Scarred King (Adamov Bratva #1)

1. Laila

1

LAILA

“I’m here to see Mr. Adamov.”

The man behind the desk gives me a once-over from beneath square glasses and scowls. He must see the truth.

I’m not here to “see” Mr. Adamov.

I’m here to beg Mr. Adamov.

Even “beg” might not be a strong enough word. In truth, I’m here to plead with Mr. Arsen Adamov to take pity on the less fortunate and throw me a frickin’ bone, because Lord knows no one else has in a long, long time.

“And you are…?”

“Laila Barnes. I have an appointment.”

He gestures to the waiting room, his shiny cufflinks catching the tastefully recessed lighting. “Take a seat with the rest of the hopefuls.”

I take one look at the crowded waiting area and almost turn back to ask if there’s another room I could wait in instead.

If these are the hopefuls, I’m looking for the hope less , please and thanks.

This crew looks like Central Casting for a movie about Ivy League admissions. It’s brimming with dozens of men and women in smart suits and crisp blouses, the kind of people who know which fork to use first in white-tablecloth restaurants and what the difference is between “bourgeoisie” and “proletariat.”

Needless to say, I do not belong.

But the man behind the desk has gone back to the tireless work of forgetting I exist. With a sigh, I claim the last remaining seat between a woman in a perfectly tailored blue pantsuit and a potted plant that still probably has a better shot at getting this job than I do.

In case this is an Undercover Boss situation, I turn to the woman with a smile. “I’m Laila.”

One thin eyebrow arches. “Okay.”

“Job interviews, am I right?”

I cringe as soon as the words are out of my mouth. I sound like a terrible 80s comedian. How ‘bout that airplane food, eh? Yuk-yuk-yuk.

She is unimpressed. Her gaze slides from my face all the way down to my unmanicured toenails, doubling back to take in my outfit, as if it was too odious to catalog the first time through.

I felt pretty okay standing in the bathroom mirror an hour ago. Now, I stick out like a sore thumb in my red blazer. In a world of professional blacks, whites, and beiges, I look like the emergency button I wish I could pull to get the hell out of here.

“I wouldn’t know. This is my first job interview.” She cracks a smile, but it’s predatory. “Hopefully, it’ll be my last.”

“Confidence. That’s good. You have to manifest what you want.”

For instance, right now, I’m manifesting being sucked into the tractor beam of an alien spacecraft.

The curl of her upper lip tells me that, if that happened, the only helping hand she’d offer would be a wave before I disappeared into the ether. “I have a Bachelors’ in business analytics from Princeton and an M.B.A. from Oxford. That’s a little more useful than ‘manifestation.’”

I gulp. “Wow. Maybe I should head down the street and hand in my resume at Dairy Queen.”

Instead of laughing, she nods like I hit the nail on the head. “Best of luck with that.”

With my face on fire, I pick up my purse and flee to the water cooler in the far corner of the room.

I grab a paper cup and fill it with cold water, barely resisting the urge to dunk my head under the spout. Instead, I take small, dainty sips and remind myself why I’m here.

First and foremost, the shoulder-padded monstrosity I’m wearing. The fact I couldn’t run out and buy a skirt and jacket from this century and instead had to dig this one out of the back of my mother’s closet is reason numero uno why I need this job.

Followed very closely by reason number two (which maybe should be reason number one, but denial is my medicine of choice): Mom.

I’m not qualified for this job.

I’m not even qualified to look at the qualifications for this job.

But the benefits are amazing, and landing this gig—as impossible as it may seem—would change everything for us.

“Get it together, Laila,” I scold under my breath, just as someone clears their throat behind me.

A man wearing a bespoke suit and a worried frown is waiting for his turn at the water cooler. I step out of his way with an awkward apology.

Once he’s poured his drink and quickly put as much distance as possible between himself and the crazy woman in the corner, I facepalm hard enough to knock myself out.

Unfortunately, I remain conscious.

I’m not cut out for this. I’m an embarrassment. I heap shame upon my family name, which is already buried under mountains of the stuff.

Dairy Queen is starting to look real good when my phone buzzes in my purse.

Because no illness could ever dampen my mother’s unending ability to know exactly when I need her, I’m not even surprised to read her message.

MOM: You just concentrate on that job interview. Don’t worry about me.

Fat chance of that.

I text back, reminding her I left a casserole in the fridge along with instructions for warming it up. She hasn’t had much of an appetite lately. I swear she gets thinner every day.

As soon as I’ve sent the text, my phone buzzes again, this time with a call.

Deadbeat Dad flashes across the lockscreen.

Not a chance in hell am I taking that right now.

Resisting the urge to fling my phone across the room and cause even more of a scene than I already have, I decline the call and slink back to the waiting room. The room has thinned out. Only three of the prim-and-proper Ivy Leaguers await now, including little Miss Oxford-Upon-Asshole.

As I take a seat, the brass double doors of Mr. Adamov’s office open and one of the hopefuls exits.

Except she doesn’t look very hopeful anymore. Her face is pale and she’s on the verge of tears.

Miss Oxford sits up. “How was it?”

The woman shakes her head miserably. “Apparently, I’m not ‘Adamov Liquor material.’” Her lip quivers. “He told me to ‘come back once I’ve grown a personality.’”

The poor woman flees the waiting room, and it’s Miss Oxford’s turn now. She stands, her skin somewhere between green and chalky white.

“He sounds like an asshole,” I declare. “You don’t want to work for someone like that.”

She whips around, eyes narrowed. “You don’t become the CEO of a multi-billion dollar company at twenty-eight without being an asshole. It comes with the territory.”

I wince, shiver, gulp, and crumble all at the same time. I heard he was young, but there’s young and then there’s young. I try to imagine myself as a CEO in four years’ time, and I have to disguise my bitter laugh with a cough.

She glares at me again, and I pretend to be looking for something in my purse just so I can look away. Maybe if I dig deep enough, I’ll find the higher education and internships I should’ve been pursuing instead of a half-finished yoga certification.

But as she leaves, I actually find something I’ve been looking for. Behind my bottle of pain pills is something sleek and purple…

“There you are!” I exclaim. Partly in horror, but mostly in relief.

Just in time, I stop myself from pulling it out in full view of Mr. Cufflinks. He would certainly not approve of me waving around a purple vibrator in the middle of his pristine waiting room.

Then again, if he knew how long I spent on my hands and knees searching for this thing, he might understand.

Last week, Mom came home unexpectedly, interrupting my middle-of-the-day “alone time,” and I’d tossed it over my shoulder without thinking. When I went back to finish the deed later, I couldn’t find it.

I squeeze the handle like I’m hugging an old friend. Hell, these days, this purple vibrator is the closest I’ve come to having any kind of romantic relationship.

My vibrator identifies as male and his name is Seth. We’ve been happily involved for the last year and a half.

Admittedly, it was more of a friends-with-benefits type situation until eleven months ago when Mom’s routine health checkup came back with a stage two cancer diagnosis that knocked the air right out of both of us.

From that moment on, Seth became my primary source of comfort and stress relief. The last week has been hell without him.

The office door opens and Miss Oxford breezes past me with a cool smile on her face that I interpret as a job interview gone right.

“Miss Barnes,” the receptionist calls, “you’re next.”

Dropping Seth back into the depths of my purse like a hot potato, I slide my bag onto my shoulder and walk through the double doors.

Do it for Mom, says the voice in my head.

Do it to not humiliate yourself, says another.

Close enough.

“Good evening.” I greet the tall, broad-shouldered man standing by the windows with his back to me. Truth be told, I don’t mind. This whole interview might go better for me if he never turns around. “I’m Laila Barnes.”

He turns, somewhat lazily, towards me, and…

Whoa.

It’s disgusting how some people have it all. Arsen Adamov is twenty-eight, obscenely famous, filthy rich… and also, apparently, has bone structure designed by the gods.

Olive-green eyes, bright and perceptive, pass over me in a single, smooth sweep, and I’m positive he knows all of my sins. He raises a hand—a calloused hand, a huge hand—and drags it through his tousled auburn hair in what must be slow motion. When he purses his lips, I just know that somewhere out there—maybe in several somewheres—there are romance novels dedicated to mouths like his.

Even if this interview is a bust, at least I have a new imaginary face for Seth.

His eyes narrow.

Dammit. I knew he should’ve stayed facing the windows. How can he hate me already?

“You’re buzzing.” His voice is deep, rich, chocolatey. It scrambles my thoughts.

“Excuse me?”

His lip curls. “Silence your phone.”

“Oh.” I’m already digging into my bag for my phone when I realize that the incessant vibration is accompanied by a soft but distinctive whirring sound. A sound I’ve become intimately familiar with over the last eighteen months.

Shit .

“S-sorry,” I stutter, fumbling around in my bag for my noisy mechanical boyfriend. “Let me just?—”

The aged shoulder pads of my jacket are no match for my heavy purse, and the strap slips right down my arm. The contents of my bag spill across the carpet like lava racing down the sides of the volcano.

My phone. Tampons. A dusty breath mint.

But the star of the show is Seth, who is rolling—and still vibrating, I might add…

Straight towards Arsen Adamov’s feet.

I reach for it, but it’s too late. As Seth settles against Mr. Adamov’s wingtips, the man himself bends down and picks my vibrator up off the floor.

His sleek gold wedding band flashes at me as he switches the vibrator off, plunging the room into a painful silence. His green-eyed gaze shifts slowly to me.

“Well… that is certainly one way to make an impression.”