Nikolai nodded, shuffling across the mattress to tug Katarina into the side of his chest. She dropped her head onto his shoulder.I can’t give you advice, Kat, and I’m so sorry.He didn’t say it, knowing it wouldn’t help. Kissing the top of her head instead, he let her throw her arms around him and squeeze him tight.
“Thank you,” she breathed into his neck as she melted into his side.
“I told you, you can come to me for a shoulder…or…since someone’s panties are on, if you need those two taken care of?” He smirked as she scoffed, shaking her head. “Offers on the table.”
“My in-laws aren’t worth the energy it would take you to deck them.” Katarina sat up again, pulling away from his shoulder but not his embrace. “I think it’s cause Gill gets out soon. They’re going to try for custody or something. And I just need to figure out how to win that.”
Nikolai opened his mouth, shut it, then opened it again before he could think better of the words coming out of his mouth. “You could talk to Blightwood.”
“What?” she blurted out, pulling back.
Nikolai grimaced. “Yeah, look, I don’t like it either but…You’re part of the family now. Jessie can put you on the books as official payroll and accounting department. So, you’re employed. You live here with us, that’s super easy to change on your paperwork too. So, you’ve got a roof. Tell all this to social services then ask Blightwood to back you up since he got you the divorce papers rushed for domestic abuse. I don’t like you talking to the Enforcers, but…Isabella’s safety is the only thing that matters.”
Katarina’s face fell, her eyes wide with worry. “Really?”
“Yeah, and I mean, if that doesn’t work, I’ll snap Gill’s neck in the ni—OW!” Nik yowled as Katarina slapped him hard on the arm.
“Don’t you dare! You’ll get in trouble and you’re not allowed to leave me! You hear me! Don’t you dare get yourself arrested just because my asshole ex knows how to work the system.”
Nikolai beamed evilly, climbing to his feet. “He’s not the only one. Time you put that big brain to work, Kat.”
She scowled at him, but he could see his words got to her. Katarina stood up with him and nodded to the shower. “Go on and scrub up, you’re super stinky.”
“You like it,” he teased, putting a hand to her face and playfully pushing her away. Katarina swatted at him but left him to get in the shower. He could hear her banging away in the kitchen before he turned on the faucet.I don’t want you to have to do this…but you’ve got a point, trouble.If he just straight up killed Gill, Aravis would figure it out. She would need to get the system to work for her for the time being. They could address Gill at a later date, once the Council wasn’t breathing down their necks.
Or maybe Jessie might actually give Frankie a call. Who knows. So long as they kept their hands clean of Gill’s blood, it would probably be fine. Besides, they had Pierre fucking Simmone to hunt down, a mastermind to unmask, and a car bomb prototype to find.Priorities.
Chapter Twenty-seven:
~Katarina~
Katarinawasn’tsurehowshe managed all of it inside a few hours. However, she was locking up Jessie’s office with a stack of paperwork ready to submit in the morning. Her employment packet was already uploaded and processing at the council’s public record. Payroll was calculated and pending. Her change of address was ready to drop off, as well as Isabella’s. She even had time to whip up the shop’s quarterly tax submission early. While she wanted to be out in the yard working on the car, Nikolai had a point. If she was employed, with an official roof over her head, then the courts would see her as a viable option. Her only point of pain was convincing Aravis Blightwood to help her again. She just needed them to see Gill was dangerous. Even if he couldn’t go down for all he did, so long as they let her keep Bella away from him, she’d be happy.
That was till she stepped out of the lobby, on her way to pick up Isabella, and found Petunia and Rupert Hurley in the parking lot. Both of them with a pouting Isabella pinched between their legs. The second Isabella saw Katarina, she lurched forward only to be held back by a firm hand.
“Hey! What are you doing!” Katarina snarled, storming forward like the bull after a fluttering red cape. “She doesn’t get out for another thirty minutes. You don’t have parental permissions to pick her up from school.”
How did they even get her early!It would be one thing for them to beat her to the pick-up lane and weasel their way in…but to have audaciously walked into the building and taken her out early? Even 45 minutes early? Katarina hated that she bet it was more than 45 minutes, that maybe they’d held her poor kid hostage for longer than that. Katarina shook down to the bone with fury as she closed the distance. Stuffing her keys in her pants pocket, she snatched her child away from them.
Petunia snickered, “The school gave us special permission seeing as Gill is getting out tonight.”
Katarina froze, hugging Bella tight in her arms. Isabella murmured, “Momma, is Daddy coming home?”
“That’s ridiculous. The Lord Commander said he had a minimum of 30 days. It’s barely been over two weeks.” Katarina shifted her child nervously on her hip as she put another step between her in-laws and herself.
“He’s also been given special permission. You see his ungrateful wife is preparing to flee the city, I hear.” Rupert stepped toward her and Katarina wrenched backward.
“Ex-wife!” she spat, twisting to put Isabella closer to the shop than those two. “And I’m not fleeing. I’m right here.”
“That’s not what we heard,” Petunia sneered. “Give us Isabella back. If you’re going to run from your responsibility, then do so, but you won’t take our granddaughter with you back to the hells.”
“I’m! Not—you know what,” she snarled, spinning from them. “I don’t have to listen to this. Neither does Isabella.”
“Momma! Where’s Daddy!” Her daughter cried out, eyes welling with tears. It broke her heart to hear it. She froze in the middle of the asphalt, staring forward at the shop. Like he could sense the disturbance, Jessie peeked up from a vehicle he was inspecting. He locked eyes with her and within a moment, he was wiping his hands off on a rag and walking toward her.
“See! She wants her father. Why are you being so unreasonable and allow a man to see his daughter?” Petunia added and Katarina hugged Isabella close to her chest.
“Isabella, go get a piggy back ride from Fluffy, huh? He’s missed you all day.” She smiled weakly as she put Isabella back on the ground. Her child looked between the grandparents looming over Katarina’s back and then the shop.
