two days worth of footage.

***

I alleviated myself from procrastinating shopping duties with Miss Bennett under the solid advice that I'd escort her to dinner sometime this week. I couldn't think of anything worse, candlelit dinners, romanticism and false-hearted amorousness, especially with an uppish woman who believes her shit doesn't stink.