Chapter 13 To Keep a Promise
Chapter thirteen
To Keep a Promise
The downside of spending so damn much time with someone was that you either grew to resent them immensely for no real reason, or you missed them like a tangible thing after scarcely a minute apart.
Otto remembered when he’d been younger and excited about the notion of training to join the security team.
He remembered considering himself honored that the pakhan might allow him, an adopted son of a mid-ranked man, to protect someone or something of value.
And he remembered when he’d finally processed that being a person’s guard would be a fairly constant duty he had begun to develop reservations—concerns that he’d overcommitted.
How could anyone, really, spend nearly every waking minute with the same person for possibly the rest of their lives, resigned to watching and speaking only when spoken to, and not hate that person?
Probably it made a difference depending on the charge, and in that, Otto was well aware he’d gotten lucky. For as difficult as teenager-Lina had been, she’d grown out of her stubbornly resistant phase and developed a strong sense of responsibility.
And after a decade, after finally getting to fucking touch her, having to restrict himself to a separate room felt like torture.
It didn’t matter that the room was connected by a propped-open door and the sweet sound of her laughter sporadically carried through.
The actual warmth of her presence was lacking.
He couldn’t see her. He couldn’t hear her words clearly.
It was the latter issue that was making him twitch.
But she’s fine. She was enjoying her overnight with her friend, after a long day of wandering through too many aisles of nauseatingly colored and overpriced fabric.
A scene he would personally vastly prefer to never have to endure again.
Though at least he’d managed to sneak a couple of pieces into his allotted quota that he could surprise Lina with later.
With the day of shopping behind them and the women winding down in the next room, Otto occupied himself quietly.
He kept one ear open and his handgun in easy reach on the nightstand, alternating between scrolling the internet until his brain went numb and trying to read.
At about the point where he was seriously considering downloading one of the dime-a-dozen puzzle-matching shooter type games just for something else to do, he realized the laughter from the adjoining room had tapered off.
Lina stepped into the doorway a couple minutes later to bid him goodnight.
It took everything in him not to haul her inside.
Instead, he padded soundlessly up to her until he stood a bit too close and allowed himself to graze only one thumb over her jaw. Her skin was too damn soft. “Goodnight,” he whispered back, holding her gaze.
She pulled her lip between her teeth and smiled, and it was perversely satisfying to see her struggling with their distance, too. That made it easier to let his hand fall away and watch her turn back toward her bed—the one closer to the inner door, of course.
He watched until she slid beneath the comforter, then turned to try and get some sleep of his own. He needed to be sharp for the next day, after all.
Evelina never had thought up the best strategy for ditching Kat, so her guilt was doubled by the time she had to stumble her way through whatever lie rolled off her tongue.
Not only was she lying to her best friend when she probably didn’t need to, she was also lying to a pregnant woman.
Even her conveniently-religious, law-breaking parents would have frowned at that, she was sure.
And she didn’t know why she felt the need to lie.
She could barely explain it to herself. She simply …
wanted to keep the family lineage quest as much a secret as possible.
At least until she had her answers.
After all, if it’d been okay to talk about, she would surely have learned about her mysterious aunt before her mother’s last Saturday.
Otto tightened his grip of her hand, pulling her to a stop on the sidewalk and sharpening her focus. “You’re sure this is how you wanna play it?”
Evelina tilted her head to glance up at him, unsurprised to find him scowling ahead at the small building she’d had such a hard time finding on Google.
She turned her own gaze outward, studying the weather-worn brick with striking steel beam accents.
It was an odd combination of classic and industrial, but that made it distinctive, too.
Which was good, because the signage over the wide doorway was arguably too subtle.
She wedged her fingers between Otto’s for a better grip. “I’ll remind you this was your idea.”
Otto grunted.
Her lips twitched. “One of your better ones, probably. We both know I’ve already hit my research tolerance, and I’ve basically found nichto.”
Otto raised their joined hands and pressed a kiss to the back of hers before rumbling, “It’s your call. I’ll be with you, regardless.”
A fraction of the nerves flaked off, dissolving away and making her next breath easier.
“C’mon, Kat’s waiting.” It had been a dangerous gamble, choosing to tell Kat she wanted to do something for Otto to make up for hauling him around the previous day’s event.
A lie she’d bolstered with the emotional weight of how he’d recently taken bullets for her and how he’d been ‘surprisingly patient’ with her through everything—none of which was technically false.
It just wasn’t at all what she was doing.
There was always the small chance Kat would accidentally mention to someone at work how Evelina had ‘done something special’ for Otto, something she’d wanted privacy for.
And while Evelina had no intention of keeping them a secret, she was aware that the timing was wrong to suddenly reveal she was sleeping with the bodyguard her father had assigned her as a girl.
Everything was so damn complicated.
She did her best to shove that frustration aside as Otto reached past her and pulled open the door.
She led the way inside, obligingly stepping wide enough to allow him to shadow her in and move in front of her while he scrutinized the interior.
It was what he did, even when they had no reason to suspect a location. She’d long since stopped fighting it.
Eventually, Otto moved a hand to her back and guided her forward.
Evelina reached up and curled one hand around the strap of her heavier-than-usual purse. She’d brought everything she imagined she might need for this. Not that she had any experience hiring a PI.
She flicked a glance at a small sitting room that looked like a cross between a lobby and a tea room and reminded herself to be strong.
Woman-in-charge, remember? She made a conscious effort to raise her chin as she walked and square her shoulders properly, willing herself to exude the confidence of the image in her mind.
You are going to be pakhan. Own every space you walk into.
Her father certainly had, and in that, she could stand to learn from him.
They passed a partially open door to a toilet room and came to a closed door with a frosted glass panel and stenciled lettering spelling out the name of the man she’d come to meet—Raul Campo. No voices drifted out, so Evelina dropped her knuckles against the wood frame and held herself still.
“Come in,” a male voice called seconds later.
Otto reached around her and pushed open the door, holding it wide.
Evelina strode inside, far enough that Otto could follow before shutting the door again, and briefly swept her gaze around the room.
It was probably a third the size of her father’s study, surprisingly well lit, and almost overwhelmingly cluttered.
File cabinets stood like castle towers on either side of the window, a bookcase crammed full of books, notebooks, and looseleaf papers in seeming random order occupied most of the wall between the door and the desk, and a large map of the continental United States was pinned to the wall behind the man at that desk.
The desk itself was metal, not wood, and had a stack of file folders on one corner opposite the angled flatscreen monitor on the other.
More predictable paraphernalia scattered across the top, including a plain planner and a tablet.
Two uninviting-looking chairs faced the desk, taking up startlingly little floorspace, so Evelina opted to step up until she was standing behind one.
The man at the desk had leaned back in his chair, eyeing both of them as he rolled a toothpick around in his mouth.
He looked every bit of the mid-fifties his online profile had said him to be, if not more, with the lines on his face and amount of gray in his receding hairline.
But his dark eyes were still sharp, revealing a fully functional mind.
“We don’t have an appointment,” he finally said.
Evelina offered a smile. “Your business page said walk-ins were welcome.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled and he inclined his head. “Well, if you went out of your way to look me up.” He motioned to the chairs as if they hadn’t seen them. “What is it you need found?”
It was stupid how loaded that question felt, but nonetheless, Evelina had to draw one more steadying breath. “Before I tell you, I need to confirm something.”
His dark brow pinched for a brief moment but he inclined his head. “If I can.”
“How confidential are your services?”