*Adrik*
“I bet Mommy was a drug addict, hmm? I bet she neglected you because she was too busy hooking for drug money and when she wasn’t fucking random dudes, she was probably so high she forgot she had a kid. How close am I?” Stephen said, a small smile on his face. The great thing about Stephen was his understanding of psychology. He only used it as a weapon when he got pushed past his point, which was incredibly rare, but he was well past his point when it came to what Armando did to Sephie. He knew how to mindfuck a person better than anyone else and he enjoyed doing it.
Armando started to struggle again, trying to get free, again to no avail. “That’s why you pick the women you pick. Sephie was only partially wrong when she said you had a savior complex. You do have a savior complex, but you’re also trying to recreate your mother in every girl you fuck. You get them hooked on drugs so you can be their savior. But she was dead on accurate about your superiority complex. When the initial high of fucking a new woman wears off, you either kill them or leave them as addicts, completely broken, because they disgust you. Just like mommy dearest. No wonder you need help sleeping at night,” Stephen said.
Armando was still struggling to get free, but now he began yelling in Italian incoherently as loud as he could. His face was a deep shade of red as his anger took over completely. Viktor didn’t say a word, he just took a bandana out, rolled it up, walked behind Armando, and gagged him with it. Because Armando’s arms were tied to the chair, he could do nothing but take it.
“Goddamn yelling. I can’t stand yelling. They were right. Your mother taught you zero manners while she was fucking the whole town,” Viktor said, walking back to the door of the room. Armando was still yelling, but now it was muffled by the wad of cloth shoved in his mouth, which admittedly was much nicer than having to listen to him screaming.
“Ricardo and Lorenzo probably knew all of this when they chose you,” I said. As soon as I said they had chosen him, he glared at me. “Oh, they definitely chose you, Mando. You see, you might still be under the impression that you were ‘choosing’ Sephie to be your next conquest, but it’s really been you all along. You’ve been a puppet your whole life. Sephie, on the other hand, well, not only has she survived every single horrid situation she’s been put in, she’s made the perpetrator pay with his life. Don’t worry, you’re going to find this out firsthand soon enough,” I said. “You might think you’re above her, but it won’t feel like that when you’re dead and nobody remembers your name. And Sephie? She’s just getting started. The whole world will know her name.” I stood and watched as Armando struggled, still yelling, still angry beyond belief. I knew we’d found his weakness and I was planning on exploiting it even more. I wanted him to suffer as much as possible.
I turned to the guys, who were standing behind me. I said, in Russian, “I think we should leave him to his thoughts for the night.” They nodded in agreement. It had only been a little over an hour, but I was already missing Sephie. I needed to make sure she was okay. Viktor opened the door and walked out first, giving instructions to the guards.
On the elevator back to the penthouse, Stephen couldn’t help but laugh. “Well, that was way more informative than I thought it was going to be.” We all joined him in laughing, because what else could we do in that situation. While there was a tiny part of me that might’ve felt bad for Armando under different circumstances, he sealed his fate when he took part in grabbing Sephie. He just made sure his death was going to be slow and painful when he decided to beat her.
We walked quietly back into the penthouse, assuming that Sephie would be asleep. The TV was on, which was a rare occurrence for us, and the three of them were somehow all lying on the couch together, with Sephie in the middle still wrapped up like a burrito in a blanket. She was sound asleep, against Andrei, with his arm around her to keep her warm, with Misha laying in the opposite direction, holding onto her legs. I looked at them, clearly amused by the scene.
“She got really cold when you left. This was the only solution that kept her warm,” Andrei said. Misha slowly untangled himself from her legs. I watched him do it and still had no clue how he was lying the way he was and still able to watch the movie. Or how there was room on the couch for all three of them. Andrei and Misha were not small men.
“We offered to help her to bed when she started to get sleepy, but she didn’t want to be alone. She said she still didn’t trust that she wouldn’t start shaking,” Misha said.
“You don’t have to justify anything to me. That’s why I left you two with her,” I said, laughing quietly. I walked to the couch, looking down at her and Andrei, trying to weigh my options. It was not as easy to pick her up and carry her to bed now that she was hurt. Moving her was painful. I hated to wake her up, but I didn’t see a way around it given the way she’d fallen asleep against Andrei. I looked at him, saying, “tighten your grip just a little so she doesn’t move when she starts to wake up.” He nodded and I could see his arm flex around her. I knelt down in front of her, my hand against her cheek. “Sephie, I need you to wake up,” I said softly, my thumb rubbing her cheek lightly. She mumbled in her sleep and started to move, but Andrei stopped her. Her eyes opened, seeing me in front of her. I was immediately hit with her warmth, causing me to smile at her.
“You’re back,” she said, quietly, lazily blinking away the sleep.
“Come on, let’s get you to bed. I didn’t want to hurt you by moving you in your sleep,” I said. “I still don’t understand how the three of you could fit on that couch.”
Her gorgeous smile made my heart threaten to stop. “It’s simple, really. Magic,” she said as she started to try and unwrap herself from the blanket. Andrei helped her and then kept hold of her as he sat up slowly while I moved her legs so she was sitting. She was able to stand up almost on her own, with only a little bit of help from me this time. “How long have you been gone? What time is it?” she asked. Ivan answered her, telling her we’d only been gone a little under two hours. “I can take more superprofen before I go back to bed, then,” she said, walking slowly toward the kitchen. I caught her, steering her toward the bedroom instead.
“I’ll get it, love. It’ll be faster this way,” I said, grinning at her.
“Solid logic,” she said, walking toward the bedroom.