Page 37 of Aleko
“You don’t…” She rubbed her head, trying to keep up with the conversation.
“You can stay for a week. That would give you time to pick up some more jobs.” Lia bit her lip with indecision. The idea of sleeping in a clean bed with that soft blanket was incredibly tempting. “We have some German that needs translating. You would be helping us.”
Lia exhaled in relief. “Yes, I can do that. German is easy.”
“Great,” he said nodding. “Then we can go home.”
Negosi had the leftovers boxed within moments, and Lia felt guilty that she immediately tried to think of a way to take the leftovers out to the field. They belonged to Alex, even if she was the one carrying them, and she couldn’t just take them.
Alex opened the door for her again on the way out of therestaurant. It was fine, but it was awkward to have the person behind her reach in front of her to open the door. Why weren’t ladies supposed to open doors? It seemed like such an odd thing.
She stepped out onto the sidewalk and heard Alekos’s phone chirp behind her. He sighed and hesitated in the doorway, responding to the text. She walked out to the parking meter and set the bagged left-overs down on the sidewalk, before using the meter for balance as she adjusted the strap on the heel of her shoe. She liked the ones Alex had bought, but her feet didn’t know what to do with new shoes and were getting rubbed at the heel.
“Hey, translator girl!”
The voice was loud and aggressive and Lia looked up, startled and wary. Three men were coming at her, two of them were Russians from the club. She didn’t know the third, but she assumed he was with them.
“Where is it?” demanded the man in the lead, moving faster.
She slipped her backpack onto both shoulders. Ordinarily she would have just started running already, but the fastest way out of the situation was actually Alex’s car, which she was standing right next to.
“Fuck off,” said Lia, matching his tone. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Bitch. I will fuck you up. I know where you sleep. You think I can’t find you? I found you here. Now tell me where the stick is!”
He grabbed for her arm, but Lia struck first, jamming her fist out into his throat and then clawing at his face. She knew the second man would be coming for her, and she pivoted, but by then, Alex had arrived. She watched in shock as he grabbed one man by the neck and, in one fluid move, flung him into the cement block wall of the building and punched the next man. By then, the first man, his face now streaked with blood from Lia’s attack, had turned to face him. Alex grabbed him by the face andbounced his head off the parking meter.
Then he stepped over the prone body and opened her car door.
Lia made a move to get in and then remembered the left overs. She snatched up the bag from the sidewalk and got into the passenger seat.
Episode 22
The Ride Home
Alex
Alex was furious, but not particularly sure what to do other than break their necks and Negosi probably didn’t want a pile of dead bodies on his sidewalk. He had no idea what the men had wanted, but he’d seen the way she put on her backpack at their first words. Alex pointed the car toward home and turned to look at Eliandra to see what she had to say about the situation. Her hands were shaking and she hadn’t buckled her seat belt. She said something loud and fast and in Russian, tears welling up in her eyes. She sounded frantic. He pulled up to the stop light and started trying to get her out of her backpack so she could lean back in the seat. She objected, still in Russian.
“No, it’s fine. We’re just putting it in the backseat,” Alex said. Lia finally let him pull it off. But her tone was still panicked, even as she settled further back in the seat.
“Eliandra, breathe,” he ordered and she tried. Her inhale was ragged and gasping and the exhale was complicated by trying to speak. “You’re fine,” he said, reaching out and cupping her face. “Just breathe.”
“Da.” She inhaled again. Her eyes were wide and she still looked scared. She said something else.
“Agápi mou.”He brushed some hair out of her face and she clutched at his hand. “You’re stuck in Russian. I can’t understand what you’re saying.” The fingers of both her hands curled into his palm and he closed his hand around them. If they had been wolves he would have pressed up against her, using his body to calm hers.
“They said they knew where I slept! I didn’t do anything tothem! Why would they look for me? I don’t know them! Their deal was with Galatas.”
Alex felt a surge of rage. He should have left the pile of bodies and paid Negosi for his trouble. How dare they frighten her like this?
“They do not know where you sleep,” he said.
“They found me at the restaurant.”
He growled in frustration, but he could see that the sound upset her and he softened to a more soothing tone. That worked and she took a deeper breath.
“I will not let anything happen to you,” he said, making as much contact as he could across an emergency break and keeping his eyes locked on hers. “You are safe. They cannot touch you.”
