Page 91 of No Longer Safe

I pinched my lips together. “Yes, she is.”

“When were you going to tell us?” I pushed past him in the doorway and took a deep breath.

“Probably never,” I laughed. It sounded like a joke but it wasn’t. I didn’t want to use their names for connections. I didn’t want anyone here to think I’d gotten the job because of who I was sleeping with or who I was living with.

Lu met me down the hall, her big bag slung over her shoulder. “I’m done for the day and after looking through the work you did this morning, I would say you’re done for the day too.” She hooked her elbow with mine.

Tavon stayed on our heels. “Does no one else think it’s important that Audrey here is seeing Alexei Cristof?”

Lu rolled her eyes. “No one cares who she’s seeing. You’re just starstruck.”

Tavon’s mouth dropped open and he hung back as we walked out of the office floor and into the elevator. “I didn’t want anyone to know.”

She laughed and bumped her shoulder with mine. “Did you not realize you were being followed by paparazzi?”

“That picture he just showed me of Alexei all over me outside of the club was not taken by paparazzi. It was taken on a cheap phone camera.”

“I mean, they’re rich. How would you not know that someone would take your picture and post it somewhere?”

“There are lots of rich people I don’t know. I met Alexei and Ace and didn’t know who either of them were!” I pointed out.

“You practically live under a rock.”

“I don’t live under a rock anymore.”

“Anymore,”She booped me on the nose.

Lu took a bite out of her hot dog and did a little happy shimmy. “Do you have plans for this weekend?”

I hadn’t thought about it but I was sure Alexei had a few things planned for us. He mentioned something about a few fundraisers we needed to attend. I hadn’t realized when he said we would have our pictures taken that it would be paparazzi. I shivered. I would be in the press again.

“You look frightened,” Lu peered down at me with concern. “Just don’t read the tabloids. They have nothing good to say, okay? No point in getting worked up over what Tavon discovered.”

I ate my hot dog in silence and when we were finished with our lunch, I decided it was better to go home and get ready for my date with Alexei than worry about things out of my control.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Alexei

Father wasmany things but the biggest thing that he was, was an asshole. I’d always known it growing up, but I knew it even more now as I got the phone call that Father was ready to meet an hour before I was supposed to pick up Audrey for the fundraiser we were attending. The last thing I wanted to do was see my father before I had to be with my girlfriend. I still couldn’t believe I was calling her that.

I’d honestly never felt so good. It felt weird. I honestly had no idea what I was doing but I was trying my best to be what was good for her. I’d never been in a serious relationship before. The closest thing I’d ever gotten to one was fucking the same girl more than four times and that didn’t include dinner or a movie first. With Audrey, I was experiencing many firsts. We actually talked about things we liked, what we wanted our futures to be,anything.It was weird but it was good, it was new and I didn’t want it to end. I craved talking to her, I craved touching her, tasting her,fuckingher. But lately, it wasn’t fucking… it was more.

Lightning flashed across the massive floor-to-ceiling windows in my father’s office. I checked my watch for the fifthtime, he said an hour before I was supposed to pick Audrey up, but he wasn’t even here yet.

At least it was here in the city and he hadn’t forced his hand to have me go to him in their northern estate. I wouldn’t have been able to take Audrey out at all tonight if that had been the case. I could still see her and touch her when I was finished dealing with this fucker.

My knee bounced as I waited for him. He always loved his dramatic, late entrances. I should have known better. Didn’t he understand that people had things to do? Oh, he understood, he just didn’t care. Good ole Pops for you.

“Thank you for meeting me today, Alexei,” he began as he unbuttoned his sports coat and sat down behind his chair. “I know it was a bit last-minute but unfortunately with how much I have to oversee, I can’t plan too far in advance. I had several meetings this afternoon and one ran over.” He smiled, the motion not even meeting his eyes. The heartless bastard didn’t have meetings all afternoon and giving me an explanation was just a part of the manipulation that was about to come or he wouldn’t have smiled. He was trying, unsuccessfully, to butter me up. “I’ve always had your best interest at heart and it’s time we talk about it.”

The folder flashed into my mind. My knee stopped bouncing and the anxiety over being late to see Audrey tripled into something else. We never talked about my future, in fact, we never really spoke at all. Everything that needed to be discussed was with Ace, besides that one stupid conversation we had in their estate, in what felt like a lifetime ago.

He leaned back in his dark green, wing-back chair and stared at me with his soulless, calculating eyes. The same eyes that stared back at me in the mirror every day. They were cold, distant, and menacing. The last thing I wanted to do was remind anyone of my father but I was the spitting image of him, so Itried my hardest to be nothing like him. If they saw it in my looks, they sure as hell wouldn’t see it in my personality.

“It’s time we talk about your future,” He assessed me silently and I prayed I didn’t portray what a ball of nerves I was at this topic, at this meeting in general. Where was Ace? He was usually our father’s shadow. I would have done anything to have him as a buffer tonight. I hoped Father would wrap this up quickly so I could be with Audrey. I couldn’t even let her know I was going to be late. If I pulled out my phone, it would only make this worse. “It’s about time you start thinking about settling down.”

I blinked. I’d done my best to show him that was what I was trying to do. It was why my picture with Audrey was in the tabloids. It was why I was attending fundraisers with her. “What?”

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