Page 36 of Adam
He walks around the table and stops right in front of Levi, without talking.
“You want a kiss, pretty boy?” Levi sneers, a disgusting, smug smirk on his face.
Adam grabs Levi by the hair and slams his head into the table with a sickening crack. Blood splatters across the wood as his nose shatters on impact, Levi howling from pain.
Wes and Boris shove their chairs back, draw their guns, and level them at Adam. Father freezes, stunned. Mother and I gasp, paralyzed by fear.
He holds his hair tighter and leans in close to his ear. “Open your mouth about her again, and the next thing I snap will be your fucking neck.”
“Adam, stop it!” I shout.
“Isabella, stand down. Let the new dog off the leash. I want to see if our investment knows how to earn his paycheck.” Dad sneers.
Adam shoves Levi’s bloodied head aside like trash, then straightens up, calm and unfazed, like he just swatted a fly.
“I’m getting paid to keep her safe,” he says, wiping his hand on Levi’s shoulder, as the man is nearly unconscious. “The bonus is making sure no one even thinks about talking to her the wrong way.” His eyes flick to the head of the table. “That part is free. Call it ‘a personal touch.’” He glances at me. “It isn’t negotiable.”
A chill runs down my spine. I don’t know if I should feel flattered or terrified that, after all, he’s not a hero, but a savage man willing to go to any length to protect me.
“Now you’re showing me why you were the right choice,” Father praises.
Adam hums modestly, crosses his arms, and throws me a grin. “So … what’s on the schedule today?”
Idon’t know what the hell snapped in me. I was cold before. Ice in my veins, nothing but the mission. She was supposed to be a pawn. A step on the way to burying her father six feet under and pissing on the dirt after.
But now someone opens their mouth, tosses a slur her way, and suddenly I’m ready to rip their tongue out with a pair of pliers and feed it back to them. Something inside me howls when she’s hurt, even just with words.
What the fuck happened to me?
I used to be a ghost in a crowd. A shadow without a name. Apathetic by design. There was no room for anger, especially not on behalf of someone else. But now it’s like I care. And not in the sweet, puppy-eyed way, but in the kind of way that makes mewant to kill slower and make them feel the weight of what they said to her.
Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with me?
I’m not in love with her. Don’t even start with that fairy tale garbage. I don’t do love. That shit is for the soft, the desperate, the kind of fools who see storms coming and stand there smiling in the rain. Whatever this is, it’s not love.
Besides, you don’t fall in love in two days, especially not without even touching someone. That’s just bullshit.
But something’s wrong for sure. I think about her constantly. Where she is, who she’s with, what she’s thinking. And when someone talks down to her, my blood catches fire. I want to end them.
She was supposed to be a fucking job. A step in the goddamn plan. But now she’s everywhere in my head, and I don’t know why.
I walk outside the house, waiting for her to digest what just happened, get ready, and take her to her class. She had to change her clothes as they were splashed with a bit of Levi’s blood. Oops.
The day is warm, the sun is out there showing off, and the birds chirp around. Perfect weather for a ride, if I could actually use my damn bike. But I can’t, because my lunatic ex-boss thinks I’m dead.
But the silver lining … my sunglasses stay glued to my face instead of trying to take flight like they’ve got somewhere better to be. Always nice when your eyewear doesn’t try to escape at thirty miles per hour.
“Trying photosynthesis, you weed?” Wes’s cheerful voice snaps me back.
He stops beside me and lights a cigarette. Ew. Why does everyone around have to do that shit? One more reason I want to plant my fist in his face.
“I’m sorry,” I say, not even bothering to look at him. “I think I heard someone who shouldn’t be here talking.”
He lets out a dry chuckle and shakes his head, before he inhales his smoke.
He looks young—probably my age—but there’s gray at his buzzed temples, threading through black hair like it’s trying to sell him as someone wiser.
He wishes. He’s just noise with a face.
