Chapter 3 - Simon
Bardil’s call really killed the moment.
I couldn’t say no, though. There is an issue at the warehouse, and I’m the one closest to it to check it out. Maybe it’s for the best. I shouldn’t even have been at dinner with her. She didn’t see anything. There’s no reason for me to be anywhere near her anymore.
But that was the best night I’ve had in a long time.
I huff in agitation as I pull my car keys from my pocket and jog toward my car.
The right thing to do is to forget about her. She’s a civilian. She’s far too innocent for my world. I need to walk away and let her live her life in peace.
The entire time I’m at the warehouse, I can’t stop thinking about Blair.
Luckily, the issue is not an issue at all.
After the security guard and I had gone through the video footage to see what triggered the alarm, we realized it was nothing more than a rat. A fucking monster of a rat, but still just a rat that crossed one of the motion sensor beams in the storage unit.
“Find out how it got in and seal it up. The dock is full of rats, but that thing was on a whole different level,” I tell the guard.
“Fuck, if that thing came running toward me in the dark, I’d be firing bullets at it,” he laughs.
“I wouldn’t blame you,” I agree.
As I drive away from the warehouse, I’m still thinking about her, and when I get home, shower, and go to bed, she’s still looping in my thoughts.
The problem is that as soon as I confirmed that she didn’t see anything, I was supposed to walk away.
I wasn’t supposed to go into her bookstore.
I certainly wasn’t supposed to purposefully bump into her after work to try to sabotage her date.
And why the hell was I jealous that she got asked on a date in the first place?
And since when would I let something like that derail my plans? Plans I’ve had for ages.
Plans to carry out the perfect revenge against Jaco Marcas.
I still haven’t even looked at the damn data from the phone I took.
As I lie in bed with my eyes closed and my arm folded over my face, I tell myself it’s done now. She’s a distraction that I don’t need in my life, and this whole thing has already caused too many unexpected side missions.
I tell myself that tomorrow I will return to my plans and my life and forget about her.
But that isn’t what happens.
It’s Wednesday today.
Every day since I had dinner with Blair, I have found myself staying out of sight and watching her.
I watch her from the car or from a coffee shop.
I follow her when she gets her iced coffee at lunchtime.
I walked around the entire mall yesterday while she window-shopped.
I made sure to keep a safe distance, but there were a few times when I recklessly got too close.
I almost pretended to bump into her again, an accidental meeting that could have led to another dinner date, but my logic overruled my impulsiveness.
What is it with this girl? How does she make me forget about my carefully made plans, my structured days, and the main thought that has been consuming me for months—revenge.
Jaco Marcas. His name hasn’t even flickered through my mind in the last two days while I stalk Blair from place to place, watching her secretly.
My brothers know nothing of my plans against Marcas.
And they know even less about my new obsession with this innocent civilian girl.
I have to keep both of these things hidden because I don’t want other people interfering with or messing with my plans.
However, as I say that, I realize that I am allowing my obsession with Blair to interfere with my plans against Marcas.
What has gotten into me?
On Thursday, I message my private investigator and have him do more research on her. I want to know where she grew up and whether she has siblings. I want to know where her family is and if she studied anything. I want to know everything about her. Everything that can be found out.
Because she hasn’t led a secretive life, he gets back to me with a full report by Friday morning.
I’m in the car outside her work, watching her through the wooden-framed bookshop window, when the message comes through.
See attached PDF. Not much to tell you about her. Are you trying to figure out some connection to someone? If you give me more information, I can do another search.
I figured the investigation into a random, normal girl would confuse my private investigator. But what he doesn’t realize is that any information I get on her seems precious to me. It’s another thing revealed. Another piece of knowledge that brings me closer to knowing her better.
Opening the PDF, I note that it’s only one page long. It really is a short report.
Blair studied here in Miami. English literature. She wanted to be an author, but somewhere between attending university and finishing her studies, something changed that.
Perhaps she didn’t enjoy the studying. I will have to ask her when I see her.
But I can’t see her! I need to stop following her!
My eyes drift down the report on my phone. She has no brothers or sisters, and it seems she distanced herself from her parents as soon as she turned sixteen. I wonder why? That is another question I want to ask her. Maybe I could take her for lunch. What harm would it do?
Huffing, I shove my phone aside and press my hands against my face. This girl is driving me crazy. The more I find out about her, the more I want to know.
I’ve barely done any work this week, and it’s getting harder and harder not to just walk into the bookstore and ask her to dinner.
But I would need to explain how I knew she was here. I was walking past. I saw you through the window.
No.
Patience is one thing I am actually very good at.
Delayed gratification. Waiting for something you really desire makes it that much sweeter in the end.
After her lunch break, I force myself to go into the office for a few hours while I know she’s back at work. But at five thirty, I make sure I’m outside again, in case she closes earlier than her usual six o’clock.
Through the window, I watch her colleague talking to her. She laughs; he moves a little closer. My blood boils, but I hold back the urge to rush in there. Brandon. She mentioned him at dinner. Maybe I should ask my PI to look into him as well.
No.
He’s meaningless. I can tell by her body language that the guy doesn’t stand a chance of getting past the friend zone. I still don’t like that he gets to spend time with her in person every day, while I am stuck with such a vast distance between us.
When this shit with Marcas is over, maybe I will ask her to dinner then.
After she’s locked up the store, I wait for her to pass where I’m sitting in my car, then I climb out to follow her.
I hate the fact that she catches the bus every day.
If she were mine, I would never allow that.
My usual routine has become walking her to the bus station, then heading back to get my car so I can drive to her home and watch her make dinner through the kitchen window.
The streets are busy with people heading home and others heading out for the customary Friday night drinks.
Blair is more of a homebody than a party girl.
She seems to love curling up on her sofa with a book.
And she also seems to really enjoy cooking.
While she’s busy every evening, I watch her singing and dancing in the kitchen.
It’s one of my favorite times of the day with her.
She turns a corner and heads down a quieter street.
I have to drop back a little more to make sure she doesn’t see me.
She walks as though she doesn’t have a care in the world. Taking her time, looking up at the sky, smiling at people who walk past. It’s strange how she can seem so shy and so sweet at the same time.
We are five minutes from the bus stop when chaos breaks loose.
Four bulky men step into her path.
She hesitates, looking nervous as she mutters sorry and tries to step around them.
But two of the men move with her, blocking her again, while the other two step in behind her to surround her.
I jog closer, my body spiking with tension.
One of the men looks up, and my heart shatters.
I recognize him. That’s when I realize I recognize all four of them. Men for hire. Killers in the bratva world. What the fuck are they doing, antagonizing her?
“You’re going to have to come with us,” one of them says.
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she gulps, looking terrified.
I’m moving faster now, filled with urgency to reach her.
I can see the black van moving slowly down the street toward them, and I already know what is going to happen. In a minute or two, it will stop next to them. They’ll throw her inside, and the door will close behind them, and I might never see her again.
The rage that floods me is indescribable.
Drawing my handgun, but keeping it low, I don’t think twice, catching the men by surprise, I step right into their circle and grab her. She screams in fright when I drag her backward against my chest, pulling her away from them.
One of the men sneers. I cock my head to the side, narrowing my eyes at him.
The others all look toward him. He’s in charge. He gets to make the decisions. They thought it would be an easy snatch-and-grab, despite it being peak traffic time in the city. They didn’t account for me being here.
I see the man glance down at my hand, taking note of the gun. He clenches his jaw tightly while I throw him a dangerous smile, daring him to make a move, knowing it would attract too much attention for him.
Blair is whimpering and digging her fingers into my arm, trying to pull my arm away from her body.
“Let me go! What’s going on?” she squeals.
“Stay calm, keep walking backward, just trust me,” I whisper in her ear.
“Simon?” she gasps in shock. She stops trying to claw my arm away from herself.
In front of us, the van has been parked next to the four men. The one in charge has made a decision. He shakes his head and says something I can’t hear. The others climb into the van.
Wheels spin, and it drives off. I don’t let her go or slip my gun back into the holster until the van is completely out of sight.
The realization slams into me.
I know those men because Jaco has hired them on several occasions. He sent them after her. And that means that he knows I’ve been plotting against him. He might even know I’m the one who killed Lucas.
Instead of coming after me, they went after something they think I care about.
Something I do care about.
Blair.
The van is gone, so I release her and let her step away from me. She spins to face me.
“Thank goodness you were here! I think they were trying to rob me!” she blurts out, almost in tears. “I didn’t know what to do. If you didn’t happen to walk past…I don’t…it was so scary!”
I pull her into a hug and hold her close. “It’s okay now. Seriously, it’s okay, they’re gone.”
Her body is shaking as I turn her away from the bus stop and start walking her back toward my car. She is muttering, in shock, all the way, not even asking where I’m leading her.
When I open my car door for her and push her inside, she doesn’t argue.
I climb in on the driver’s side and start the engine. “Are you okay?” I ask, turning to look at her.
She nods slowly, frowning and swallowing hard. “I’m a bit shaken. It was…it was just really scary,” she says, rubbing her eyes and letting out a soft sigh as she tries to pull herself together. “Thank you so much for being there. I don’t know…”
“Don’t even think about it. It’s okay now. Come on, let’s get off the street,” I say, pulling out of the parking bay and heading toward my mansion.
The bottom line is that for some reason, there are mafia men after her. I don’t know why yet, but there is no chance that I am going to leave her alone and give them another opportunity to come after her. It might be because of me; maybe someone saw us having dinner together the other night.
I can’t let her go back to her place; they might even be waiting there for her.
The only place she’ll be safe is with me, at my home.
I don’t really have a choice. She might not like it very much, but she’s going to have to deal with it.
I refuse to let anything bad happen to her.