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“Always a pleasure, Prickles.” He said and I winced at the look in her eyes. If only this guy knew who his neighbor was.
I was still reeling about seeing her in this well-to-do neighborhood. Most of the crime families lived in the Boulevard district of Sinclair Bay and here she was, living in suburbia like she was pretending to be a housewife.
I followed her to her door, and she spun around with a glare.
“Why are you here?” She hissed and I had to hide my smile.
“You aren’t nice in the mornings,” I said, unable to resist teasing her just a little. Her cheeks flushed a delicious shade of pink when she got angry, and her eyes turned into a dark grey-tinged blue. Like storm clouds.
“That isn’t an answer.” She said as she walked through her door. She put a hand out to stop me and I sighed.
“Look. You seemed to need someone to watch your back, so I am here to help.” I said and she raised one of her perfectly arched brows at me.
“You are here to help.” She repeated and I nodded.
“Yeah. Bodyguard for hire.” I smiled and she frowned.
“Why?” The hesitation in her voice told me everything I needed to know. She didn’t trust anyone.
“I have my reasons.” I didn’t want to saybecause you reminded me of my sister, and I can’t watch her die all over again. That would just be fucking weird.
“I don’t trust reasons. I need answers.” She said, hands on her hips.
“Because I lost someone to violence, and you remind me of them. I wish they had someone they could have trusted.” I saw the shock then the apprehension in her eyes.
“I am not your redemption, Leo. I am a woman who does bad things. I won’t have someone around me who tries to stop that.” She licked her lips and winced as Hamish revved the bike again.
“I know. I’m not innocent, Katerina. I have seen and done things in my own life that I am not proud of. I am not looking for redemption.” Just salvation. But I wasn’t going to say that to her.
“Fine. We can do a trial. But don’t you have clients and a gym to run?” She asked and I shrugged.
“I can fit in the most important clients around a new schedule. The rest can be taken by one of the other trainers and the gym runs fine without me. I’m not there when I am fighting anyway.” I followed her inside and she looked at me with curiosity.
“I am an MMA fighter. When I am preparing for a fight, I don’t focus on anything but myself.” I explained as I walked into her living room, sitting on her couch.
She nodded as if that was enough for her before disappearing into her bedroom.
The house was neat, minimal which wasn’t a surprise, and in neutral tones. It suited her.
I was still trying to wrap my head around this woman and the knowledge that she was one of the most powerful people in Sinclair Bay.
When she came back out twenty minutes later, her hair was in a sleek bun, a white blouse was tucked into waist-high black pants that hugged her body in a way that should be illegal, and the black stilettos had me thinking some very inappropriate things.
This woman was a fucking goddess, and she didn’t even know it. If it hadn’t been for the panic attack I had seen when I was training her, I would have thought she was immovable.
But someone had scared her to the point that she had a vulnerability and that pissed me off.
So, she did bad things, didn’t we all?
“Are you sure about this? I am about to walk into the lion’s den and try to root out the pigs that eat at my table.” She said and the flash of anger had her accent thick and sexy.
“Put me in, coach. I’m ready.” I joked and she rolled her eyes.
“Don’t come crying to me when it’s too much. If you are doing this, let’s take your car. They won’t expect me then so I can see if that puts them off guard enough to fuck up.” She said, walking out the door knowing that I would follow.
I wasn’t going to lie; I had a thing for a powerful woman. A woman with confidence who didn’t ask questions. I was no pushover, but I was surrounded day in and day out by women who looked fake, acted fake, and were as vain as you could get.
When Katerina came back, I thought at first, she was going to be like the rest of them but when she asked me to do a job, curiosity got the better of me.
