Lucca’s gaze travels from me to Kon and then to Mariya. “Are you sure you’re Russian?”
“Shut up,” Mariya said weakly.
“We still did better than the fucking Irish,” Kon says from the floor.
“Yeah,” Lucca nods, “I saw the state of your bedroom. Not to sound like a bad roommate, but get out of here. I kicked everyone out of the main room. You can nurse your hangovers on the couch.”
Grumbling, Konstantin hauls himself off the floor and reaches down to help Mariya off the bed. “I can get up on my own,” she said, slapping his hand away.
Gently sitting on the bed to keep from jostling me, Lucca watches them bicker as they shut the bedroom door. “How are you doing, baby?”
“I’m questioning my Slavic heritage,” I moaned. “I’m so ashamed.” He has the nerve to smother a chuckle while he helps me sit up. Running my hand down my chest, I notice I’m wearing his t-shirt. “Oh… did we have sex? Did I miss it?”
Lucca bursts into laughter and I cringe, holding my hands over my ears. “No, baby. You… tried. But I’m not going to fuck you when you’re drunk. I want you fully aware of what’s happening.”
“This is very embarrassing,” I moan.
“Go back to sleep for a little while,” he whispers, “give the paracetamol a chance to work.”
It takes most of the day to recover from our deeply ill-advised victory party, but by late afternoon, I feel well enough to drag myself out of Lucca’s bed to take a run. He’s in a meeting with Professor Fukumoto, so I leave him a quick note and head over to my suite to change.
The sun’s rays are stretching across the flat landscape of the island, lighting the insanely sheer cliffs to a golden shade. As usual, I take the outer running path, wanting to be close to the cliffs, to see Mother Nature’s late autumn show.
When I was first sent to the Ares Academy, I never thought there would be a day when I would not only be happy, but happy to be here. But maybe Vladimir Adamovich was right, when he approached my parents when I was eighteen, maybe I was a good fit for the Academy.
Breathing in deep, letting the ocean air fill my lungs, I push myself a little faster on the path, waving at the guard always stationed by the lighthouse. This time, he nods to me, which feels like a breakthrough.
The shadows are looming over the path as I hit halfway through my route, and I slow down, thinking about cutting through the campus to get back home. As I catch my breath, I hear the footsteps.
“La mia piccola puttana, my little whore, there you are.” Mateo steps out in front of me, he must have been hiding behind one of the sheds attached to the greenhouse. Schmidt stands next to him, fists clenched. Glancing over my shoulder, I see two other members of his gang of assholes.
“I’m meeting Lucca,” I say flatly, trying to come up with an escape route. They’ve learned from their last attempt, hemming me in from the front and back, the thick glass wall of the greenhouse on one side and on the other…
I’m so screwed.
Unless I take a dive off the cliff or break through the glass wall of the greenhouse, I don’t have a way out of this. Can I scream? Can I scream loud enough for anyone to hear me? The roar of the waves beating against the sheer rocks is so loud that I don’t catch the next thing this evil prick says.
“I beg your pardon?”
His face flushes an angry red. “I said, puttana, that I’m first in line for your magic pussy. Has Lucca fucked you yet? It’s going to be impossible for your Pakhan to marry you off to someone now, isn’t it? Maybe there will be some nasty old fuck that won’t mind that we all screwed you first.”
This isn’t happening. I clench my hands, trying to hide that they’re shaking, I feel violently cold, then hot, sweating, and clammy.
You just need to take out two of them to run, I hear Lucca’s voice. You scream and charge them; they won’t expect it.
“You’re not getting away with rape, asshole,” I said coldly. “Even the Academy’s not going to overlook that.”
They all laugh, and the ugly sound swirls around my brain. Mateo pulls out a phone and holds it up, the flash clicking madly as he takes pictures of me. “Schmidt, you got the video rolling?”
“Yeah.” The blonde who shot me in the back is almost giggling with excitement.
“I don’t think you want these pictures sent to your big brother, the Pakhan, do you?” Mateo grins, “Maybe I’ll put a video together, put it online, featuring you creaming on my dick, you little whore? You’re going to-”
Screaming so loud that my vocal cords vibrate, I charge at him, slamming the heel of my hand into the bridge of his nose, hearing a deeply satisfying ‘crack!’ as it breaks. Driving my elbow into Schmidt’s throat, for a second I think I’m getting out of here, I’m going to make it-
A hand digs into my ponytail and yanks me back violently, throwing me onto the limestone path. Mateo straddles me as one of the others holds my arms down. I’m still trying to buck him off me, still screaming as he slams his hand down on my throat, squeezing viciously.
“I offered you the easy way,” he sputters through the blood gushing from his nose. “You might have even enjoyed it. But now…”
The flash blinds me as they keep taking pictures, his blood is dripping onto my face as my scream turns into a croak.
There’s a blur, and Mateo’s off me, and then the hands holding me down are gone. I roll to my side, coughing.
“You motherfucker! Ti ammazzo, maledetto bastardo! I’ll fucking kill you, you bastard!” Lucca slams his fists into Mateo’s face and I see the guard who nodded at me pull his gun on them.
“Get off him, Toscano! We’ll take him to the Dean. Stop!” The guard’s shouting at Lucca but he keeps smashing one fist, then the other until two more men race over, pulling him off a limp and bloody Mateo.
Lucca yanks away from their hands and turns around, looking for me. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he whispers, scooping me up and heading for the medical clinic.
“It’s not your fault,” I sobbed, “I thought I was safe.”
“I should have been with you,” he said, shaking his head.
“Take me back to your place,” I beg, “I don’t need the doctor. I just want to take a shower or something.”
“They hurt you.” The sound that comes from him is painful to hear, anguish, and self-loathing.
“Stop. Lucca honey, look at me. Just put me down, okay?” Stepping into the shadow of a building, he does, cupping my face, running his hands over my clothes. “See? I’m not hurt. They just yanked me down onto the path. They didn’t touch me, not really.”
His mouth twists. “There are marks on your neck from that fucker. You’re going to bruise.”
“Thank you for coming,” I croak, wrapping my arms around his waist.
A guard joins us. “Dean Christie requests that Miss Aslanova get checked out by Dr. Giardo. The Dean understands that she might like to take a moment to recover, but she has set a meeting for 8 p.m. in her office.”
Resting my head against Lucca’s chest, I focus on my breathing. “In, out. Another deep breath, hold for five seconds, out. Deep breath in…” Lev taught me how to regulate my breathing when I started having panic attacks the year he was assigned as my personal bodyguard.
“Fine,” Lucca gritted out. “We’ll be there.”
“The request is for Miss-”
“We’ll be there,” he corrected the guard, picking me up again and heading for the clinic.
I sat through a quick, deft examination with Dr. Giardo, who patched up my skinned elbow and gave me some arnica cream for the bruising forming around my neck. Luca texted Mariya to bring me some clothes and put me in the shower in his room.