Chapter 17
SLADE
“Why the fuck would I let you go?” I ask, Nicolas, the fucker I’m going to kill tonight.
Nicolas is a twenty-eight year old bodyguard from the Italian Mob.
Ryker sent me his information and requested that I kill him.
Why does my brother want me to kill him?
I have no clue.
All he said is that he needed me to eliminate this guy and that he'd pay me for it.
But I told him not to bother with the money because after the past few weeks I've had, I need a good challenge to keep myself busy.
Nicolas is really good with combat from what Ryker told me.
He knows his weapons and is quick on his feet.
I’m filled with so much pent up anger and fury that all I want to do is smash someone’s head into a wall.
And lucky for Nicolas, he caught me on a good fucking day.
I took some pills to calm down my racing heart and the loud voices in my head. Isabella has been consuming all my time and I’m starting to get withdrawals, so I need something to just take the edge off since she wasn’t here.
She has no clue that you’re a cold blooded killer and you’re afraid of her knowing you take drugs?
She can live with the fact I’m a killer.
She’ll accept it because she has the same kind of dark and twisted mind as mine.
“Because you won’t do shit. You’re just some Russian prince that gets bored so he kills people for fun.”
I shake my head lightly. “You have no clue why I’m going to kill you. I don’t even know why I’m killing you. This is for my brother.”
“Vaffanculo, stronzo,” he spits in Italian.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I take it out and Isabella’s name lights up the screen.
“My girl’s calling so I’m going to need you to shut the fuck up for a few minutes,” I say, walking over to him and taping his mouth shut. He struggles against my hold but once I get the tape on I answer her call. “Avtor.”
“Hey. I’m probably going to be a little late coming home. I have another meeting with my team about the book. They said they had some questions for me.”
The clock on the wall tells me it’s five-thirty.
Fuck I completely forgot that I have to have Niko pick her up.
“Okay. I’m sending Niko to wait for you outside. He'll take you to the apartment.”
I can’t have another situation like last week happen again.
Niko’s been looking into it.
He has been checking all the street cameras, trying to connect the person with the black hood that Isabella saw on the street to the one who was outside my apartment. I’m sure the connection is that they are the same fucking person.
“Okay, where are you? Why can’t you come?’
“You miss me already, avtor?” I smirk.
“As if.” She chuckles.
“I made food for you before I left for work.” I walk around my warehouse as Nicolas struggles against the ropes while watching me being a lovesick puppy.
For this girl I am.
What am I doing?
Making meals for her, sleeping in her bed, getting her a fucking five hundred rose bouquet for her birthday, making her cum almost every single day even though what happened in my childhood was supposed to ruin that for me.
She’s just a girl.
A girl who’s starting to make me feel things I definitely shouldn’t be feeling.
“What did you make?” she asks.
“Alfredo pasta.”
“That sounds good.”
I know she loves pasta.
Her mom and dad would cook homemade pasta for her since they are Italian.
I’ve learned a lot of new things about Isabella in the past few weeks of constantly obsessing over her and spending time with her.
Her favorite color is red, her favorite movie is Pulp Fiction, her favorite actor slash actress is Angelina Jolie, she had a dog named Charlotte who was a golden retriever but she unfortunately passed away.
She used to live with her grandma before she moved to New York.
She told me a little bit about her parents.
Isabella said that they died in an accident but there is more to the story she isn’t telling me, even though I know most of it from the research that Niko did for me.
She would ask things about me and I would tell her some stuff but not in detail.
She has no clue about my real life.
“Why do they want to talk to you? You keep having a lot of meetings at work.”
“It’s because they are just really interested in the book,” she explains. “They want to talk about some of the scenes I wrote, I think.”
“Okay, well I probably won’t be home until late so don’t wait up for me,” I say, looking back at Nicolas. He is just staring at me with boredom now. “I’ll see you when I come home okay?”
Home.
I’ve never called that fucking apartment home.
Another thing she has changed for me.
“Okay, bye.”
I hang up and pocket my phone.
I rip the tape off of Nicolas’s mouth and he says, “Fucking bitch boy. You’re nothing.”
I throw my fist at his face, knocking it to the side. He spits out blood and smiles.
“Did I hit a nerve?” He raises an eyebrow.
I grab his throat and squeeze, his face turning red. “Why the fuck does my brother want me to kill you? Other than you being a fucking pain?”
“I-I-”
I let go of his throat so he can talk.
“I work for the Italian Mob. I’m Lorenzo’s daughter’s main guard.”
I furrow my eyebrows at him. “Interesting,” I say as I think.
Ryker possibly going undercover for the Italians?
How long has he been planning this?
I’ll have to call Landon to see what he knows.
All three of us have secrets but we’re close and we tell each other most things.
Only thing we keep hidden from each other is this competition our daddy dearest is making us do so it possibly has to do with that.
When I asked Ryker why he wanted me to kill this guy he wouldn’t say.
“They’ll know what happened. You can’t hide forever, Rykov. The Italians already have a plan to get rid of you pieces of scum. You and your entire family.”
“Alright, let's see what you got so I’m prepared.” When I go to untie him he head butts me and stands before slamming the chair to the ground.
The chair breaks apart and I fucking curse at Niko for giving me a wooden chair instead of one of the metals ones I always ask for.
My head is pounding as he gets out of the ropes and comes at me.
We throw punches and we kick and push each other around.
I slam him on the floor and strike constant jabs at him as he tries to defend himself and cover his face.
He bucks his hips from under me and throws me off of him. I get my knife out of my pocket but he knocks it out of my hand and kicks my chest so that I’m down.
He grabs my knife from the floor and stalks towards me.
My head still fucking feels like it’s spinning from the head butt.
“You messed with the wrong fucking guy, Rykov,” Nicolas says before he gets on top of me and prepares to stab my face but I hold his arms, forcing them away from me.
“I’m going to kill your entire family and then find out who your girl is.
” He slices my cheek making me wince. “And then I’ll fuck her on your dead corpse. ”
Rage fills my body and I throw him off of me. I grab my knife from him and don’t think twice before stabbing it in his eye. He screams and cries while I stab him repeatedly, in the chest, face, arms, anywhere I see fucking fit.
His body goes limp after a while but I don’t care, I take my anger and emotions out on him until my body is covered in his blood and he’s just an open corpse on the floor.