Anastasia looks up at Stefano and frowns a little. He wants to take her out for shopping and then her appointment with a 'psychiatrist' is fixed in the afternoon.

Allesandro claims that meeting this special person will help her.

She wanted to refuse badly but after seeing his face, she accepts mostly due to the fear of angering him.

Stefano and her makes their way through the entrance of the mall. He looks down at her and rolls his eyes after seeing a frown on her face and her being lost in thought.

Something that she always do.

He grabs her hand, effectively snapping her out of her thoughts. A surprised jump is all he gets in answer and she looks up at him curiously.

After seeing him already looking down at her face, she immediately faces down on the floor with wide eyes.

"I would say that this thing you do is absolutely cute but it's getting annoying now." He rolls his eyes for the second time today.

"Anywhere particular you would like to go?" He asks her.

Anastasia blinks at his question. She just wants to go to school or maybe stay hidden from everyone of her 'family'.

"This is getting too irritating." Stefano huffs quietly and drags her into the first store his eyes falls on.

Only question that tugs in her mind is that there is no other person present in the mall leaving the workers in shops.

Almost like judging the question mark on her head, Stefano tells her.

"I booked the whole mall. Technically, it is one of our family's shared property. So it wasn't the difficult thing to do."

A little nod he gets in answer indicating that she heard him well and clear. He seems caring enough to do that but it never clicks in her mind.

Just like that three hours went by.

"Now we only need to purchase electronics." 'We' kind of sounds ironic. Well, he's the only one shopping stuff after stuff for her. Nothing seems to interest her and she barely nods at anything he asks her. It was always a nod of approval and he is not going to lie but it's ticking him off.

As they were about to enter the store, his phone starts to ring.

His eyes widens after seeing Hunter O' Crimson calling him.

Why the hell is he calling me out from all people?

"Stay here. I will be back in a moment." He leads Anastasia to one of the bench outside of one of store.

"Don't move from here."

Saying this, he urgently excuses himself.

Anastasia looks around for a second before burying her gaze on the ground.

With a faint worrisome look on Stefano's face, he hangs up the call. The whole Crimson state and family is under attacked. According to Hunter, it is likely that the group responsible will target Stefano's family too. But it seems like he is missing out a few bits.

That's when it clicks in Stefano's mind that the youngest member of Crimson family is close to his little sister.

Just as he was about thinking about calling his older brothers or perhaps his father, a sound of loud gunshot reaches his ears.

"Fuck! You have gotta be kidding me!" Cursing, he rushes towards the sitting area where his sister is.

Anastasia jumps in fear at the loud sound of gunshot. She's still recovering from shock as suddenly her older brother is standing in front of her with a pissed off look on his face.

"I swear to God, today is not really a good day for these fuckers." Muttering under his breath, he grabs her arm and hauls her up.

His body tenses as suddenly he feels a movement behind him.

In a span of single fast moment, he have grabbed Anastasia in his arm and ducked to narrowly avoid bullets shot at him.

It was deadly quiet for a long moment as he effectively rolls out of the way and finds a perfect spot to hide.

"Stay here. I will be back in a minute."

He quietly speaks to his little sister, the same words again, who is currently shaking in fear but her reaction to his words is somewhat strong.

With a stubborn shake of her head, she clings to him while tightly hugging him.

He blinks the shock away and a little sternly pulls her away from his chest.

"Hey! If I don't make a quick use of these bastards; we are both gonna die!" Suddenly one of the store's sliding door opens and a quiet, panicked voice calls out to them.

"Mam! You c-can come in here." It is the voice of one of the worker.

"Go!" Stefano pushes her in that direction and looks towards the new company he is currently having.

"You bastards have a lot of the nerve showing up here!" Stefano remarks grimly at ten emotionless looking males.

"Hand over the girl, Stefano! Or we will take her by force!"

At these words, Stefano's eyes dangerously narrows.

"I usually prefer staying away from other's business but the girl you are talking about is not some stranger. She's my little sister and you won't even get past to her even over my dead body."

Anastasia hears these words silently.

It seems different from those comments she has heard.

But it fills her chest with a certain warmth with a new discovery that someone is finally protecting her. Along with this feeling, a certain fear knocks over her heart.

The fear of losing this person and she certainly owe them for saving her from hell. Maybe, she can protect him too....

Her fists clenches in determination. Something that she had almost never felt before.

If he was willing to throw his life away to protect her, she would return the favour too.

'These bastards are surprisingly armed and trained well. It seems like another whole group of them is waiting outside. Just great. Was that what all he needed!' He rolls his eyes sarcastically and points the gun at them carelessly.

"You all are getting on my nerves now." He murmurs, avoiding a cheap shot and prepares to shoot them back but he freezes feeling a presence behind her.

His head snaps to look at Anastasia. He looks at a huge metal bat in her hands and gaps in disbelief.

Ducking out of the way from upcoming bullets, he grabs her and pins her behind the pillar.

"Just what the hell is wrong with you? Didn't I tell you to stay hidden?!" He silently growls out.

Anastasia stares at him with wide eyes. All the determination wanted to fly out of the window but she grips herself hard after hearing slow approaching footsteps.

They do not have enough time to talk in this dangerous situation. But apparently it did not matter for few seconds.

She shakes her head stubbornly. Stefano feels like his eye twitch for a second.

"Are you rebelling?"

She huffs at him and quietly puffs out her cheeks.

Stefano's eyes flickers with amusement.

"Hey. This is adorable and all and I promise to coo at you later but we are kinda in life-death situation. I need to protect you. Didn't I promise?" He pokes her head with his two fingers a little mockingly to make his point clear.

She blinks in surprise and quickly tries to get over it.

"S-so I do too. I-I promise to protect you too." She stumbles on her words and gets them out quietly but it gains her another shocked look.

And then next shocking thing happens, when he lets out a small chuckle and a small smile forms at his lips.

"It's endearing. Everything about you is endearing, my sweet little Ana. But you forget that I'm your big brother. So my responsibility to protect you is many times bigger than yours."

With these sentence, he pushes off her and faces the assassins who have gotten closer.

His smile turns into smirk.

Perfect opportunity. That was what he was waiting for!