Chapter 14 Nikolas
Nikolas
Tommy is quiet on the way to our room, lost in thought. I don’t blame him. I’ve known Isidoro for a long time, and I’ve never witnessed him get so riled up. I understand that the stone is important to him, but still… He’s never before acted this way, no matter what kind of deep shit we were in.
“What are you thinking?” I ask as we enter our room and I close the door. I check it’s locked before I go over to the window and peek outside. Wild jungle sprawls before me, the only giveaway that it’s part of Isidoro’s property the neatly maintained ponds and stone paths.
Tommy plops on the fluffy couch opposite the window, sighing deeply and rubbing his temples. “Your friend is hiding something.”
His apologetic gaze finds me when I glance over my shoulder at him. I nod. “I think so, too.”
It pains me to admit it, but there is something that Isidoro isn’t telling us. And that is a problem. Our relationship is built upon mutual trust, and if we lose that, well, then nothing guarantees Tommy and I are safe here.
“I only saw cameras outside and at the entrance. Nothing inside,” my little spy says, fiddling with the couch’s soft cover.
He’s observant. A quick learner. He soaks up anything I show or mention like a dry sponge craving water.
I lift the snow globe that’s sitting in the left corner of the windowsill and inspect it. Inside it a gothic castle looms over a frozen lake where people are skating. “Isidoro likes his privacy and that of his guests.”
Humming, Tommy bobs his head enthusiastically. “We can use this to our advantage.” He hops up, then joins me at the window. “Let’s find out what he is hiding!”
Warm, soft fingers envelop mine, smaller and slenderer but instilling a sense of belonging within me. “You want to snoop around my friend’s house? Despite the kindness and hospitality he’s shown so far?”
My question causes a line between those cute eyebrows, but the determination across his pretty face doesn’t waver.
“Yes. He… doesn’t seem like a bad dude. I like him.
But I can’t shake the feeling that something is off.
” You and me both. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to suspect your friend or anything, I just…
The last couple of days have been a lot what with us almost dying multiple times. ”
He’s being cautious. He suspects everyone but me.
It’s the key to survival in this world, the one thing that will keep you alive when you become somebody else.
You have to always be on the lookout for your past catching up, you can’t ever truly reveal who you are. It’s a lonely and solitary existence.
Or it was. Before I met Tommy. Before he made me the luckiest man in the world. Because even if I have to abandon who I am once again, this time I will not be alone. I will have him by my side as I build a new life.
“Okay,” I say simply, reaching out and stroking his hair. “Let’s find out what Isi is hiding.”
Tommy’s gorgeous blue eyes go wide, his mouth hanging on an unspoken word. “What?” He blinks, the gears of his brain turning. “Really? You agree to this?”
I angle my head to the side, studying the ridges that appear across his forehead.
“Yes. You harbor doubts about my friend. As much as I wish that wasn’t the case, I have my own suspicions.
So, I hope you are ready to play detective, Tommy.
” I peck his cheek. “And you better do exactly as I say so we don’t get caught. ”
“Shit.” Tommy throws himself at me, hugging me tight. The snow globe almost slips from my hands, but I manage to place it back on the windowsill safely as I inhale his sweet scent, intoxicated and reinvigorated by it. “You are the best.”
No, he is. My cock jerks in agreement. He deserves the world, and I intend to serve it to him on a silver platter, but for now, I should put his mind at ease about Isidoro.
Whether that means proving my friend is just weirdly attached to this gem or whether we might have to make use of the torture dungeon he keeps on one of the sublevels.
We stay put for a couple hours after dinner, stitching together a map of the place.
I’ve been here a couple of times, but some areas and rooms are a bit fuzzy.
The red door Isidoro mentioned earlier is the obvious culprit, our target.
The issue is that I don’t remember exactly where it is, or if I’ve actually ever seen it.
His residence is a maze that spans multiple floors and sublevels. Why he needs so many is beyond me, but then again, why do billionaires need tens or hundreds of homes? The bigger and the more, the better, that’s their motto.
Tommy walks over to the door, cracks it open and takes a peek. “Ok, it’s clear. Let’s go.”
The golden clock above the TV shows one forty-eight in the morning. I imagine most of the staff would be sleeping already.
“Remember.” I halt my lovely accomplice as he makes to step out. “We are just exploring. Act normal if we run into somebody.”
“Yes, I know. We were doing nothing wrong and just accidentally ended up inside the room he specifically told us to stay away from,” Tommy confirms, grinning sweetly at me and wiggling those perfect eyebrows.
“Exactly. And leave the talking to me, if it comes to that.”
“Roger, boss.” He salutes me, the smile not dropping.
I can’t tell if he’s nervous or excited or both. Most people would be very adamant about snooping around somebody’s home like this—it’s extremely rude—but here Tommy is, being the one who suggested it. He’s got a knack for learning how to be a part of my world.
Consulting with our DIY map, we start our mission. The opulent hall leads us to the lounge, from where it splits into two. We take the left corridor, which leads away from where we entered the residence.
We open the door to every room we walk by. Half are bedrooms and the rest are for leisure, equipped with soft-looking couches, bars, big screens and foldable stages. I wonder why he needs so many. Does he throw big parties? But I don’t remember ever attending one. Weird…
“Okay, we should turn right here. This red door should be at the end of the hall,” Tommy says, pointing in the direction we need to go.
I let him lead the way, keeping an arm’s length between us as I trail behind. From time to time, I glance back to make sure no one is following us. Like I assured him, there are no cameras, so at least we don’t have to worry about that.
“There it is!” he cheers, jogging the last stretch of the corridor.
An emergency exit sign sits above the red door, illuminated in green. On the other side of the glass that spans its middle section, I can see gloomy stairs leading up and down.
“I hope there isn’t an alarm,” Tommy says and pushes open the door, not waiting for me to check.
We both freeze at the screech the old thing lets out. My heart bangs in my chest and adrenaline floods my blood. Damn, I hope nobody heard that. My breathing shallows, pinpricks covering my skin. The alarm will go off any moment now!
I wait, buzzing like I’m about to jump out of a moving train. But even after close to a minute, there’s nothing. No blaring alarm, no armed staff rushing to apprehend us.
Shiiiiiit. We got lucky.
Sighing as tension evaporates from me, I squeeze Tommy’s shoulder. The world spins around me from the rush of relief. “From now on, never ever open a door before I check if it’s safe to do so. Am I clear?”
He pokes his tongue out playfully. “Sorry, I got excited and didn’t think about that.”
I shake my head, fighting off the need to squish his cheeks and nip on his nose. “Am I clear, Tommy? If you want to stay alive in my world, you can’t make mistakes like this.”
“Yes, okay.” A lovely flush of red settles across his face as his eyebrows hang low. “Sorry. Maybe you should take the lead? I’ll keep an eye behind us to make sure there’s nobody tailing us.”
This is a good idea. It gives me the opportunity to show Tommy how to do it too, what to be aware of in his surroundings, where to check for traps and cameras. So far, nobody seems to have noticed what we are up to, so there shouldn’t be anyone rushing to ambush us.
“Okay. Let’s do that.” I step through the door, then slowly approach the stairwell and glance up and down.
It’s clear, no cameras or staff here either.
“I want you to observe me. Pay attention to our surroundings, always look for something out of place. Think two steps ahead, never let your guard down.”
This might seem extreme, considering we are just snooping around in the off-limits part of my friend’s home, but if this were anywhere else, failing to do any of those things could get Tommy killed.
My eager apprentice joins me at the stairs, peeking up and down just like I did. “Clear,” he says as he jogs back to the door and quietly closes it. “Which way now?”
I weigh our options. If we go up, we’ll probably just reach the outside. This is an emergency exit, after all. But if we go down…
Tommy’s gaze darts to me, a shit-eating grin stretching his lips. “Down, yeah?”
I bob my head. “Yes. But don’t forget to double-check for cameras first.”
I let him handle that, even though I did a sweep already and know that there aren’t any, but he needs to get into the habit of checking, no matter where we are.
“No cameras. We can go.”
I lead us down a floor. There is one more below it, but I can catch a whiff of paint coming from there, which tells me that part is still under construction. Whatever Isidoro is hiding must be on this first sublevel.