Chapter forty three

Kazimir insisted that we needed to talk about the events that had transpired that night and discuss how we were going to proceed in the future now that the Atelli were allegedly moving their operations out of Russia but I insisted that I needed food in my stomach before my stomach decided to eat itself. We compromised and went to the nearby twenty four hour Chinese restaurant and got a private booth.

The Kyung restaurant was an interesting establishment that is famous in St Petersburg for being the best Chinese restaurant in the city. Although the place primarily served Chinese food , the family who owns and runs the place was actually Korean not to mention the fact that the people who actually cooked the food were a trio of Jamaican brothers but since their kung pow chicken was divine and their dumplings unrivaled nobody really gave a damn.

We entered the restaurant which was predictably empty this late at night and walked to an area at the back of the room that had sectioned off areas for people who wanted privacy. A lot of teenagers use these booths to make out *ahem* not that I would know anything about that *ahem* so they were called the make out booths. Sergei and Kazimir sat down across from the table from Delilah and me. Sergei kept staring daggers at Delilah and said,

"What is she doing here?"

I tried to make my voice as soothing as possible , "Calm down Sergei. How much do you remember about what happened at the warehouse?"

"I don't remember much but what I do remember is that she betrayed me to the Atelli."

"Well it's a long story but she's sort of my responsibility now so I have to take care of her."

He seemed to misinterpret what I was saying and got so upset that he started to raise his voice, "What do you mean by that? I know Jasmine is pretty and you are usually a sucker for a pretty face but Jasmine sold me out to the Atelli, you suddenly swooping in and saying she is yours isn't going to magically absolve her for what she had done to me. She sold me out to the Atelli, Sophia! This isn't something you can just sweep under the rug."

"Dude , that is not what I meant. Look I hate to break this to you but 'Jasmine' didn't even exist, she is a fictional character that this woman whose real name is Delilah made up to trap you. I know you probably have a lot of deep feelings for her that are messing with your judgment right now but calm the hell down and lower your voice."

"What do you mean Jasmine doesn't exist? I've known her for a month for God's sake, she's sitting right there and why do you keep calling her a woman, she is barely eighteen."

"Believe you me she is not eighteen and she doesn't really look like this. Hell, she isn't even human but don't freak out , whatever you might have done together she is not a gross slimy monster with tentacles or anything."

Suddenly Delilah interjected with that throaty voice of hers, "We never really did anything except kiss once when we exchanged promise rings."

I looked at Sergei with an eyebrow raised, I forgot all about what I was going to say to him as something much more shocking was revealed by Delilah, " You have been going out with this girl regularly for a month now and all you could get was one kiss? And you exchanged promise rings, really?"

He turned almost as red as Delilah's true form, "She said that she was religious!"

Delilah was trying to keep her voice even but I could still hear the humor in her voice as she said, "We succubi have a special instinct that let us know what type of persona we need to adopt to lure in our target, for Sergei it just happened to be a super religious teenage daughter of a preacher and a florist named Jasmine."

Now both my eyebrows were up as I stared at Sergei, "Sergei, is this true? Were you looking for true love or something?"

"HELL NO! Look girls are throwing themselves at me all the time, it was just nice to actually pursue someone for a change."

"OK I am now going to pretend that I didn't hear you say that girls falling over you too easily was a problem and move on. Let me tell you the whole story of what happened tonight."

As we were eating noodle and dumplings , I told them about my epic battle with skeleton man and the soul trapping fog monster although I did tweak the story a little bit so that I looked a little more cooler and might have left out how I got my ass kicked allover the place by said fog monster. I finished the story with how I rescued the damsel in distress Sergei and met the enslaved demoness who pledged her services willingly to me after seeing my heroic deeds.

By the end of my story Delilah was on the floor, unable to keep herself in her chair as she was laughing so hard. Sergei on the other hand was fuming, I guess he didn't like my depiction of him as the helpless maiden.

"I had almost forgotten about that, you shot me!"

"Well yeah, but its not like I had a choice. You were brainwashed and blocking my way."

"And your solution was to shoot me?! I can't believe you! You not only stole my new girlfriend but you also shot me for no reason!"

Delilah raised herself from the ground just enough to say, "But I thought we had established I was a succubus acting as bait , not really your girlfriend."

Sergei pointed his index finger at her imperiously, "You got me kidnapped by the Atelli, you have no say in this matter. Now as for you Ms Sophia the charges against you stand as one count of shooting my foot off and one charge of stealing my serious girlfriend."

"I object! I only shot your foot to save you and she wasn't really your girlfriend."

"I'm sure that you could have knocked me out without shooting me, plus technically Delilah was still my girlfriend when you took her."

I sighed in defeat, "Fine, what will it take for me to make this go away."

He smiled triumphantly and said, "The keys to the Lamborghini for the next month."

"I will give you a week, but I swear if you put a single scratch on her I will shoot you again and this time I won't heal you."

As we were leaving the restaurant Kazimir leaned over to me and whispered into my ear, "Why are you making such a big deal over the car, with the amount that Vladimir paid you to rescue his son you could buy as many super cars as you want."

"Yeah, but Sergei doesn't need to know that."