Marco walked towards me. The boots he was wearing thudded against the hardwood flooring, making him more menacing.
“Marco…” Alex warned. I noticed that he didn’t step into Marco’s pathway. It was clear that his protectiveness towards me had limits.
Marco leaned on the bed, so that he was staring me straight in the eyes. From far away, his eyes looked pitch black, but now, I realized they were a deep chocolate. What made them terrifying was their complete lack of warmth.
“No,” he said to Alex. He didn’t take his eyes off of me, and it took everything I had not to look away. Something told me that if I did, Marco’s would always think of me as a weak little kitten, and he'd beat me around accordingly. “She needs to understand what she got herself into.”
“I didn’t get myself into anything,” I sneered. I wasn’t willing to take the blame for our current predicament. I’d been minding my business, when Marco decided to storm into the alleyway and kill the bouncer. “You are the one who decided to shoot someone in cold blood.”
Marco chuckled. “If you knew what he had done, little dancer, you would be glad that he’s dead.”
I swallowed. I didn’t know who Marco really was, or Adrian for that matter, and I didn’t care to know. It was clear that whatever he was involved in was both illegal and dangerous, and all I wanted was for it to go away, and for my life to return to normal.
“I want to go home,” I said.
“You can’t,” Marco told me.
“What are you going to do? Kidnap me?” I asked. I shouldn’t be giving him ideas. This man was dangerous. Probably the most dangerous person I had ever come across in my life.
Marco shook his head and stood back up. “I don’t need to kidnap you,” he told me.
Alex’s eyes grew big. It was clear that he was surprised by Marco’s words.
I was too. I thought that he was going to exert power over me.
“In fact,” Marco said, there was a bit of amusement in his voice. “I’m going to send you home.”
My mouth dropped open in shock. “Really?” I asked. I felt myself leaning forward slightly in excitement. I hadn’t thought that Marco was going to let me go home. Several hours ago, I didn’t think I was ever going to see my family again.
Marco nodded. “You are going to see exactly what you’ve gotten yourself into.”
His words sounded like a threat, and they chilled me to the bone. But I wasn’t going to question it. If Marco was letting me go, I would do everything that I needed to prove to him that no one would make me talk about what I’d seen.
“As far as I’m concerned,” I told him, “I didn’t get myself into anything because you and I have never met.”
Marco smiled. “We will see,” he said.
“We will.”