Novels by SlavoAsad

Cornell shot to his feet.“Who was it? Give me a name. I'll kill the bastard tonight.”“Cornell, calm down. We can't discuss this over the phone. We have a lead now, so just... please, don't rush into anything. I'll be in Bellwick City the day after tomorrow. I'll explain everything then.”He frowned. Hannah was usually direct and decisive. Hearing her stumble over her words like this made him uneasy. There was something she wasn't telling him.Still, he let it go for now.“All right. I'll pick you up.”He ended the call. After three years of carrying the blame, he was finally going to learn the truth. He was already imagining what he'd do to the man responsible when he got his hands on him.He was still enjoying the comfort of a proper bed the following morning when someone kicked him in the backside.He rolled over to find Rebecca standing there.“What?”“Don't take that tone with me. You've got a visitor.”She gave him a look and walked out.Cornell dragged himself up, scratched hi

The five guards had managed only to make Cornell look even more impressive.Maria knew these men. They were military veterans, all of them capable in a fight, yet he had handled them as though they posed no threat at all.What she'd just seen belonged in an action movie. Even a trained stunt performer would have needed a wire harness to pull it off, and the man she'd dismissed as a nobody had done it without so much as breaking a sweat.She pressed a hand over her mouth, fighting the urge to gasp.She might have underestimated him.Cornell paid little attention to her reaction. He took out his phone, dialed, and spoke loudly enough for her to hear.“General Sten, I'm sorry. Your granddaughter has a lot going for her, but we're not right for each other. I'll do everything I can to keep her safe. As for the engagement, I'd appreciate it if you let that go.”There was a long silence before the old man answered.“All right,” he said at last, the disappointment plain in his voice. “Thank y

Lora looked at the results again.There was no mistaking the name at the top: Cornell Bateman. Next to it was a score of ninety-nine.Ninety-nine? On Vardic and Latin?Someone had to have made a mistake.She took the papers from her assistant, ready to point it out. Instead, her expression changed as she read. By the time she reached the second page, she had a hand over her mouth to stop herself from gasping.Forty-nine out of fifty in Vardic. A perfect fifty in Latin.She'd only just pulled those questions from the question bank. There was no way he could have seen them beforehand. Was he actually a language specialist?She looked across the room at Cornell, who appeared to be bored out of his mind, and realized she had no idea what to make of him.More urgently, she had no idea what to tell Maria.She went through the answers again, searching for something she could mark down. A little creative grading might still solve the problem.But his handwriting was neat, his reasoning clear,

After talking his landlady into feeding him breakfast, Cornell changed into the suit he'd rented the night before and headed straight for Sterling Tower.He'd found a job posting online the previous evening. Maria Sten was looking for an executive assistant. If she wouldn't have him as a fiancé, perhaps she'd have him as an employee. Either way, he'd be close enough to keep her safe.Sterling Group occupied nearly forty floors of the tower, right in the heart of Bellwick City. With downtown property prices as high as they were, the offices alone said plenty about how much money the company had.Its main businesses were fashion and cosmetics. The products sold throughout the Republic of Aldovia and in a growing number of markets abroad, making it an international company in every sense.The industry also meant that the building was full of attractive women in business attire. Plenty of men would have considered working there a perk in itself, so every recruitment drive drew a flood of

The landlady was still staring at the stairs, trying to work out how two grown men had just gone flying across the landing.Cornell snapped his fingers.“Hello? Still renting rooms?”She blinked, then got to her feet and lit another cigarette. Whatever else she'd seen in her life, it had taught her how to recover quickly.“You can handle yourself. I like that.” She smiled at him. “Thanks for stepping in. Want a smoke?”He shook his head. Nicotine was a habit he had no intention of picking up.“Suit yourself. Come on, I'll show you around.”As she led him through the building, she introduced herself. Her name was Rebecca Abrams, she was twenty-seven, and her parents had died years ago. The building was the only thing they'd left her.None of the rooms quite worked for him. Most were too small, and the few with enough space cost more than he could afford.He was beginning to wonder whether he'd have to look elsewhere when Rebecca stopped.He'd just saved her from those men. Besides, bus

According to the file, Maria Sten ran Sterling Group in Bellwick City. Cornell left the hospital with the address and set off to find her.Walking through the city felt stranger than he had expected. He'd only been gone three years, but whole stretches of it seemed to have changed while he wasn't looking. After asking for directions several times, he finally found Sterling Tower, the company's headquarters.Now that he knew where it was, he decided he could spare a little time to find somewhere to stay. For three years, he'd spent twenty-three hours a day in a cell barely thirteen feet across. He'd had enough of those four walls to last him a lifetime.Being back among traffic, shops, and ordinary people put a spring in his step.Then he remembered how little money he had.His accounts had been frozen when he'd gone to prison. Everything he could currently call his own amounted to less than seven hundred and fifty dollars, and he'd borrowed that from Hannah before leaving the hospital