by LP Lovell
“You little bitch! Hold her.” It all happens at once. The concrete floor hits my back. Hands grab at my arms and body, pinning me down. I scream and my nails rake over skin. Erik’s body falls over mine like a lead weight and hot breath blows over my face, making me wretch. I kick and lash out and when it does nothing, the tears blind me. He pulls at my jeans so hard my entire body jerks and he’d drag me across the floor if it weren’t for the other man holding me down. He throws my jeans to the side, and I try to pull away, to curl my bare legs closer to my body. Fingers wrap around my ankles, wrenching them apart. A sickening grin works over his face and it feels as though someone has a hold of my heart, squeezing it in their fist as he reaches for my cotton panties. Managing to work one arm free, I swing at him and slap him across the cheek. My palm meeting face sounds like a thunderclap in the room. His hand slams around my throat and he snarls in my face, spraying spit over me. I gasp for breath, bucking my body uselessly as he rolls his hips between my legs. Black spots begin to dot my vision, and I’m on the verge of losing consciousness.
“Enough!” The voice comes from the doorway and Erik stills. The guy holding me down releases me as if I’m on fire. “Get off her,” the voice says. Erik flashes me one last glance and pushes to his feet.
I gasp as the pressure is released from my throat and sit up, scrambling backwards into the corner of the room. I clutch the tattered pieces of my shirt together as I pull my knees to my chest. I don’t want to be here. I want to be anywhere but here. Pressing my face against my knees, I close my eyes. I imagine I’m back at the orphanage with Anna sitting next to me, her sweet smile on her face.
Something brushes my knee and I whimper, lifting my face. A man crouches in front of me. He has dark hair with a few grey streaks at his temple, and eyes the same colour as a stormy sky. He wears a suit with a waistcoat beneath his jacket and a red tie knotted neatly at his throat. A small smile touches his face and his eyes meet mine, watching me for so long that I have to look away. He doesn’t try to touch me though. Slowly, he reaches inside his jacket pocket and takes out a lollipop, offering it to me. I frown, confused. I don’t trust him and I don’t take it from him. He shrugs and takes off the wrapper, popping it in his mouth before he slides his jacket off his shoulders and slowly drapes it around me. Grabbing the two sides, I pull them together, covering my entire body inside the material.
“What’s your name?” he asks. I don’t respond, and he lowers himself to the ground, sitting on the dirty concrete in his nice suit, propping his back against the bed. All I can hear is him sucking on the lolly. “My name is Nicholai.” He stretches his legs out and crosses one ankle over the other. “Nicholai Ivanov.”
“Una,” I whisper.
“You’re strong. A fighter,” he says, holding the bright red lolly in front of his face and inspecting it.
“Please let me go,” I whisper, fighting back tears.
He tilts his head to the side, rubbing a hand over his chin. “It’s the strong that survive in this world, Una. And the weak…they die, forgotten and inconsequential.” I sweep my hair behind my ear and he tracks the movement. “I can offer you the greatest gift of all, little dove. I can make you strong.”
“How?”
A smile pulls at one side of his mouth. “I can make you a warrior.” He stands up and offers me his hand. “If you survive…and I truly hope you do, little dove.”
1
Una
Thirteen years later
Austin Daniels closes the door to the penthouse suite of the Four Seasons. I glance around at the sheer opulence of the place. I guess dirty politics pays well.
This godforsaken city has been my home for weeks now, and I’m more than ready to be done with it. I feel stilted being surrounded by all the concrete, as though I can’t catch a full breath. I’ve spent weeks posing as his social media manager online, but of course, the moment he met me, he wanted to fuck me. Most men are predictable and simple creatures in my experience. They see women as a commodity, something to which they are entitled, a pretty face and a tight body to forget their troubles in. To the unsuspecting eye, I’m their walking fantasy. The reality couldn’t be further from the truth.
He moves behind me, gliding his hands around my waist. Every instinct I have roars to the surface, demanding I react. Years of training wrestle with my control as that voice in my head shouts at me to kill. It’s all I know, it’s all I am. I force it down, committing to follow the plan. He presses his lips against my shoulder and I tilt my head to the side, allowing him to work his way up my neck. I tune out the feeling of him touching me, mentally overriding it.
“You’re so beautiful,” he says, blowing warm air over my skin. I turn to face him, taking in every detail of his face. Austin is a good-looking guy in his late thirties. He’s driven, wealthy, ambitious, but he’s too ambitious, that’s what’s landed him here, with me in his hotel suite, seducing him. Poor, stupid fuck.
Men like Austin, well, our paths should never cross. I don’t ask the reasons when I take a job, I just do it and get paid. He must be in bed with some really nasty people to have my kind of price tag on his head. In my world, corruption and death are constant companions, a simple fact of life, a measurable risk. And I’m the queen. Austin doesn’t belong here, and yet he willingly ventured into a place where the monsters under the bed are very real. I slip my fingers beneath the material at my shoulders and push it off until the straps slide down my arms. The dress falls apart, exposing my bare breasts. His eyes fall to my chest and he shakes his head, reaching for me. His hands palm me, brushing over my nipples reverently. Shrugging out of the dress, I slide it over my hips until it pools at my feet and I’m left wearing nothing but my heels. He’s completely focused on my body and it’s pathetic, really.
“Get on the bed,” I order.
His fingers fumble clumsily over the buttons of his shirt as he tries desperately to undress himself. I sigh, quickly running out of patience. The shirt finally parts and he shrugs out of it before lying on the bed. I flash him a sensual smirk and throw a leg over his chest before I slide up and straddle his face. This is a personal favourite of mine.
“Lick me.” My voice a husky, sex-laced breath.
He groans and grips my thighs, swiping his tongue over me. I grip the headboard tight enough that my knuckles turn white and my nails bend back against the heavy wood. He flattens his tongue over my clit, and I grit my teeth, my entire body tensing uncomfortably. Sex is not a pleasurable experience; it is a means to an end. There’s a certain power in it, rendering the victim weak, compliant. After all, blood and bullets are so messy. I consider just killing him right now, but his bodyguard is right outside the door. I need him to hear me moan, listen to Austin groaning. Enough that he relaxes his guard, because if he’s any good, he’ll still be on high alert. Of course I could kill him too, but I like to keep my jobs clean.
Forcing a fake moan past my lips, I roll my hips against him, making sure he’s completely relaxed. One hand dives into his hair, pulling him harder against me as I ride out the pretend orgasm. When he’s completely unaware, I shift, placing my thighs on either side of his neck. I smile down at him. He smiles back, his face covered in my pussy, and when he opens his mouth to say something, I tighten my grip on his hair, clamping my thighs against his neck. Wrenching his head back, I hear the satisfying crunch of the vertebrae in his neck cracking. I never tear my eyes from his, watching as the light leaves them, feeling the life drain from him. His body jerks underneath me for a second, the nerve endings going haywire.
It’s the ultimate power, a rush unrivalled by anything else. Death is unscrupulous and I’m her harbinger. I stay there, waiting and listening for the telltale rush of air to leave his lungs. It does with a heavy hiss, and then the twitching slows until he lies still.
Sliding down his lifeless body, I sweep my hands down his face, closing his eyelids. I lean over him and press my lips against his forehead. “Prosti menya,” I whisper agai
nst his skin in my native tongue. Forgive me.
I’m not a pious woman. I’ve seen too much evil in this world to ever believe in a god or anything greater than this hellhole of a life we have. All you can do is dig your way out of the gutter, and for me, I had to use a mountain of bodies as my stairway up that shit-stained cliff face. This man did nothing to me; he’s simply a job, a paid contract. He died because he was weak. I continue to survive because I am strong and do what I was trained to do. Kill. I ask forgiveness because although I have to do this, I shouldn’t enjoy it nearly as much as I do. I don’t kill simply to survive, I like it, I live for it. Never do I feel more alive than when I’m taking life. The thrill of death has become an addiction I willingly feed. And I’m good at it. I’m the best. We all need validation somewhere.
2
Una
Bumping my bike over the curb, I allow it to roll down the small embankment into the treeline. Kicking the stand down, I take off my helmet and rest it on the fuel tank, then pulling the hair tie from my hair, sending long, white-blonde strands cascading down my back. The scent of the woods wraps around me, the pine trees, the earth, the moss. After the confines of the city, it’s a welcome reprieve that revitalises me. The city is too loud, the cars, the people, it both overwhelms and numbs my senses. Out here, I can hear everything and nothing, because silence reigns, disturbed only by the occasional chitter of a bird.
Pulling my hood up over my head, I start jogging up the road, clinging to the shadows as I approach the house. To the unsuspecting person looking in, this is merely the Hamptons mansion of some guy with a fuck lot of money, I know better. This is the fortress of Arnaldo Boticelli, the underboss of the Italian Mafia. Not many outsiders will ever see the inside of those walls, and I am always an outsider. It’s why they hire me.
I wait until the guards change; taking advantage of their small moment of distraction to make for the six-foot high stone pillar that sits to the left of the enormous metal gate, just in the shadow of the guardhouse. Gripping the ledge, I haul myself up, launching straight over the top and landing on the other side in a silent roll. I pause, waiting, listening. My senses are attuned, picking up the slightest sound and movement. I can tune it all out or allow it all in. The faint panting of a dog and the clumsy footfalls of heavy boots are all I hear. Thirty seconds is all I have to get to the house. I run over the dark lawns, but the closer I get, the riskier it is. The mansion is like a modern palace, made of glass walls that allow light to spill out across all that surrounds it. There are at least three snipers on the roof along with four guard patrols circling the perimeter and six directly surrounding the house.
Scanning the house, I spot one of the upstairs guest rooms has a window that is ajar. The enormous pane of glass is tilted from a central pivot, and the room behind it is cast in darkness, one of the few that isn’t lit up like a Christmas tree. The guard below the window seems distracted, bored. Making a break for it, I sprint into the light cast across the lawn and outflank him. My feet whisper across the grass as I run up behind him, jumping and wrapping my thighs around his hips in order to leverage my arm around his throat. He staggers for a moment and slams back into the wall, winding me as he tries to pry my arm off his throat. I squeeze harder, using everything I have to crush his thick neck. And then he goes down, hitting the ground with a soft thud. I land lightly on my feet beside his unconscious body, my chest heaving with the effort.
Now…I just need to scale the building and slip in the second-storey window. Easy.
Arnaldo’s house is a fortress of marble and glass, all of which I know is bullet proof. Pressing my back to a wall, I peer around before ducking back in. Two guards stand outside the double doors that lead to Arnaldo’s office. Yanking my hood further down until it shadows my eyes, I take a deep breath before stepping out from behind the wall. The guards snap their attention to me, and I pop just a little more sway in my hips as I approach them. They both reach for their weapons and I drop to the ground, ripping the pistols from my thigh holsters and pulling them up in front of me. The triggers give way under my index fingers and the guns release with a silenced pop. Both of them grapple for a second, reaching for the small darts protruding from their necks before they simultaneously slide down the doors. Darts so aren’t my style, but then it doesn’t go over well to come into a client’s house and kill their personal guards. I press my boot against the arm of one of the guys, shoving him to the side so I can open the door. My boots sink into the thick carpet and I push the door closed behind me.
Arnaldo looks up from his enormous desk and smiles, steepling his fingers in front of him. Of course, he was expecting me. I told him I was coming. Two of his guards stand like silent vigils behind him, their backs straight and their assault rifles pointed at me. I keep my face lowered towards the ground, ensuring that the hood casts my face in shadow.
“You going to shoot me, boys?” I ask, a cocky smile playing over my lips. When in the worst situations, I often find a smile can save you. Everything in life is about perception. What you do doesn’t matter, only your opponent’s perception of what you will do. Smile when they expect you to cower, play the helpless woman when they expect you to come out all guns blazing. An unpredictable enemy is the most deadly, after all.
“Una,” Arnie greets me in his thick Italian accent before clicking his fingers and signalling for his men to leave. He knows I won’t talk with them here. The door clicks shut, and he smiles, gesturing for me to sit. “Thank you for agreeing to meet.”
I narrow my eyes at him. I’m already aware of the man behind me, but I’m waiting to see if he’ll move. Arnaldo is the one who gives it away, his eyes shifting infinitesimally before meeting mine again. Smiling, I tilt my head to the side at the same time as I drop the tiny silver blade from the thick cuff around my right wrist. It’s the size of a large hairpin, but as sharp as a razor and weighted to have a reasonable throwing range. My hand flies out behind me as I keep my eyes fixed on Arnaldo. I hear the blade drive home, burying itself into the wood of the door. The mob boss’s lips curl into the shadow of a smile and his eyes pinch at the corners.
“You missed.” The voice behind me is rough and deep. He approaches from behind, and I fight to stay still when I feel him brush entirely too close to me. Circling in front of me, he stops, our bodies barely an inch apart. The aim is to intimidate and it amuses me. He’s tall, a lot taller than me, but where most of the men Arnaldo keep seem to be bulky, this one is athletic. His shoulders are broad, but taper into a narrow waist. Honed muscles lay over his lithe frame, the result of discipline and work. Some women see a man like this and think him attractive, but I’m beyond such base notions. I think him dangerous. He stands casually, his hands in the pockets of the expensive suit that wraps around his body like a glove. He radiates power like a beacon, it unfurls, curling around me and sucking all the air from the room. My curiosity wins out and I tip my head back, dragging my eyes up his chest until they reach his face. He looks like one of those guys you see in a magazine. Full lips, chiselled jaw, high cheekbones, and hair that’s just slightly too long to be professional. Everything about him screams entitled, rich, pretty boy, until I look in his eyes. They’re the colour of a well-aged whisky and almost completely unreadable, ice cold. I fight to keep a smile off my lips, because everything about him screams challenge. His eyes narrow and I see the tight restraint, the leash he puts himself on, because there’s an edge to him, something cold and dangerous with a ruthlessness to rival my own. He catches me off guard for the smallest of moments, but it’s enough, because he’s seen my face. I’m not entirely upset at the notion, because it means I might have to kill him, and this one would make for an exciting adversary.
Reaching up, I brush my finger over the shell of his ear, coating my finger in the blood pooling from the small knick. “I never miss.” His eyes hold me captive as I lift the finger to my lips and suck, tasting the coppery tang of him. He doesn’t flinch, doesn’t move. “If I wanted you dead
, you’d be dead.” His expression never wavers, never gives away even a hint of what he’s thinking. He’s both intriguing and infuriating.
“Bacio della morte,” he says in fluent Italian, his tongue caressing the words like a lover.
Kiss of death. It’s what the Italians call me.
“Sei spaventato?” I reply with a smirk. Are you scared? I can’t help but bait him, though I doubt this one fears anything. You know what they say, there’s a fine line between bravery and stupidity. He’ll find it’s a very fine line indeed when dealing with me.
Tilting his head to the side, a stray lock of dark hair falls across his forehead. The move reminds me of a predator weighing its prey, which is laughable. His eyes hold mine long past the point where normal people would start to feel uncomfortable. The way he looks at me almost has me wanting to look away, to back down. Me! I never back down from anyone, because to do so is to perceive a threat. No one threatens me. Who is this man? He embodies power, wears it like a man who was born with it, and yet, I do not know him, which means he does not assume power. Curious. Everyone can be read like facts off a sheet of paper, their fears, their hopes, their strengths, their weaknesses…if you know what to look for, they’ll tell you everything. He’s telling me nothing, giving away nothing, and it has me intrigued. I stare into his eyes, pushing, probing, looking, and yet he stands like a wall of iron in front of me, impenetrable and steadfast.