13
Jace
There’s a firm knock on the front door.
“You’ve really downgraded your residence,” Matteo says, glancing around the empty apartment.
He knows this isn’t my place.
Well, I own the entire building, but I don’t live here.
This apartment was supposed to be empty. Security alerted me this morning that the apartment had a squatter.
At least that’s what I’d been told. But it wasn’t just a random homeless person living in the apartment.
“Isn’t your girlfriend living in this building?” Matteo asks.
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I say, correcting him. I clear my throat. “Yes, Olivia is living next door. It looks like one of Caruso’s men was watching her.”
There’s surveillance equipment hooked up inside the apartment, revealing several rooms, including Olivia’s bedroom and the bathroom.
“Or it could just be a pervert,” Matteo says.
No one knows my connection with Olivia, but I still can’t help but suspect it’s the Caruso family behind this invasion of privacy.
“Whoever it is, they haven’t come back all day,” I say. I’ve been waiting for them, with my gun, prepared for a fierce interrogation.
“The surveillance is pretty low tech,” Matteo says. “Caruso would plant bugs and wouldn’t have his buddies next door. It reminds me more of a really bad sting by some lame-ass cops.”
I don’t believe that she’s been talking to the police or anyone else. Olivia doesn’t know anything, least of all that I’m mafia.
And she can never find out.
“I hope you’re right.” I want it to be a pervert who I can pound the shit out of and know without a doubt that she’s safe. “Either way, I can’t let her stay in the apartment complex any longer.”
I don’t feel safe letting her live here.
“What do you intend to do?” Matteo asks. “Move her to another building?”
“I’ve already texted her to meet me at my place.”
Memories of her spending the night months ago flood through my mind. Images of her wearing only one of my t-shirts stirs my cock. I clear my throat and turn away from Matteo, wandering around the apartment one last time.
I need a moment to compose myself, and there’s plenty of surveillance equipment and evidence left behind to investigate.
Matteo glances over at a table opposite where I stand. “Did you see these markings?” He points to the writing in Russian. “Could it be the Bratva?”
The Russians are unpredictable. They’re violent. That’s not to say that we aren’t, but we don’t murder cops or judges.
My family is bound by a code of honor, Omerta. We don’t kill unless it’s necessary. I don’t find enjoyment in bloodying my hands, but I do what I must.
“I hope not,” I mutter. We have a relationship with them and understand that we don’t mix in each other’s businesses. “This doesn’t seem like a Bratva operation.”
The Russians don’t sit around and watch an innocent woman. They’re not known for their patience.
If they wanted something from Olivia, they’d have snatched her, interrogated her, and then murdered her when they were done with her.
Another reason I want her out of the apartment complex. She’s not safe here.