Page 168 of Ruthless Rustanovs

That Sola was going to get exactly what she deserved. Just as soon as he found her.

It was Christmas Eve, and Scott had been waiting outside Sola’s house for nearly two weeks. The old man, Brian, had come and gone from the main house a few times, when that nurse came to babysit the crippled fag he lived with. But Sola had yet to return.

Partly out of boredom and partly on a hunch, Scott decided to switch things up that evening and follow the old professor when he left the house shortly after the Mexican nurse’s arrival.

Let him have a few, Scott decided when Professor Krantz pulled up to J.J.’s, a strip mall dive bar, and went in. Maybe the liquor would loosen his tongue and he’d be more likely to tell Scott where Sola was when he came out.

But the longer Scott waited for the old man to leave the bar, the angrier he got. It had been almost two hours since the professor had gone in, and it had long since grown cold and dark inside Scott’s Mustang.

Scott’s phone lit up, buzzing again with his agent’s number.

His new team had unexpectedly made it into the playoffs, and though Scott hadn’t been scheduled to officially start playing until the following season, both his agent and his new coach had asked him to bench up for the upcoming games.

Scott had agreed to do this back when he thought it would only be a matter of days before Sola returned.

The plan had been to wait for her to come home, beg her forgiveness, and then convince her to come back with him to Omaha.

Just for the holidays, he’d claim, if that was what it took to get her there.

But she never returned, so Scott had missed yesterday’s flight to support his team during the first of their playoff games. A lot of people were mad at him now. And his agent wouldn’t stop calling. He’d even threatened to dump Scott as a client in his last voicemail.

All because of Sola.

Yes, he’d beg for her forgiveness. Do whatever it took to get her on the next flight to Omaha with him.

But once they got to Nebraska, it would be another story.

He’d have to start training her immediately, just like his father trained his mother.

He’d have to teach her not to talk back.

To be a good wife. The kind of wife Scott deserved.

Scott had a vision of how their life would be together. So clear, it felt like a film in his head. But first he had to find her.

On an impulse, Scott tossed his phone into the car’s cup holder, and climbed out. He was sick of waiting.

He found the old man easily. The professor was on the dance floor, dancing to Kid Rock’s, I’m a Cowboy, Baby.

Well, Scott supposed you could call it dancing.

The old guy was sloppy drunk and barely able to stand.

He was half swaying, half staggering at a completely different tempo to the music.

The only thing steady about him was the drink he held tightly in his hand.

Scott scanned the bar. No college kids. Mostly locals, none of which were wearing Suns jerseys or any other sports team gear that he could see. They all seemed far more interested in drowning their individual sorrows than in Scott’s arrival.

Good, he thought, making a beeline for the professor. Less chance of anyone rolling tape on the conversation he was about to have.

“Sola send you here to get him?” the guy behind the bar asked as Scott passed by. “I’ve been trying to call her for over an hour. Brian is definitely ready to go home.”

Scott just nodded at the bartender and laid a hand on Professor Krantz’s shoulder. “Okay, Professor Krantz,” he started to say.

Brian jerked around and squinted up at him. “Alexei! Is that you?” he slurred, placing one hand on Scott’s chest to steady himself. “I’ve been trying to reach you, man. Sola…you have to call that cousin of yours. Tell him to let her come home.”

“What?” Scott asked. Icy anger exploded in him at just the thought of Sola with another man.

But of course that’s where she was. He’d been too soft with her.

He realized that now. He’d wanted their relationship to be a little bit sweeter than the one his parents had.

But that had been a mistake. Scott could see that now.

“Where is she?” Scott demanded. “Tell me exactly where she is and who she’s with. Right now.”

Brian didn’t look so much scared by the threat in Scott’s voice as confused. “You don’t know? But you sent me there, Alexei, you—wait a minute…”

The old man’s eyes narrowed on Scott. If not for the situation, which involved him having important information Scott needed, the look on his face would have been comical.

“You’re not Alexei! You’re that ex-boyfriend of hers. I’m not telling you anything!”

“Now Professor Krantz…” Scott started.

“What are you doing here? Were you following me?”

Scott could almost feel the interested gazes of the few bar patrons land on the two of them. Brian was getting loud, but Scott purposefully kept his voice low as he tried to explain, “I just need to know where Sola is. I need to find her. We had a misunderstanding—”

“I don’t like you. I’ve never liked you,” the old man informed him, his face growing redder and more belligerent by the second. “Now get off my property. Before I call the police!”

“This isn’t your property!” Scott snapped back at him. “Now tell me where Sola is and who she’s with, or I’ll—”

The professor once again cut him off. This time with a right hook straight to Scott’s face. The punch was sloppy and without much force behind it, but it did the job. Scott’s head whipped to the side, and he staggered—more out of surprise than anything else.

Shouting erupted in the bar, and by the time Scott righted himself, one customer was holding Brian back and the bartender had come from behind the bar carrying a bat.

“Sorry about that,” he said to Scott, shaking his head at Professor Krantz. “Brian’s obviously had too many. Let’s stop this right here. I’ll personally make sure he gets home tonight, and he can sleep it off.”

“No!” Scott snarled, lunging forward. He was going to kill that old man. Pound him into the ground. Forget how much Sola cares about him, he thought—

Scott stopped himself mid-lunge, an idea suddenly occurring to him. An idea that would definitely bring his missing girlfriend out of hiding.

At the very last minute, he backed away, raising his hands in a pantomime of surrender. But it wasn’t surrender really. More like the beginning of a new play.

“No,” he repeated to the bartender. But this time he added, “Call the police.”

Then he smiled calmly at Professor Krantz, the man who would serve as his unwitting ticket to getting Sola back, and declared, “I’m pressing charges.”