Not. After all, they were acting on my orders, and everything was going to plan.
“Thanks. ‘Preciate it.” He dipped his chin. “Enjoy your meal.”
“I will.”
Ferguson’s head disappeared, only to be replaced by Kyrill’s.
“They holding off with the count until you’re done here. Need anything else?”
I took another bite and chewed carefully. “Nah. Thanks, bratan.”
My mind was still preoccupied with the pickle apology when Kyrill closed the door and blessed silence engulfed me once more. The carnival outage could be described as both inefficient and inspired, although none of it happened on purpose.
A mental image of a six-foot dancing pickle flashed through my mind, making the corners of my mouth twitch.
Nothing like that would’ve happened under my supervision, of course. I would have harnessed her natural talent for causing discourse in the right way. As amusing as the whole story was, it was also incredibly revealing.
She’d stayed and apologized when most people would’ve panicked. I’d seen it happen during riots in here, with the chaos making even the steadiest of people lose their heads.
But even though Adelaide was a walking disaster in her everyday life, she appeared to keep her cool when faced with situations like this.
I was itching to find out more about her. It would be so easy to do so, but for some reason I was hesitating. Cracking my knuckles, I turned the idea over in my mind. Why didn’t I want Hunter to look into her yet?
It was safe to say it wasn’t because I didn’t care — Adelaide intrigued me; this much was clear.
I definitely wanted to know what she looked like, so it couldn’t be a pointless act of unwarranted restraint. Was I afraid to find out she wasn’t my type? Maybe.
My fingers moved to the spots where my rings used to sit, wanting to indulge the habit of playing with the cold metal, even after years of not wearing them.
I wasn’t afraid she wouldn’t be my type. I was afraid she would be because I knew I was already starting to get hooked.
It took only three measly letters for the first seeds of possessiveness to take root in my heart. Talking to her was almost addictive; it felt way more intimate than it should have.
There was a strange scratching sensation in my chest. The thought of someone else getting to see this version of Adelaide didn’t sit well with me. This version of her wasmine.
Unlike most people, she didn’t carefully pick and choose her words when talking to me. Instead, she wrote exactly what she was thinking, completely unapologetic and unafraid.
I wasn’t used to people challenging me these days. Some of the guys in my inner circle, like Kyrill, would question me, but always respectfully; never outright challenging my conclusions as she was doing. And no one I knew was this forthcoming with their thoughts. It was … different. A good kind of different.
I polished off my plate, the scrape of the fork was loud in the quiet room.
As far as I could tell, Adelaide had no ulterior motive. Most of my conversations and interactions in Blackwood revolved around people wanting something from me but all she seemed to want was my engagement.
She wasn’t even asking for my darkest and deepest secrets. All she wanted was to get a reply — any reply, really.
Kind of odd.
Was she lonely? She never mentioned having any friends. I could probably count on one hand the number of people she’d mentioned so far. Was her family around? Her father had died, but were her mother or sister still in her life?
There was something about the way she wrote — not just the chaos, but the way she described it. As if no one had been there to witness it with her. As if she were accustomed to filling the silence herself.
This thought settled in my mind with an unfamiliar weight. It wasn’t so much about pity. It was more like a sense of recognition.
I’d spent most of my life moving from one place to another, never staying long enough to belong anywhere; just long enough to be noticed for the wrong reasons. The Russian kid. The outsider. The kid with anger issues whom the others watched before deciding to keep their distance.
My mother had made sure of that in her own way, severing all ties and keeping me far from any extended family or father figure. No place had ever been permanent. It was all transitions and perpetual movement.
Growing up under these circumstances, you quickly learned silence was easier. You learned people were temporary. It was better not to need anyone to stay, so you didn’t.