I didn’t wait for a response, but rather hung up the phone and tried to calm my frustration as I approached my current estate. All of my staff were standing in a heap outside the front gates, all with bags in their hands, and my underlings that I’d contacted were all trying to keep them calm.
“Boss.” Kova stepped forward, one of my team that had taken on a leadership role as of late. “The entire property has been evacuated. What would you like us to do?”
I turned to face the staff. “I’m sorry, but until further notice, you all have been relieved of your duties. I’ll pay severance to each of you to help with looking for homes. I’m sure it goes without saying, but anything you’ve seen or experienced inside of my home is confidential. You still have contracts and I respect all of you and really don’t want to have to punish any of you for not fulfilling them. There’s a chance that these jobs will become available to you again, but not for some time.”
There was some errant murmuring, but no one was brave enough to press the issue. I turned and looked at Kova. “I’ll explain the details later, but this estate has been compromised. I’m relocating, and will be hiring all new staff for secrecy. I’m going to go through this place and spend the next couple of hours gathering everything I want to keep, and then emergency protocol will be activated.”
Kova’s eyes widened a little bit. “You mean…thatemergency protocol?”
“Yes.” I set a hand on her shoulder. “Please call rides for everyone and get everyone rooms at the CosmoCo for a week. That’s how long they have to find new places, and I’ll have their severances paid out by then. Put the rooms on my open tab with CosmoCo. If anyone has any questions, direct them to me.”
“Yes sir,” Kova said.
“Only foot soldiers should be left here when I get back. I don’t want any general staff seeing the protocols.”
She nodded again. “Yes sir.”
Leaving Kova and the rest of my crew behind to take care of business on the outside, I walked in and started to collect everything I absolutelyhadto keep. As a rule, I tried not to keep too many things that couldn’t be replaced in case of an emergency, mostly because in my business, I might need to pick and leave at the drop of a hat. I kept almost all of my files electronically and in a cloud that I could access from any computer at any time if I needed to, and I’d never been one for heirlooms or large trinkets.
It was fairly easy to collect everything that I wanted, and anything of importance to Milli he kept at his own home. I’d managed to stuff everything into a couple of big duffel bags, retrieved the emergency cash I kept in a safe in my office, and was just on my way out when I passed by Avion’s room. She didn’t have much in her room that was personal to her, and it gave me pause. She’d been at my estate for close to three months, and had acquired very few personal effects. She did have a painting on her easel, but unfortunately, it was the one that I’d ruined being a brute right before her brothers came and snatched her away from me. From that point on, it’d been out of the frying pan and into the fryer; she didn’t even get the chance to start something new.
Avion had only been a prisoner in my home…
Maybe to a certain extent she started to feel less like one because I loosened the restrictions on her leaving her room, and I ultimately did procure anything for her that she wanted, but someone who lives somewhere for three months would have something to show for it if they weren’t just a prisoner. It sent my mind drifting back to Avion telling me that she was changing the emergency contact information on her medical profile from her brothers, to me. Was that just because she didn’t have any other choice, or did she think more of me than just some guy holding her captive who she occasionally had sex with.
Just before she got shot, she offered to work off her father’s debt. It seemed obvious to me that her father’s debt wasn’t a huge concern between us anymore, but maybe it was the only thing tethering her to me.
If I told her she was free to go, would she go?
I took a deep breath and shook my head free of that thought. I didn’t want to think about Avion leaving. When she got shot and I had to sit there with her bleeding out in my arms, I realized that, however strong they were, I had feelings for Avion that were far beyond anything I’d felt for anyone in the past. Eventually we would have to discuss the specifics, but for right now she had to heal and I had to figure out how to protect my assets and my family. We could deal with the rest later on.
Feeling fairly confident that I had everything I wanted and knowing that if it didn’t occur to me then it was something that could be replaced regardless, I walked back out of the estate. There were a couple of lingering cars pulling down the road away from the estate, but it seemed the only people left behind were my staff, which was good.
“Boss,” Kova said as I approached. “All the staff have been informed of the changes and booked in the hotel for a week. Everyone apart from soldiers have been sent away and the emergency protocols are prepped and ready to go.”
“Very good,” I said. I handed over the bags I’d gathered to her and said, “Pack these in your car and I’ll inform you of where to bring them. Everyone else should get going now. I’ll be starting the protocols now.”
Taking the bags away from me, Kova nodded. “Yes sir. I’ll await your call.” She turned around to face the rest of the soldiers and shouted out. “Alright, let’s get out of here. Head to your rendezvous points and wait for further instructions.”
After each giving me their own forms of affirmations, the rest of the soldiers started to pile into cars and make their way out. Kova was the only one left behind, waiting for everyone to get going, then she tapped me on the shoulder, climbed into her car, and pulled off down the road. Finally, it was just me left staring up at my estate. Memories of when I’d first had it built came flooding into my mind. I was so paranoid that I had it designed like an impenetrable fortress. It looked more like a prison than a home from the outside. I used to appreciate that, but it just seemed cold now.
It was because, as much as I hated to admit it, I’d changed. I thought about this new place I’d be going to, similarly found with paranoia in mind, but it’d look like an actual home. It’d feel more like one too, especially with Avion there. I used to make fun of my parents all the time for owning a mansion upstate. It didn’t feel imposing enough for mafia dons, but my mom had her fun pouring hours of energy into it, building it up and making it look like one of those homes you’d see on a house parade. It never made sense to me, but Avion provided clarity in a way I wasn’t expecting.
Merrick always demanded that having something to protect made you weak, but I was beginning to think that he didn’t mean that in the black-and-white way I’d always heard it. He had my adoptive mom, Tamryn, after all. And I had to believe, if it came right down to it, he’d protect me. He had an empire to protect and all of those things didn’t make him weak, they made him strong. Threatening the things my dad cared about made him his most dangerous.
Clearly I still had some learning to do.
Deciding that I had no time left to stand and be introspective, I pulled out my phone. There was one app on it that I had never opened, which served as the trigger for my estate’s emergency protocols. It was my hope when I installed the app and set up the protocols that I would never have to use the trigger, but with the Narzand Brothers’ threat still ringing in my mind, I knew I didn’t have a choice.
The app itself wasn’t sophisticated, and in fact, after three security walls, was just a literal, big, red button. Pressing it brought up a final warning:
ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO ENACT THE EMERGENCY PROTOCOLS? THIS CANNOT BE UNDONE.
I pressed that I was sure, and a sixty-second countdown popped up on my screen. I knew I was far enough away from the estate for it to not be an issue, so I just stood and watched for the inevitable destruction. As the timer counted down closer to zero, I could start to see smoke billowing up in the distance, and during the final ten second countdown, orange and red flames started to engulf everything in sight. By the time it reached zero, everything, as far as the eye could see was totally ablaze. Though my fortress was made of specifically inflammable materials, the emergency protocols were designed to ignite the place from the inside out, burning everything down but the structure itself.
In about six hours, the only thing that would remain of this place would be its frame, which would then be demolished by the steelworkers that had automatically been notified by the app to come and pull down the frame they’d built years ago, ask no questions, and be paid a quarter of a million dollars to do so.
As I was watching the place burn, my phone rang as Milli called me. “Hello? Is everything okay?”
