AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Here’s the thing…” I check the message from Bambi on my smartwatch. “... Mr. Nichols. Mr.JoshNichols. From Los Angeles as well—how lovely. We’re practically neighbors.”
I meet his terrified gaze, my smile still perfectly in place. His throat bobs with a terrified swallow.
“Here’s the thing,” I repeat. “This is a business. This ismybusiness. And what people do undermyroof ismybusiness. So when someone like you comes in here and threatens my guests, you threaten my business.”
He gulps again. It’s audible in the silent room.
“And I simply can’t have you threatening my business, Mr. Nichols.”
“I-I s-s-swear, man, I’ll never?—”
He grimaces in pain when both men bracing his shoulders squeeze tight. Any more pressure and they’ll snap his collarbone.
“I swear,Mr. Zakrevsky! I’m out! I’ll never come back!”
I steal a glance to the guard on my right, who immediately hands me the man’s now-unlocked phone. I skim through the texts.Most of them are hookup requests and uncouth responses to various rejections on one dating app after another.
The truth is, this guy is hardly worth the time I’m giving him right now. The only reason why I’m even bothering is because reputation precedes performance, and the public currently milling around the Main Floor need to see the House keeps things safe and clean.
But there are far greater threats than Mr. Nichols out there. Truth is, this sad excuse for a man doesn’t even register. So I do the next best thing and cut him some slack.
Notice Ididn’tsay that I cut him loose.
“Sasha.”
The guard to my left steps forward. He’s intimidating with broad shoulders, a deep chest, and bald head tattooed with tribal flames near his ears. The very picture ofDo not fuck with me.
“Da, pakhan?”he grunts in Russian.
I smirk. He knows the game well.
“Keep Mr. Nichols company while we decide what to do with him. And see what you can do about these dating profiles; they’re atrocious.”
Sasha nods and calmly sits in the chair opposite Nichols, taking the phone once I set it on the table. Nichols slumps in his chair, clearly on the verge of sobbing. He doesn’t know what’s about to happen to him. He doesn’t know how Sasha is going to “keep him company.” All his mind can do is run through the worst possible scenarios, and they’re obviously terrible.
If he were anyone who mattered, they probably would be.
But I don’t need the blood on my furniture, and besides—the nightmares he can conjure himself are worse than anything Sasha’s brass knuckles could ever do to him. My men will make him shit his pants for an hour, then rough him up a bit, throw him into the back alley, and let him scurry back to whatever rat hole he calls home.
I give a curt nod. The rest of the men file behind each other and we exit the room together, leaving Josh Nichols to the worst hour of his life.
The curious gazes that skirt our way as we stride to the pit are exactly why I have this little protocol in place. No one knows what’s going on in that room—only that Demyen Zakrevsky personally manhandled a serial sleaze who dared come into this House.
Bambi matches my smirk when she hands me her tablet at the edge of the pit. “Right on schedule.”
The screen is lit with selfies and captions posted by the now-elated VIP guest as she tours her luxury suite and tries on the silk complimentary robes. Comments and likes continue to pour in as friends and family push the posts through the social media algorithms.
“And the bookings?” I accept a tumbler from a passing server and take a sip.
“Up by fifteen percent since it went viral. We’ll have a busy weekend next week.”
“Perfect.”
Bambi flips the cover shut and tucks the tablet under her arm. “Tolya would be proud of you, you know.”
The thought comes as a hard punch to my gut. My mood suddenly sours, and I resist shooting her a glare. I know she means it as a compliment. I hate how it feels more like a reminder that his empire fell into my lap through Fate’s cruelest twist.
It doesn’t matter that even Tolya insists I stole nothing from him. It stillfeelslike I did.
