Maybe, just maybe I was better than I’d originally thought.
I clung to that thought as I lifted the mask to my face and stared at her one last time, as the monster she had no clue she’d invited into her bed—into her heart.
A fool’s tongue runs before his feet. –Russian Proverb
I WAS SO WARM. I CUDDLED back into strong arms and let out a happy sigh. Nikolai kissed my temple, I turned on my side.
“You are so beautiful,” he whispered, his eyes glassy, like he hadn’t slept all night.
“What’s wrong?” I started to get up.
He opened his mouth to speak then shook his head. “We have to get back to work today… and I’m going to have a hell of a time keeping my hands off you.”
I laughed, burrowing my face in his firm chest. “I gotta admit, I’ve always loved the whole forbidden office romance thing… Want me to pin up my hair with a pencil and wear some thigh-highs?”
He growled, covering my mouth with his, then pushed me back against the pillows. “We’re going to be late.”
“Look at you… so punctual,” I teased, loving that he was finally letting his guard down with me, actually smiling, making me believe that even if he was in deep professionally with my father, he would do absolutely nothing to hurt me.
“Why does punctual sound so erotic coming from that wicked mouth of yours?” He nipped my lower lip then deepened the kiss, tossing the covers in a whoosh from my naked body while trying to strip himself of the wrinkly clothes he’d fallen asleep in.
Within minutes the barrier of clothes was gone, and he was lifting me up into his arms and carrying me into the shower. I let out a screech. “I thought we were going to have a lazy morning? What happened to having sex?”
“Whoever said sex always had to be in a bed?” came his answer just before he quite literally tossed me into the shower, then pinned me against the wall and shoved his tongue into my mouth.
It. Was. Everything.
He knew when to be aggressive, when to be soft, and I needed aggressive this morning after the episode with Jac.
With ease he lifted me into the air, pushing my back against the cold tile wall, then plunged into me.
“Whoa.” I nearly slid down as the force of his thrusts had me seeing stars.
“This…” He captured my mouth again and again, matching his movements effortlessly, making me lose my mind, all sense of feeling. “I want this from you… every day… I want… you… I just…” He stopped talking, allowing his body to move in mine.
It was perfect.
He was perfect.
I was so close, my hands greedily trying to grab at anything I could to get more leverage when I finally found my release and accidently said out loud, “I love you.”
It was impossible to see his face as I slid down the front of his wet body, I expected him to freak out.
“Good.” He kissed my mouth softly, then exhaled as if he was relieved. “Because I’ve loved you for a very long time.”
“What?”
“We should get ready.” He pulled away from me, then slapped my butt playfully. “Don’t want your boss to fire you.”
“Nikolai, shouldn’t we talk—”
“We will.” He cut me off. “Just not now… but soon.” His words said he was happy, his body language didn’t match them; his movements were stiff, and then he let out another sigh as he showered the rest of the soap off his body.
What just happened?
Things got weirder as the day progressed. Nikolai, when he was in my office, was edgy, short, and then apologetic. I kept telling him it was fine, but something told me it was my fault, if I hadn’t blurted out those three words.
“Idiot,” I muttered to myself. I say I love you to the first guy I sleep with? Maybe my father had been right about keeping all guys away from me, at least Nikolai hadn’t faced some sort of crazy accident because he’d shared my bed.
I could only imagine what my father would do if he knew Nikolai and I were involved, considering the contract specifically warned against it.
Speaking of the contract… was that void now? Was I still a prisoner? Did it matter? Would I stay if he ripped it up? I swallowed over a lump in my throat. Yes. I would stay. Because I did love him. I couldn’t explain it, but it was like a part of me was tied to him. It was a scary thought, one that no matter how many times I tried to justify it, I couldn’t. It was a feeling, deep in my soul, a feeling of rightness.
“Try harder!” Nikolai barked into the phone. He pinched the bridge of his nose as he glanced from me back to the window. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Maybe it’s not in Seattle.” He gave a curt nod. “I know what your information says but we need…” An impatient sigh ended in a pithy curse. “Fine.”
“Everything okay?” I asked, hoping he wouldn’t bite my head off for asking. “Are… you okay?”
“No.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows, the Seattle cityscape was blanketed in rays of sunlight, bursting through the clouds. “I’m not.”
“You can talk to me.” I stood and slowly made my way over to him. “You know that, right?”
“That’s just it…” He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. “I can’t… I really can’t.”
“But—”
“Maya.” Nikolai turned. “I wish I could. Believe me.”
I stared down at the ground, nervously popping my knuckles as he rocked back and forth on his heels.
The movement, so familiar… hypnotic.
Back and forth, back and forth.
I popped my knuckles again.
Nikolai grabbed my hands firmly. “What’s going on?”
“Your shoes…” I felt my vision blurring. “Not your shoes. Sorry, just the way you’re standing.”
Realization crossed his features, though I have no clue why. I looked back down at his shoes. I couldn’t help it.
Slowly, Nikolai raised his hand to my face. I thought he was going to feel my forehead, maybe I was getting sick?
Instead, he covered my eyes with his hand, making it so my only choice was to look down, at the movement of his shoes as they rocked back and forth across the floor.
And like a horror movie pressing play in my mind.
I saw blood on his shoes, drip, drip, drip.
With a gasp I pulled away.
“Maya, what did you see?”
“Blood.” I gasped. “On your shoes.”
Call me what you like, only give me some vodka.—Russian Proverb
I BIT OUT A CURSE AND removed my hand, her eyes were glassy with unshed tears. “Am I going crazy? Be honest.”
If only it were that simple, make a simple diagnosis about mental instability, write her a script, and we move on with our lives.
No, her reality was so much more tragic that it hurt my entire being to think about it.
“Nikolai?” She pleaded, her voice small, afraid.
“No.” I sighed, reaching for her hand, intertwining our fingers together. I could feel my heart beating as it thumped against my chest. I exhaled. I inhaled. I exhaled. And when I looked at her? It was as if all natural functions of my body needed more effort. I had to tell myself to breathe, force myself to think straight.
The information Phoenix had given me had been useless. While they’d succeeded in hacking the cameras that Petrov had… they were still having trouble tracking down the actual locations.
Each location researched was a false lead.
Phoenix believed that the actual location was trapped somewhere inside Maya’s head… I agreed with him, because I was the one that closed the door and threw away the key, damn it.
“If I asked you a favor.” I was going to lie to her… again. “But couldn’t tell you why…”
She shrugged. “It would depend on the favor.”
“Maya, I’m very good at what I do, why don’t I allow you to into an altered state of consciousness, and we can talk through the blood, possibl
y discover why you’re having those visions?”
She frowned. “I don’t know…” Then she looked away. “My father was always really superstitious about hypnotherapy. He said it was the devils work.”
Ironic, that the devil would warn against the devil. “It’s completely safe,” I reassured her. “And I do have an ulterior motive.”
“Oh.” She took a step away. “And what’s that?”
I prepared myself for the lie, forcing my body to relax, allowing an easy smile to cross my face. “Well, Phoenix believes that your father is still keeping girls locked away in whorehouses, but every location we check into is a dead end. By the looks of it, there are still two houses in operation… They were able to hack the live camera feed, but the location is scrambled…”
“And you think I know where it is?” She asked in a doubtful voice. “Look, my father rarely allowed me near any of his businesses, and those were the legal ones… My mom and I were trophies he paraded around at political dinners… we never kept his secrets because we never knew any. He never had a reason to tell them to us.”
I pushed her more. “But, the mind…” I licked my lips, hating myself all over again for trying to manipulate her… but I needed her to say yes… if she said no, I would do it anyway, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go on living knowing everything we had would be based on a lie. I wanted to tell her, and I would, after I destroyed everything, after I gave her a reason to stay.
After I proved that I would fight her father—and win.
“It’s powerful, you may have seen something and not be fully aware.”
Maya held my gaze for a few seconds of silence. “Do you love me?”
That wasn’t what I expected. Not by a long shot. At least in that I could give her an honest answer. “You know I do.”
“Then I trust you.”
She shouldn’t.
Just like she shouldn’t love me.
But I was in too deep, the dark waters washing over me, washing over us… the only way out was to inhale–together.
“Thank you.” I held out my hand again and led her out of the office, on the way out telling my receptionist to hold my messages while I took Maya up to her apartment.
I’d never been nervous about re-entering a person’s mind…. because it was on rare occasions that it happened. I just needed to remember to stick to the box… that was how I brainwashed. I didn’t lock everything away together, but separated it, giving each memory a different trigger.
The main memory was the sex… seeing her father have sex with the prostitutes while men watched.
I needed to bypass that memory in order to get to the previous one, which was, how did she happen upon the whorehouse in the first place? She said she was looking for her father, meaning she knew who to ask and where to drive her brand new car.
“You look nervous.” Maya said in a tight voice then laughed awkwardly. “Should I be worried?”
I smiled confidently. “It will be just like you’ve taken a short nap. I swear it.”
She exhaled once I shoved the key into the lock and let us both into the apartment.
“So, where do I lie down?”
“You stand.”
“What?”
“Kidding.” Her stunned expression was priceless, and it put me at ease, “Why don’t we go into the bedroom?”
Her heels clicked against the marble floor. I followed the sway of her hips as she marched ahead of me then kicked off her heels and lay across the bed, her hair a crowning glory across the pillows.
I was having second thoughts.
Third thoughts.
Maybe fourth thoughts? Was that possible?
“This okay?” She asked, on a swallow.
I closed the door behind me and lowered the lights then cleared my throat. “Perfect, Maya.”
She shivered.
“You’re cold.” I noticed the goose bumps breaking out on her arms, quickly pulled the afghan from the nearby chair and covered her in it. “There’s no need to be nervous… I’ll be quick.”
“Bet you say that to all the girls in bed.” She winked. Her trusting smile nearly did me in.
Nearly.
“Very funny.” I placed my hands on her right arm, on the first cut, the pressure would be familiar… though only in the back of her mind, in the forefront I was simply touching her arm, nothing more. “Now, close your eyes.”
She did as I asked.
“I’m going to count to five, with each ascending number I need you to take a deep breath and exhale, can you do that?”
“Yes.”
“Fantastic,” I lowered my voice. “One.” She inhaled then slowly exhaled. “Two.” She repeated the process. “Keep breathing Maya, I want you to think about your favorite place in the world… I want you to go there, in your mind, right now.” She sighed. “Do you have that place in your mind?”
“Yes.”
“Three… inhale again, exhale slowly.” She followed my instructions. “I want you to sit down in this place, then as you sit, focus on your breathing in and out, in and out… you exist to breathe, you exist to simply be.”
Her body started relaxing, I pressed harder on her arm. “Four… inhale, now exhale. Your body is going to start feeling very heavy, this is normal, the pressure you feel in your arm is like sand getting placed inside your limbs, as I press your arm, imagine sand weighing you down, allowing your body to fully relax against the bed. You’re so relaxed that even your breathing has slowed down, your chest rising and falling with slowness. You feel your heart rate match your breathing as your body gets heavier.” I moved my hand to her chest and pressed down. “And heavier.”
Her breathing slowed.
“Good Maya, you’re doing so well. Remember, you’re in a safe place, nobody can hurt you here. On the count of five I’m going to snap my fingers and you’re going to go into a dreamless sleep, when I snap my fingers twice in a row, you’ll wake up refreshed and energized.” I held my right hand midair, unsure of whether I should proceed. But it was our only hope… discovering where the girls were taken, destroying them before Petrov discovered she was remembering. I had to be one step ahead of him.
“Five.” I whispered then snapped my fingers.
Her body went completely limp.
“It’s the day of your sixteenth birthday,” I whispered. “You’re so excited to meet your friends for the party in downtown Seattle. You want to drive, but your mother said you need to ask your father’s permission first… but you can’t find him, where is he?”
“I don’t know.” Maya said in a clear voice. “I’ve looked everywhere! Texted him, called, everything goes straight to voicemail.”
“What do you do Maya? Can you walk me through it?”
All I needed to know was how she discovered his whereabouts. If I took her too far past that memory we’d meet the next box, where she saw her father at the whorehouse, and all the memories I’d locked away would shatter with that trigger, they were fragile already, too fragile.
“My mom doesn’t care, and if I don’t leave soon I’ll be late… Father always refuses to let me into his office, it’s always locked anyway, but I pick the lock… the men are gone and so is he. He’s always been paranoid about technology and my mom gets him an old school planner every year for Christmas. Maybe it’s in his office.”
“Good, Maya, what happens after you pick the lock?”
“It’s easy. Too easy.” Maya moved a bit on the bed, her arms coming up off the mattress as if she was walking. “His office is very bare, no computer, just file cabinets and a desk. His desk has a lock on the middle drawer. I pick that lock too. When the drawer opens, I see his planner.”
“Do you pick it up?”
“Yes.” Maya started trembling. “I pick it up and quickly find the date… it says he has an appointment at three in the afternoon.”
“Where Maya?” Unbelievable, her mental stability was astounding.
Maya didn’t answer.
>
“Maya? Where is he?”
“He’s…” Her eyes squeezed as if she was trying to repel the memory. “He’s…” Shit maybe I had locked the memory away too deep. “Seattle.” She shook her head back and forth. “No wait… there’s numbers… and underneath it, it says new construction… I remember him talking about office buildings he was putting up in Everett, down by the docks.”
“Well done Maya, is there an address with the numbers?”
“It’s…” Her breathing was starting to accelerate. “So, dark.”
“Not so fast Maya, remember you’re safe, you don’t need to visit that place... just tell me where it is.”
“So dark!” She writhed on the bed. “I go in, I shouldn’t go in, but I go in. What am I walking into? It looks abandoned, but I try the door anyway. It’s dark around me, I try the first door, the second, the third building and see my father’s Lexus, then the door opens. It smells funny.”
“Maya, let’s focus on your surroundings, do you notice anything different?”
“Fish.” Her teeth chattered. “It smells like fish, and there are docks behind us, construction, but nothing’s being built or maybe it’s just too late at night. I walk in the door—”
“Maya why don’t you take a step backward… don’t go in the door.”
“I have to!” She shouted. “I have to go in!”
“No.” I sat back down on the bed and gripped her arm, pressing firmly against the scars, hoping mentally her body will remember the physical pain that manifested last time she was under, and pull back, instead she tries to jerk away from me. “Please! Please let me go in. Something’s in there, someone’s hurt.”
My gut clenched.
“I need to help her! She’s screaming!”
Maya was too far gone. I quickly released my hand and tried to talk over her. “I’m going to snap my fingers twice, when I snap my fingers you’re going to wake up feeling rested and—”
Maya let out a blood curdling scream as her eyes flashed open.
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