Page 42 of In Her Blood
Kat gave a weak shrug. “I guess we’ve all been busy…?”
Evelina had no room to argue that, so she released a breath. Probably Kat’s words meant the father was the new man, which meant he was at least currently involved. But there was another problem that quickly popped up in her mind, so Evelina nudged her friend to continue down the line and whispered, “You know you can’t keep working at the bar.”
“But—” Kat cut herself off and sighed dramatically. “Can’t I at least, like, work back-room stuff?”
Evelina smiled. “I’ll figure something out for you, don’t worry.” She bumped her friend’s arm with her elbow. “I got you.”
Kat bumped her arm in return. “I know, bish.”
Chapter thirteen
To Keep a Promise
The downside of spendingso damn much time with someone was that you either grew to resent them immensely for no real reason, or you missed them like a tangible thing after scarcely a minute apart.
Otto remembered when he’d been younger and excited about the notion of training to join the security team. He remembered considering himself honored thatthe pakhanmightallow him, an adopted son of a mid-ranked man, to protect someone or something of value. And he remembered when he’d finally processed that being a person’s guard would be a fairly constant duty he had begun to develop reservations—concerns that he’d overcommitted. How could anyone, really, spend nearly every waking minute with the same person for possibly the rest of their lives, resigned to watching and speaking only when spoken to, and not hate that person?
Probably it made a difference depending on the charge, and in that, Otto was well aware he’d gotten lucky. For as difficult as teenager-Lina had been, she’d grown out of her stubbornly resistant phase and developed a strong sense of responsibility.
And after a decade, afterfinallygetting to fuckingtouchher, having to restrict himself to a separate room felt like torture. It didn’t matter that the room was connected by a propped-open door and the sweet sound of her laughter sporadically carried through. The actual warmth of her presence was lacking. He couldn’t see her. He couldn’t hear her words clearly.
It was the latter issue that was making him twitch.
But she’s fine.She was enjoying her overnight with her friend, after a long day of wandering through too many aisles of nauseatingly colored and overpriced fabric. A scene he would personally vastly prefer to never have to endure again. Though at least he’d managed to sneak a couple of pieces into his allotted quota that he could surprise Lina with later.
With the day of shopping behind them and the women winding down in the next room, Otto occupied himself quietly. He kept one ear open and his handgun in easy reach on the nightstand, alternating between scrolling the internetuntil his brain went numb and trying to read. At about the point where he was seriously considering downloading one of the dime-a-dozen puzzle-matching shooter type games just for something else to do, he realized the laughter from the adjoining room had tapered off. Lina stepped into the doorway a couple minutes later to bid him goodnight.
It took everything in him not to haul her inside.
Instead, he padded soundlessly up to her until he stood a bit too close and allowed himself to graze only one thumb over her jaw. Her skin was too damn soft. “Goodnight,” he whispered back, holding her gaze.
She pulled her lip between her teeth and smiled, and it was perversely satisfying to see her struggling with their distance, too. That made it easier to let his hand fall away and watch her turn back toward her bed—the one closer to the inner door, of course.
He watched until she slid beneath the comforter, then turned to try and get some sleep of his own. He needed to be sharp for the next day, after all.
Evelina never had thought up the best strategy for ditching Kat, so her guilt was doubled by the time she had to stumble her way through whatever lie rolled off her tongue. Not onlywas she lying to her best friend when she probably didn’t need to, she was also lying to a pregnant woman. Even her conveniently-religious, law-breaking parents would have frowned at that, she was sure. And she didn’t know why she felt the need to lie. She could barely explain it to herself. She simply … wanted to keep the family lineage quest as much a secret as possible.
At least until she had her answers.
After all, if it’d been okay to talk about, she would surely have learned about her mysterious aunt before her mother’s last Saturday.
Otto tightened his grip of her hand, pulling her to a stop on the sidewalk and sharpening her focus. “You’re sure this is how you wanna play it?”
Evelina tilted her head to glance up at him, unsurprised to find him scowling ahead at the small building she’d had such a hard time finding on Google. She turned her own gaze outward, studying the weather-worn brick with striking steel beam accents. It was an odd combination of classic and industrial, but that made it distinctive, too. Which was good, because the signage over the wide doorway was arguably too subtle.
She wedged her fingers between Otto’s for a better grip. “I’ll remind you this was your idea.”
Otto grunted.
Her lips twitched. “One of your better ones, probably. We both know I’ve already hit my research tolerance, and I’ve basically foundnichto.”
Otto raised their joined hands and pressed a kiss to the back of hers before rumbling, “It’s your call. I’ll be with you, regardless.”
A fraction of the nerves flaked off, dissolving away and making her next breath easier. “C’mon, Kat’s waiting.” It had been a dangerous gamble, choosing to tell Kat she wanted to do something for Otto to make up for hauling him around the previous day’s event. A lie she’d bolstered with the emotional weight of how he’d recently taken bullets for her and how he’d been ‘surprisingly patient’ with her through everything—none of which was technically false. It just wasn’t at all what she was doing.
There was always the small chance Kat would accidentally mention to someone at work how Evelina had ‘done something special’ for Otto, something she’d wanted privacy for. And while Evelina had no intention of keeping them a secret, she was aware that the timing was wrong to suddenly reveal she was sleeping with the bodyguard her father had assigned her as a girl.
Everything was so damn complicated.
