Stolen from the Hitman: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance by Alexis Abbott, Alex Abbott Page A

paperclip I kept from some papers I’d been working on earlier this morning. Drawing it out and keeping it low, I use my fingers to subtly pry it open into a shape I can work with. I quickly draw my jingling keys out of my other pocket to make it look like I have a legitimate means of accessing the door before stepping forward and moving both to the lock, slipping the paperclip into the keyhole and carefully twisting it and turning it before I hear the lock click in short order, and I pop the door open, slipping inside before swiftly shutting it behind me.
    A quick survey of the room tells me that my suspicions were correct — the apartment is empty. Americans are notorious for finding European living quarters cramped, the walls thin, and someone inside would have been stirred by my knocking and entry.
    But it strikes me how little the apartment looks lived in. The place is virtually spotless, something I never would have expected from the equivalent of college freshmen in their first time away from home. The only sign I see of someone having moved in at all is a Kindle plugged into a charger by the wall outlet, a little current converter awkwardly bulging from the end. By now, I’d expect to see clothes strewn about haphazardly, boxes of leftovers about the tables, and maybe a few wine bottles in the garbage, but the place looks impeccably tidy.
    I take a few more strides around the room, inspecting the place for any signs of what might have happened. It’s clear that they’ve at least entered the apartment, but for such tidy people to have abandoned the first day of class makes me even more suspicious as to what might have happened. With no further hesitation, I take a few steps into the girls’ shared room.
    Here, it’s almost as bare as the living room, but there are more signs of life. The beds are newly made, and the suitcases are hardly unpacked. I glance between the two beds and raise an eyebrow with a soft smile. One of the beds surrounded with suitcases, each one laden with clothes to the point of bursting, and I can spot designer outfits in the open suitcase, along with a number of other personal affects that betray wealth. The other bed bears a lone suitcase with a few store-brand outfits stuffed neatly inside. Having recruited the girls personally, it’s plain as day as to which belonged to whom.
    I can’t help but feel a little sympathy for Liv. Her frugal belongings remind me of my own upbringing back in Russia. It was harsh, harsher than anything I’d ever wish on the likes of any of the girls here, and far more frugal. I was never given the kind of opportunity I’m able to give the girls now. But for people like Liv, I can only imagine how overwhelming and inspiring this kind of chance must be. I almost chuckle to think back on the harsh winters of my homeland, my one good friend and I getting an offer to be whisked away from the frigid and desolate Siberian tundras to the city of lights and magic that is Paris — to get a university education, of all things. We probably would have turned it down, knowing us. We were too concerned with scrounging for food and not freezing to death each week to bother thinking about the kinds of luxuries France enjoys.
    I can’t help but see something of myself in Liv. Her little American hometown with probably fewer citizens than this university has gymnastics students didn’t know wealth of any sort. It might not have been the crushing poverty I knew, but it was not a life of ease by any measure. I want to see her succeed. And I know talent when I see it.
    And that makes me all the more sure something is amiss here.
    I spot a laptop open on Liv’s bed, and I turn it towards me, brushing my fingers over the touchpad to wake it up. The screen lights up, and I narrow my eyes to look at the email notification in the corner, pulling up the newest one that’s already been read.
    It takes me a moment to realize what I’m looking at, but realization dawns shortly,