Seduced by the Syndicate Lord

4

I can sense Maximo’s eyes on me in the rearview mirror every few minutes, probably wondering what the hell I’m even thinking of bringing her to my house instead of making an example of her.

I have no answer to that question though. No reasonable explanation as to why I’m taking her as a payment for her brother’s debt instead of doing whatever necessary to make sure she doesn’t have any information that might lead me to the slippery little f**k. There’s something about her that intrigues me. I looked into her when we were trying to find Leo. She trained to be a nurse, and she worked as one in Northwestern Memorial for three years. She was good at it too. I read all of her performance reviews. Incredible with patients and respected by her colleagues.

Then two years ago, she quit, and nobody from the hospital ever heard from her again. She left her nice apartment block and moved to one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city. She took a night shift, cleaning empty office blocks. Besides that, she rarely leaves the house.

She’s a mystery. A puzzle I want to solve. I’ve always been good at reading people. Usually, within a few minutes, I can figure out their story, but not her. That’s what intrigues me. It has nothing to do with her bright blue eyes and the fire in them when she stood up to Maximo and me. Nothing to do with her perky t**s straining against that cleaning uniform she has on beneath her coat, or her full pink lips and how good they would look if I was f*****g her smart mouth. And absolutely nothing to do with the way her blatant defiance and disregard for who I am made me harder than I’ve ever been in my life.

No. Not that at all.

When we pull up at my house, Katerina cranes her neck to get a full view of the place. It’s huge, with two wings, one for me, and one for my brother and his wife. But he’s not living here right now. No doubt, she’s looking for ways to escape though. She won’t find any.

Once Maximo has stopped the car, I climb out and walk around to her side. When I pull the door open, she scowls at me.

“You can walk into the house, or I will carry you in. And you can kick and scream for help and not one single person here will stop me or come to your rescue.”

She glares at me as she weighs her options, and a few seconds later, she steps out of the car, her jaw set in defiance even as she follows me the few steps to the house, while Maximo grabs the small suitcase of personal belongings she gathered from her place. She didn’t bring much, just a few clothes and toiletries and a photo album.

Maximo called ahead once we knew we were going to have a new houseguest. My housekeeper, Sophia, opens the door.

“Mr. Moretti,” she says with a polite nod.

“Sophia, this is Katerina. Can you show her to her room?”

“Of course, sir,” she replies, opening the door and ushering Katerina inside.

Katerina turns to me, her eyes wide and full of anxiety. I like the way she looks at me. I am the man with all the answers, and that makes her dependent on me. And I definitely like that.

“I’ll bring your bag up in a moment,” I tell her, and she nods, although her face is still clouded in confusion and uncertainty, which I guess is understandable.

She follows Sophia along the hallway and up the stairs. A few seconds later, Maximo joins me.

“You sure you know what you’re doing, D?” he asks, giving me a look that suggests he knows my motives aren’t entirely motivated by my need to recoup the money that Leo Evanson stole from us.

“Nope.”

“What exactly is she gonna be doing while she’s here?” he asks with a grin.

“I’ll think of something.”

“I’m sure you will.”

I ignore his innuendo. “She was a nurse, right?” I remind him. “Surely, she has skills that will be useful to us?”

“Sure,” he says, but he’s still looking at me like he knows I’m thinking about another set of skills she might have. “You haven’t forgotten your pop is coming for dinner later, have you?”

“f**k!”

“You did forget?”

“I do my best to forget any things related to him.”

“Good thing one of us is on the ball though, eh?” He nudges me, and I roll my eyes at him.

Anyone else tried to ride my ass like he does and I’d put a bullet in them. But Maximo is like a brother to me. He’s a year older than I am and we grew up together. Our fathers were best friends until his was murdered when he was fourteen. He lived with us after that. There was no official adoption — it just was. I would die for him and he’d do the same for me in a heartbeat. Loyalty like that is hard to come by.

“Why do you think I keep you around here?” I say as I take Katerina’s bag from him and head to the stairs.

“Because you couldn’t f*****g function without me.” He whistles, heading off to my study, while I prepare to welcome our guest.

Sophia is leaving the room when I reach it, and when I walk inside, Katerina is staring out of the window, looking at the courtyard below. She’s taken off her coat at least, so I figure she’s accepted she won’t be leaving any time soon.

“Kind of a nice room for a prison cell,” she says, full of snark.