The Carrero Contract - Selling Your Soul (Book 1 of Contract Trilogy)

1

I turn in the uncomfortable, hard bed pulling the sheets up over the itchy hospital gown and try not to wince with every single pain that runs through my body. Even with the number of drugs they have pumped into me, it's no picnic having broken ribs and a body that looks like it lost a fight with a train. I'm in agony and barely able to take a breath without the aching, burning shuddering waves, of a good old-fashioned beating.

Tyler and his men are animals and I hate to think where I would be if Sophie had left me to them; what was inevitably my last night on Earth if they had their way. The girl didn't owe me a damn thing, but she saved my bacon, and now I will be eternally grateful to her even if we never see one another again.

I'm woozy, waking with the throbbing of pain after a fitful few hours dozing in and out of sleep. I feel like I have been here days already, even though I know the reality is, it's only been half a day. 

Sophie is probably long gone with her boyfriend and my name banished for all eternity for getting her caught up in my mess. Owing drug dealers a lot of money and not having the means to pay for it, is not something everyday girls want to deal with. Getting kidnapped off the street by thugs and threatened with imminent death will be a second to that.

I am just lucky she had a rich boyfriend who is related to New York's biggest gangster; Alexi Carrero, and now, I guess I owe him my debt.

A shadow in the corner of my room startles me out of the last ounces of sleep as I jump in fright, my heart racing and plummeting into instant trembles, to see what looks like a man standing by my window near the door. It's hard to make out properly with one eye swollen shut and the other barely able to focus in the darkness. The moonlit sky outside is illuminating him from behind so that to me, all I get is a sinister silhouette of a very large male, who is more than a little intimidating.

Standing tall and broad, taking up the small space with an aura of authority, and yet he is so very eerily still, staring at me silently; it's almost like he's a statue.

''I didn't mean to startle you, Miss Walters.'' The smooth tone of a man in complete control, husky with a hint of an accent that isn't quite New York. Foreign maybe, and so slight it's only there in the odd little word, almost smothered out by a more upper-class City dialect. It's as though he's spent years here but maybe wasn't born here.

Accents are kind of my thing, seeing as my own very upper crust London one stands out a mile when surrounded by tough New Yorkers. I made sure over the years that it never faded, and I avoided taking on American slang to avoid it.

My heart immediately shudders at where I've heard that specific accent before, at who this must be, and I blink as I try to make out his form a little more. Reaching for the lamp beside my bed and struggling to find where the nurse pushed the damn button control when she settled me for the night.

I clear my throat nervously, heart hammering away in my chest, and struggle to try and sit, making a complete mess of doing so while wriggling about in the most excruciating manner; it's painful as hell and my poor bones feel like I am putting them through a rigorous ordeal.

''Please ... don't move on my account. I only came to see that you were being cared for. We can talk another time when you are recovered.'' He moves away from the window and I catch more of him in the light, confirming exactly who this is. I would recognise that physique and profile anywhere, after seeing him out there walking through his minions and Tyler's men like the Kingpin of New York. He isn't someone you would ever forget in a hurry.

Alexi Carrero himself towers by the end of my bed and turns to me for a moment, stealth like a panther, so fluid and graceful in his movements. My breath halting in my lungs as my body shivers apprehensively; he just oozes danger and command so effortlessly that I can almost feel it in the room around me.