Page 167 of Nemesync
I feel air filling my lungs again.
Once the bullet was out, my hands trembling, I held it up, exhaling deeply.
“Another souvenir,” Nikolai remarked.
Elijah, though injured, managed a smirk.
I kissed his cheek again, the gravity of our situation sinking in. “I’ll never look at clubbing the same way again.”
Nikolai chuckled at my reaction and reached over to pat Eli’s shoulder. “I thought she may kill me too if I didn’t let her come back to you,” he said with a grin.
I took a life to keep him safe, just like he’d done it for me countless times.
He saved me again and again.
And tonight, I finally got the chance to show him how grateful I was for him being my guardian angel, in the most intense, albeit not romantic, way imaginable.
You almost got him killed. You didn’t save him, it’s your FAULT.
I didn’t have the energy to acknowledge the voices now.
I tore a piece of my dress, quickly making it into a fake bandage to stabilize his injury, stopping his bleeding and stitching him up when we arrived home.
Niko headed back to the penthouse in silence.
The night had taken a turn, I never thought it would take.
Danger is everywhere I am.
Elijah was still recovering, but he seemed to be doing better than me, to be honest. He gently held my face. “You saved me, and I appreciate it, but don’t ever put yourself in that damn position again. That’s my job,Milaya.”
Turning his attention to Nikolai, his eyes flashed with a menacing glint. “Niko, you know better. You let her back inside when I explicitly told you to keep her safe.”
Niko shrugged, smiling. “Eli, I tried, but she was unstoppable. And I don’t regret it a bit, she did what I had to do.”
I didn’t even try to respond.
My mind was consumed, suffocated by dark thoughts.
My father’s men had come for me.
People died, Elijah was injured, and although he managed to take down most of them, it was clear they were sent with the intent to kill me.
How insane must one be to want to harm their own flesh and blood? How scared he must be to send a horde of men to eliminate his own daughter?
I can’t stop feeling guilty. Just by being with them, I put them in danger. It’s as if danger follows me like a fucking shadow.
“We won’t let them harm you,” Elijah spoke, grabbing my hand softly.
“They don’t know what they’ve unleashed. We’ll make sure they regret this, Little Z,” Niko added.
I couldn’t shake that black hole in me, that sadness, thedeception.
I’m sorry.
“I never thought my own father’s men would turn against me. And they almost killed you, Elijah; they want us dead. It’s not something I would allow, and it’s just absurd to try to kill me just because I left him and don’t help him anymore.”
Those haunting green eyes found my soul again, caressing each scar on it, delicately. “They will never do that; I’ll kill them all before they could just have a glimpse of you. I’d set the damn world ablaze, with them in it, if that’s what it takes to keep you safe.”
