Mafia Men: Nikolai's Inferno - Chapter 26: Chapter 26

.Evangeline.
I knocked on his study door and waited, it was still early, so, I know Scott won't be there. Nikolai was usually alone in the mornings. Perfectly Scott-free.
A gruff come-in made its way to my ears and I flung the door open. I stilled as I saw him talking on the phone with someone. He seemed tense, he always had a dark aura surrounding him but today it seemed darker.
I made my way around his desk and he rolled his chair back, slightly turning towards me. I leaned my butt against the edge of his desk and watched him as he finished up his phone call.
"I have made it clear many times before, Moretti"
Moretti... Ugh, even the way he says people's name is beautiful.
I stared at his strong hands, they were so clean, veins protruded out of them, and the nails were perfectly trimmed. Even his hands are perfect. The same perfect hands that were between my legs yesterday night gave me the most amazing feeling in the world.
I don't know where I got the courage from because the next thing I did surprised me as well. I touched his perfectly perfect tie and tried to adjust it although it was already fine, I just had an intense desire to touch him.
Last night he made it pretty clear that what happened was just for me. He did it to make me feel good but how can I tell him that I want to make him feel like that too? It goes both ways from what I have heard.
I was so busy playing with his tie that I didn't notice his stare on my face. I felt a sudden weight between my legs, the temperature of the room rose, and my skin felt too hot to touch. He gripped my hand all the while talking on the phone, his gaze sparked with dark amusement, though a small amount of
irritation leaked through.
Was he annoyed by my presence?
I smiled and then tried to pull my hand out of his grip but he didn't let me, I stood there before him and waited as he talked. He spoke another language in between, Italian...
Che due coglioni! Stronzo! Figlio di puttana!
He repeated those words the most...
He finally hang up and tugged me closer to him by my wrists. "Do you need anything?"
I furrowed my eyebrows. He had asked this question one too many times as if he was only here to fulfill my needs and everything I needed. Like there was nothing else between us and he was just my guardian after my parents died.
It didn't make me feel good about myself. I already felt like a freeloader only now he was granting me sexual favors as well.
"I met one of your men last night, Lorenzo. I just wanted to let you know. I wouldn't want you to think that I did something without your permission"
He made a hmm sound deep from his chest, and my cheeks heated up at the sound.
"It wasn't my fault, he um... I was just strolling in the garden when he came out of that shed."
"Did you talk to him?"
"Um... yes. Was I not supposed to?"
"No, it's alright..."
"He's scary"
A hint of a smile pulled on his lips. "What did he say?"
"That he tortures people in those tunnels"
"He didn't lie"
Saying that Nikolai let go of my wrists and turned his attention back toward the papers lying on his desk. I walked around his study, looking behind the drawn curtains. The entire ambiance of his study was so
dark, and so him.
I loved it.
I loved his darkness.
"Nikolai, I'm bored" I voiced once I have memorized his entire office.
"Then make yourself useful"
I frowned. "How?"
With his hand, he pushed a stack of files my way. "Arrange them in alphabetical order"
I gleamed, picking up the stack of files I walked to the couch and coffee table in the corner and placed them on it. The files seemed like profiles of people, mostly his family members because most of the files had the last name "Costello".
After fifteen minutes or so, I was done arranging them in alphabetical order. "Done" I announced.
Without even looking at me, he pointed toward the right-side wall and I followed the direction of his finger. My eyes widened as I saw a couple hundred more of these files. I shrugged and walked to them, picking them up and reading the name, and aligning them in the right order. This is gonna take a long time but it's not like I have anything better to do.
Somewhere between sorting the files, the door opened and closed. I looked up and saw Scott and at the same time, his eyes fell on me. He froze in his spot. His gaze traveled between Nikolai and me.
"What the fuck is she doing in here?" he asked Nikolai, ignoring me like I was not even present in the room.
"She's working" he just answered.
A flare of arrogance burst through my veins as I gave Scott a smug look and got back to my work. He shook his head like he couldn't believe it and then continued rambling about something in Italian, so, that I
won't understand.
Scott left the room an hour later as I put the last file on the Costello stack. "Done and done" I announced.
Nikolai cast an uninterested look my way and then got back to whatever he was doing. I blew out a breath and lay on the couch, I put my legs on the headrest and let my head drop down from the seat. I was bored with nothing to do, my legs were in the air, and I moved them up and down as I sang along to a song.
"Evangeline..." a warning and I stopped humming the song immediately. I pulled my legs down and sat on the couch like a normal person.
"You know, I researched your name" I voiced.
He didn't look at me, only nodded. "What about it?"
"There was this big book in the library with names from all over the world. Your first name is Russian and your last name is Italian?"
"Hmm..." again an uninterested hmm.
"Why?"
"My mother's a Russian and my father is an Italian" he answered smoothly.
It was the first time I have heard him talk about his family. I suddenly wanted to know more. "What's your mom's name?"
"Anastasia Costello"
I smiled. "That's a beautiful name and your dad's?" I still asked even though I knew his father's name, I wasn't going to tell him that I researched on his family.
"Luciano Costello"
"How did they meet?"
He let out a dry breath and stopped whatever he was doing. He looked at me with a sense of bitterness. Was I annoying him? He then opened his desk drawer and pulled something out, he placed it on his desk
and looked at me.
"Take it" he ordered.
I got off the couch and made my way to his desk. I saw my cell phone resting on his desk, I gasped and looked between him and the phone.
My lips parted, "You trust me enough now?"
"No, but right now I need you to stop talking, so, I can work, Evangeline. Take it before I change my mind."
I squealed and picked it up before he could take it away. "But can I stay in here? I won't make a sound, I promise"
He gave his head a subtle shake. "Fine"
I walked back to the couch and unlocked my cell phone. I saw hundreds of notifications but most of them were from Stacy and Brittany, they texted me, asking me what had happened or why Liam suddenly
disappeared.
I bit the inside of my cheek and contemplated if I should ask him about it or not but before I could, he got up and walked out of his study.
I read the rest of the texts and saw Nikolai's missed calls from that night. He had called me more than twenty times and then they stopped around five a.m. I guess it's when he finally found where I was. There were no texts from Liam, I didn't know where he was and how he was. Since Nikolai wasn't here, I tried calling his number but his cell phone was turned off.
He was a good friend to me while in college and I don't want him to get hurt. I know what Nikolai can do to people, last night talking to Lorenzo only proved my point.
What if they are keeping Liam in those underground tunnels and torturing him? The thought sent a shiver down my spine and my chest suddenly felt heavy, I didn't want to be the reason behind someone's
suffering.
I got up from the couch and put on my shoes, I walked out to see where Nikolai had gone. He was not anywhere in the house, so, I headed toward the foyer and stilled.
There was a man getting beaten up by Nikolai's soldiers while he just stood tall above him and watch the entire scene with calculative and cold eyes. I winced every time I heard a punch followed by a crunching sound. He pleaded for his life, he called for Don Niko to have mercy on him again and again but Nikolai seemed so cold and indifferent.
This was not Nikolai, it was the monster that lived in the back of his head. The same monster I saw when I was begging him to forgive but he didn't.
Then I heard the cocking of a gun. I knew what was going to happen next, I may have seen a bunch of dead bodies but I haven't seen someone getting shot with my own eyes. Nikolai pointed the gun at his head while his soldiers held the poor man up by his arms.
"You made a mistake. I welcomed you into my home and you stole from me." I held my breath as I saw the scene, I half wished that Nikolai would change his mind at the last minute and he'd let the man go. But from what Nikolai said, it seems that he stole something from his house. He can just return it, there's no need to kill him over that.
The air was filled with the staccato rhythm of gunshots. I inhaled sharply, the sound racketed in my ears. I saw his body collapsing on the floor like it was never alive. Blood. Blood. Blood. So much blood gushed out of the bullet wounds. The men around the body were composed, comfortable as if they have seen a million dead bodies before and I'm sure they had. Craziness and darkness dripped from all of their eyes. Nikolai tucked his gun on his back under his jacket before he turned and entered the foyer. His heated gaze met with mine, and he exhaled loudly through his nose, probably not liking the fact that I had seen him kill a man. He looked back at the pool of blood right before his front door, his soldiers had taken the dead body somewhere else and then he glanced back at me.
"You okay?"
That was not the question I was expecting him to ask me, I thought he'd scold me for being here but I nodded nonetheless. "I'm okay..."
He nodded before he walked inside the house and I followed him.
"Are they gonna bury him now?" I asked
He didn't look at me. "No, they are going to throw him in a ditch and light his body on fire until he's dust"
I took a breath. "Oh... was he your friend?"
"A traitor"
He took the stairs and I mindlessly followed him wherever he was going. It's like he was my direction, my compass right now.
"Hmm..."
"Did it scare you?"
I looked at his broad shoulders and perfectly ironed jacket from behind. "What?"
"What you saw..."
For some reason, it didn't. It should. I felt bad for the man that got shot but other than that I wasn't afraid of Nikolai or what I saw. At this point in my life, it felt nothing compared to how I saw my parents lying
in the pool of their own blood.
"No..." I simply answered
He stopped outside a door and then turned. "I'm tired, Evangeline. I have work to do, go to your room" saying that he opened his bedroom door and walked inside leaving me out here alone.