IK ITS BEEN A WHILEEE GUYS
but i just finished heart of fury (second book in this series) so now I'm back to working on finishing this one!!
reminder- there will be new scenes and diff dialogue as I'm doing this all from memory, if you're a rereader lmk if you remember a scene that you rly want me to make sure I add. I'll try my bestt love yall 💕💕
Adriana's POV
"I can't be here anymore. I'm Katie from American Housewife."
"We're in New York, honey. Not Connecticut."
I slump, my chin sinking into the dark sheets. "You don't get it. I wasn't made for this. I was made to spend denaro and hop on a private jet to Morocco."
Layla's sigh spilled into my ear. "Well, then, find a purpose."
"Interesting you say that." I flip over and stare at the ceiling. Black. I flip back over. "Hugo's plug get pulled yet?"
I stare into the body-length mirror across my room. Lift up my feet and criss-cross them.
"I wish. He keeps telling me to feed the dog."
"Huh? What dog?"
"Exactly my point."
"You know.. maybe you should just kill him yourself." I wouldn't, in a million years, let myself be barred within Layla's walls. It itched my throat just thinking about sharing a bed with someone who smelled like a casket.
The line went silent on the other end. "So you expect me to just flounder up gold bars on my own?"
I snicker into the phone. "You cheap, cheap, gold-digger."
"You know, you might as well steal Nikolas's Amex. Don't act like you haven't already seen it."
I pause. "You know, actually.. I haven't. Believe it or not- he's vague. In every way. One second he looks like he'll devour me whole on the spot, the next all he needs is a knife and my throat to slit it."
"Enemies to lovers? God, that's my dream. I'm stuck with recessing hairline to grave."
I grab a bottle of red nail polish from my bedside table- already stained with black polish. But Nikolas didn't look like he cared about money much less than he cared about coming into my room.
"Oh- gotta go. Hugo's mumbling some bull about taking me out for dinner."
"Bye. Love you." I click off the phone and spend a good hour doing my nails, because god forbid someone forgot to bring a bag of cotton balls and some acetone to avoid any mishaps.
I check my phone and head downstairs at exactly ten p.m, because that's when Nikolas starts work in his study. Starts.
My mind went to the enormous amount of strawberries logging up the fridge. I hadn't thanked him for the gesture, not yet, but I didn't feel the need to. If he wanted to spend money on me, then amazing for him. I also didn't feel like talking to him. My social battery had declined for the past few days, and I wondered if it was because he'd barred me from speaking to anyone else.
Then I remembered Papa's warning.
"The way you talk, the way you act, all determine whether he's satisfied with his choice, and whether that means we land in deeper shit than we already are."
"His choice." I scoffed, out loud. Choices. Not like I get any.
I simpered into the main living room, surprised to see a man on the couch, his top-half bare and gleaming with sweat. I stepped closer, catching his attention, and after a second realized it was Nikolas's brother.
Mikhail- that was his name, right?
He looked up from his phone screen, analyzing me, and then stood up. He was about Nikolas's height, meaning I had to crane my neck to look at him. It wasn't fun. I crossed my arms as he threw a mischievous smirk at me. Nikolas was cold, but this man was the opposite. Opposite meaning, I could actually see emotion coating his face. Did I like it? Maybe.
He laid out a hand for me to shake. "Ciao. I'm Mikhail. Don't believe we've formally met."
I raised an unimpressed brow, but shook his hand all the same. "Don't tell me that's the only Italian you know."
"I thrive on knowledge."
I nod, slowly. "And I'm guessing it only goes a long way?"
He raises a brow, amused all of a sudden. And for once, I could actually see it on his face. "Pretty and smart, huh? I thought Nikolas would play it safe."
"I don't think the way I act determines my altercations with your brother."
"It does determine the kind of woman you are."
For once, I didn't have a reply. Did I just find another man up to par?
I shrugged, then caught the metal of a lighter sticking out of his sweatpants' pocket. My fingers pull out a box of Papa's Marlboro's from inside my bra, and Mikhail's eyebrows hiked to his forehead.
"You smoke?"
I pulled the lighter out of his pocket and stared at him.
"No."
I flicked it on, lit the small column of paper, and stifled it between my lips. Warmth bugged under my skin, bleeding into my veins as the smoke filled my lungs.
I glanced at his scabbed knuckles. Hm.
"You fight?"
He sat back down, eyes scanning me with narrowed eyes. I handed him my cigarette. He took it.
"No."
To that I gave him a wispy smile of amusement and then tucked the cardboard box back into the top of my bra, turning and heading into the kitchen. His eyes followed me there, even with my back to him and my face in the fridge.
"You like strawberries?" I asked, pulling out two new boxes. Had to finish them somehow.
He scoffed. "I'm not a sweet type of guy."
I rose a brow at him from the kitchen island. "Lemons?"
He flickered his gaze to the hallway next to the kitchen, a carnivorous grin forming on his lips. "More like vodka."
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as Nikolas's presence filled the entire kitchen. I wanted to shoot Mikhail a glare, but he was back to tapping on his phone.
"Someone's bitter," I muttered under my breath, not deciding to stray from cutting strawberries no matter how fidgety Nikolas made me.
"Turn around." Even the dim lighting flickered from his stern command.
I took a deep breath and then twisted, eyes stopping on not one, but two men in the vicinity.
Nikolas, and-
My hand tightened around the knife, the breath in my chest suddenly escaping all at once.
Petrov.
There he was, clad in his usual suit, a smile on his face that only seemed to look disgusting to me. His beady, black eyes crawled all over my bare skin, somehow making my blood go even colder.
No. Please no.
Me and Layla talked about this. I knew they worked together. This situation was inevitable, yet my pounding chest said otherwise. I felt myself go pale, and the strawberry I was holding was now but a crushed up, dripping mess on the floor.
I shifted it to behind my back before Nikolas's wavering eyes saw.
Stop it. Relax.
It didn't help that Nikolas was looking at me expectingly, waiting for me to show the respect that he knew I rarely carried for men like him.
I held in a shaky breath, put the knife down, and smiled.
"Hello, I'm Adriana."
Petrov's smile grew wider.
I couldn't handle it. Nikolas's eyes boring into me, and Petrov's making an uneasy trek down my body, lingering on all the wrong places.
Make it believable.
"Petrov Vassiliev," he greeted.
His voice was the same as all those months ago. Torn and carved out of my darkest memories, drowning in a silent mockery. He knew I was scared. He remembered everything he did to me. Everywhere he touched, everywhere he marked, it seemed to throb in response to his leery eyes.
I fucking hated it.
I itched to turn and run out. To take the knife in my hands and stab it into those black eyes just so they wouldn't meet mine again.
"He's my right-hand man." I switched my gaze to Nikolas. Somehow, in some stupid way, my trembling hands stopped to tremble when I saw his grey eyes. It was the coldness in them, unresponsiveness. I could show whatever, and he wouldn't give me a reaction. It provided me with a sense of comfort, a sense of agility that allowed me to look at him onwards and not the horror beside him.
Nikolas drawled on about how they worked together, something about me showing adequate respect, but all I could feel, all I could hear, were Petrov's words and touches. His flimsy promises and how, like the fucking innocent dove I used to be, I believed in them.
I waited until their shoes clobbered back down the hallway, upstairs, and into the study before I let the knife clatter back onto the counter. My breath shuttered, and I ran a shaky hand through my hair.
It's okay. You're okay.
"Alright, I'm out." I flinched at Mikhail's voice. Oh, right. He was still here.
I recovered quickly and resumed cutting strawberries as he walked past me and through the hall to leave out the front door.
An act, that's all you need to do.
I'd been strong enough to brush off what he did to me. Would it be just as hard to ignore the aftereffects? No one knew it was him in the car crash. No one knew I was the only one who saw him before he hit us.
Pretend.
I'd done that for most of life.
What was a little more?
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alr yall we progressin (not rly but thats ok)
SEEE UUU