Page 2 of The Gambler

He didn't like the way the prick had spoken to the innocent one, but he stayed out of it. It was family business, and only a fool got in between family. Plus he knew from experience, that someone like this Jenna was loyal to a fault and loved wholeheartedly. At least that's how it had been with Ali and now so with the others. But when she cried out that was the last fucking straw.

He was up and out of his chair before the men gathered there knew what was going on. There was a chorus of 'oh shit' coming from some factions, and the two guards, although they'd known something like this might happen, hadn't been quick enough. Some might even say they'd held back a little.

Dragging a full magnum of Dom Perignon from the side table, he approached the other man swiftly, bringing the bottle down across his head; splitting his face open.

Chairs were scraped back, as men left their seats; the young frightened Jenna set up a screeching sound loud enough to wake the dead, and Alec writhed in pain on the floor, too stunned to know what the fuck had just hit him.

Andros turned to his two guards, who were now flanking him. "Cash me out."

Only then did he turn to the girl, who had given up her screaming, to stand cowering in the corner, rocking back and forth as she mumbled to herself.

He approached her nonthreateningly, eyes glued to her face and her moving lips. As he drew near, he could finally make out the words she kept repeating over and over again.

"The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want." So innocent it almost broke his heart.

He knew what he was about to do, would bring down a shit storm on his head. Alec was a made man in one of the leading underworld families in the country.

Andros didn't give two fucks about that, but his grandpa would. Too fucking bad, even gramps knew how he felt about shit like this, he'd understand, or he wouldn't who gives a fuck.

"Come flower." He drew the girl slowly, gently from the corner, under the watchful eyes of the room's occupants. By this time, the missing Tina had returned, and was bellowing about what had happened to her husband.

She flew at him when she saw him leaving the room with the girl in his arms.

"You fucking bastard."

"That would be your husband, tell your in-laws, if they want their daughter back, they'll have to deal with me."

"What, are you crazy you stupid prick? You can't just take her, come Jenna."

She tried taking the young girl from his arms, but he shifted his body.

"The fact that you have a vagina would not stop me from breaking your fucking face. Now step the fuck off, we're leaving she's had enough for the day."

Poor Jenna didn't know what to think. The mean man had hurt her Alec, but he had the angel's face, the one she always dreamed about, so he had to be hers right? He had to be the one.

Her angel would never hurt her, so she wasn't afraid, as he left the room with her in his arms. It had been a long time since anyone had carried her like this.

"Angel, where are we going?" She asked in her singsong voice as she laid her head on his shoulder.

"Fuck me! You?" He looked down at the young girl in his arms in awe, as memories of another time played through his mind.

Memories of something his sister had said to him once, a long, long time ago. Had he known ten minutes earlier what he knew now, Alec Petridis would be a dead fuck.

Chapter 2

His thoughts were in turmoil. What he held in his arms, if his thinking was sound, was his most precious possession. Something he'd not actively searched for, but which had always been at the edges of his mind, since that day so long ago. He couldn't get to his car fast enough now, to get away from this place, to get her away. What he really wanted to do was go back, and tear the asshole from limb to limb. The fuck had dared to touch what was essentially his; the fact that the other man could have no knowledge of that bore no significance; it's just the way Andros looked at things.

Placing her in the back of the car, he waited for his two shadows to exit the building, which they did not long after, with his winnings in hand.

"Here boss."

They passed the half a million dollars over to him. Good, he can build the nurse's wing onto the school he had in the works for his little charges. Not that he didn't have enough money to do it outright, because he did, he just liked the idea of taking money from the fools who sat around those tables, wasting it, while so many suffered, and putting it to good use.

He heard the rumblings of course; some said he was a fool, that he was fighting a lost cause. The one and only time it had been said to his face, the other man had been the recipient of a broken jaw and a couple broken limbs, after being thrown into a wall.

To say Andros was a hothead was like calling Vesuvius a hill. The young man spoke with his fists more often than not, but it wasn'tjust because of his innate hot-blooded temper, no. It's because he truly couldn't abide stupidity in any form, and he saw injustices of any kind as stupid.

The car eased gently into the night's traffic, as they headed back to his home in upstate New York. A rather lengthy drive, but one he enjoyed. So deep in thought was he that he didn't realize when she'd first crawled into his lap. Looking down at her, inhaling her sweet scent, he felt his heart stir.

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