“No, thanks.”
He shot me a patronizing look like I was being ridiculous.
Ignoring him, I kept watching the formulas fill in on the screen.
This wasn’t like the cook who’d urged me to sip tea and have soup after I zoned out in the shower and got too cold. It wasn’t like when she’d explained that Adrik was the boss and he would “provide” for me as he saw fit.
Why are you bothering?
Viktor wasn’t afraid to approach me. In another world, in an alternate reality, I might have been able to claim he was befriending me. Nikolai too. Maksim wasn’t so bad, either, and Lev was all right. Alexei seemed too intense, like Adrik.
But I had to stop myself right there and quit that line of thinking.
They didn’t care about me.
I couldn’t matter toanyof them.
Like Sacha and Igor, like the guards who blended into the background, and like the cooks and maids and butlers, I was here to work.
I was stuck here, not necessarily out of obligation, but because I well and truly had no life elsewhere.
I was right all along.
When I first met Adrik, I latched onto the idea that I would survive by proving my usefulness.
And I had. I’d demonstrated how I could work for him, and that was all I could count on for my future.
Love?
Friendship?
A purpose beyond this employment?
Those were the silly things I wouldn’t waste my time on anymore. No matter how much it broke my heart.
27
ADRIK
Another week passed after I killed John Morovov. Every day, Elena showed up on time, in the same style of a simple blouse and plain but sexy skirt. She showed up without fail, ready to put in a full day’s worth of work at the computer. Day in and out, with that lousy posture and slouch she was never ready to correct.
With too many things going on at once, I couldn’t spend as much time near her as I wanted to. And after talking to my brothers and cousins, I got the impression that I had two options where the beautiful and haunted Elena was concerned.
One, I could apologize and talk to her, let her know that she did not have to shut down and shun me. That was not going to happen. I didn’t feel sorry for killing her father, so if I told her that I did, that was nothing but a lie. Furthermore, if he was truly the cause for why she felt such low self-esteem and self-worth, then I had done wrong by her. I should’ve killed him sooner for treating a treasure like her so poorly.
A leader of a criminal organization did not hold on to power by apologizing for taking out one loser. There would be no apology for that hit being carried out, particularly when someone like John Morovov didn’t deserve to live after his crimes.
I should’ve killed him the first time I saw him.
I should’ve killed him then.
That thought didn’t stick too well in my mind, though, because if I had killed him and let that be his punishment then, I never would’ve met Elena. I never would’ve had the chance to keep her in my life.
The other option that my brothers and cousins seemed to have for me was to give her space. To let her adjust and work through whatever emotions were making her look so down and depressed.
Patience was required for that option, though, and my patience was running out.
Due to how packed my schedule was and how many little fires I had to put out, I ended up giving her space. I didn’t encourage any conversations with her, and because I wasn’t around as much, my brothers or cousins walked her to the guest house when she was done working every day. I had picked up awfully quickly how she avoided being in a room alone with me, and I didn’t push it.
