by Emma Slate
“Noted.”
“I have a question for you, though. How is it, even knowing you’re about to die, you manage to have some courage? I’ve never understood that about you.”
I shrugged, knowing that would infuriate him. He hated not having answers and he never could figure me out. Even if I didn’t have a plan, I lied and let him think I was one step ahead of him. And that got to him more than anything else.
“You’re not going to break me,” I said calmly. “You want to kill me? Get it done. Just promise me one thing.”
“What?” he demanded impatiently.
“Make sure Hawk has loving parents, okay? That’s all I care about.”
He nodded, his jaw tight. “On your knees.”
I dropped to my knees, seeing the world around me blur. Time slowed down. I licked my suddenly dry lips and made myself stare up at him. I would not bow my head like a soldier defeated in battle. If Winters wanted to kill me, he could look me in the eyes when he did it.
Winters raised the pistol and pointed it at me. The stench of my fear permeated my nose. “Was it worth it?” I asked him.
“Was what worth it?”
“All this, just so you could be a celebrated American hero? Never mind that you were nothing but a disgrace to the FBI. They won’t forgive you. They won’t ever trust you again.”
“Of course they will,” Winters said, taking my baited hook like a baby taking candy.
“Why? What makes you so sure? Have you called your old superior? What was his name? Don Archer? Good guy. We talk, you know.”
Winters’s eyes widened. “Stop talking.”
“Why?”
“Because I hate the lies coming out of your mouth.”
“Really? Look at my phone. Scroll through my contacts and see if I’m lying.”
I held in my smile of triumph when Winters was distracted by my ploy. He reached into his pocket and pulled out my phone, cursing when he saw his old superior’s name.
“That’s his cell number, direct line at the office, and his home phone number,” I said.
“What the fuck!” Winters shouted. “How do you have this? Why do you have this?”
“Because he and I have a deal,” I stated. “I give him just enough illegal activities to bust and he leaves the SINS alone. So you see, if you kill me, you won’t be returning a hero—and Archer will take you out himself.”
Winters howled like a man in a drunken rage. He threw my phone against the stone wall of the basement and it fell to the ground, the screen cracked and useless. Making use of the distraction, I managed to get myself into a crouch and lunged at his legs. As he went down with me draped across him, a shot rang out. I felt a burning graze along my upper left arm, but it didn’t slow me down; the pain in my arm only enraged me more. I was a mother with revenge on her mind.
“Barrett!” I heard Ash call. “Move!”
I rolled off of Winters and hit the hard wood floor of the basement. Another shot rang out, but this time it came from the pistol in Ash’s grip. Winters cried out, his hands reaching for his thigh. A hand came away bloody. He moaned and writhed on the floor like a pathetic animal I couldn’t wait to slit from belly to nose.
While Winters was momentarily incapacitated, I sat up. Ash still had the gun aimed at Winters, but her hands shook. “You’re good, Ash. Set it down.”
She blew out a breath and dropped her arm to her side.
I crawled to Winters and swung my legs over his body to straddle him. I pressed my hand to his injured thigh and he moaned again.
“Duncan is upstairs in the living room,” I said to Ash, not taking my eyes off of Winters’s pale face. His eyes were closed, but tears seeped from the corners. “And Hawk is upstairs in a crib. Get everything ready.”
“But, what about you—”
“I’ve got to take care of something first,” I said. “You don’t want to be here for this.”
“You sure?”
I finally looked at her. Her face was drawn and tight, but she’d stick this out with me if I asked her to. I shook my head. “See to Hawk and Duncan.”
Ash picked up Winters’s fallen weapon and with one last look at me, she headed for the stairs. I waited until I heard the door to the basement close before returning my attention to the struggling man underneath me. He attempted to buck me off of him, but he was rapidly losing blood from the wound in his thigh. Ash had nicked the femoral artery and if I waited long enough, he’d die. But I wasn’t letting him off easy, nor would I let Ash become a murderer. She wasn’t strong enough for that, which is why she didn’t blow his head off even though she had the opportunity to.
Reaching up to my hair, I pulled out the hairpin Flynn had given me on our six month wedding anniversary. My auburn hair tumbled loose. The hairpin was one long piece of metal, the handle intricate scrollwork. It was a dagger of beauty and craftsmanship.
I lowered the dagger towards Winters’s chest and he let out a whimper. It only added fuel to my rage. Here was a man willing to kidnap a child and murder me; now that he was the one about to die, he cried like a sniveling coward.
I slit his shirt, baring his chest speckled with dark brown hair and tight nipples. I dragged the dagger lightly across his skin. “You mocked the emoticons,” I said. “And yet, they’re the reason you’re in this position.”
With a flick of my wrist, I slashed his skin and created a line right underneath his left nipple. Winters moaned in pain. I made a similar mark underneath his right nipple.
“And now for the smile,” I said, my own lips pulling into a fierce and feral grin.
“No,” Winters pleaded.
“Yes,” I insisted, slowly trailing the point of the dagger across his belly into a half moon.
He yelled and screamed, but the sounds didn’t penetrate my fog of rage. All I saw was a cloud of red. My vision narrowed at the pulse at his neck, throbbing quickly, attempting to pump blood through his body. But it was leaking out of him too fast. Much too fast.
“Please,” Winters begged.
I leaned over him so that my hair brushed his bare chest. I stared into his eyes. “Please what?”
Winters was gone with pain and I’d made my point. Three of them, actually.
You can do this, a voice in my head said. This man took something from you. This is your revenge.
“Aye,” I whispered aloud to the voice of Igor Dolinsky’s ghost.
Winters’s brown eyes began to dim. I took the dagger and plunged it into the side of his neck, into the carotid artery. He jerked beneath me, spasming for a few seconds and then stilling.
I climbed off of him and stood. I cleaned my dagger on Winters’s torn shirt before twirling up my hair and sticking the hairpin in to hold it in place. My hand that had been pressed against his bullet wound was bloody and damp. I wiped it on the back of my jeans.
With one last glance at Winters’s dead form, I said calmly, “See you in hell.”
Part III
Chapter 30
I was covered in blood. Some of it my own. Some of it not. I was tired and cold. My vision was spotty, winking in and out. I leaned my head back against the wall that I’d slid down, unable to make it up the basement stairs.
“Barrett,” a voice said.
I stared at my hands and started to giggle. “‘Out, damned spot.’”
“Hen,” Flynn said.
Looking up from my bloody hands, I stared into my husband’s glittering blue gaze. “You almost look real,” I said.
Flynn’s jaw tensed, his hands moving over my body. “What have you done to yourself, love?”
His touch felt real, strong and sure. “You’re here?”
“Aye.”
“How?”
His hand slid over my left bicep and I hissed. Cursing, Flynn ripped away my shirtsleeve to reveal the gun shot graze along my arm. He made a tourniquet to staunch the flow, pressing his hands to it.
“She’s going to need stitches,” Flynn said, turning his h
ead to address the man in shadows.
Sasha nodded. “I’ll tend to this.”
He referred to Winters’s corpse on the ground.
“Hawk,” I whispered.
Flynn looked back at me, grabbing my hand to replace his. “Ash is with Hawk.”
I closed my eyes and nodded. Relief swept through me. I felt myself being lifted, and I collapsed my head against the solid wall of Flynn’s chest as he carted me up the basement stairs. He didn’t stay on the first floor, but continued through the dark house to the second floor and into the bathroom of the master bedroom. Setting me down, he kept his arms around me which I appreciated since I was sure I would’ve fallen over.
Flynn turned on the light and set me on the closed toilet. Moving to the tub, he drew a bath before stripping me out of my bloody clothes, including the tourniquet on my arm.
“I’m going to have to stitch that,” he said, holding out his hand to me and helping me into the water. It wasn’t nearly hot enough, so I turned the hot water on full blast.
“Careful,” he said. “You’ll burn yourself.”
“I’m cold.”
I watched him explore the bathroom, looking under the sink and opening drawers. “What are you looking for?” I asked.
“First aid.”
He came up empty and then looked at me. “I’m going to run downstairs and look around. You’ll be okay?”
I nodded. “I need clean clothes.”
“Aye.”
He came back to the tub, leaned over, and placed his lips on mine. Connection and yearning zinged through me, finally making me feel something other than shock.
Flynn pulled back all too soon. “I’ll be back.”
The door to the bathroom shut softly and I was alone. I turned off the water and reached for the soap. I washed my body and face, the water turning a murky pink. My left arm throbbed, and I examined the torn flesh of my arm. It didn’t look deep, but it was flayed open.
Flynn still hadn’t come back by the time I’d pulled the plug on the drain. I stood and reached for a bath towel to wrap around myself. As I dried off, Flynn returned with a small first aid kit. He set it on the sink and dug through it, pulling out a bottle of iodine, gauze, needle and thread.
And a bottle of scotch.
I shook my head. “No, I won’t drink.”
“Ash fed Hawk a bottle,” he said. “Drink some. Trust me.”
He unscrewed the lid and handed me the bottle. I took a drink straight from it, enjoying the warming, burning sensation. “At least Winters had good taste in liquor,” I muttered.
Flynn grunted, an excessively Scottish noise. It made me smile. “So how are you here? You and Sasha?”
As I sat in a towel, he cleansed my wound and studied it before threading the needle. I swallowed and kept my eyes trained on the bare bathroom wall.
“Duncan called before you left.”
“I knew he couldn’t be trusted,” I said. “You and Sasha abandoned the plan in London.”
“Arlington planted fake information.” Though his touch was tender, when he pierced my skin with the needle, I let out an involuntary sound.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” he asked, head bent as he stitched up my wound. “Blazing in here? A lot of things could’ve gone wrong.”
“But they didn’t,” I said. “We have our son back. That was the most important thing, wasn’t it?”
Flynn didn’t reply, and I took another sip of whisky. He worked quickly stitching me up and then wrapping my arm in a layer of protective gauze.
“That’ll hold until we get you to a doctor,” Flynn said. His hand settled on my bare shoulder as he loomed over me.
I stared up at him, enjoying the feeling of heat running across my skin. Scotch, adrenaline, Flynn. I was feeling it all. “Touch me,” I said, reaching a hand out to him so I could pull him closer.
“I can’t. You’re not—”
“I am. I’m healed. Please, Flynn.”
His eyes burned into me as his free hand went to my hair to pull out the hairpin. My auburn hair tumbled free and spilled down my back. He hoisted me up, and I unwrapped the towel from around me and let it drop. I stood naked in front of him even as he warred with himself.
“I don’t trust myself with you. Not with the state I’m in.”
I smiled, but it wasn’t in humor. “I don’t trust me, either.”
We were both swirling with anger and lust. Our coupling would not be gentle—it would be a force, just like we were.
“I’m not looking for soft.” I unsnapped the button of his jeans and lowered the zipper so I could get my hands on the heat of him. I grasped him and squeezed and his breath hitched. He leaned into my touch as his head dipped. We kissed with fervor and animosity, passion and release, anger and absolution.
I hardly noticed the sound of a bottle shattering when it hit the floor when Flynn lifted me onto the bathroom counter. He dropped his pants and then my hands wormed their way under his shirt, curling around the muscles of his chest.
“Off,” I commanded, tugging at the hem of his shirt.
He stripped out to his shirt and my hands glided up his muscled arms and caressing his jaw to drag him forward.
One of his hands gripped my hip while the other slid down my body. He found me wet and wanting, eager.
I hooked my legs around him so he was forced to come closer. He strained towards me, his shaft long and hard and ready.
“Now, Flynn.” I was breathless and panting.
He entered me slowly, his eyes locked on mine. “Okay?” he asked, his voice gritty.
I nodded and wiggled against him. “More. I can take more.”
Flynn wrapped an arm around me, lifting me up to change my angle. He pounded into me, harsh and fast. But there was no pain, only pleasure.
“Oh, God,” I moaned as I climbed higher and higher, my orgasm starting at the base of my spine. I came hard and clamped around him. He jerked inside of me, his face falling to my neck. My legs dropped from around him and he gently eased out of me.
He lifted his head and stared into my eyes. “Did I hurt you?”
I shook my head. “Did I hurt you?”
Flynn kissed me softly and then pulled back. “You scared me. When Duncan told me what was happening—he knew you’d go with or without him—but he told me to get here as soon as possible. I knew you’d do anything to get Hawk back even if it meant you dying. And I…”
“What?”
“I wouldn’t have been able to live with it either way. You or Hawk. It’s an impossible choice, you ken?”
I nodded. “It’s a choice neither one of us should have had to make. I know.”
He took a step away so he could gather himself and put on his clothes. “I found you a pair of sweats and a button down. They’re in the bedroom.”
He helped my off the counter and led me into the bedroom. I leaned over to step into the pants and my long hair fell into my eyes. Standing back up, I reached up to pull my hair into a bun.
Flynn held out my hairpin that doubled as a weapon. I looked at it for a moment and then took it, jabbing it through my bun to keep it out of my face.
He took my hand and led me out of the bedroom and into the hallway. I heard sounds coming from downstairs, the shuffling of footsteps, voices in dulcet tones.
Flynn and I entered the living room. Duncan was finally awake. He sat on the couch, looking a bit woozy. Ash walked around the living room, holding Hawk close and rubbing his back.
I held out my arms, and she set a sleeping Hawk into the crook of them. Flynn wrapped an arm around my shoulder and for a moment it was just the three of us having a reunion.
“Glad to see you’re awake,” Flynn said to Duncan.
Duncan grimaced. “Bastard tranqed me the moment I stepped through the door. Where is he? I’d like to smash his face in.”
“He’s dead,” Flynn answered flatly. “Sasha is in the basement cleaning up the evidence.”
I didn’t even want to know what that entailed, so I cradled Hawk closer and let my attention drift to the infant in my arms.
“Dead? How the—”
“Me,” I said, interrupting Duncan. “I did it.”
Duncan looked at Ash. “I’m missing something.”
“I think we have a lot of puzzle pieces missing. Love, you should sit down,” Flynn said to me.
I sank into a comfortable chair, feeling the adrenaline leave my body. It was nearly dawn and I was suddenly exhausted; I’d been up for over twenty four hours, not to mention I’d killed a man. Tortured him, actually.
Flynn knew. When he found me, I’d been covered in blood, not all of it mine. Sasha had no doubt learned the truth since he was dealing with Winters’s body.
I looked around the room, noting the exhaustion, the faces lined with tiredness, the sluggishness of our mental faculties. None of us were operating on all cylinders.
“Where do we go from here?” Ash ventured to ask.
By default all of us turned to look at Flynn. “We wait until Sasha is finished in the basement. In the mean time, let’s all get comfortable. We aren’t going anywhere for the time being.”
Chapter 31
I dozed as dawn turned into day. A baby cried, but I thought it was just a dream. It wasn’t until I felt a hand on my shoulder and I came awake that I realized it was Hawk.
Weariness tugged at my body, but I forced myself to stand and take Hawk out of the living room so he wouldn’t disturb the other sleeping occupants. Ash and Duncan were spooning on the couch and Flynn was asleep, sitting up in a chair.
Sasha followed me upstairs to where I’d originally found Hawk. I took my son to the changing table and put him in a fresh diaper. I sat down in a chair and settled Hawk on my lap as I made a move to unbutton my shirt. Sasha turned his back to give me privacy.
Hawk had been drinking from a bottle for weeks, but I hoped he would go back to breastfeeding. I put him to my skin and waited.
“We have to burn down the house,” Sasha said, his back still to me. “All of our prints are everywhere, there are a bullet holes in the walls, and a body.”