The Assassin's Wife

by Nikita Slater

  The edge of his lip lifted in a cruel sneer. “Blood money, you mean. Don’t be coy, Natasha. Not when you are being so refreshingly honest with me.”

  Her stomach twisted and she flinched a little, but she nodded all the same. He was right, she may as well be honest with him. They were living off his blood money. He’d bought the cabin and built her beautiful little studio with the money he took from killing other people. “Very well, yes,” she whispered, then lifted her eyes to meet his once more, begging him to take her up on her offer. “Why not, David?”

  He stepped closer to her, not quite touching, but giving her the sense that she was caged nonetheless. He was not a massive man, but large enough that he outweighed his wife by a fair amount. He moved with a fluid grace that almost equaled hers. Many times in the past she thought he could have been a dancer of some talent if his life had followed a similar path to hers. She had no doubt he could easily come upon and eliminate his targets without their ever knowing he was near.

  “Why not?” he repeated, his voice both musing and mocking.

  Her rapidly beating heart began to sink. He never intended to give her hopes any credence. Still, she had to try. “Please, David.” She reached out daringly and took his hand in hers. “It can work!”

  “it won’t work!” he snarled, jerking his hand from hers. “You are a fool, rebonok.”

  She flinched when he called her child. This was no endearment, but an insult meant to cut. She cowered back against the table as he towered above her, clearly intent on finishing their conversation. She tried to bring a hand up to instinctively cover her ear, not wanting to hear any more of his painful insults, but he jerked her hand down and held it in a hard grip.

  “Men of my profession do not just quit. We do not simply disappear into the wilderness,” he stated, his voice quiet but deadly. Each word was like a bullet to her heart. “We do this job for life. It is kill or be killed and that is the end of it. You were the one aberration I have allowed in my life. You have already brought enough danger to me. Now you will close your mouth and not spout such stupid, dangerous things.”

  Tears burst forth without her permission. His cruelty was almost too much to bear. She tried to lurch past him, but he trapped her against the table, holding her hips in a bruising grip. He took her chin and forced her face up to his. Dark eyebrows swooped low over angry eyes. A sob escaped her lips as tears dripped steadily down her cheeks. She brought her palms up and pressed them against her eyes. He took both of her wrists and pulled them down. She gasped.

  “Look at me,” he snapped and then demanded, “Tell me you understand what I am saying, woman. Because I will be dragging your ass on these jobs with me. I cannot trust you here alone. I need to know that you understand how things are going to be or you’ll find yourself handcuffed and gagged in a lot of hotel rooms in the future.”

  Anger flooded through her, giving her some relief from the fear and misery. What an mu’dak! He was denying her the happy ever after she so badly wanted, forcing her to stand in front of him like a child while she was unable to control her stupid tears and now he wanted confirmation that she understood he was completely and utterly a heartless prick. She tilted her head back, narrowed her eyes at him, then twisted and jerked her wrists down the way Jordan had taught her, forcing David to break his hold.

  “Otva ’li, mu’dak!” she hissed up into his face, using Russian to emphasize her fury. Get the fuck off, asshole. “I understand perfectly, David. I understand that I don’t want you touching me anymore. You don’t get to treat me like this and then touch me again. Sleep alone from now on.”

  She rushed past him, storming toward their bedroom, intent on locking herself inside. She barely made it a hairsbreadth past David when his hand clamped down on her arm, whirling her back around to face him in a twisted facsimile of a dance. She gasped and brought her hand up to his chest to steady herself, her feet turned quickly, gracefully on the hardwood floor so her ankle wouldn’t twist. For a split second the ice in his face gave way to scalding rage.

  “Brat!” he snarled down at her, his lips pulled back, his teeth clenched. “You don’t get your way so you think you can withhold your body until you do? Is that your childish plan?”

  She glared up at him and tried to pull away, knowing it was hopeless, but trying anyway. His hand tightened on her arm until she cried out. “Nyet, David, that was not my plan! I just don’t want you anymore.”

  “No?” he asked with such quiet menace that Tasha knew she had taken her defiance too far. She’d unleashed something new in her husband. Something she’d not previously seen before. “I don’t care what you want, Natasha. You do not tell me where and when I touch my wife.”

  She stared at him, anger giving way to fear. Shivers racked her body as the threat grew between them until she thought she might collapse. Her breath came out in short bursts until she was almost dizzy from lack of oxygen. “David, please,” she whispered. “I’m sorry…”

  He shook his head and ran a finger down her cheek before tapping it against her lips. “Perhaps, moya zhena. It doesn’t matter. I want what is mine.”

  “Nyet, David, nyet! Not like this!” she pleaded, trying to reach him. “Please let’s just talk! I don’t want…”

  She cried out as he wordlessly turned toward the table, swept the remaining dishes from the surface and then ruthlessly bent her face down over the surface. She tried shoving herself back up, but she was no match for his strength. He took her arms, pulled them back and pinned them against her waist in one hand. He pushed her skirt up with the other, pulled her panties down her thighs and forced her to step out of them. She heaved and rocked against the table while he forcibly subdued her.

  Then he did the worst thing she could imagine. Instead of just taking her like she thought he would, he laid his broad chest against her back, pinning her down, reached between their bodies and began to play with her, bringing her body relentlessly, ruthlessly alive against her will. She sobbed into the table, begging him to stop, to release her and let her go. He used her body against her until she reached such a fevered pitch that she was no longer trying to pull away from him. She began begging for the opposite, pleading for his possession. Then he released her wrists, unbuckled his belt and unzipped his pants. He pulled her hips back and slammed his cock into her tight sheath, forcing a scream from her lips and more tears from her already swollen eyes.

  He fucked her savagely against the edge of the table, shoving her pussy into the hard wood until she was thrashing to both escape the pain and come from the incredible pressure building up inside her. He wrapped one fist in the back of her dress and pushed her hard against the table, knowing she was very close to exploding.

  “David!” she screamed as an explosion of black and white stars shot through her vision.

  He wrapped an arm around her waist, lifted her off the table and kept pumping into her from behind, burying himself as deep as he could in his woman’s body. She thrashed against him as her orgasm swept her higher. He groaned into her neck, biting into the fabric of her dress and then deeper into her flesh until she screamed and came again, her pussy spasming around his cock. He wanted to come with her, but he wasn’t done teaching her not to fucking question him. Not to withhold her body from him. Ever.

  He slammed her forward, back over the table, bending her until her ass was lifted as high as it would go with him still buried inside her. She cried out and clutched the edge of the table. He shoved her dress up, baring most of her back. He reached underneath her, gathered her slick wetness onto his fingers and moved his hand to her perfect little asshole.

  He knew his wife had been raised in a strict Catholic household. She was shy about sex when he had first taken her, though she had opened up to his many demands quickly. He would not allow her to be any other way. He had allowed her time when it came to anal sex. He had always intended to eventually initiate her into the dark pleasures to be had therein. Unfortunately, she had run before he’d gotte
n the chance. Now she was out of time. And she would take her introduction to this exquisite torment as punishment.

  He rubbed his finger over the tiny rosebud, taking sinister pleasure in her shocked gasp and the way she jumped in his arms, crying out in protest. “Nyet, David,” she yelled, “not that, please!” she reached back to shove his hand away.

  He leaned forward to say silkily in her ear, just as he slid the tip of his finger into her ass, “Da, Natasha, this, and everything else I choose to give you.”

  She screamed long and loud as he used the fluid he’d gathered from her pussy to force his finger all the way into her tight back passage. She panted and squirmed while he gripped her by the neck, pinning her down against the table. He held her until she finally stilled beneath him. When she was no longer protesting his invasion, he began moving his finger in and out of her. Her gasps of dismay quickly turned to moans of pleasure and soon she was rocking her ass backwards to meet the thrusts of his hand.

  Unable to hold out any longer, David joined her, rocking his hips against hers, fucking her against the table once more. He filled her pussy with his cock while fucking her ass with his finger, taking his wife in a way he’d never taken her before. Filling her, forcing her to reach for new heights as her orgasm crashed down on her and her pussy squeezed his dick harder than ever. He threw his head back, gritted his teeth and slammed himself deep, gaining access to her cervix. She screamed again as he nudged her womb. He didn’t fucking care. She belonged to him. He emptied himself into her hotly spasming channel as she lay whimpering underneath him.

  He stayed buried for another minute, watching the woman he’d just fucked into submission. She was curled on top of their table, her arms wrapped around her torso, her eyes closed. A single tear escaped her lashes and trailed down her cheek. He watched it dispassionately. She needed to learn. It was safer if she knew her place in his life. In their lives.

  He pulled out of her body. A tiny sound escaped her and she shuddered. He gathered her in his arms and carried her through the cabin to their bedroom, laying her down on the bed. He climbed in with her, crawling over top of her, caging her. He tilted her chin up. Her eyes fluttered open and she looked at him with confusion and a little trepidation.

  “You will never threaten me again, Natasha,” he said with deadly intensity. He sealed his promise with a bite to her lip, before settling his body against her back and tucking a blanket over both of them.

  Chapter Twenty

  He could die, Tasha thought dismally, kicking a clump of snow into the tall pine trees. She pivoted on her foot, twirling as best she could in her too-big boots on the frozen ground. The eerie calm of the mountain felt so much like their life in that moment. Frozen, waiting, moving slowly forward; almost there, but not quite. Each day melted a little more, but each fresh snow fall heralded another frozen moment in time. A reprieve. A brief minute where she could catch her breath once more and hang on to this time with her husband. Why did she have to go and ruin it with her silly question?

  David always seemed so indomitable that it felt impossible that anything could happen to him. Yet, he’d confirmed as much when he’d said in his business, it was either kill or be killed. He was right, her request had been childish. Thoughtless. Of course, assassins did not just quit their jobs. Murder was a life choice. There could be no going back. What had she been thinking?

  She sighed and looked around the idyllic mountain landscape. She could see the peaks of other, higher mountains towering above their isolated, lonely clearing. Such a beautiful place for them to escape to. She wondered again how long David had stayed here before coming after her. It seemed impossible that outside life could intrude on them. And yet, David’s words echoed in her head. Kill or be killed.

  With that last grim thought, she turned and made her way back inside, stomping her boots on the porch before going in. Her eyes widened in surprise when she saw he was on a phone talking to someone. As far as she knew, neither of them had spoken on the phone to anyone since arriving at the cabin. She frowned and hovered in the doorway, wondering if she should leave, but he just looked at her, his expression devoid of emotion. When he didn’t wave her away she finished closing the door and simply stood in the door and listened with unabashed curiosity.

  David was using his satellite phone since they didn’t have reception any other way. He was mostly listening to the person on the other end, his body tense and motionless.

  Tears gathered in her eyes and her mouth felt suddenly dry. Her stomach cramped. A visceral response to what she knew was happening before her eyes. A job. He was being called back to work. She could feel her breakfast churning in her stomach and acid burning her throat. She clamped a hand over her mouth. His sharp eyes tracked the movement. Still his face did not show a single emotion.

  “I have been taking care of business up North. Nothing that concerns you,” David said dismissively into the phone, his eyes still pinning her in place.

  He paused as he listened.

  “It has been taken care of.” His tone was so sinister Natasha shivered in response.

  Another pause.

  “I’ll be clear to move again when I am needed. I am at your disposal, Mercer.”

  Pause.

  “Accepted. Send the details to my usual address.”

  Pause.

  “Who is the mark?”

  Pause.

  She caught the slight flare of surprise and then a glimmer of satisfaction as the corner of his eye crinkled ever so slightly. Whoever was on the phone had presented David with a challenge and David enjoyed a good challenge. She knew her husband well. Tasha’s stomach cramped again in response. Unfortunately for her, a challenge meant he could be made more vulnerable to a bullet.

  “Assets?”

  Natasha’s heart rate sped up, blood pounding in her ears, as she listened to David accept the mission. Oh god! He was going to assassinate someone. The thought made the nausea intensify until she was clutching her stomach. She tried hard to breathe through her nose and listen to the rest of the conversation, but David said very little else.

  Finally, unable to hold herself together any longer, Tasha dashed to the washroom. She felt David’s eyes tracking her movements. She shut the door without looking at him and collapsed over top of the toilet, shoving the lid up just as the bile rushed to the surface. Vomit and tears burst forth at the same time. She heaved until she was empty, one arm curved around the top of the toilet, while the other clutched her stomach until the cramping settled a little. She hadn’t heard David enter the washroom so jumped in surprise when she felt his fingers tugging the cap from her overly warm head. He reached past her slumped body and flushed the toilet for her.

  She closed her eyes and leaned her clammy head against her forearm where it was braced against the edge of the seat. David didn’t say anything. She heard him turn on the tap in the sink and then he crouched behind her. She wanted to shove him away, but was too weak to open her eyes let alone go up against a fully trained killer. She moaned in appreciation when he crouched behind her, gently moved the sticky hair at the back of her neck aside and pressed a cool, wet cloth against her overheated skin.

  “You understand, Natasha?” he asked quietly, settling on the floor behind her.

  He made sure the cloth on her neck stayed put and then shifted her hips so she was sitting more comfortably between his spread legs. She felt tugging against her ankles and peeked down between her hands to see him unlacing her boots. He pulled them off her feet and tossed them aside. She curled her toes against the uncomfortable sensation of the cold melting snow that had fallen from the boots soaking into her socks. David reached behind him, pulled a towel from the rack and wrapped it around her feet, protecting her from the wet floor. She felt a rush of gratitude at his kindness for taking care of her, then a spark of revulsion hit her, nearly doubling her back over the toilet again. She’d just heard him accept a job to kill someone and knew deep down he was looking forward to it. She was b
eing touched by the hands of a killer. Misery flooded through her.

  She nodded her head, still not lifting her face from the cradle of her arms. He was asking if she understood the significance of his phone call. How could she not? He’d made sure that she stayed to hear the important part. He could have waved her away, or relocated to another room. Instead, he left no doubt in her mind that he had accepted a job and that they would soon be leaving the safety of their idyllic hideaway.

  She took a quick breath and whispered, “Are you going to kill someone?”

  He didn’t answer the question at first. She felt him tense behind her. “Why would you ask a question like that, my love?” he asked, his voice low and dangerous, my love, heavily accented to her ear.

  Finally, she moved, forcing herself to lift her head and turn so she could look at him, stormy eyes accusing. “Because you’re a killer and I heard you taking a job. Th-this Mercer person has hired you to kill someone else, haven’t they?”

  He shook his head, his dark eyes sharp on her pale face. He ran a finger over her cheek and across her chin as though checking her for damage after her bout of illness. He leaned forward, getting in her space and staring her down. “You ask dangerous questions, Natasha. It would be better if you just did as you were told and let me work.”

  She brought a hand up to his chest and tried to push him back, her fingers brushing the leather of his holster. She jerked her hand away with a frown. She hadn’t realized he was carrying his weapon. Why would he need it on the mountain? “If you wanted me dead, I would be dead.”

  He nodded slowly and traced her jaw with his fingertip. “This is true. However, I can cause a great deal of… discomfort… in your life if you were to cross me again, Natasha. Please tread carefully.”