The Unanticipated Visit| Completed

An Explanation Will Do

After coming out of the bathroom to change her clothes, Jasmine went into her room to see if Nikolas was there.

Upon walking in, she saw Nikolas sitting at the edge of the bed on his phone typing away. Seriousness had marked his face as well as annoyance, he had been so distracted that he hadn't heard the door open.

Breaking him out of his concentration was Jasmine's voice, "Are you ok?"

He let out a breath as he looked up at Jasmine, "Yeah I am good. Let's go to the living room."

Nikolas got up put his phone in his pocket, stretched and smiled at Jasmine before gesturing for her to lead the way.

They entered the living room where they found Leon and Sophie laughing. Sophie had stitched up the hole in Leon's left leg and cleaned the blood away with antiseptic.

Leon was still sitting on the laid out towels on the couch with his left leg out, in his boxers and Sophie sat on his right side cross-legged.

Sophie finally realised that her best friend had come into the living room.

"Hey. Glad you're back," Sophie smirked as if to say that the whole flat knows what happened.

Jasmine blushed and tried to brush it off. Whereas Nikolas chuckled at the comment and her reaction.

Sophie got up to move to the other side of Leon to create space on the couch for Nikolas and Jasmine.

They all sat on the couch and Sophie grabbed the remote which had been beside her on the couch arm and started to flick through Netflix.

Jasmine started, "So Niko, Leon. Are you not going to tell us why the hell Leon had blood gushing out of his leg or the fact you decided to visit at one in the morning?"

Sophie still flicked through Netflix to show that she was minding her own business, in reality, she also wanted to know the answers to Jasmine's questions.

Nikolas replied, "If I tell you what happened tonight I need you and Sophie to keep calm, ok?"

Jasmine nodded then looked to Sophie for her reply. Sophie turned towards them and nodded her head while whispering a small 'yeah'.

"Ok," Nikolas breathed out before saying, "I and Leon are part of something dangerous. I have always been part of this dangerous thing and I didn't realise until I moved away to Italy. I am hesitant to tell you because I am aware that you may be frightened or I will start to put you in unintentional danger."

Jasmine's eyes flicked to Sophie's. She was confused and so was Sophie as both boys had a solemn look on the face.

Nikolas continued, "We're in the Italian mafia. I know that me telling you this puts you in danger but you can't help your curiosity, can you Jasmine." He smirked a little. Jasmine laughed a little, feeling a tingling in her heart that he remembered her curiosity from a young age.

"The reason why we had to come here was that we were at a, um, business meeting, let's call it, and we got ambushed. I and Leon got out alive but I don't know about the rest of my men. When you came back into the bedroom, that was what I was trying to find out."

Nikolas could see that all the jigsaw pieces were being put together in Jasmine's mind like the reason he left or the reason his dad was hardly around seen by her and because he was running a mafia. Whereas Nikolas was trying to forget the hardships he went through to end up where he was today. The harsh memories invaded his mind, all the bad things he had done he wanted to forget. He didn't want the love of his life to think him a monster.

Jasmine murmured, "It all makes sense. So have you found out yet, you know about the other men that attended this 'meeting'?"

"Don't worry, Jasmine. When I find out I will tell you, and Sophie I am sure Leon will tell you. Right, Leon?"

Leon nodded and turned to look at Sophie, "Are there any questions that you want to ask us?"

Sophie squirmed where she sat, her fingers were fiddling with each other and she stared down at them. She finally asked, "You said we might be put in danger, what if people see that you here and come after us? What do we do if that happens? because we all know that if you guys are back in Italy no one will be here to help us."

Leon turned as much as possible, to reassure her and held her gaze to reply, "No one will hurt you, both of you, our job is to protect you so don't worry about it too much. It is Nik and I's a concern, ok?"

Sophie took in the information, she glanced at the time on the tv and said, "It's quite late, we should get the gentlemen something to sleep on."

Jasmine held up her index finger to the men as if to say, 'give us one minute'.

They went into their rooms to see if they could find anything for the men to rest on.

Sophie found spare blankets and Jasmine had lots of pillows to spare.

In Jasmine's closet, she found jogging bottoms her older brother left when he visited. Jasmine carried the pillows and jogging bottoms to the living room and placed them on the floor. Sophie was already there sorting out the couch and Leon had gotten up from with the support of Nikolas.

Since the gunshot had been in his thigh, Leon found it difficult to change into jogging bottoms so he disregarded them.

Sophie had removed the blood-stained towels from the couch and handed them to Jasmine so she could put them in the laundry.

By the time Jasmine had got back from putting the towels in the laundry basket in the bathroom, Sophie had finished Leon's sleeping place on the couch.

Leon limped towards the couch and plopped himself on it letting out a groan, then a sigh of relief.

Meanwhile, Jasmine had finished making Nikolas' make-shift bed on the floor and looked up to see Sophie helping Leon get comfortable.

Sophie walked into the kitchen and looked in the medicine box that she and Jasmine keep in their home. She popped out two paracetamol tablets and had given them to Leon before he laid down and slept off the pain.

They said goodnight to both men and went into their bedroom to seek the beautiful sleep that was taken from them.

Jasmine picked up the forgotten red kimono off the floor and put it on her bed to remind herself tomorrow to put it in the laundry basket.

She got into bed and closed her eyes. She heard her bedroom door open but she was midway between being conscious and being asleep.

The person had gotten into bed with her and put their arm around her torso, pulling her closer towards themselves.

It was Nikolas that whispered in her ear, "Goodnight, Tesoro."

He kissed her cheek and also went to sleep.