Leaving behind most of my belongings, I scramble for my purse and tuck the gun inside. I need to get rid of the evidence somewhere far from here.
Dragging on a pair of black leggings and a long-sleeved shirt, forgoing a bra and underwear, I pull the strap of my purse around my body and head for the balcony. I find a pair of sandals by the open door and slip them inside my bag instead of putting them on, because I'm going to need to keep my footing for where I'm going next.
By now, some people, having heard the gunshots, are probably calling hotel management, who in turn are calling the police. I need to get the hell out of here, and I can't risk being seen going through the hallways and lobby.
Having scoped the property out the moment we got to the hotel, I know that there is a fire escape at the corner of the building, a few rooms down from this one. I just need to crawl over the adjacent rooms' balconies to reach it. And then I'm home free.
Steeling my nerves, I crawl and jump over the cement and glass barriers until I reach the steel platform of the fire escape. Swinging my nimble body around the corner of the building, my hands grab the railing and pull myself up and over the railing. Then my legs carry me down the steps as quickly and carefully as I can, only slipping a few times.
At the bottom, there is a bit of a drop-off, but I'm willing to chance anything at this point. Lowering myself down on the bottom rung of the ladder, I swing and tuck and roll as I reach the ground.
I roll onto the gravel, skinning my hands and knees up pretty good, but I'm not hurt other than a few minor cuts and scrapes. Pulling my sandals from my purse, I slip them on my feet. Then, I turn towards the dark alley, intending to run, when my face collides with a wall of muscle.
As I stare up at the tall, handsome man with piercing steel-gray eyes, I know I'm in trouble.
CHAPTER 4
JACKSON
SHE'S EVEN MORE beautiful up close is my first thought.
And my second thought — just as the woman raises her leg and knees me right in the crotch — is holy fuck, that hurts!
And just like a thief in the night, the woman disappears between buildings while I'm standing there in agony doubled over with my hand planted against the brick wall of the hotel.
Sucking in a deep breath and trying not to puke, I take a few seconds to gather myself, and my sore balls, before retreating back to my rental car parked on the street. I loaded my suitcases while the daring trapeze artist climbed over balconies and maneuvered down a fire escape. She's like some sort of hot ninja, and holy shit, her kicks are definitely lethal.
Kicking the car into reverse, I place a hand on the headrest of the passenger seat, look over my shoulder and floor it.
I know these streets like the back of my hand, and I'm guessing that my little fugitive does not. If she did, she would know that she's running straight toward the docks and, thus, a dead end.
Squealing to a skidding stop, I whip the wheel and put the car in drive, racing down a dark, narrow street, dodging the occasional tourist out on a nightly stroll.
The water comes into view as I ease up on the gas. Throwing the car in park, I dig into my medical bag in the passenger seat and prepare a syringe full of sedative just in case. I don't have a plan of action in place. I'm just going to go with the flow at this point.
I take a moment to breathe while filling the syringe, letting out an unsteady breath. I've never actually chased anyone before. And holy shit, the rush is incredible. My heart is beating hard in an erratic rhythm against my ribcage while the adrenaline rushes through my veins.
Tucking the capped needle into my jacket pocket, I step out of the car and look towards where the woman should be coming out of. The way she ran should lead her right to me.
I duck in behind a dumpster. Watching. Waiting. A thrill of excitement shoots through me and straight to my heavy cock, which still throbs in pain from when she kneed me in the nuts.
I hear her before I see her. Her panicked breaths escape her lungs in the quiet night as she runs straight towards me. Like an animal stalking its prey, I stay low and quiet and wait for the perfect moment to strike.
As soon as I see her pass by me in a blur, I stand up and chase her. It doesn't take more than a few strides before she's in my arms, her back to my chest. I lift her up off the ground, and she struggles, but she doesn't scream.
Holding her tightly against me, stealing her breath, I whisper in her ear, "I saw what you did."
My words affect her, and she stops struggling, but only for a moment. "Let me go!" she demands.
I release her, and she turns to face me. Her blue eyes are blazing as she glares at me. And then her face morphs into confusion. "You're not one of Pavel's men. Who are you?" she demands. She speaks perfectly good English, but her thick Russian accent is a dead giveaway as to her roots.
"Who is Pavel? The man you shot?"
She slowly begins to back up, but I follow her every move. "What…what do you want from me?" she asks.
What do I want? Wait, what the hell do I want? I don't even have an answer for that question. I made it a point to follow her, to capture her, but now I have no idea what to do with her.
I should turn her into the authorities. That is what I should do.
But I've never really been one to follow the rules, and this girl has me so intrigued I can't even think straight. I decide that I want answers more than anything else. I want to know who, what, where, why and how before I choose her fate.
"I watched you murder someone," I tell her. "What do you think I want? What would you do if you were in my situation?" I ask as calmly as I can.
Her head shakes, her blonde locks swishing from side to side, some of them sprinkled with specks of blood. "You don't understand. You can't take me to the police. I'll be dead by morning," she cries.
I'm not sure if she's meaning the police will kill her or perhaps someone else. Someone else connected to the man she shot perhaps.
As her eyes fill with tears, I immediately feel sorry for the girl. I don't know her backstory or why she murdered that man. Maybe she had no other choice?
I put my hands up in a pacifying gesture. "Look, just tell me what's going on, and then maybe we can both just walk away from this," I offer.
She stops walking backwards and looks up at me with big, blue, sad eyes. "Yes. Okay," she whispers.
I'm drawn into those beautiful blues, like two endless, tranquil pools surrounded by waves of tears, as she takes a step closer. And then, with reflexes that surprise even me, I manage to block her knee that's aiming for my balls once again. I grab her leg in midair and twist hard until she falls to the ground on her stomach. Damn, all that sparring with Wraith in the gym really fucking paid off.
"Jesus, what is it with you and kneeing people in the balls, lady?" I hiss at her. "You on a mission to stop procreation or something?"
I go to the ground with her, pinning her under me as she struggles like a wild animal. "Stop!" she screams. "Let me go!"
Fuck, I can't have her drawing even more attention than that damn gun going off in her hotel room. I can already hear the sirens in the background racing towards the scene of the crime. I don't need the police finding us and asking me questions I simply cannot answer.
Feeling like I have no other choice, I retrieve the syringe from my pocket, pop open the cap and stick the needle in the back of her neck, slowly injecting her with the sedative.
"I'm sorry," I whisper in her ear.
She struggles to the very end. And then, she gradually goes limp under me.
Rising up, I stare down at her sleeping form and frown.
What the fuck am I supposed to do now?
CHAPTER 5
KATYA
"WAKE UP, SLEEPING beauty," someone calls from far away.
Groggily, I blink open my eyes, my vision blurry from sleep. "Wh-what…where am I?" I ask the spinning room. I'm beginning to think that everything was just a dream…
"We're in a small bed and breakfast a few
miles outside of the city," says a familiar voice.
It takes me a few moments to recognize his voice…and then it hits me. The man who attacked me by the docks. The man who saw everything. And the man who apparently drugged me and knocked me out.
Sitting straight up and feeling more aware now, my eyes focus on the figure sitting across from me at a table. The table is full of breakfast food, and he heartily chews a forkful of eggs with a killer smirk on his face.
I stare at him, taking in all of his features and committing them to memory in case I need those details later. He's tall and handsome — brutally so — with dark hair, gray eyes. Day-old stubble lines his strong jaw, and he's wearing dark jeans and a gray, short-sleeved, V-neck shirt with a blazer draped over the back of his chair.
I carefully watch him as he lifts another forkful of eggs into his mouth, his full lips clamping over the tines. His left arm is decorated in black and red tattoos, and his dark head of unruly hair looks like he's been combing his fingers through it recently.
He doesn't look like a psychopath, but I learned a long time ago that looks can be deceiving. He looks almost…normal. But why would a normal man chase me, tackle me to the ground and knock me out…with whatever the hell he knocked me out with?
None of this makes sense, and I'm still trying to find my bearings.
My head pounds away with intensity. And when I try to move my hands to massage my temples, I finally realize I'm tied to the chair I'm currently sitting in. Glancing down, I see that my arms and legs are tied tight with lengths of rope.
Struggling against my binds to test them, I'm disappointed that there is no give whatsoever.
"Hungry?" he asks me, not paying any attention to my struggles.
I shake my head no, but my stomach has other plans and chooses that exact moment to growl loudly in protest.
He chuckles darkly, and his smile broadens. He has perfectly white, straight teeth, and his smile is contagious, but I force myself to remain passive.
"Do you like bacon?" he questions, picking up a piece of perfectly cooked, thick bacon.
My mouth waters at the sight. How long has it been since I've tasted a delicious food such as bacon? Too damn long, my mind decides as I find myself nodding without any real conscious control.
He rises from the table and moves towards me. He holds the bacon between his fingers and offers it to me. I slowly open my mouth and tentatively take a bite of the meat. It practically melts in my mouth, and I can't help but close my eyes and moan at the taste.
His chuckle has my eyes snapping open. "Sorry," he apologizes, schooling his features. "I just don't think I've ever seen anyone enjoy bacon so much before."
I want to tell him that being on an extremely strict diet and being starved periodically for the past decade will do that to a person, but I don't dare say anything of the sort. This stranger doesn't need to know about my past or my present or future, for that matter. As soon as I can figure out a way to get out of this and get away from him, I'll never see him again.
I finish the piece of bacon, nipping at his fingers towards the end. He pulls back his hand quickly and smirks. "Feisty little thing," he quips.
I don't think I've ever had anyone refer to me as little before. Sure, I'm thin, some would even say underweight, but I'm tall — five foot ten and even taller with heels, which is my normal attire.
But this man has to be over six feet tall. He's lean, but muscular.
Pavel, my husband — ex-husband — was short; only five foot five. I towered over the man, but it wasn't always so. When I was a young girl, he was so big and powerful, and he proved that point to me every damn day.
"Where did you go?" the man asks, breaking me out of my reverie.
I shake my head, not willing to reveal any information about myself. Frowning at my non-response, he holds another piece of bacon in front of my lips, and I can't help but lean forward and bite into the crispy meat. I suppress another moan and focus my eyes on his. They are an icy-gray color, but they emit such warmth behind them.
I'm not sure yet if this man is a potential friend or an enemy.
He hasn't turned me over to the police. Yet. But he also has me tied to a chair, so that definitely doesn't make him the good guy in this scenario.
Although, on the other hand, he is feeding me bacon. Delicious freaking bacon.
I'm so confused it makes my head spin.
"So, Katerina, what brings you to Sicily?"
I stare at him in confusion. How the hell does he know my name?
He waves a hand over the documents spread out beside him on the table. "Your passport says you've been in the city for only two days."
Ah, he raided my purse. The fucker had been looking through my things while I slept. I quirk a brow at him and remain silent.
"Are you a call girl, or did that man you shot actually mean something to you?" he asks.
My eyes stray to the wall behind him, effectively blocking him out mentally. I refuse to answer any more of his stupid questions. I just want to get the hell out of here and back to my family and home…if I even still have anyone or anything left to return to.
CHAPTER 6
JACKSON
THE GIRL TIED to my chair is a mystery. And when she refuses to answer my previous question, I pull the remnants of the bacon away and tell her, "Fine. No more bacon for you," in my best impression of the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld. Fuck, I love that episode.
It's a shame to deprive her really, because it brought me a lot of pleasure seeing how much she enjoyed eating. Especially bacon. And let's face it, bacon is fucking awesome. Given her thin frame, I suspect she's not used to the finer things in life — like bacon and doughnuts.
Damn it, now I'm hungry for doughnuts too. But room service only brought up some sort of berry croissant.
Fuck, why am I even thinking about doughnuts and croissants right now? I need to get my head in the damn game.
Shaking my head, I grab a full glass of orange juice. "Thirsty?" I ask. "Fresh squeezed," I remark with a grin. I take a healthy swig of the juice and moan in delight. "Delicious."
Her eyes meet mine, and she quirks a blonde brow at me as if silently questioning, Are you seriously torturing me with food right now?
Okay. So it's no surprise that I'm not good at this torture thing, but I know how I get when I'm hangry — hungry and angry — and that's almost as bad as torture. So if she's as hangry as I am right now, maybe food is the right method to get her to talk.
She stares at the juice in my hand as I bring it closer to her. And when she licks her lips, I know I have her right where I want her.
"Just answer my question, and you can have as much as you want," I tell her.
She narrows her eyes at me and then says with a huff, "Fine." I wait for her answer with bated breath, and I don't even have time to prepare myself when she answers with, "He was my husband."
Her husband?
I am so floored by her response that it takes a few moments just to process that fact in my overactive brain. Talk about being shocked. I would have been less surprised if she would have told me she was a fucking astronaut…or hell, the leader of a secret underwater city filled with mermaids.
Even though I have all of her information laid out in front of me, I feel like I'm missing a big piece of the puzzle here.
Her name is Katerina Fedorov. She was born in Russia and is twenty-six years old, a few years younger than me.
And she apparently just murdered her husband.
But why? There has to be a motive behind it. There are, of course, the obvious reasons — he was old enough to be her grandfather and, let's face it, he didn't exactly try to keep up in the looks department.
But she must have loved him at some point if she married the guy. So what gives?
True to my word, I lean over and bring the glass of juice to her full lips. I pour the liquid into her mouth slowly, and I can't help but allow my gaze to linger over her delicate, slender neck as sh
e swallows.
I should be terrified of this pretty, little murderer; but for some reason, she doesn't scare me at all. Maybe it's because of the fact I have her tied up right now, but I like to think that deep down she wouldn't hurt me.
There's an overwhelming sadness behind her blue eyes that I just can't shake. This girl has been through a lot. And like some sort of glass puzzle, I just want to break her open and put her back together again to get the whole picture.
Katerina's scent wafts over me, and I inhale it greedily. She smells like flowers and, like, fucking sunshine…if that even has a scent. I don't know how the hell else to describe it, but she smells incredible.
After a few seconds, I take the now empty glass away and sit back in my seat again.
"What's your name?" she asks.
"Jackson."
"So, Jackson, what are you going to do with me?" she questions me.
I shrug and take a bite of toast, chewing quietly. "Not sure yet," I answer her honestly. "I need to talk to my cousin about that." I'd been so caught up with this Katerina business that I haven't even so much as texted Lucien since our conversation last night on the phone. I heard my phone ringing earlier this morning, but I was too fucking tired to even answer. I smile when I think about Lucien's reaction to me not picking up. I bet it's driving him fucking insane right about now.
Offering her a bite of eggs, she takes it carefully. After chewing and swallowing, she inquires, "Your cousin?"
I nod.
"Who is your cousin?" she asks, but it sounds like a demand.
"No one you would know, but he's powerful. Can make things happen. Can give you a new identity and make you disappear," I tell her. "If you want," I add quickly.
"I don't want to disappear," she tells me quickly.
I stare at her in confusion. "You just shot your husband, and you weren't going to run?"
Watching Her: A Dark Romance (Keep Me Series Book 3) Page 3