Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 80660 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80660 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Alexei inwardly winced. Was he becoming jaded?
He snorted softly and took a sip of his drink. Fuck that. He was jaded before he’d managed to escape Russia with his mother. He was born jaded. But that went hand in hand with being born into the Krestyanov family.
Gabor stepped outside, talking loudly to a thin waif of a woman on his left arm while he waved his right arm wildly. He was wearing a shiny orange shirt that made him appear to be a polished tangerine. His brown hair was thinning, leaving his nearly bald cap shining with sweat. Large, coke-bottle glasses were perched on his enormous nose. It was as if he were some throwback from the seventies porn era, but that felt like an insult to porn producers from that time period.
Alexei smoothly turned and started toward the open doors that would lead into the large living space inside. The crowds had made the interior of the house unbearable. There wasn’t much of a breeze stirring, and the air conditioning simply couldn’t keep up with the people.
He hadn’t taken more than a few steps when his watch vibrated. A knot twisted in his stomach, and he stopped to look at who might be calling him. Few people had his number, and not one of those calls would be good at the moment.
Gabriel
Shit. He’d been dodging his uncle’s calls for two days. He couldn’t continue. If he didn’t talk to him soon, Gabriel and Justin were going to appear on his doorstep, and that would be a hundred times worse.
It didn’t matter that he was twenty-three and could manage his own life just fine. Gabriel was his only blood family left. They needed each other. And as much as he hated to admit it, he sort of liked that his uncles checked up on him. It showed that they cared.
The only problem was that the calls were all about coming home. About going through a longer apprenticeship. He was ready now. Not only to work on his own, but to live on his own. To live his own life and to make a name for himself. He didn’t want to continue living in the shadow of the Reaper and Chameleon. He needed to establish himself, and that was only going to happen by getting away from Gabriel and Justin.
Most people wouldn’t understand, but there were definite drawbacks to being related to two of the deadliest assassins in the world.
Shoving away a heavy sigh, Alexei wandered over to a shadowy part of the garden and tapped the Bluetooth earpiece he was wearing.
“Hey, Uncle! How’s it going?”
“You’re not fooling anyone,” Gabriel replied in a low, hard voice. Alexei cringed despite the thousands of miles separating them. He could hear Gabriel’s glare, and his uncle could glare better than any angry Russian grandmother.
“How’s Uncle J? Is he around?”
“Justin is fine. He’s just left to run an errand.”
Alexei clenched his eyes shut and silently swore to himself. If anyone could talk Gabriel down from his black moods, it was his husband. The man was so damn happy and goofy all the time. It was nearly impossible to stay angry around him, though Gabriel gave it a good try. Justin always won.
But Justin wasn’t going to save his ass this time.
“Where are you?” Gabriel inquired.
“Amsterdam,” Alexei immediately answered, earning a weary sigh from Gabriel.
“London,” Gabriel corrected just as quickly.
Alexei rolled his eyes and started pacing again. “Why did you ask if you already knew?”
“A test to see whether I should trust your answers.”
“Ouch!”
“You lied first.”
Alexei flinched, hating that he couldn’t argue with his uncle’s logic, because he was right. He was almost always right, and it was so damn annoying. Why did he always have to be right?
“Sorry,” he mumbled.
“Don’t apologize if you don’t mean it.”
“I do. I don’t know why I lied. Reflex, I guess,” he continued. It was amazing. Just a few minutes earlier, he’d been feeling on top of the world. A bloodthirsty wolf hidden among the sheep. After a couple of minutes of talking to his uncle, he felt like a little kid again.
“That’s not reassuring,” Gabriel grumbled.
Alexei replayed in his head what he’d said and nearly groaned. “I didn’t mean that it was a reflex to lie to you. Simply a reflex while on a job.”
“So, you are on a job.”
“Fuck.” Alexei stopped pacing and barely stopped himself from stomping his foot. “Can you stop using your KGB, mind-fucking skills on me for five minutes?”
There was a long silence, and Alexei cursed himself again. He’d hurt Gabriel’s feelings, which was surprisingly easy to do but incredibly hard to read on him. His uncle kept everything bottled up, but he had two serious sore spots: his past as a Krestyanov and his time working for the KGB. Alexei knew better than to throw those back in his uncle’s face, but the man had him so flustered, and he didn’t want to be flustered while on a job.