by K. T. Samois
“Of course not. Why self-incriminate?” Ree’s voice is dry as dirt.
“She’d call it gauche to get blood on silk, but yes. J has… agents to do her dirty work. She was looking to recruit me as one.”
“She succeeded.” It isn’t a question.
“Yes.”
“I won’t ask what you did for her. I don’t want to know.” She stares down into her coffee like it’s the abyss. Her gaze lifts and flays him. “Whatever it was — was it worth it?”
“No.”
“Is it something you would want to get back into?” She holds her breath.
I won’t stick around if it is.
He shakes his head no, and Ree remembers how to breathe.
“Okay. Good to know. Cause I will not be like J. I don’t want to be. Which means you can’t want to be, either.”
And nothing you can do will change the past, Ree, so you might as well get on with the day.
“You said you had contingencies in the event she finds you. What are they?”
“Kill her?”
Ree stares.
“Okay, and the steps we’d take to accomplish that are…?”
“I would have relied on improvisation,” Hardin says like it’s something to be proud of. “She can’t predict what I don’t know.”
Ree sighs.
“Right. Well. She doesn’t know me, either, so I’ll work on a Plan C. But Hardin… if you stuck your dick in the font of all evil… and she isn’t the one who held me at gunpoint… then who’s the little mess?”
“A former colleague?”
“Yeah, because that seemed all business. Hardin. Where did you work, a brothel?!”
He snorts out a tired laugh before he can help himself, and Ree stares. “What is her name?!”
“I don’t know! It’s not something I’m proud of, but I don’t know. I didn’t ask! It would have been a fake one, anyway.”
“She called you Master, Hardin!”
“See! She doesn’t remember my name either!”
That shocks something resembling a laugh out of her. She stomps on it like an ember in fire season. “No! You are not allowed to be funny. She still knew my name! How’d she do that?!”
“Internet creeping?”
“Impossible,” Ree blurts. “Evie’d go nuts.”
Except that your phone rang, just as… Damn it, Evie.
“Okay, so. The pissed off young woman who held me at gunpoint is your ex-submissive.”
“Yes.”
“Who is distinct from your ex… J. From J.”
Even bringing up her first initial makes Hardin sit up in his seat. It would appear that however long he was at her side, it was long enough for Hardin to develop a Pavlovian reaction to her name.
“Hardin?”
“Yes, Riona?”
“What — What was J to you? Before… when you spoke about her…”
There’s an awful silence, broken only by Hardin breathing in through his nose.
“What are you insinuating, Riona?”
Ree is tired, and Ree is freaking the fuck out, and Ree can’t lie worth a damn on a good day. She doesn’t even bother to try.
“I’m asking if you were lovers.” Once it’s out, she takes a sip of her black coffee to cleanse the palate. “Don’t lie to me, Hardin. You know I’ll know.”
“Yes.”
He says it like ripping off a Band-Aid, or a scab. It makes her stomach churn.
“Wow, Hardin. Your life was a dumpster fire. Thanks for the heads up on that.”
“Which date did you plan on me bringing that up, Riona?”
She narrows her eyes. “Oh, I don’t know! I would have set, “before we moved in together and a couple weeks later, your… colleague breaks into our damn house” as a solid benchmark! How many more colleagues do you have?!”
“There were a few,” he snarls, temper rising to meet hers. “You’ve already pointed out that my life was a… dumpster fire prior to our meeting. What did you expect? A knight in shining armour? An officer and a gentleman? I’m your bit of rough, kitten, your opportunity to get those upper class hands a little dirty. Isn’t that my appeal, Riona?”
She’s always known that Hardin’s had a harder past, and she’s given him as much leeway as she can bear. But he can also be a massive asshole some days, and this is one of them. There’s empathy, and then there’s being a doormat.
“Your appeal? Your appeal?!” Her voice goes so high she’s surprised her neighbour’s yappy Morkie hasn’t lost it shit along with her. “No, Hardin! Until about five seconds ago, your appeal was your personality!”
“Was?! And what’s the appeal now, Riona?”
She stares at him over the rim of her coffee mug and debates smacking sense into him with it.
“Currently?! Thank your personal trainer in your prayers on Sunday, Hardin, because it’s a good thing you’re hot!”
Ree lets him skate on any number of minor sins — a preference for snooty Danish art-house film, for example, or his tendency to put raw onion on sandwiches — but this is a bridge too far. Then he goes and burns it.
“I ought to fill that smart mouth of yours-” Hardin has the sheer testicular fortitude to say, and Ree can’t help it.
She barks out a laugh.
“Try it,” she warns him with gallows cheerfulness. “You’ll pull back a bloody stump, because I am not in the mood for you to smoulder at me right now, Captain. You get that this is fucked up, right? This whole situation is a SNAFU.”
He looks as though he’d like to comment on her choice use of jargon, but decides that’s a battle to pick another day.
“I do.”
“Okay. So long as we’re clear on that point. Now.” she continues, shelving her temper. It isn’t constructive, and they’ve got bigger problems. “What are we going to do about it?”
“We?” Hardin’s usually pretty good at hiding his reactions, but that, right there, is surprise. His eyes have widened, and his lips have pursed. His shoulders are up around his ears. Hardin looks miserable, and her heart breaks for him just a little.
“Yeah, Hardin, we. Isn’t that the point of this? What this is… what we have? That’s ours. We made it. We built it. And we can build more, and better. I want that for us.” He opens his mouth, but her hand raises; he falls silent. “But I’ve been honest with you, Hardin, even when I thought it was going to make you ghost me on our first date…”.
It’s the truth, and he knows it. When he ducks his head, Ree goes in for the kill.
“Hardin. You have to tell me things. You know it’s the only way this thing between us can work. Don’t you trust me to keep your secrets?”
***
“Yes”, he admits, and it feels like glass shards in his mouth.
Trust is weakness, is a pain point, is exploitable. It’s also easy to abuse.
“I do. I don’t trust people… but I do trust you. God help me.” He takes a breath, knowing that he’s just given her a huge weakness to exploit. He drags his hand through his hair and feels a bit like he’s waking up from sleep, dazed and caught off-guard.
“And you’re right,” he admits. “About the question of what to do next. I… am open to suggestions.”
It grinds against his ego like sandpaper, but it soothes his raw nerves when Ree puts her coffee down.
“Okay,” she tells him. “Okay. We can think of something.”
Riona sidles in his lap to kiss him. There’s no heat behind it, no intent, just a gentle forgiveness. “I know that was hard for you, but it means the world to me to hear you say it. Is there anything else you need to tell me?”
He hesitates, and her hand cups his cheek. It’s cool, and soft, and gentle as ever.
“Hardin,” Ree murmurs, and her mouth says his name, but her tone says his title. “Is it important?”
“Nothing that affects us.” He can see her eyebrow raise, but even with her tenderness, he still feels run a bit ragged.
“It
isn’t. I swear it, Riona. It’s just… about my past. When I was younger. It’s nothing to affect us, just… unhappy memories I’d rather not burden you with.” He can’t look up from the ground; he can’t bear to look at her after this nightmare he’s brought in her life.
She seems to anticipate that and slides from his lap to kneel at his feet. Now he has nowhere to look but at her. With that advantage in hand, she rests her cheek against his thigh.
“Dad says a burden shared’s a burden lessened… but I understand. And I’m sorry, as well. I got mad at you dismissing my expertise, but I disregarded yours. I shouldn’t have applied without letting you know. It’s just… I want you to do well. Us to do well.” Ree exhales a shuddering breath, and then nods.
“I know it couldn’t have been easy to tell me about your past, but thank you for telling me. It means a lot, Hardin.”
He doesn’t dare touch her without permission, but he can extend an invitation.
“Kitten”, Hardin says, voice rough with emotion. “Come here.”
She surges back up into his lap like water into a vase; within moments, she’s filled every available space she can find. A cloud of red hair. The smell of sleep-warm skin. The hint of yesterday’s perfume and his cologne. The warmth of coffee and of something that is inimitably Riona. All of it — all of her — is his. And she could have died, yesterday.
He presses a firm kiss to her hair, cradling her close as he can.
***
Okay, so think strategically, Riona. What do you know?
She knows she and Hardin have a common cause. She knows Hardin’s got more baggage than the airport Lost and Found, mostly in the way of an awful history. Yeah, but you also know you can talk your way out of being shot, and isn’t that a neat trick to have?
“Okay. So, if you’d like my input-”
“I would. Very much, Riona.”
He’s trusting her with his literal life, and Ree doesn’t intend on taking that for granted. But she also knows Hardin has an anaphylactic allergy to displays of emotion, so she doesn’t mention it.
“That’s gratifying,” she dissembles. “Let’s list what we know. We know your… uh… swipe-right… knows where we live. That’s not great, especially when you go on a mission.”
“That could present an issue, yes.”
“No kidding. Could I go with you?”
“No.” It’s a stark, instantaneous response. “Unequivocally not.”
“Yeah, okay, fair,” she agrees. “Someone’s got to water the plants. But that’s a problem, Hardin. Could you, like, creep her on Instagram or something? I’ll need her name to stick her with a restraining order.”
He makes a noise somewhere between a groan and a laugh, but Ree doesn’t care. “And as for — for J. Are you on her radar now? As a potential threat, or a target, either/or.”
“Yes.”
“Oh, fabulous.”
“She didn’t take my leaving her well.”
Ree rolls her eyes. “I don’t know a lot of megalomaniacs, but I can’t imagine any of them taking getting dumped well. So you’re a target, and that makes me a target, and our best bet is getting rid of little ex before she reports to big ex that she’s got a hot lead.”
Ree nibbles at her thumbnail, gaming out her chessboard. “Logic dictates little ex won’t want to share her money with anyone else, so she won’t have told any other bounty hunters… not to say they haven’t all done their own homework. On the other hand, if your big ex is as scary as you say she is, little ex finding us is going to end up on her radar sooner rather than later.”
“I don’t think I like you calling them that,” Hardin says, sounding a bit terse. “And anyway — we might evade her.”
“You literally just told me there’s nowhere this woman doesn’t have feelers. How far under the rock would we have to crawl to where she wouldn’t reach us? We could move to Alaska or Zimbabwe or something, maybe. You can… do whatever it is you do until you’re killed doing it or come home unable to do it any longer.”
Which doesn’t sound like fun. If I’m going to have a target on my back… why not enjoy the fringe benefits? Live the high life, be a bit high profile—
“Oh, I’m so smart.” Ree says, high on her own cleverness. Hardin looks up at her.
“What?”
“What if… what if we’re just too high profile to hit?”
He looks at her, not quite following.
“Think about it, Hardin. First, if we get this bid, we’ve got enough money to hire our own private army. We’d have to; we’d have missions to run. So that’s the first thing. Second… what if… we were just too high-profile to take out? If obscurity is no remedy…” She thinks of Moira’s technicolour hair. “What if we tried aposematism instead?”
“You want us to put ourselves on her radar?”
“Well, she knows it’s us either way. I’d rather die rich than bored. We just have to win the bid. That’s our big shot!”
“We might get shot.”
“I mean, I almost got shot yesterday just for being your girlfriend.” Ree looks down for a moment, but when she speaks, there’s steel in her tone. “I’d rather be a target than collateral, if it’s all the same to you.”
Hardin stays silent for a moment. It isn’t a no, but it is consideration. She can see him weighing his options, and resolves to wait for his expertise. Hardin seems to come to some conclusion. Scrubbing a hand over his face, he nods.
“All right. Have it your way. Bright colours it is.”
Ree laughs at his grudging assent.
“Okay!” She claims his lips in a kiss. When she pulls away, they’re both breathless and smiling. “Hey,” Ree says when he rests their foreheads together. “I love you. I’m sorry we fought.”
“As am I, kitten.”
“On the bright side…” she says, and shifts so she can look up at him through her lashes with fox-like slyness. “I’ve never had make-up sex before. Want to see if we should agree to disagree more often?”
Hardin makes a choked noise in the back of his throat when she slides her hand down to the waistband of his pyjama bottoms. They’re held precariously on his hipbones, and Ree’s lips tingle to feel his skin.
There’s two layers of fabric between the two of us. That’s it.
“What did you have in mind?” He asks through gritted teeth.
Ree loves the effect she has on him, and takes just a little mercy on her Captain. “Well, you mentioned something about my smart mouth, sir.”
He stares at her for a moment, stock-stunned, until his gaze darkens with insinuation and his lips curve in a lopsided grin. “Filling it, I believe.”
“Mm,” she agrees, and slithers out of his lap and on to her knees again.
“Riona,” Hardin warns with a growl, and Ree smiles.
“Yes, sir?” She sounds so innocent that even he raises an eyebrow.
“Don’t bite.”
She giggles, leaning forward. Bracing herself on his thighs, she leans in and presses her mouth to the flesh just below his belly button. For a moment, she just lets her breath warm the taut flesh. The moment he relaxes, she teases him with a quick nip of teeth. The muscles of his abdomen contract against her lips in a ripple of muscle.
“No promises,” she says, surprised at how low her voice is.
He makes a heated noise in the back of his throat, but Ree’s on a roll. She likes the way his total focus is on her. You’re the only woman he’s thinking about now.
Maybe it’s selfish, but she doesn’t care.
“Sir?”
“Yes, kitten?” His voice sounds strained with the effort, and Ree smiles.
“Would you take your pyjama bottoms off please? They’re getting in my way.”
She would laugh at how quickly he does as she requests, but she’s too distracted by all the skin on display. Hardin’s a well-kept man, so if he’s a little vain, he’s earned it. There’s lean muscle under firm skin, and Ree has the sudden
thought that he would have made a wonderful danseur. He has the physique for it, all elegant lines. With his trousers on the floor, he sits himself back in the chair, unabashed.
It’s a good look on him, but it also gives her an opportunity to get a good look at him. She likes what she sees. She lets him know by pressing another nibble lower, following the sharp cut of his ilium. Dark blonde hair tickles her fingertips, and Ree shifts her hand lower to indulge her curiosity. His muscles flex as though he’s been electrocuted, and he heaves out a breath through his nose.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Ree murmurs, solicitous and sweet. “Was that too much?”
“No,” Hardin says through gritted teeth. His voice is tight, his gaze ravenous.
“Oh, okay,” Ree says guilelessly. “Just checking.”
She presses a brief kiss to the last little love-bite, already forming a reddish bruise on the pale skin of his abdomen. He hisses out a shaky breath, and Ree feels like the most powerful woman in the world. She traces her hands over him, lacquered nails a cool counterpoint to the warmth of her breath and the heat of her body. She commits him to memory with her hands even as her mouth traces a leisurely path down to the root of him. Hardin has a white-knuckled grip on the chair arm, and Ree smiles.
“Sir?” Riona whispers, breath hot against the underside of his erection.
“What?” Hardin snaps with military precision. There’s no give to him, no warmth in his voice. The single syllable is as sharp as a rifle retort, but Ree can see the tendons in his elegant feet flex as his muscles clench every time she breathes.
“Would you play with my hair, please?” Riona asks, and the noise Hardin makes is feral. His right hand flies off of the chair as though it’s a hot pan and tangles itself in her hair. Ree moans as his fingers knead their way across her scalp, and Hardin’s hips arch up, seeking the heat of her breath.
He’s so hard it looks painful. But he makes no move to address the issue. Instead, Hardin waves his hand in invitation.