The warmth of his hand covered mine as he held my hand firmly in his. Although he didn’t say anything to me, I was still d that we were still connected in some way. The way Hayden helped hold my hand and support my waist as we walked down the stairs to the ground together brought a small smile to my lips.


    "Thank you…" I whispered when our feet finally touched the ground.


    Hayden nodded before his hand reached out to help tuck a few loose strands of my hair back behind my ear. The wind was blowing wildly around us, and I noticed that the air was slightly warm and humid. The airport that wended in didn’t resemble much of a standard airport at all.


    Therge buildings were not present, and the runway was nothing more than a small trial that had been smoothened out to be suitable fornding. Apart from the two of us and the security team that Hayden travelled with, there was no one else in the airport as far as my eyes could see.


    Although we flew alone, we were not the only ones on the trip and that was to be expected. Security was tight and Hayden travelled with a mini army of his men. Rows of men dress in ck greeted us when we stepped off the airne. Among them was a very familiar face who offered me a huge smile when heid eyes on me.


    "Good to see you still in one piece, Malissa," Luka said beforeughing loudly.


    I found myself smiling back at him easily. In such a precarious situation like this, it was always good to see a familiar face that I knew. Apart from Hayden and Luka, I didn’t know any of the other men that travelled with us and that made me slightly uneasy. From his greeting, I had a very good guess of how Luka viewed my rtionship with Hayden. I had to say that he wasn’t that far off the mark.


    Hayden was rough and maniptive, but he had never hurt me. I nced over to the man in question and saw that he was as zoned out as could be.


    "I hate flying. Makes my back stiff…" Lukained as he flexed his back.


    Unlike the man standing right next to me, Luka was in a roaring good mood. Hayden let out a sighed like he wanted to be anywhere else but here. Wordlessly, he tugged softly on my hand as he signaled for me to follow him.


    As if able to read his cue, Luka walked in front of us while the other men nked our sides. I had no idea where we were, but this ce appeared to be an airport on one of the small ind in the middle of the ocean. The air around us was humid and quite warm. I was thankful for the breeze blowing in from the sea as it blew my hair behind me.


    I bet that Luka could also sense that Hayden wasn’t approachable at the moment because he did not address Hayden in anyway.


    I nced over at my angel’s cold face again and I could tell that his mind was elsewhere. He was thinking of something, and I bet that no one knew what it was.


    "Get in. I’m riding with you guys," Luka said with a satisfied grin as he helped me into arge SUV.


    I took my seat next to Hayden before Luka joined us in the car. The ride to our destination passed by in silence as both Luka and I didn’t dare disturb Hayden and his busy thoughts. I passed the time by staring out at the view of trees passing by through dark ss. Thankfully, the ride was a short one and we arrived at our destination soon after.


    The ce where we arrived seemed to be a dome shaped building that was located pretty much in the middle of nowhere. There were no houses or any other buildings around. There were no signs that told me where we were. I haven’tid eyes on anyone who seemed toe from the ind since wended, and I was starting to wonder if the ind was even inhabited by local people.


    If I had to describe it, the structure in front of me looked like arge exhibition center that had been built here for reasons unknown to me.


    "Security checkse first. They’ll send someone to check you two and my job is to check Ethan. That’s how it works," Luka exined.


    Clearly the level of trust was extremely low between the two gangs. Each gang chose their own representative to do a security check of the other. I nodded and just went along with the flow, trusting Luka to know what to do because Hayden was still on mars and unreachable. The onlyfort that I had was the fact that he was still holding my hand.


    "No weapons of any kind are allowed in there so there’s no need for you to worry. Worstes to worst, the two will fight it out with their fists and you just have to stay out of the way. Got it?" Luka said to me, and he sounded serious.


    "Aha…" I mumbled as my face felt numb.


    Was that supposed to reassure me in some way because it seemed to be having theplete opposite effect.


    "Hopefully no one dies…because it won’t be a quick and painless death…" Luka said before winking at me.


    What did he just say?


    I stared nkly back at Luka with my mouth hanging open while I wondered what I had gotten myself into this time.


    "Stop scaring her any more than necessary. She’s worried enough as it is," Hayden mumbled a warning without looking our way.


    "Alright. You better not do anything crazy in there. You’ll be the one that’ll really scare her," Luka warned in return before he chuckled.


    This old man was truly finding this situation amusing and I couldn’t understand his humor at all. I tried to piece together the little that I knew about the situation between the two gangs. Thest time that I was at Hayden’s office and attended a meeting with him was precisely about the conflict between the two gangs.


    --To be continued…