Chapter 357 Talk to Me, Man

Chapter 357 Talk to Me, Man
Dominic was sitting in Lucian’s office, acting like a hurricane with legs. He kept rifling through the paperwork in front of him, not really taking in anything and having to reread each page over and over before he could get his mind to actually focus on anything. He was working with Aleksei, Tiger, Nat’s, Bernardo Valerie, and Lucian who were all spread out, fully focused as they poured through their own stacks of paperwork. Even with separating the stacks, they knew it would take them probably two to threw weeks to go through it all. There was so much of it, but Lucian didn’t trust anyone else to bring them in for it. 
It seemed everyone could feel the negativity rolling off of Dominic like smog as they all sat a little closer to each other across the room from him than they needed to to give him more space. Dominic slammed his hands on the table after rereading a simple bank receipt for bullet proof windows five times. Everyone else jumped and finally looked up, eyes wide. Lucian’s eyes met Dominic’s and Dominic wasn’t sure what his friend saw there. He felt like his entire being was just spiraling out of his control. Lucian studied him for a few seconds and then nodded towards the door. Dominic silently followed his best friend down the hall and into one of the smaller, more private, conference rooms. As the door closed behind them, Lucian turned, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning against the door frame. 

“Talk to me, man. What’s going on?”

“Nothing’s going on. I just want to get this done.” 

“And yet, you’re the least focused one in there, Domi. You’ve hardly gone through your stack at all man.”

“Yeah…well…I’m being thorough. Usually, you appreciate my thoroughness.” 

A small smirk crossed Lucian’s face.

“Thorough, eh? You walked in here this morning with your shirt on backwards and inside out.” “What?!”

Dominic looked down and, sure as shit, his plain black T-shirt was both inside out and backwards, the label looking right up at him from his collarbone. 

“It was a long night.”

Dominic grumbled while fixing his shirt. 

“Okay, I’ve had a few of those. Talk to me, Domi. I know she didn’t hate your grits. That’s not humanly possible. So what is it?”

Dominic took a deep breath, looked towards the ceiling as if asking for strength, and then spilled his guts. He told Lucian everything that happened from her loving dinner to their conversation on the couch, even the secrets he revealed to her. 

“It was like it was just breathing air talking to her. It felt wrong to not do it.” 

Lucian rubbed a hand along his stubbled chain.

“I’m putting a pin in the new safe house eavesdropping for now, Domi, but I’m circling back at some point. I’m more curious about where she went after that.” 

“No clue, Luc. I searched and scoured for that address and anything out of the ordinary in that industrial park and there’s no pubs, clubs, or bars. At least,
nothing on the internet." 

“That is odd.”

“And I went back this morning on my way here and the steel door was locked. Every building I walked into to ask about it, no one knew what was in there.

They just said someone else owns the bottom two floors of the building. I got the plans for the building, Luc. Those two floors were humongous, like warehouse style times two stacked on top of each other but it shows to be empty.” 

“What do you think she’s involved with?” 

“I don’t think she’s involved with shit from a negative sense, Luc. I really don’t.” 

“Underground fight ring? You said she looked the same so maybe she was just watching.”

“Potentially. Size and secrecy make sense.” 

“Well, what do you want to do about it?” 

“I don’t know yet, Luc. I want to figure out what it is first before I do anything else about it. I mean, she and I, we aren’t anything.” 

"Except for the fact that you’re soulmates.”

“But are we though?”

“Valerie thinks you are and you know I’m not about to disagree with my wife.” 

“…About anything.” 

Dominic added, smirking at his pussy-whipped in the best of ways friend who just laughed and shook his head. 

“Exactly! One you have soulmate sex you’ll feel the exact same way." 

"Don’t rub it in, man. Valerie and you have the sex that wet dreams are made of.”

Dominic said as he sat in one of the office chairs around the conference table, his elbows on his knees, his hands in his hair. 

“You’ll get there, Domi. If she’s truly your soulmate, you’ll get there.” 

"That’s the thing, Luc. I feel like I need to prove to myself that what I’m feeling is right. I was only exposed to this stuff as a little kid before your dad found me. Half of the people in the drug dens thought that they were wizards…” 

“But some of it stuck with you though, right?” 

“Sure, yeah. You know my mom’s side of the family was all gypsies and the very few times I met them it all felt natural and made sense to me.” 

“You know we could still find some of them, Domi.” 

“No. None of them wanted me. None of them stepped in and took me away from my parents when they were doing what they were doing. When they knew I was living on those floors surrounded by needles, they made it abundantly clear what they thought of me and my existence.”

Dominic’s voice trailed off as he got more emotional than he had in years about it. He swallowed the lump in his throat and blinked back the tears before Lucian could see them. 

“I know, man, I know it’s okay. I have someone else we can talk to. A part of our chosen family.”

“Yeah? Who?” 

Dominic sat up, an eyebrow raised in curiosity. Lucian pulled out his phone and fired off a text. The response came almost immediately and Lucian looked up at his best friend and smiled.

“All right, Dominic, it’s get settled. Valerie is going to take everyone in that room out to lunch and you and I are eating lunch here and we’re going to have bro talk.” 

"Bro talk?” 

“Yeah, bro talk. Remember, it’s like girl talk only bro talk because we’re bros?”

Lucian winked at him and Dominic laughed as the memory hit him. 

“Did you just turn the tables on me and quote me?” 

“Sure as shit did, Domi. You have no idea all of the life changing things you’ve done for me, especially that one. Let me start returning those favors.” 

Dominic blushed a bit at the idea of someone looking out for him now but nodded his head.

“Alright, Luc. Lunch and bro talk.”

Lucian’s phone vibrated again.

“I hope you don’t mind. I invited Kirsten to our bro talk. I think she’ll have some ideas to help you.” 

“She solved your problems with this, didn’t she? I can’t believe I forgot about that conversation for a second there!”

“Now you see why we need to loop her into our bro talk!”

“You’re a genius, Luc!”

“Hey, Domi, say that louder when we are closer to my office, I want Valerie to hear you say that.”

They walked out the door, patting each other on the back and walk back into the office.