by Warren, Skye
“I lived on the street until I was old enough to enlist.” The memories have sharp teeth and claws. They threaten to rip out my throat so I can’t speak. My next words come out hoarse. “The things I did, Holly. You would be disgusted with me if you knew.”
“I wouldn’t.” She pushes against my chest, and it shouldn’t move me. There is not nearly enough muscle on her slender frame to dislodge me, but it works anyway. I roll over onto the bed, and then she’s on top of me, my cock still in her cunt. “There is nothing you could say—”
“Don’t,” I say, too sharp. “You have no fucking idea.”
“Maybe not,” she says, her hips moving, rocking. She’s riding me. “Maybe I don’t understand what you went through, but I do know my feelings. I know you can’t change them.”
Her pussy clenches around my cock, and I grunt in pleasure. “I got numb on the street. So fucking numb that I thought I wouldn’t be able to feel anything. Only pain could make me feel anything at all. Until you. You make me feel other things, terrifying things, but, Holly… God, Holly, what terrifies me is that sometimes even you aren’t enough.”
Determination darkens her eyes. I didn’t mean to lay down a challenge, but that’s the way she’s taking it. She puts her palms on my chest and lifts up, bearing down fast enough to make me catch my breath. Then she’s fucking me, riding me, a beautiful blur, and I throw my head back, unable to do anything but take it. My hands clench her thighs, and I know there will be ten finger-shaped bruises there tomorrow. Is that the line? Where is the line? Then she comes, her pussy drenched with arousal, her secret muscles clenching me, and I don’t care about the fucking line. I thrust up into her, hard, coming in hard, wrenching, painful spurts.
She collapses onto my chest. I gently push her onto her side, away from me. There are only inches between us, but they might as well be miles.
I can’t believe I told her about my time on the streets. I may not have embellished with the details, but she’s a smart woman. She can figure some of it out.
Fuck. I’ve never told anyone that, and for damn good reason.
It’s me at my lowest point. Desperation. Hunger.
And endless, endless pain.
“Elijah,” she whispers. “Let me come with you.”
I stare at the ceiling when I answer, my heart a cold stone in my chest. “That’s the difference between London and me. She needs you. I don’t, sweetheart. You can’t help me. It will be easier on my own.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Elijah
The meeting is set for noon. We leave with exactly enough time to get there. Normally we’d arrive early and scout the place, but the lieutenant colonel will expect that. There will likely be traps and a few rifles pointed at our heads. Anything we do to protect ourselves can be seen as an act of war against the American government. So we’re going with only a couple of knives and a handgun. Barely anything by our usual standards. It’s a risky move, but not going is not an option. The lieutenant colonel won’t shoot me on sight. If he only wanted me dead, there were easier ways to accomplish that. At least I’ll hear what he has to say before I tell him to go to hell.
“So,” Josh says. “You and this writer chick. You’re an item?”
Over the past year I’ve gotten to know my brothers fairly well. Liam is the serious one, the upstanding one. He would not interfere or even ask about my personal life—except if he thought it was a safety issue. On the other hand, Josh is more casual. He’s comfortable throwing out a question like that without any preliminaries.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he continues, kicking his boots up on the dash of the black SUV. “I’m not judging you. It’s more of a congratulations. She’s hot in a sexy librarian kind of way.”
I don’t say anything. I also don’t punch him in the face and crash the SUV into the Mediterranean Sea. So I’d say that I’m winning right now.
“That being said, I still don’t understand why you don’t get a little sister action going. The other one’s hot in a Cosmo cover model kind of way, and if you could get both of them into bed—”
“Is there a point to this?”
He grins. “I knew I could get you to talk.”
Out of the three brothers, I’m the most taciturn. “You want to talk about relationships? Do you also want to braid each other’s hair?”
“Listen, I know we were basically raised like feral wolf cubs, but this is a normal thing. Brothers talking about a girl they’re interested in while we go on a road trip.”
“A road trip? We’re going to confront a rogue military officer.”
He grins. “So it’s a good road trip.”
The road curves sharply, and I deftly steer to avoid sliding off the mountain. The road down the Amalfi coast is precarious, and even worse, one lane for much of the way. That means we get stuck behind a string of sputtering old Volvos and tour buses with no way to speed up.
The cars in front of us roll to a stop, and I’m guessing there was a fender bender ahead. “So if you want to talk about a girl you’re interested in, how about you go first?”
“A girl? A single girl?” He snorts. “I’m interested in lots of girls. No one in particular.”
“That’s not what Liam said when he got drunk that one time.”
Josh straightens. “When was that?”
“When Samantha left.” Liam was her guardian until she turned eighteen. Then she turned the tables by approaching him. Sexually. He was unable to move past his guilt at taking advantage of her and she walked away from him.
“God, he was a fucking disaster during that time.”
“Imagine if she hadn’t taken him back. We’d be stuck with that asshole.”
In addition to excess drinking and a complete lack of sleeping, he trained until he literally dropped from exhaustion. It was dangerous and depressing.
“What did he say?” Josh tries to keep his voice light, but I can tell he’s affected.
“Something about a girl you met a few years earlier. What did she do? Some kind of dancing. A burlesque dancer. Or maybe a stripper. Did you date a stripper?”
He speaks between gritted teeth. “She was a ballet dancer.”
“Oh, that’s right.” I smirk. “I knew I could get you to talk.”
The cars ahead of us begin to move again, and we pass by a truck driver arguing with the owner of a Toyota, both of them gesturing. They found a small turnoff by an abandoned gas station to have their disagreement.
“Fair’s fair,” he says, his tone still artificially light. “There was a girl. A ballerina. We had a fling. Her brother threatened to kill me. I plotted his demise. It was all very Shakespearean.”
“Have you actually read Shakespeare?”
He snorts. “She didn’t enjoy being used as a pawn by the US government.”
“God, none of us do.”
“She also blamed me for most of it. Which I deserved.”
“So she left your sorry ass.”
“Saw right through me. Somehow you’ve managed to fool a sexy librarian into thinking you’re worth a damn. She’s not even mad about being a pawn for the US government.”
“She will be if I don’t get this goddamn bounty lifted.” The bounty on her head is not an official order from the US government, of course. Like most of the things the lieutenant colonel does, it’s off the books. Plausibly deniable. Shadow operations.
“So does this lieutenant colonel want to fuck your ass or what?”
“Hell if I know. It’s a control thing with him.” At least he agreed to a meeting. Of course he did. How else could he make his demands? “He wants to own me.”
“And here I thought that was Liam’s job.”
My hands tighten on the steering wheel. “Was she the one?”
“You think that’s a real thing? Soul mates and all that shit?”
“I don’t know. Liam and Samantha seem pretty real.”
“The thing that gets me about soul mates is, if we all have them, t
hen even evil bastards have them. Maybe our mom was really our dad’s soulmate. Maybe she was destined to be beaten and bruised because of some goddamn scroll written in time.”
I glance at him sideways. “Have you been smoking pot this morning?”
“I’m just saying. Soul mates aren’t only for the good people.”
“So you’re saying assholes like us have a chance?”
He snorts. “You might. As long as you don’t fuck it up with Holly Frank.”
I swallow around the knot in my throat. It’s hard to believe in hope when you’ve held on to despair for so long. It’s hard to imagine a happily ever after when all you’ve ever known is pain. Maybe my brother is right.
Maybe soul mates aren’t only for good people.
Maybe bastards like me get one, too.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Holly
The fisherman worked the nets for three long, hard decades. He heard the old wives’ tales about sirens and monsters, but he only believed in what he could catch. His face grew lined with the whipping of the wind. His knuckles turned into hard knots. And every sunrise found him on his boat.
One day he felt a hard yank on the nets, and he pulled them in. A large weight fought him, bigger than any fish he’d ever caught, and he worried about a dolphin with its fin trapped.
It took every ounce of muscle in his seasoned body, but when he finally pulled the haul onto the deck, it was not a fish or a dolphin. It was a woman. More specifically, a mermaid.
He approached her with the wonder of a child, but she was panicked, thrashing, tears in her large blue eyes. “Shhh,” he told her. “I won’t hurt you. Let me help.”
His large hands were deft as he cut into the knots and freed her.
“What’s your name?” he asked, but she crawled to the edge of the boat and threw herself into the water, disappearing in a flash of silver-purple scales.
The next day he went back to the same place and waited, no net in the water. For hours the sun beat down on a dry, empty deck and endless water. When he despaired of finding her again, he saw the same flash of silver and purple. She swam right up to the boat and put her hands on the helm. This time she had no fear, not of his muscles or his knife.
He approached her cautiously. “What’s your name?” he asked again.
She gave him a mischievous smile and swam away.
On the third day he did not wait for her to arrive. When he reached the same spot, he anchored the boat and stripped down to his briefs. Then he dove into the water. He swam in large, arching circles—a search pattern—trying to see into the deep waters.
She was underneath him, watching, curious and delighted with this human she had caught. He was hers. She didn’t tell the other mermaids about him, because she didn’t want to share.
Only when he began to tire did she swim up to greet him, thumping his legs with her tail and flicking her hair over her shoulder. He laughed, the sound rusty from disuse.
Weeks passed. Months.
He began to wonder if he loved her, and if she could love him back. Most days the mermaid would come play with him. On some days she would not, and he began to grow resentful of whatever business kept her away those times.
In his small crofter’s hut, he began to build a net, the largest one he’d ever made.
When it was finished he hauled it onto his boat and threw it into the water. He caught her. He caught her, and this time, he didn’t immediately let her go. In that moment it ceased being a game. That is where the love story ends and the real story begins.
* * *
The knock comes two hours after Elijah and Josh leave. I’ve been scribbling in my notebook ever since they left. My new story idea has cramped my hand. It’s been a long time since I wrote about mermaids. Not since my first published book. It must be the seaside setting that’s inspired me to write about what creatures inhabit it.
I’m only halfway curious when I hear voices downstairs. There are occasional deliveries of food from the local merchants.
Liam appears in the doorway, and I know something is wrong.
His green eyes appear dark, and though it’s an expression I’ve never seen on his face before, he’s worried. He gives me a curt nod in greeting. “The lieutenant colonel is here. The man Elijah is supposed to be meeting. I called him, but it’ll be another two hours before they make it back.”
A sense of surrealness washes over me. I know my blood is pounding, but everything is happening in slow motion. The sun seems brighter, the details on the terrace sharper. Leaves that had only been green are now vibrant. The sound of waves rushes in my ears. “What does he want?”
“He wants to talk to you. I would tell him to go fuck himself… but he has an arrest warrant for you from the AISE. The Agenzia Informazioni e Sicurezza Esterna. We’re in their country. They have jurisdiction.”
My voice turns into a squeak. “They’re going to arrest me?”
There’s a telling pause. “No, but it would be hard to stop them. Easier to give in to the lieutenant colonel’s demands. He claims that if he talks to you, only talks, he won’t make the arrest.”
“He wants to talk to me?”
“Most likely he’s going to ask you about the diamonds. That’s what he really wants. Well, he wants Elijah, too, but I think at this point he’d settle for the diamonds.”
Panic makes my throat tight. “We don’t have them anymore.”
Liam’s green eyes look so much like Elijah’s, it makes me ache. “Be honest with him. He would spot a lie anyway. Once he knows that Taggart has the diamonds, he can try going after him. If he has AISE in his pocket, he might even get them back.”
“Do I have to do this?” Part of me is terrified to face the man that even makes Elijah blink, despite all his muscles and confidence. The other part of me is curious to know who this man is and what sort of hold he has over the man I’ve come to love. It’s more than just the coercion. There’s some strange bond between these two men. It keeps Elijah tethered more than any bounty on my head. Even his brothers haven’t managed to break that hold.
Liam shakes his head. “There’s a chopper about a thirty-minute drive from here. We can slip out the back with London and be off the ground before they can stop us. But…”
“But we’d be running from the authorities.”
“It wouldn’t look good.”
“Would you get in trouble?”
“I’m more concerned for Elijah. We’d have to leave him here until we could get an extraction team. He can take care of himself, though. And Josh is with him.”
“I’ll talk to him.”
Liam can’t entirely hide his relief. “I’ll be in the room with you. And we have our security team stationed at the door and outside. He can’t hurt you.”
I suspect that isn’t quite true. This lieutenant colonel has taken on almost mythical proportions. It feels like almost anything is possible, but maybe it’s good that I get to talk to him. I might uncover what hold he has on Elijah. I might learn how to break it. “I should talk to him alone. You can wait outside the room.”
Liam raises his eyebrows. “Are you sure?”
“No, but I have a feeling he would insist on it even if I didn’t.”
Liam studies me. After a long moment his lips curve up. “You’re good for Elijah,” he says, and before I can process that statement or respond, he’s gone.
I close the notebook where I’d been writing and set it aside.
Then I stand and pace in the few moments left that I have alone. The second-floor landing opens to a small balcony. Wrought iron furniture. Ivy on the walls. It’s a picturesque setting. The beauty doesn’t match the conversation I’m about to have. Because unlike Liam, I don’t think the lieutenant colonel will be satisfied with diamonds.
Liam appears at the door again, this time preceding a man of middle age. He’s not wearing a military uniform. Instead he’s in a black suit, but it’s clear from his bearing and his haircut that he’s arm
y. His skin has a splotchy redness that makes him look perpetually angry. He smiles, and my skin crawls. I would look away if we passed on the street. Now I force myself to meet his pale, watery eyes. “Lieutenant Colonel Jefferson,” I say, holding out my hand.
He grasps my hand with a sweaty palm. “I see my reputation precedes me. Don’t tell me that our dear Elijah has been sharing classified information.”
The implied threat makes me flush. “Of course not.”
He gestures to the small wrought iron table and its two chairs. “Please. Sit. It’s such beautiful weather. We can have some lemonade.” He gives Liam a significant glance. “Perhaps you can get it for us.”
Liam gives me a hard look. “I’ll be right outside the door if you need me.”
I nod, even though the taste of fear is metallic in my mouth. I’m in the room with a sociopath. That much is clear to me from even the few words we exchanged. There’s something reptilian and flat about his eyes. This is the man who Elijah reported to. This is the man he served.
When we’re alone, the lieutenant colonel settles into one of the seats. I’m more slow to occupy the other one, perching on the edge as if I need to bolt.
He gives me a frank assessment. “Pretty, but I don’t understand the fascination.”
Indignation rises in my chest, but I force it down. I return his assessment with one of my own, taking in his florid face down to his scuffed dress shoes. “Powerful, but not nearly important enough to control Elijah North.”
He gives me a tight smile. “I see his kitten has claws.”
“You wanted this meeting.”
“To see why Elijah walked away from his rank, his career. To be frank, why Elijah North walked away from me. I created him, after all. I can destroy him, too.”
“I think if you could do that, you already would have.”
“You think? Then you underestimate how valuable he is to me. It would be like blowing up a shiny new Black Hawk. A complete waste. The military already has more than enough waste. Assets like Elijah North are rare. And important to national security.”