Family
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Kasia put her phone away after speaking to Lucas, tucking it into the back pocket of her tight jeans.
She had been worried about him.
She always worried about him; the way Ras used him despite Lucas being the youngest of his sons. How he still ground Lucas hard. And Lucas was like a soldier, taking the orders even when it put him in harm's way, when it took him away from home for days or weeks at a time, he never ever questioned his father's authority.
Kasia owed Lucas her life and she would do anything for him. She wished she could take away his burdens, take away all his worries. But protecting him from Ras was impossible. Him... his brothers and sister... Ras was so hard on all of them, he was unforgiving and unrelenting as a father.
Kasia was relieved that Lucas was back home safe from Nebulon. Whatever he had done there, he was home safe now.
She breathed out.
She poured out an Old Fashioned and a rum and soda and handed the glasses to a waiting guest at the bar.
Kasia worked as a bartender in the club that was based on the ground floor of the Andromeda. The Adrien's owned the building, comprised of hundreds of luxury apartments and offices and was considered prime real estate in Proteus.
They owned the popular club, Spice, where she worked.
Kasia had an apartment in the building, living rent free; and because she lived rent free she worked at the club without a salary, working on tips alone. But she didn't mind because she made great tips that funded her lifestyle and paid her bills, and being in the building kept her close to Lucas.
And close to Christian, his older brother.
Kasia leaned forward as a guest shouted out a drink order, requesting a Tattersall Bootlegger.
She nodded, "Coming right up!"
The club was always busy, and in turn so was Kasia. Taking drink orders from the patrons, answering random questions, constantly being hit on... sometimes she hated everything about the place, the revelers who came night after night, the cheap synthetic smells of their perfume, cigarettes, the dazed looks in their eyes from their drugs and alcohol...
Sometimes she hated being here.
Sometimes.
Christian made it bearable.
Kasia's warm brown eyes swept the crowd until she found Christian on the other end of the club, and her heart skipped a beat when she saw him. Like it always did when she saw him. It always felt like a sweet liquid sensation coursing through her when she saw him, full of comfort and some expectation.
She kept her eyes on him, even as she mixed the drink in front of her.
Right now, Christian was keeping things in order, he was trying to keep a drunk man under control. The club had a bouncer, but sometimes Christian handled some of these things himself, especially because the man in question was an important government official living it up in the club with a woman who wasn't his wife.
The man's tab had run exorbitantly high after ordering expensive bottles throughout the night, and he had been making out heavily with the woman in one of the private booths.
Anthony Reed was a government official that Ras Adrien kept in his pocket for favors. And Ras assured him his antics would be kept private at Spice.
YOU ARE READING
GAMBLE
Science FictionAn Odyssey Story. New Story. Part of the Proteus world but a stand-alone. Bianca is held for ransom after her father fails to pay his debts.