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I was getting everything done down here, despite what Evelina thought. I’ve even made some breakthroughs in my latest software, pinning down some pesky bugs and eradicating them from the code, all on my cousin’s relatively weak computer. All of it—the family business, my side hustle, taking care of the dog—all while managing to spend time with a woman whose company I truly enjoyed. And who drove me wild, although I had to fight against that since she was determined to think it was a bad idea.
She also refused to discuss anything about parenting, completely clamming up whenever I asked her opinion on something new I read. I found it difficult to believe she didn’t care about the differences between putting the baby in a crib and letting it sleep in the family bed. If it was a girl, should I get her ears pierced? How did she feel about allowances or should kids do chores because they were part of a family unit? All that stuff fascinated me, with the baby going to arrive in less than seven months.
But her answers were always the same. It was up to me. I was the parent, not her. It made me wonder if she wanted kids at all.
I sighed and got up to stretch. It really didn’t matter if she did or not, except that I woke up in the morning looking forward to our walks on the beach with the dog. She was a bright ray of sunshine in the darker parts of my life. Sometimes she looked downright happy to see me, making me feel like I’d done something amazing and worthwhile. Her smile alone could do that to me.
It all faded eventually, though. Whenever she remembered her status here, or when she jumped with alarm when she didn’t realize I was nearby. I longed to ask Samantha what she thought about when she stared at the ocean so intently, but I didn’t think I wanted to know the answer.
Gregory poked his head in and cleared his throat, drawing me out of my looping thoughts. “Your computers have arrived.”
“About damn time,” I said, getting up as a few guards carried in the boxes.
It had taken so long because there weren’t many people I trusted to take down my setup and properly pack it up for shipment. Evelina had gone up there a few days ago to visit Kristina, and she did it for me. She and Mikhail were taking the baby to Moscow to visit our father from there, or else she would have brought it all back with her on their plane.
Now that I had my own equipment, I could really get some work done and hopefully keep my mind off of Samantha. I opened the boxes and started setting everything up, losing track of time until gunshots outside made my heart seize with fear.
Where was Samantha? It had been hours since I last saw her, heading out to the pool after breakfast. Who in the hell was shooting?
I rushed out of the office and to the front of the house, where I found some of my guards herding her upstairs. Her face was ashen, and she looked like she might raise a fuss until she saw me. Her eyes begged me to tell her everything was going to be all right. So far, I’d been able to say those words and make them true, but now I didn’t have a clue what was happening or how bad things were.
“What’s happening?” I barked.
“Someone crashed through the gate and opened fire. Johan is dead. Firefight in the courtyard,” one of my guys said as he checked his weapon before heading outside.
This could end up bad enough if we were alone out here, but there were a few other houses on the island. The shots wouldn’t go unnoticed, and eventually, someone would call the cops. Pretty soon, it was going to be a shitshow. One I should be directing, but all I could see was Samantha’s terrified face.
I muscled between the guards that surrounded her and led her the rest of the way upstairs as I ordered them to get outside and finish this as quickly as possible, preferably before any law enforcement joined the fray. I led her to a safe room built behind a false wall in the master bedroom. It was small, equipped only with a cot, a mini fridge full of bottled water, a few bags of chips, and a minuscule bathroom with a combination toilet and sink. It was definitely only a place to go in emergencies, not to hang out in.
Once the door was closed and locked, no one on the outside could get in unless they were let in. The walls surrounding it were bulletproof, so I knew she’d be safe. I pushed her inside and showed her the wall-mounted entry and exit system.
“This is the code that opens the door,” I told her, pointing to the number hidden under the panel. “Only you can open it from here once it’s locked, okay? You’ll be perfectly safe.”
“People are shooting outside,” she said with a lost look in her eyes. I prayed she wasn’t going into shock.
“Yes, I know. That’s why you need to lock yourself in here. Do not open it to anyone but me.”
I pulled away so she could lock it, and I could test it to be certain, but her hand snaked out and grabbed my arm before I could close the door. “What if you get shot?” she asked, beginning to hyperventilate. Her other hand went to her stomach. “What if you get killed? The baby won’t have a father.”
My heart sank, seeing she was on the verge of hysteria. It would be cruel to lock her in there by herself in her state and possibly dangerous. I swore under my breath and raced to the hall to shout down that they were going to have to deal with this one on their own. I hurried back and slammed us in together, locking us down until everything was over.
She sank onto the cot and tried to make herself small, her chest rising and falling far too rapidly. It broke my heart, and I sat down next to her and held out my arms. With her aversion to guns in general and this fiasco reminding her what kind of life I led, I expected her to recoil from me. Instead, she scuttled close, pulling my arm around her shoulder and burying her face in my chest.
“Please, Leo,” she said. “Tell me everything’s going to be okay.”
Chapter 16 - Samantha
I thought I had wrapped my head around being held prisoner by a mafia crime lord. For the past two weeks, things were going fine, better than fine. I still struggled to keep my hands off Leo, but all the awkwardness from our slip-up was gone.
I had actually begun to think of this as a vacation. The weather was great; I got to see the sunrise over the ocean if I wanted to and got to swim whenever I chose. There was a library full of books and thousands of movies. I didn’t miss my crappy jobs at all. I was actually waking up in the morning without the clutching fear of Annie having to go back to public school or Gran not getting proper medical care.
Everything was taken care of, and everything was okay, just like Leo had promised on the plane. He could be as smug as he wanted about it, too. The only wrench was how much I was going to miss him after the baby was born. He made noises about me being a babysitter, but that took things too far. Once the little one was in his hands, I had to check out.
That morning I’d taken a dip after breakfast, then picked a nice bouquet for the kitchen, pretending I had any artistic inclination as I arranged the colorful blooms in a vase. Burya wanted to go out, and since Leo was in his office, I took him out to the front courtyard, where I was allowed to go by myself if I stayed in sight of a guard. The way I got around that was to make the guards follow us around. I was adjusting like a champ.
Then all hell broke loose.
The puppy and I wandered down the long driveway. I tossed a tennis ball ahead of me, and Burya gamboled after it and brought it back. I wrestled it out of his slobbery jaws and did it until we got to the end, and I accidentally sent the ball through the bars of the gate.
