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"Yeah, just simple tailing and mapping out a route and schedule and such. We'll continue into tomorrow as well. Lev has already got everything down because we've been on this case a long while, but again, this is more or less to evaluate you. Just pretend I'm not really here and do what you typically do." Easier said than done, probably, but this could be an excellent opportunity to see how she would do under pressure, too.
Although, judging from earlier, I doubt she'd be too affected by my presence once she got into her flow. She might have hidden it well earlier when I made her do her research out in the open under scrutinizing eyes, but I caught onto how tense her shoulders were with her paced breathing. After the first few successes, though, she fell into her element and worked as if Lev and I weren't there at all.
Once she was done ordering, I quickly stepped in front of her and paid for our drinks. "Wha—hey!" Hanna protested with a soft, glaring pout.
"It would have been rude of me to let you pay." I dismissed her with a soft chuckle, smirking down at her for a moment before settling my hand on the small of her back to lead her off to the side while we waited for our drinks to be made.
"It's not a date, so it wouldn't have been rude." She grumbled while increasing her pout, making her bottom lip stick out more.
Seeing it caused a small wave of temptation to wash over me. It'd be so easy to lean down and capture her lip between my teeth. Perhaps I should give into my temptation and rattle her confidence a little.
I quickly pushed the nagging feeling away to prevent my mind from becoming distracted. I couldn't afford to be distracted by her right now, or ever really.
"Doesn't have to be a date for me to treat you. Besides, I was the one who asked, so it would have been rude of me to let you pay for yourself." I countered smoothly with a charming little smile.
Huffing, she averted her eyes from me and mumbled something under her breath before glancing up at me through her lashes. "Don't make a habit of it, I can handle things myself."
"Too bad you're not the boss between us, so I'll make whatever habit I want." I retorted with a small shrug of my shoulders and a soft chuckle. "Cute that you think you can tell me what to do though." I teased her intentionally with a smirk.
Seems like I might have found her button to push, and I would damn well abuse it if I could get under her skin like this.
"Well, it's going to be a bad habit." Then, the wall was back between us with her stale words. "Thank you for the coffee though." At least she was sincere with her gratefulness, and my observant eyes didn't miss the tiny smile she tried to hide from me when she turned her face.
Reluctantly, I stepped away from her when our drinks were ready by the counter to grab them. "Careful, it's hot." I probably didn't need to state the obvious, but the caring concern slipped my tongue out of habit.
"I know, I know, I'm not stupid." She retorted with a soft scoff and roll of her eyes as she took the cup from me. Taking a sip, she instantly pulled the cup away from herself. "Shit!" She hissed with a pained face.
Sighing knowingly, I rolled my eyes at her. "Told you so princess." I chided playfully with a smirk.
"Shut up." She grumbled in response while glaring up at me. "And don't call me princess."The disdain was apparent in her voice, so I didn't press the matter any because no doubt I would piss her off if I did.
"Whatever you want little tigress." I tested the waters with a slight smirk while glancing down at her, taking in the soft glare she threw at me in response. At least I wasn't met with contempt this time.
Wanting to be free of the sweltering cafe, I quickly led her outside to the tables scattered in front of the business. "You do anything fun on your extended lunch?" Small talk never hurt anyone, even if I knew everything she did.
"Just errands, figured since I'm out already then might as well do them during the day rather than after work when I'll be more tired and less motivated to get them done." She replied simply with a slight shrug of her shoulders before sitting down and sipping at her drink, this time blowing on it first.
"I would ask if you finished what you needed, but I am doubtful since you have a whole company to run. So, business is probably never finished with you." Hanna remarked before her cheeky little tongue momentarily peeked out at me momentarily and slipped back into her smiling lips.
"A fair enough statement that I can't argue with." Unfortunately, business was never done, both legal and illegal.
People were always going to be looking for loans, ones where we had to go collect. Businesses in our territory would always need to pay protection fees, which, again, we had to collect. The bratva life would never be anything close to boring, and I was in it for life… or at least until Death would take me from my brothers.
Clearing my throat, I shifted the subject while sitting across from her. "What do you usually do in your free time?" I asked, genuinely curious about any aspect of her life that didn't include or involve work of any kind.
Hanna's soft features scrunched and twisted in thought as she pressed the lip of her cup to her own. "Nap? Hit the gym? I'm not really that exciting of a person. I mean, I usually would spend all my time on my bounties, so not much free time to myself." Her eyes were downcasted as she chewed on her bottom lip. "And sometimes I'll hang out with my friends, but we've just all gotten too busy recently to do much hanging out."
"Well, you're not going to have all the time in the world to work yourself to death if things work out after this trial period. No point in working yourself into an early grave over stupid criminals who decide to be stupid and run. You're going to have to come up with a new schedule and actually plan to live a life." She seemed way too young to have a boring life just yet.
Hanna looked like she needed to shed a few pounds off her shoulders. I had no doubts she would be hired by the end of the trial period, so hopefully, with her work hours scheduled and capped, she'd get out a little more and lighten up a little. Even if she seemed nice and cheery with her constant smile, I could see the fatigue behind it. Her shoulders would stay overly tense even when she relaxed as if she had weights on them.
I wanted to know what troubles she had to dim her like that. Why was a young lady like her so tired? Granted, everyone in this whole generation lived in a constant zombie state, but still. The typical person unwound enough at the end of the night to look somewhat lively. Even the typical boring person seemed somewhat content, unlike Hanna.
"I'll worry about that when it comes, and what's to stop me from doing research on my off time, hm? Ever stop to think that maybe I like doing that stuff?" Her challenging smile wasn't convincing enough for me.
Chuckling softly with a soft shake of my head, I looked at her with a smirk and raised eyebrow. "So, what you're telling me is that you just love to sit in front of a computer screen for hours upon hours and stare at pages after pages of reports, for fun?"
The way her face twisted was a good enough answer for me even if she refused to answer me verbally. "D-don't we have actual work to get to now?" She grumbled with a frowning pout, her eyes firmly locking with mine.
