Heirs To The City: The Quartet

Chapter Fifty One

Olivia Thorne

I watched Adrian's darkly clad figure leave several hours earlier then he usually did as I was walking to a meeting with a few of the Directors. I still had an hour worth of meeting to do, and whatever files and articles I had left for the evening.

It was only after suffering through the rest of the days work that I finally collected my jacket and phones off of my desk before leaving the office towards the elevators at quarter to seven while I moved down to the lobby. I knew that there was going to be a car waiting for me, it was just the way that things like my boyfriend's never ending attentiveness would allow. During Thornbrook I'd gotten so used to him being around all the time, that the year we'd not lived with one another had seemed like walking across coals, or kneeling in rice for hours. It had also allowed me to get used to the never ending availability of luxuries. Many men had tried to flirt with me though one way or another, they vanished from the city. Most of them were then noted to have moved, and I knew that wasn't an accident. Adrian had likely either bribed them, or threatened them. It was his style after all no one ever had gotten close enough to either of us to threaten our relationship. Adrian was clear on his limits with other women, and ensured that they kept their distance for one way or another. 

There was a time where I had through that wasn't true with Aria since the two of them had secrets that had included a one week recovery relationship after Adrian had broken up with Savannah. That however got cleared up, and I'd been around Aria enough during the last year at Thornbrook that I knew that Adrian's kindness was nothing more then him simply caring about the people around him. It was also the reason that I trusted Adrian to make smart decisions when it came to the people around him, because he would hate to have anyone see that he wasn't as crude as he made himself out to be.

Getting down to the lobby I spotted the long wheel base S-Class parked along the curb while security stood next to the vehicle. I didn't mind the chauffer but I did want to know what made it so that Adrian didn't come to get me even if he'd left hours ago, and likely was up to something, though I hadn't the slightest clue of what it could have been.

Unless it was a surprise.

He'd done this before choosing to go off and plan an entire evening because he wanted to make sure that I felt appreciated, or simply he was in the mood to do so, though if I had to guess this was an apology one for the fact Kate had to come talk to him about valuing his life knowing that he could be targeted at any point.

There hadn't been an assassination attempt, but I also knew well enough that there was no need for him to not give off the kind of image a dictator, secretary of state, or the don of a mafia family would.

He was also known for his gestures and in the world of Adrian Winters gestures did have baggage usually to make something happen.

Unless it was me or his family.

Stepping out of the glass doors and into the brisk weather of mid November I walked down to the car waiting for me outside and pull the coat I wore tighter around me though I did catch some of the looks from pedestrians moving through the city staring at me as I climbed into the Mercedes.

I'd gotten looks before, ones of contempt others of appreciation, others still of some kind of desire that would surely get all of them with canceled visas, and documents saying they were from their heritage country.

Lots of people would have seen Adrian's actions as controlling, secretive, or down right manipulative; something I'd fallen into in the past with Demetri the only differences were that, Adrian had a clear moral compass, he was open with me about everything if only I ask, and he'd kill anyone who ever laid a hand on me, while also willing to put himself behind bars if he ever hurt me.