Page 5 of Destroyer

I hold the bile rising into my throat. Gavriil's place was a shithole. It was damp, musky, and filthy. Cigarette smoke clung to every surface. The mere idea of stepping in there again churns my stomach. I can only assume the worst about Nico's home.

"Come on." I head out to the car and Nico joins me in the passenger seat, his feet up on the dashboard.

"Where do you want to go first?" I slap his legs and he lowers them from the dash. I'm not driving with his feet up there. One harsh press on the breaks and his knees would be through his shoulders.

"My Carter house."

Carter Turnbridge has paid for the boy to buy a house instead of acknowledging Nico as his son. I honestly think it's the better option. Carter has a string of bastard kids, but he would send anyone to the graves if they even thought about telling his wife.

"We need to check they is happy with tap."

Nico rents out the house to a lovely young family, and he usually takes Porter with him to check everything is OK. And because I am Porter's bodyguard, I have been the one who ends up dealing with all the teaching issues that have come up in their first month of tenancy.

After parking on the drive, we head up to where Mrs Anderson is waiting with the baby. Our encounter is brief, just a quick check up that there are no more issues.

The tap Nico referred to has been fixed and the tenants are happy, so we are done in under half an hour. The next stop is Gavriil's house. Nico inherited it, poor kid. No one wants to inherit a pile of shit when someone close to them dies. It's practically uninhabitable, so not only does he have to cover the cost of a house he can't sell, but he is also still homeless too.

Which is why he lives with me, Gregory and Porter.

I am pleasantly surprised to see Gavriil's house looks more like a building site than a tip. The ground to the left of the house has been dug up, and the first stages of a new build are underway. The general everyday mess is gone and most of the remaining mess is from the building work.

"This I wanted to show you. Outside only." Nico bounces happily in the seat. He is so excited to show me this, and if it wasn’t for his body movements, I'd consider this to be a very mature move from him. Gavriil's house was too small to be sold as a family home, no one wants a one-bedroom house, but if he adds a second or even third, he could make this a nice home for a first-time buyer or renter.

"I am making Mr Big Boss Man Edward be paying for it. He would not like very much for me to call my new grandfather, and I said I was much too busy with fixing up Gavriil's house."

"You're not blackmailing him, are you? Nico, be careful."

"No. I said about it, and he was really keen. He had all good ideas, and he is sorting an ext-extel-exte. He is making the house bigger."

"Extension."

"If I can't read good, I need to speak good."

"You speak English and Russian better than you let on, and your Romanian is perfect."

"You always say nice things."

"You always know how to say the right thing to wrap everyone around your little finger."

"What is the thing you say to Gregory? Potty in hand. Putty! Putty on your hand." Nico turns his hips, lifting his legs onto the dash as his way of stopping me driving off to avoid answering. "Who is wanting a sticky mess on their hand?"

"No, not sticky." I sigh heavily. "It means you have someone where you want them."

"So, it is then the putty you are wrapping around your finger?"

“They mean the same thing. I overheard Gregory talking to someone in the pool room.”

"Yes, it's all going exactly as you predicted,"

"You were dead right."

"Yeah, no one suspects a thing. The kid? Putty in my hands. No issues with him."

It feels like a relief to finally tell the kid what I heard Greg saying. I've been using Nico's connection to the man to investigate.

"Are you thinking of Carter or Edward?" Nico questions when I am done.

"I was thinking about Carter. Maybe he had a different motive for sending Gregory this way, but there is really no love lost between them." I've listened to Gregory talking about his family and the hatred he feels for his father came from his childhood. "He could have spoken with one of his brothers before he came down here."

---