Protected by the Beast ✔

35

Riley

*

When I was little, I was a very troublesome child. I remember my mom would doze off for hours and I would cause a scene at school. I didn't care if the teacher wanted to reprimand me. Of course they wouldn't call my mom, you couldn't call someone who was knocked out cold due to excessive drugs intake, could you?

Later on when I was taken away from my drug addict of a mom and transferred into a child protection program at the age of ten, a part of me felt lost. It was as if I just couldn't get that part of me any longer. I felt like a bird which had gotten its wings broken down due to unavoidable circumstances. But the feeling of desolation and fear only lasted for a little while, because I soon slipped into the troublesome attitude I was very much familiar with.

Occasionally, I would cause ruckus with some other girls at the orphanage and even though we got punished, we would be at it again in just a few weeks. But as I grew up and got transferred to another orphanage and then another, all that fight left me. I became someone that just wanted to stay safe, someone that started treading carefully because I began to understand that my mom probably had her own reason for deciding to get lost in endless doses of drugs to avoid thinking about some things that hurt her. That was her escape.

But I wanted to be different.

I wanted to have a list of healthy options if I needed an escape from any problem I ever encountered. I became someone that started planning her future and hoping things would go well so I could eventually live out that future, owning my own bakery and selling sweetness to the lives of several customers who, like me, had one too many past or present issues and baggage weighing them down.

Only, that troublesome girl never knew she would one day find herself in the mafia, with people after her life and in a complicated relationship with her abductor slash a mafia leaded slash someone she secretly had a crush on and this would just be the beginning of her unveiling.

~••••••••••••~

I woke up to sounds of mumbling beside me. My neck hurt a little and that had me opening my eyes and groaning as I tried to crack my neck to ease some of the tension.

Cleaning the boogers from my eyes, I let out a yawn but stifled it when I realized I'd just taken my head off someone's shoulder. An act that needed to be duly acknowledged.

Looking sideways in a slow motion, my suspicions were confirmed when my eyes landed on the Beast himself. He was reading a newspaper, focused on whatever was on it, regarding an oil company and a crisis. Squinting, I realized he'd had to lean into the seat, almost slouching so I could rest my head comfortably on his shoulder.

That brought some warmth to my heart and I found myself caressing my chest to ease the pain that followed when I realized I shouldn't think too much about his act.

I pursed my lips and looked away, only to see Leo already staring at me from the other side.

"You're awake." He noted and I nodded at the question.

"Yes. How long is the journey from Italy to New York supposed to last?" I asked him.

"You can google it." The side of his lips upturned into a smug smile that had me rolling my eyes internally.

"We're on a plane. My phone is on airplane mode." I gave him a deadpan for him to figure it out himself and he nodded in realization.

"Oh. Well, I gue-" he started when--

"Nine hours three minutes." Beast's gruff voice replied beside me, still staring at the newspaper on his thighs.

"Oh." I mumbled and double tapped my phone screen. Checking the time, I realized I'd slept for about three hours and some minutes. That was a long time!