“Oh, I think you have.”
She wriggles in the seat. “What if I put up a fight?”
“It would be a beautiful fight, I know it.” A dark, delicious tang rises like smoke in the back of my throat. “I can’t wait.”
Chapter 8
Her
I NEVER FLEW IN a helicopter before. What a shame I’m in no position to enjoy the fast turns and the thrill-ride of the low flight, or to appreciate the fantastic view as the Olympus mountains and the silvery Sound tilt and swing in front of us.
He’s certainly able to fly the helicopter, although he can barely squeeze into the pilot’s seat. All that I can do is to grit my teeth and hold on tight to the arms of the seat. He must be either a military pilot or an aerobatic one, the way he makes the machine cut and weave through the air. The helicopter turns like it’s dancing in a ballet. He leans it over and sweeps down, slipping to fly almost sideways as we come in sight of the freight terminal.
Even while he’s flying I feel him look across to me. Like I’m the prize he got away with. I feel his eyes explore me. It makes me jumpy. And I’m shocked to find that I love it.
Large planes with few or no markings line up, hulk and cluster around wide hangars.
Out on the far side of the apron, a big gray aircraft waits alone. Vapor rises from its engines and a stairway truck is parked at its side entrance. I can feel him steering toward it. As he approaches to land, he tenses. I look out where he’s looking. Two Toyota trucks dash along the road outside the runways, by the chain-link fence. Mounted on the back, they have what look like two huge guns, and each one has a man standing, holding and aiming the weapon.
Under his breath, he hisses, “Der’mo.” It sounds like a Russian curse. I’ve no idea what it means, but it doesn’t sound good.
With a fast, sideways sweep, he lands by the big, gray plane. Immediately, he opens the door on his side.
He drags Igor out from behind the seat, still unconscious. Heaving Igor over his shoulder, my Russian climbs out, calling back to me, “Come on.”
“Where to?”
“Moscow.”
I freeze in my seat. “I can’t go to Moscow.”
“Come on.”
“I haven’t got a passport.”
Laughing, he shouts back, “It doesn’t matter. We’ll travel through seriously unofficial channels. No paperwork required.”
“Are you working with the government?”
“In Russia, the government is a branch of organized crime. Much like it is here now.”
“I can’t.”
“I think you’d better.” He’s looking toward the chain-link fence. The Toyota trucks are driving straight at it, and the weapons are aimed at us.
“Come on, Emma,” he shouts. “Trust me now.”
A flash comes from one of the trucks, then a whoosh of smoke as a rocket cuts straight by and slices along the ground, under the big gray airplane.
He tells me to trust him. So I do.
As we clamber into the cockpit, the pilot turns in his chair and looks around. He has a thick mustache under a pair of big shades. “I am expecting two passengers.”
I don’t know if he’s more startled to see me or the other passenger, Igor, who’s slung over my Russian’s shoulder.
“Good thing you’ve got a big plane, then,” my Russian says. The copilot gets out of his seat and hurries to shut the door.
The pilot says, “I’ll need to make a call.”
My Russian drops a hand on the pilot’s shoulder and tells him, “Make your call after we land.”
He carries Igor back into the plane. He shouts back over his shoulder, “See those Toyotas? get moving and get out of here.”
Another rocket flashes by the cockpit window.
The copilot shouts, “Those trucks, they could get in front of the plane.”
From the back, my Russian’s voice calls out, “Good thing you’ve got big engines, then.”
The plane lurches as the pilot abruptly starts moving.
As the copilot scrambles back into his seat, he tells me, “You need to get in a seat and get strapped in. Get into a seat and buckle up now.”
I’m about to head back into the passenger cabin, or whatever is back there, but the copilot shouts, “Right now! Get in that seat and buckle up.”
I drop into the nearest seat. My Russian jumps past and lands a whack on the side of the copilot’s head. His voice is a snarl. “You don’t fucking talk to her like that.”
Then he takes out a gun and points it at the pilot. “And you don’t call anyone but the tower.”
We’re taxiing fast and the pilot is already saying, “Tower this is FRA three-oh-seven. Require immediate, repeat immediate clearance. Urgent departure.”
Over the cabin sound system, I hear, “FRA three-oh-seven, this is the tower. We do emergency clearance to land. Emergency take-offs, sorry, we’re all out of those. Proceed to runway five five. Await there for slot three.”
My Russian pulls the copilot’s headset from him.
“Tower from FRA three-oh-seven, be advised. Making immediate takeoff from runway two-one. Clear the apron, please.”
The pilot looks round at him. “You can put the gun away. They’ll comply.”
“They might scramble the US airforce, though,” the copilot says, sulkily. My Russian gives him another whack on the side of his head, on the same spot.
To the pilot, he says, “Climb to minimum cruising altitude at maximum speed. Turn hard left and head into the Pacific. We should be out of US airspace in less than ten minutes. Stay low and we may be off the radar, too.”
“You’ve done your homework,” the pilot says. “Stop beating up on my crew now, though, okay?”
The plane lurches as the wheels leave the ground. A sense of relief, a feeling of escape starts to wash over me. Then a trail of fire dots by the window. The air scrapes against the side of the plane as a rocket passes. Then another.
The pilot heaves the big plane to the right. “Hold on tight,” and to my Russian, “I’d love it if you would strap in.”
He glowers, but he drops into the seat facing away, behind the pilot, and he pulls the belt around him. He looks round at me.
“Are you okay?”
“Sure,” I tell him, keeping my voice as calm and level as I can. “I’ve never been in a cockpit for takeoff before.”
Truth is, as soon as the nose pointed up, I couldn’t see much except for sky.
I tell him, “I think menacing the pilot with a gun is against FAA regulations.”
“On Russian planes, we don’t have all that overregulation to put up with.”
Could this day get any more out of hand? When I woke up, I was nervous about seeing a big client all on my own, and handling a deal that was way outside my league.
Now I’m headed for Moscow, illegally, in a fugitive Russian cargo airplane with a Russian stranger who carries a gun, and my client unconscious and tied up in the back.
In case all of that isn’t bad enough, I can’t decide whether I’m more afraid that my Russian is going to fuck me or that he isn’t.
I start to say to him, “I don’t even…” but he lifts a finger, indicating the pilot and copilot.
“We’ll go back into the cabin when we’re in international airspace.”
We fly frighteningly low and close to the sea, but after about ten minutes, the pilot takes the plane higher and says, sarcastically, “Consider the seat belt light to be off. You may now move around the cabin.”
Immediately standing, crouched in the low headroom of the cockpit, my Russian holds out his huge hand. “Come. The passenger space is more comfortable than the cockpit, although not a lot. If you’re used to first or business class air travel, this will be disappointing for you.”
His arm stretches out to invite me, and when I stand, his hand guides me, resting on the base of my spine.
I’m caught in a storm of feelings and emotion. Everything that I know tells me that
I shouldn’t trust this man. He’s dangerous and unpredictable, he has a temper that can flare up fast. His mood is unpredictable, and he’s easy with violence.
As I try to list all of the reasons I should keep my distance and why I should not even have come with him, each one of them makes me ache for him more. And his eyes. He watches me so intently, like he could melt me with his stare.
He leads me back to a short cabin that must be about half the width of the plane. It has windows on one side and a flat wall on the other. Half a dozen padded bench seats have wide arms and they’re much more spacious than normal airplane seating, but they’re worn and faded.
It may be the least intimate space I could imagine, but stepping in here with him, as he locks the door behind us and leans back on it, I feel exposed. Uncovered. Like I’m naked and ready to be taken. Used.
My hands feel awkward as he steps over to a nook stacked with handles like drawers. There’s a small sink and a flask of brewed coffee. He tells me, “The coffee on these things is always disgusting but there should be cold vodka or beer.”
I swallow. “I just want some water, please. And I want to know, who are you?”
“I’m your savior. Your protector. I’m the man who’s going to keep you safe.”
“I wasn’t in any danger until I talked to you.”
He brings a cold plastic bottle of water. “You were in fucking danger all right, you just didn’t know it.”
As I take the bottle he tells me, “In any case, you were in the most serious danger of never meeting me. That would have been a fucking disaster.”
I hold the water bottle down by my side to try and cover how it shakes.
He ducks his head as he stands, too tall in the confined cabin space. He lays a hand on my shoulder.
I’m buzzing inside, hot and wet in my panties when he tells me, “You handled all of that well. You must be in shock, though. Second thoughts, let me get you some sweet coffee.”
“I don’t like coffee.”
“Sorry about that. You could have sweet tea if you’d rather, but it will taste like sludge.”
“You’re really selling it.”
“Take the coffee?”
“The water will be fine.”
“Sit, then.”
“I’m kind of too hyper to sit. I want to pace around.” I look into his face. I’m suddenly close with this man. I’ve known for him less than half an hour in the flesh. An hour at most, counting the phone calls. I don’t have the slightest idea who he is.
I’ve got on a plane and I’m heading to Russia with a man and I don’t even know his name. I’m still trying to get used to the way that he looks. And the way that he looks at me. His oversized good looks, his rugged jaw–he has a face that looks like it could have been to Hell and back, but if it had, it wouldn’t be fazed. His eyes could melt ice.
They’re melting me.
I have to try and get all this into some kind of a perspective, but I don’t know what to hold on to.
“I can’t take this all in.” I tell him. “Who are you?”
“Anatoly,” The burr of his accent makes me vibrate inside, right to my core. He’s older — too old, surely? Way too old. And as elegant as an international spy could be. Or whatever he is. The raw hunger in his eyes sets my nerves zinging. He makes a bow with his head. “And it is my greatest pleasure to meet you, Emma.” It’s so courteous, I almost laugh, but I can see that he’s sincere. I’m looking around, uncomfortable. I’m also embarrassed that my pants have turned into a lava pool and I’m having trouble keeping still.
“You’re safe with me,” he tells me.
“I never felt more in danger.” My knees shake and my breath quivers, “I’ve never been in as much danger in my life. Those people in the trucks were firing rockets at us.”
“Rocket-propelled grenades. They’re hopelessly inaccurate at the best of times. Off a moving vehicle…”
The tension vibrates inside me, building pressure until finally it erupts. Before I know what’s happened, my hand is open, my arm swings and I wipe a slap across his face. My fingers are numb at first. Then the cushions of my fingers whiten, and the flesh stings. A red mark blooms on his chin, but it’s faded and my fingers still hurt.
He takes my hand and looks at it. He bends his head and plants a soft kiss in the middle of it. People say, ‘Kiss it better,’ but I never knew it could actually work.
His eyes shine up into mine. As he holds me with his eyes, I’m filled with a tingling column of singing dizziness. He pulls me to him. My mouth drops open and I fall into him.
I’m lost, enfolded in his arms. His mouth, his breath taste of dark, forbidden thought. He makes me think of things I shouldn’t ever. He gives shapes and light to my most secret thoughts. I need to stop this. Control myself.
In his arms, I am his. Prey to his mouth.
“Emma,” his voice is like the hard, purring growl of a snow leopard. He holds me with enough strength to crush me instantly, and enough tenderness to feed me forever.
“You will belong to me. I will claim you and take you,” and I feel like I’m slipping out of myself as his lips take mine. I’m crushed into him, wrapped up in him. Consumed.
My breath and his make a new being. Hot. Needing and hungry.
We move together, molding, fitting. Pressing closer. More completely.
My arms wind around his neck, pulling him into me as his mouth takes mine and our tongues take on a new life of their own. His chest swells and my breasts crush, soft and fluttering against him.
The hot, hard length of him rises hard against my stomach and my thighs spread, wanton, wanting, eager and willing. My mound grinds and scrubs along his thickening ridge.
He takes my head in his hands. Kisses me again and pulls back. As he stares into my face, intent, his furious breath rasps and his lip quivers. He kisses me again. Hard. And once more. Tingling pulses trill from my toes to the hardening buds of my nipples.
“Wait,” he turns. He takes out his gun. As he looks up into the top corner of the cabin, I see a tiny glass lens. He slams the handle of his pistol into the glass. It dislodges and breaks. His eyes are back on me. My heart shudders like a small bird, shaking its wings in a stream in a shaft of morning sunlight.
“Hey,” the pilot’s voice crackled on the PA, “That’s a critical safety feature.”
Anatoly’s eyes stay on me as he lifts a handset from a cradle on the wall, “Log it to be fixed after you land.” Still holding my eyes with his, he hangs up. And he strides back to me.
“I need you,” he reaches around to grip my hair at the back of my head.
My hips roll and grind, dragging my mound against him. His hard length sets me alight and I’m desperate. Drenched and sore with need. I should stop this. But I want him so badly it hurts.
“Who the fuck are you?” I plead as he strokes my neck, tugs on my hair. When he cups and squeezes my breasts, I moan and lock my lips on his mouth.
Anatoly : Ruthless (Bad Russian Book 11) Page 4