A/N:
Daimonáki mou = My Little Demon
Mikrós Daímonas = Little Demon
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(Vasileios's POV)
I flipped through the stack of papers that my guys collected hoping to find something about the girl sleeping soundly in my bed.
She was asleep before I got out of the shower and had a death grip on Ares's fur. I had grabbed the other pillow and spent the night on the couch a few feet away from the bed. If she woke up forgetting where she was and felt someone in bed with her I didn't want her to panic. Ares stayed with her the whole night while the other two slept where they usually do.
By the time I fell asleep it was almost seven in the morning and I woke up around eleven. Four hours were more than I usually got so it didn't bother me much. I messaged Orion and told him to pick something up for me so he would've be here until three or so which gave me time to go through the papers.
Halfway through the stack and I'd still found nothing. Nothing with her name on it or anything. I had about a quarter left when I saw movement from the bed out of the corner of my eye. Glancing up, I found her peaking at me through her lashes while she remained buried in my sheet.
"I know you're awake, Mikrós Daímonas."
She gave me a smile and sat up, causing Ares to let out a groan of annoyance. Her hair was a complete mess and my shirt that she wore hung off one shoulder.
I lifted up the papers so she could see them I asked, "How come you're not in here anywhere?"
Her smile turned into a frown that I didn't like as she scooted to the edge of the bed and stood up. She sat beside me and motioned towards them and then motioned to her my mouth.
"Want me to read them to you?" I guessed and she nodded. So I started at the beginning of the stack and began to read.
Thirty minutes in she grabbed my arm and squeezed. I reread the sentence again and she squeezed harder. It was a page where he had names and prices across from those names.
Star's starting selling price is $1,000,000.
"They called you Star?"
She nodded and pinched her fingers close together.
"Tiny Star?"
She shook her head.
"Little Star?"
She nodded.
With that knowledge I quickly scanned through the next few pages and found every spot where she was mentioned.
"So according to this your birthday is in October and you're nineteen years old."
She pointed at me and gave me a questioning look.
"Me?" She nodded and shrugged.
"My age?"
A nod and a smile.
"Twenty-four." I answered just as someone knocked on the door.
"It's me, Boss." Orion announced.
"Have what I sent you for?"
"Both of them."
I brushed her hair back from her face, grinning as she nuzzled in my hand like a cat. "Go use the bathroom if you have to and then we'll go eat something. I'll be right here."
Of course that wouldn't suffice for her. She grabbed my hand as she got up and pulled me with her. She let go of me at the doorway and left me there as she brushed her teeth and used the bathroom. I kept my eyes on the floor only looking up when I heard her wash her hands. Just like before, when she was finished she slipped her hand into mine and waited patiently.
I whistled for the dogs as I opened the bedroom door and they went running past us. I heard Tak let them outside while I led Astraea to the kitchen where Orion was waiting with a familiar face.
"Goood afternoon Doctor Samaras." I smiled.
"Amato," she glared. "My husband told me you'd be calling me today. He didn't say anything about kidnapping."
"Then clearly that's Kiron's fault and not mine."
Cressida and Kiron met in med school and got married a year after meeting. She's went on to become a psychiatrist and him a surgeon. They helped my father from time to time and now they help me.
"This her?" She asked looking at Astraea.
"This is Astraea. Astraea this is Cressida."
Daimonáki mou clutched onto my hand and gave Cressida a small wave.
"Sit and I'll make some breakfast while you all talk." Tak said, entering the room at that moment.
Cressida took at seat at the island while I put Astraea in the same seat from last night and sat beside her.
"Orion filled me in on the way over here." Cressida said, watching Astraea carefully.
"Any thoughts?" I asked.
Instead of answering me, she turned to address Astraea directly.
"After you've had breakfast I am going to take you somewhere with me. Vasileios isn't coming with us. He will stay here."
Her eyes widened, her breath picked up, and she wasted no time putting herself in my lap and latching onto me like a koala.
"You have to let go of him, Astraea." Cressida said, acting like she was going to reach for us.
That set her off even more. She grabbed the fork that Tak had set in front of me and acted as if she was going to stab Cressida with it. Cressida was quick to grab the fork and laid it out of her reach. Astraea then looked up at me with the biggest saddest eyes and began to cry.
I cupped the back of her head as I glared at Cressida.
"I'm not going anywhere. You're not going anywhere. You can stay right where you are." I whispered, rubbing soothing circles on her back.
"I'm not going to take you anywhere. I promise." Cressida told her, her tone softer than it was before.
"Why fucking say that then?" I growled.
"I needed to see her response to the thought of being away from you."
"Did it get you anything besides making her cry and pissing me off?"
"Sometimes when people go through intense trauma they can...latch onto the person that saves them."
"You think that's what she's doing? She's latched onto me because I saved her?"
"That was my original thought as Orion explained everything to me. He mentioned at the end that she had a picture of you."
"Still don't know where she got it."
"She may have attached herself to you for some reason long before you rescued her. Possibly when she got the picture. We need her to explain how she got it and how she feels so that I can come to a definitive conclusion."
"And until then?"
She shrugged. "Keeping doing what you're doing. Just be aware that, based on her reaction just now, if you were disappear from her sight she will most likely go into a panic attack. You might be the one thing reminding her that she's not just stuck in a dream back at that place. That this is real, she is safe, and no one is going to hurt her here."
Astraea kept her arms locked around me for the remainder of the time that Cressida was there. She didn't even move to eat the food that Tak made and I had to feed it to her. It reminded me to tell Cressida about Astraea crying the night before when we told her to pick what she wanted to eat.
"If that place was as bad as it sounds, I doubt she was given a choice in anything. Going from having no choice at all to an abundance of choices could be to much for some people. It can cause them to overthink and send them into a panic. Until she is more comfortable with being here and more comfortable with making her wants and needs known, it may be a good idea for you to pick for her since she trusts you so much. If you don't want to do that then just give her two things to pick from."
Once I made sure Astraea ate a good amount of breakfast, I gave her the meds that Kiron had prescribed along with a large glass of orange juice.
"May I go home now or was there anything else you needed?" Cressida asked as she finished her food.
"That's all. Thank you for coming."
"Call if you need anything. And I do mean call. No more kidnapping please".
"I'll do my best."
Orion took her back home which left me to deal with the second thing I had him collect.
"Mikrós Daímonas," I said, pulling her head back so I could see her face. "I have something to take care of and it will possibly be very unpleasant and very messy. Think you'll be okay seeing that? Tak will be there and I'll bring Ares too."
She nodded.
"Let's go then."
I let the dogs back in and gave the command for Ares to follow even though it appeared to be unnecessary. He was stuck like glue to her side the second he saw her which surprised the hell out me.
I've had all three of them since they were pups and Ares is the least friendly one out of them all. It took him a long while to warm up to me and to this day I'm the only one he doesn't growl, snap, or bark at. Titan and Athena will let other people pet them but Ares if likely to take your hand off for trying. Seeing him allow her to pet him yesterday when we found her was a big shock to me.
"Going to let him socialize for breakfast too?" Tak asked when he saw Ares with us.
"Maybe. Maybe not. Depends on how things go."
"Well he's ready for you." He grinned, turning on his heel and walking down to the basement.
I turned and brought Astraea's attention to me. "You do as I say while we're down there, okay? If it gets too much for you you can step outside the room with Ares or close your ears or close you eyes. Got it?"
She nodded.
I plastered on a huge smile as we walked downstairs to the little hidden room I had where Tak was waiting.
"Andreas! Good to see you again so soon!" I shouted, startling the man who was bound and blindfolded in a chair. I positioned Astraea right by the door with Ares by her side and then made my way up to the man.
"M-Mr. Amato, S-Sir....I-I didn't..."
"Please, call me Vasileios. You're the only person who has ever been in that chair twice. They usually don't make it out of this room alive. Just think, the last time you were sitting here you didn't have your hands attached."
"M-Mr. V-Vasileios, whatever I-I did I can ex-explain." He cried.
I pulled off his blindfold and then forced him to look at Astraea.
"You're going to tell me everything you know about her and about that fucker Cosmo. Understand? You're going to tell me everything you ever heard while you there, every name you remember, every single detail."
His eyes widened when he saw her and that told me that I wasn't going to like his answers very much.
"Who was she to him? She had to be someone because she wasn't in line to be auctioned off."
Silence.
"Andreas, you better start talking before I get the urge to grab that same saw from last time."
"She...She w-wa his daughter."
"What?"
"Cosmo is her f-father. She's go-got a brother too. N-Named Anton. He ran when he sa-saw you come in. A woman n-named Charolette and a guy, C-Christos, ran with h-him."
"Tak," I hissed, not even bothering to look at him.
"I'll get Lo and his bunch on it. See what they can find."
"Keep going Andreas."
"That's a-all I really know. I was s-still the new gu-guy so he didn't fully trust me."
"But you have ears and I know you're a sneaky little fuck."
He looked behind me at Astraea which did nothing but piss me off.
"I'm starting to get that urge, Andreas." I growled, drawing his eyes back to me.
"I heard Cosmo and Christos talking a few days ago. They were talking about how much money someone was going to pay for her. The others were to go to auction, but she was a private sale."
"Why? Because she was his daughter?"
"There were three men interested in her. He...he offered them all a...piece of her, but only if he..."
"Only if he what?"
"Got to watch." Andreas whispered.
My blood ran cold and I felt my hands begin to shake. I felt a familiar pressure begin to build inside my head. I closed my eyes and ran my hands through my hair trying to calm myself down.
"When?" I growled out.
Silence.
My eyes popped open and I grabbed hold of Andreas by his hair, pulling hard.
"When?!"
"Last night! Last night! They arrived before you did! It was supposed to happen before the auction started!"
I let go of his hair and used my foot to kick the chair back causing it fall over on its back. Turning around, I found Astraea with tears in her eyes and her bottom lip quivering.
Closing the distance between us, I backed her against the wall and cupped her face in my hands.
"Did they touch you, baby? Be honest."
She nodded as more tears escaped her eyes.
"Did they...did they get..." I couldn't even bring myself to say it. "Fuck!"
She shook her head over and over and over again.
"They touched you, but not that far?"
She nodded.
I pressed my lips to her forehead and hugged her against me, relaxing a bit when she buried her face against my chest.
"Anything else you'd like to say, Andreas?"
"That's all I know. I swear."
Glancing down beside us I saw Ares staring up at me with a familiar look in his eyes.
"Ares, uccidere*."
(Ares, kill*.)
Ares reacted instantaneously and ran after him. I stood there holding her to my chest as Ares tore Andreas apart. When the screams finally stopped Ares came walking back over and looked up at me. His jowls were dripping with blood creating a small puddle on the floor.
"Good boy." I grinned causing Astraea to pull away.
She stood on her tiptoes to look over my shoulder at what remained of Andreas and then looked at me with the sweetest smile.
"We're going to have some fun aren't we, Daimonáki mou?"
~~~~~~~~
A/N:
*Deep sigh* I love him and his murder pups. 🥰😍