One shot. A soft hiss of air. He’s down, a hole in his forehead and a splatter of blood across the wall. It’s messy. This is why I prefer the knife. I rush in to grasp his body before he can hit the ground. I jab the blade up into his skull from beneath his jaw anyhow, making sure it’s done as I lower him down to the floor gently.
Then I listen at the doors.
One room is empty, the other, I hear two people inside. Sounds of moans, sex. They’ll be distracted, making the kills even easier.
I head inside casually, the door opening to show them at the bed. One with his pants around his ankles, the other man on his knees. No sign of the woman.
I fire a shot and that ends the man’s pleasure, but just as the other man realizes he’s now fellating a corpse, I end him too. It worked well; neither got to cry out in the brief time it took me to kill them. Small favors.
I only have moments to get the rest of the job done. A bullet to the head is no absolute guarantee—people have lived through stranger things, and I make sure they’re dead with my dagger once again before heading back out.
Nothing short of absolute success is acceptable to my employer. Nobody survives. That was the term of our contract. The stakes are too high for anything but.
Yet as I’m exiting the room, a guard arrives just in time to see the mess of his comrade splattered over the wall. That’s why I hate guns. So messy. I can generally control the spurt of blood from my dagger until I’m done positioning the corpse.
Everything would go to hell here and now, if I weren’t so well practiced at death. This is my life. I live it, breathe it. It’s what I’m good at. Before he can utter a word, my hand is at his mouth, grasping tightly. He’s reaching for the gun at his belt, but I stop him, seizing his hand.
The conundrum is that while I stopped him from sending warning to his fellow guards and getting his weapon, my two hands are now tied up as well.
He glares at me, a death stare. If looks could kill, he’d be as good an assassin as I am.
I let him push me back, though, and we’re backpedaling into the gory murder scene of the bedroom. This guy’s good. He’s not distracted by the scene at all as I hoped he would be. Maybe he’s born into death too. I have to up my game.
I head-butt him, and blood gushes from his nose. It’s enough to set him off balance, so I twist around, get behind him, then force him to the floor. My two hands are still occupied, and I can’t risk letting him speak or get his gun, so I make use of other limbs.
My legs get in around his neck, and I clench my thighs about him. I twist, using my hand at his mouth and my two legs to wrench his head back, suffocating him, straining that neck until at last… I hear it. The crack of bone.
His arms go limp, but he’s not dead. There’s still movement in his eyes. I’ve just crippled him, severed his spine. I end his misery with a knife at the back of his head, beneath his skull.
That’s four guards down. And counting the two outside the door and the two at the car, that’s all of them. But the job’s far from done.
I head back into the hall, avoiding the main party room and its boisterous laughter and music. I go to the main door, open it up, and take out the two guards there. The blood spray spreads wide and won’t be as easily noticed, so I haul them into the penthouse suite.
Now it’s my time to join the party.
There’s too many of them, even with how drunk and drugged they are. If I just walk in and start killing them, it’ll be a noisy mess. So I go to a small, hidden fuse box in the wall. Something you’d never know was there unless you were an employee. I pry it open, cut the lights, and all is dark. But the music still plays.
I hear voices of surprise, laughter, mockery. Anger.
But the darkness is nothing to me. I switch on the night vision of my mask, but I don’t really need it. I can still visualize them all where they were when the lights went out, pinpoint them by the sounds they each made. The guards took professionalism, skills, training to deal with. These rich and powerful men? They are like slaughtering hogs on the farm.
I walk in, and one by one, I began to end them. Grab, stab, slash. Grab, stab, slash.
It isn’t until there are only three of them left that they even begin to notice the silence of their fellows. Another is dead before worry sets in.
“Stop fucking around, where’d you guys go?” asks one of the two remaining, flanking each side of the drugged woman, her body lewdly revealed and left splayed upon the sofa between them.
Before I can kill another, the man on the left turns on his phone’s light, and it blinds me. But I don’t need my eyes and pain is nothing that can distract me. With gun in one hand, I put a bullet through his head, and almost simultaneously, I lunge into the man on my right, the dagger jabbing up beneath his jaw and into his skull, crunching through cartilage as I kill them both.
They’re dead. They’re all dead, but for the guards at the car. And this lone woman.
The light from the phone is still surprisingly bright, and I turn off the night vision. I’m now able to see her laying there, chest heaving as she looks up at me, glassy eyed but aware.
I point the gun right to her forehead. I’ve done my mission so far with no more than a low gurgle of alarm. I’ve done it all with pure professionalism, and more than that, I’ve done it all happily. I’ve not regretted or failed to enjoy a single death tonight. And while I keep a stoic facade, all business, inside, my heart’s racing with glee rather than anxiety.
No one lives. Or we’re all fucked, rings Gregor’s voice in my head.
What’s one more, anyways?
Alicia
I awake to a pounding headache, something worse than I’ve ever experienced. No hangover has ever approached this nightmare in my skull, and I’m pretty much the queen of bad hangovers. The light that ekes through my eyelids is already too much, and I keep them shut as I clutch my forehead.
How much did I drink? I ask myself, confused.
But no amount of nursing my skull is gonna make things easier on me, so I force my eyes open. The sun streaming in through the window takes a while for me to get used to, stars appearing behind my eyes. Eventually, I adapt, and I realize that the curtains are drawn, and it’s still a pain. The red drapes filter the light so that the Spartan, unfamiliar room is seemingly drowned in blood.
It reminds me of a nightmare I had the night before.
Me, lying there, blood spattering in the air as I watched some tall, dark, looming man pointing a gun at my head. He was like a specter of grim death. Stoic, towering, broad, and powerful. Hidden beneath dark clothes and a terrifying mask, blood soaking into his clothes.
A terrible dream, brought on by the drinking, I guess. Though I don’t usually have nightmares.
The memory sends a shiver down my spine, doubly so as I try to understand my foreign surroundings. The cold concrete floors and brick walls, the simple bed that looks more like a cot.
What the hell happened last night?
I brush back my blonde hair, the strands still clinging to each other with leftover hairspray. My red dress is almost eerie in the strange light, and for a moment, for just a single moment, I wonder if I’m dead, surrounded in the color of blood.
I stand, my feet bare, my high heels tossed to the side. I can’t be dead, I tell myself. Dead people can’t feel this damn hungover.
Every beat of my heart sends a throbbing pain right to my temples, and I nearly stumble back to the bed, giving up in agony, but now I’m a bit curious. Did my boss take me somewhere?
“Hello?” I try to shout, but it comes out as a groggy murmur.
There’s nothing, only eerie silence. The place is so still. The pain in my head seems to plead with me to relax and take my time, but the unfamiliar place urges me to get up and get out. So I head to the dark metal door of the room and try the handle. I fear that it’s going to be locked, but a simple turn and it opens.
And more dreaded sunlight spills in. This time, it’s unfilter
ed by curtains, and it’s abrasive on my eyes. I feel like a vampire, or the walking dead.
“Where the hell am I?” I mutter, because last I remembered, I was with the congressman at some hoity-toity dinner. And this doesn’t seem like the kind of place that my rich boss would’ve taken me. Even my place is less grey and unremarkable.
I step out into the room and slowly force my eyes to adjust. I can see a table, a kitchen, even a sofa. And while all of them are crisp and clean, they’re once again simple. There’s no real personality to the place at all, not even in a hotel kind of way.
“Sit,” comes a deep, dark voice from right beside me. I didn’t even see anyone there!
It’s a lone man, broad in the shoulders, with sleek black hair brushed back. He sits in that grey metal chair by the small table, one other seat waiting for me. He’s dressed darkly, a turtleneck and pants, both simple—clean, but definitely not a fashion statement. While his face… his face is chiseled, with a wide jaw and sharp, emerald eyes.
He’s ominous, sure, but he’s hot as hell. He’s not cute, not like a guy my age. He’s all man, but his seriousness gives me pause. I feel like I’m about to be chastised for something. Or hell, he can’t be a cop, can he? I didn’t do anything more than have a few drinks last night, I know that much. I might like to drink, but I never touch anything illegal, especially not out to dinner with my boss.
Immediately, it gets my back up, and I fold my arms across my chest. I must look silly with my messy hair and raccoon eyes, bare footed in a slinky mini-dress in the middle of the day.
“Where am I?” I ask, not sitting, because it’s the only bit of rebellion I have. I don’t deal well with authority figures, I guess you could say.
My first guess is that this is some security man left to watch over me by the congressman. It’s the only thing I can think of that makes a lick of sense. Maybe there’s been a national security threat and I’ve been taken to a secure bunker. Except I’m above ground, so that can’t be it...
“You are at a safehouse,” he explains to me, that husky voice curiously accented, but my mind’s too fuzzy to work out exactly what kind of accent. Not that I’m any kind of expert. “Now sit,” he says, uncrossing those thick, bulging arms from over his chest as he nudges a plate across the table toward my intended seating place.
It’s a breakfast meal, hearty and much more than I’d ever eat. Eggs, ham, various veggies, toast. It doesn’t exactly look fancy, but it looks healthy and recently prepared. “I’m not going to tell you again,” he instructs me, and I finally stop fighting.
There’s something about his tone that makes me want to obey. He’s probably way out of my league, but with a guy as hot as him, I’m not about to piss him off. The chair is cold against my upper thighs, and the food both tempts me and makes me a little queasy.
“Where’s Mr. Gallego?” I ask as I lift my fork, taking a bite first of the vegetables, since they seem the safest. And with how bland they are, I can’t imagine they’re going to upset my stomach. “I’ve never been in one of his safehouses before. I didn’t even realize he had one.”
The man gives me a stoic stare, his dark eyes piercing into me as he watches me eat. There’s no answer at first—he simply stands up from his seat, and I catch a glimpse of just how towering he truly is. He’s at least a foot and a half taller than me. Without a word, he goes to the kitchen, pours a glass of water, and returns, placing it beside my meal before reclaiming his seat.
“Do not worry about your employer,” he instructs me in that dark tone of voice. “You won’t be seeing him again any time soon.”
That’s... cryptic.
Though honestly, I can’t really remember much about last night. We had our business dinner, and that was grand, but I definitely must have drank too much according to my hangover. I could swear I was only ordering wine. After all, I wanted to be on good behavior. I wanted Mr. Gallego to take me seriously, which is hard enough as a young blonde in New York.
I take another bite of food, mulling over what he’s said.
“You’re not the cops, are you? He’s not in trouble, is he?”
He’s a hard man to gauge, but when I ask if he’s a cop I can see some slight betrayal of amusement upon his otherwise calm, chiseled facade. It sends butterflies into my stomach, and for a brief second, I wonder what he’d look like with an honest smile on his face. I bet he’d look sexy as hell.
“You worry a lot about others, for a woman I had to drag out, drugged and unconscious from a party of rich men,” he says, his amusement dry. Really dry. If you could call it amusement at all.
But it makes him sound like a man who is tired of cleaning up other people's messes. Is this who the congressman calls when he’s done something bad that needs covering up? Does that mean…
I nervously sit up, my hand running through my hair and getting caught in the tangled curls at the bottom.
“Wait, shit, am I in trouble? Did he say I did something wrong? Because I don’t usually drink that much, I swear, and I don’t even really remember what happened, so if he’s afraid that I’m going to blab, I’m not going to. And I definitely didn’t use any kind of drugs last night. Maybe it was just mixing the whites and reds.”
His brows furrow, and he crosses those arms back over his chest, studying me with something between confusion and consternation. It gives me further opportunity to notice just how immaculate the man is. He’s hard—hardened looking, to be exact—with dark stubble, a few faded scars upon his jaw, but his brows are so rigidly formed, eyebrows dark and naturally perfect. His eyes look almost kohl-lined. Overall, he’s yummy, even if I am freaked.
“I got you out of there before they did anything to you,” he says simply, but it’s hard to tell if he’s being honest or just feeding me the line he’s supposed to.
“Oh.” I take another bite of my food, the churning in my stomach not getting any better, but not getting any worse either. “Well, thank you,” I say with a forced smile before glancing around at the barely furnished room. Whoever decorated has no sense of style. I tug up on the strap of my dress, feeling self-conscious. There’s such a difference between being all dolled up at night and being dressed the same under the harsh light of day.
“Thank you for breakfast, too, I guess. My head is killing me.” I take a sip of my water. “You got an Advil or something on you, Mr...”
Not eager to give his name, he reaches a hand down into his breast pocket and pulls out a pill, placing it on the edge of my plate. But aside from the fact I’m accepting some unknown drug from a stranger, I also notice for the first time that he has two holsters strapped beneath his bulky arms, attached to a dark leather harness that blends with his attire almost seamlessly.
“Mikhail,” he says at last, after taking a moment to think it over. “What is your name?” he asks in return, but it’s strange that he doesn’t already know it, if he’s working for Mr. Gallego.
What’s happening in my life right now? The fact that he doesn’t know my name or seem to even know Mr. Gallego... It’s wrong. Something’s fishy about this.
And worse, I can’t seem to get that weird dream out of my head. I can even smell that weird scent that’s completely unfamiliar to me, see the smoke rising from a gun.
“Why am I being held here?” I ask, ignoring his own request.
“For your own good,” he says simply, darkly, that gaze of his unwavering. “Why were you with those men last night, Allie?” he says, apparently knowing my name after all. Or at least my nickname with friends.
“Who wouldn’t go out for a free meal and drinks when their boss offers them the chance?” I say like it’s the most obvious answer in the world, and it is. I have ambitions, after all, and sucking up to my boss might be the quickest way to success. They all think I’m just some dumb blonde, so I have to show them every chance I get that I’m not dumb, and I’m not even a real blonde.
Something about my answer seems to bother this strange man, Mikhail. His br
ows furrow.
“One of these men last night was your boss, Allie?” he asks, but that short-form of my name sounds so strange upon his accented voice. “Are you telling me they didn’t just pick you up at some bar, ply you with drinks, and take you to their penthouse?”
“Ew, no. I’m not a bar skank,” I say. “What’s all this about, anyways? I’m already going to have to do damage control at the office if anyone finds out about this, so if we could just keep it quiet, I’d appreciate that, Mikhail.” I give him a smile, my hand pushing out over top of the table, reaching out for his touch.
It’s been a long time since I’ve found myself curious about a guy I just met, but Mikhail... he’s definitely tall, dark, and handsome, and mysterious to boot. I wouldn’t mind getting to know him better, see what makes him tick...
He studies me a while with that penetrating gaze of his, the kind of look that makes me feel naked, and not just because I’m still wearing the slinky dress from last night. No, this is a powerful man who can see right through me, to the depths of my being. All the questions? It’s like he knows the answers to them all but is just confirming them. Sometimes because they’re too ludicrous for him to buy at face value, other times because he just wants to be absolutely certain.
“How many people at the office know you went out with your boss last night?” he asks me, his voice getting even grimmer, more serious.
“A few... We left right from the office, and then he took me to my place to get changed. I mean, it was just whoever was working late on a Friday night. Well, and his secretary, because I’m pretty sure she knows everything.”
The answer doesn’t surprise him, as I knew it wouldn’t, but it troubles him. That much is clear.
He lifts an arm, runs his hand back over his sleek, dark hair and casts his gaze down to my food, still not finished.
“Eat up. You will need all you can get. You were out for a very long time, thanks to what they slipped you. And if you don’t eat, the nausea you feel now will be nothing compared to what’s to come,” he explains casually, standing up from the table again, looming over me.
Sights on the SEAL: A Secret Baby Romance Page 41