In For the Kill

by Shannon McKenna

  “Of course,” he said. “But first, tell me something. No masks.”

  She clutched his shoulders. “What?”

  “You like me,” he said. “I’m not talking about just liking the way I fuck you, or how my dirty power games get you all hot and bothered, or any of that. I’m talking me. Just me. At least a little bit. Don’t you?”

  It hurt, in her throat, like some wild thing trying desperately to get out, but a mountain of rock crushed it. Wouldn’t let her speak.

  He waited, looming over her. Eyes relentless. He cupped her face, and kissed her, with a sweetness that broke her heart.

  It lightened the load, just long enough for her to whisper it. “Yes.”

  He entered her, slowly. So good, so sweet, both gasping with pleasure. Each long, gliding stroke caressed a million shivering points of delight. Momentum gathered, and soon they were locked in a straining knot, panting and heaving. Struggling toward that shining prize.

  Waves thundered through her, tearing her wide open, inside her chest, her head, exploding out into infinity.

  It mellowed, slowly, to the tender glow of starlight on the water.

  She opened her eyes when he pulled out of her. Cool air, against her wet skin. He still knelt between her spread legs, sliding his fingers boldly inside her, clasping her mound. Blatantly possessive.

  “I love to see my come dripping out of you,” he said.

  Her throat was too parched from yelling to reply.

  The phone rang. She jerked up, but Sam gestured her down and reached for it. “Yes?” He listened. “Give us ten, then send them up.”

  Sveti slid off the bed as he hung up. “Samuel Petrie,” she said. “I didn’t go through hell and back again to be a rich man’s bed toy.”

  His face hardened. “We don’t have time for me to get my feelings hurt about that,” he said. “Your ten minutes are ticking away. Get to it.”

  It took a judicious combination of charm and ruthlessness to get rid of Nadine and the saleswoman from the boutique, both of whom had accompanied the wheeled rack of plastic swathed garments up to Sam and Sveti’s suite. But no one needed to witness the knock-down, drag-out fight about to take place between him and his stubborn girlfriend.

  A very generous tip satisfied the boutique lady, giving him further reason to be glad that Sveti was in the shower. He had to pick his battles carefully. Good thing the prices weren’t marked on the garments themselves. He’d arranged for them to be charged to his bill.

  He sat down on the bed outside the bathroom door after he got rid of the would-be spectators, and tried to occupy himself with his laptop, check his messages, think strategically. No luck.

  The sound of running water eventually gave way to the sound of a blow dryer, which he construed as progress. He glanced through the dresses, discarding several immediately. He leafed through the contents of the envelope Nadine had given Sveti, taking note of the venue, the Villa Fenice, a half hour down the coast. He plugged the address into his phone, studied the route. Straightforward enough. He loafed.

  Finally, the door clicked, and Sveti emerged, swathed in a thick white terrycloth robe. She’d blown out her hair into swirling waves.

  Hot. Shiny. Gleaming. His fingers wanted to wind into it, and pull.

  He muscled it down. This was sexual excess, even by his own pig-dog standards. “The clothes are here,” he said. “I’m ready for the show.”

  Her face took on a look he’d come to know well. He braced himself. “Sam,” she said quietly. “I don’t want to be dressed like a doll.”

  He let out a careful sigh, his mind racing for strategies to manage her. “It isn’t a power game,” he said. “I’m not trying to buy you. I know you can’t be bought. Can we reframe this whole thing?”

  Her brows twitched together, suspiciously. “How?”

  “Look on it as an art installation,” he suggested. “You’ve graciously consented to participate, as a favor. Because you like me.”

  Her lips twitched. “Art installation?”

  “Yeah, let’s see what happens if we put a stunningly beautiful young woman into a hot dress designed by a renowned artist of high fashion. Doesn’t that sound like a fun art project? Will you indulge me, just this once? From here on out, it’s sackcloth and ashes, I swear.”

  She laughed, and let the robe fall. “You’re so full of shit.”

  Whoa. Got him, every time. She wore nothing but a nude thong. It made his palms sweat. He dried them against his jeans and grabbed the first dress, cream-colored taffeta shot through with rainbow iridescence.

  Sveti dropped it over her head and shook it into place. She gathered her fall of heavy, swirling chestnut hair into her hand and turned her back. “You said you’d be my lady’s maid.”

  Oh, yeah. He took his time doing it up, skimming his knuckles along the warm perfection of her skin. Memorizing the curve of her spine, the dip of her waist, the flare of her hip. A hot haze of lust made his toes curl in his shoes and his dick pulse against his jeans.

  He lingered over the top hook, reluctant to lift his hands away.

  She dropped her hair and turned. “So? What do you think?”

  His mouth went dry. He studied her from the front, then walked around her, looking from every angle. “Too virginal,” he said finally.

  Her eyes widened. “Really? I thought you’d approve of that effect! I figured you would want a dress that said, ‘Hands off.’ ”

  “This dress doesn’t say that,” he said. “It says, ‘I’m a defenseless, clueless innocent, so sneak me out of the debutante ball to the gazebo, and ravish me in the moonlight.’ It says, ‘Fair game.’ You are not walking out the door in that thing.”

  She glanced down at the dress. “Good Lord. I had no idea a dress could say all that.”

  “That dress is now reserved exclusively for our fantasy sex play. The game I call ‘The Deflowering.’ ”

  She let out a crack of laughter. “Why would you need to play that game? You lived it firsthand!”

  “It doesn’t count, since I didn’t know til it was too late.”

  “Oh, shut up.” She swatted at his chest. He seized her hand and kissed it. And kissed it again, trailing kisses up her wrist, her arm, until her hand shook and her eyes were dilated.

  “Sam,” she whispered. “It’s late. Let’s, ah . . . try the next one.”

  “Yeah,” he said hoarsely. “Right.”

  The next dress was a dreamy, rose-spattered chiffon thing, with a lot of asymmetrical fluttering ruffles. It hugged her torso and fell around her, graceful and romantic. She turned, making the ragged, layered skirt flutter out in a floating swirl. Pretty. But he shook his head.

  “It says, ‘Please don’t hate me because I am beautiful,” he said. “Fuck that shit. You don’t owe anyone any apologies. Take it off.”

  She turned to the mirror, bemused. “Wow. You have incredibly focused opinions about women’s fashion, for a straight man.”

  “If you’re the girl inside the dress, then yeah, I do,” he said.

  The next offering was cobalt blue chiffon, with soft, swirling knots of fabric sculpted over her torso, molded to show every contour. It hugged her hips and flared into a mermaid frill around her feet.

  Sam circled her, eyes narrowed. “This one says, ‘How dare you look at me, peon. Begone, lest I strike you down with my magical triton for your insolence, and turn you to a cowering sea slug.’ ”

  She laughed at his nonsense. “Not the vibe I’m shooting for.”

  Somehow, out of nowhere, this had become fun. What a high, what a buzz, to make Sveti smile. It made him giddy.

  Even knowing that her mood could change in a fucking heartbeat.

  He pushed that thought away as he fastened the hooks on the last dress, but the thought disintegrated when she turned to show him.

  It was soft like velvet, but flowing. Brown-tinted, golden green. Forest moss, hit by a beam of sunlight. Fabric twisted gracefully over her perfect breasts, and
fell from a high empire waist to skim her curves. It brought out her hazel eyes, the raw cedar tints of her hair.

  He found himself thinking of stories his mother had read to them. Schlocky girl stuff about fairies and dryads whenever it was Connie’s turn to pick. Sveti had just stepped out of one of those stories. That bold, yet cautious look in her eyes. As if he were a dangerous magical beast, but she knew she had the power to bend him to her will.

  He cleared his throat. “That one,” he said. “That one’s a winner.”

  She twirled, smiling at the mirror in a rare show of vanity. “I agree, for once,” she said. “It’s very nice. How much does it cost?”

  “Don’t even start,” he said. “I’m hard already, just looking at you in that thing, so don’t provoke me. I might end up getting all masterful and overbearing. Just to prove a point.”

  “Really?” She twirled, making the skirt flare. “What kind of point?”

  He tilted her face up and kissed her hungrily, until she was dazed and breathless. “The kind of point that might mess up the dress.”

  “Break his other knee,” Pavel Cherchenko said.

  “No!” Misha shrieked, as Ivan lifted the baton over the wretched, bloodied Andrei, who lay broken and unrecognizable on the floor. “It’s the truth! It wasn’t Andrei’s fault! He didn’t know! I’m sorry we didn’t tell you as soon as she arrived, but I didn’t know that you wanted to—”

  “Liar. Of course you knew. You spy on everything I do, my son. Andrei is an idiot, yes, but you are not. I had people waiting for her at both airports in Rome and Milan, and you knew it. But what bothers me most is what a bad liar you are.” He swatted the back of Misha’s head, smashing his face onto the gleaming surface of Pavel’s desk.

  When Misha dragged himself back up, blood streamed from his broken nose, along with the snot brought on by his womanish tears.

  And this piece of shit was all he had to call his heir.

  “I’m sorry.” Misha’s voice gurgled. “It was me, only me. Not Andrei. I told him to bring her up, and I—”

  “He should have called for instructions.” Pavel punctuated this with a savage kick to the kidney. Andrei shrieked. “He shouldn’t have listened to a snot-nosed, lying little boy.” A crunch of broken ribs. “He should have realized what you were doing.” A boot heel, ground onto the man’s genitals. Andrei jackknifed, in spite of his shattered vertebrae.

  “Please, stop, stop, stop,” the boy moaned. “Please.” He sobbed silently, eyes closed, blood streaming down his neck into his shirt.

  Pavel gazed at his son with a bitter taste in his mouth. He’d entertained hopes for Misha, even after the blow that Sasha had dealt him. Bright Misha, with his talent with tech, his facility with numbers. A freak, yes, but in this day and age, one needed an edge. Misha was unscarred by Zhoglo’s punishment. Marya and Sasha had been gutted, but there was still hope for Misha. Or had been. Now he was not sure.

  He was still angry at Sasha, for not being strong enough. For not appreciating what his father had done for him, by murdering that scum Zhoglo. He had to remind his own self every morning that he had actually done it, as he woke from the nightmares in which Zhoglo was grinding his boot into Pavel’s face. He was not that wretched slave any longer. He had freed himself. Killing Zhoglo had ignited him.

  He had avenged Sasha, but had his son shown gratitude for his father’s efforts? Had he valued the possibilities his father had given him? No. The worthless turd had curled up into a ball. A mute wraith of a boy who would not speak, who lost himself in drugs. First vodka, brandy. Then as soon as he was old enough to go and seek it out, heroin. His boy, floating away, on a fucking lake of opiates. He could forgive a great deal, after what Sasha had suffered, but not betrayal.

  Sasha had to die. It would be a relief to everyone. Most of all to Sasha himself, he suspected. But Pavel was appalled to find that the taint had corrupted Misha, too. Something had to be done. Something severe.

  His offspring hunched, shaking and leaking before him. He slapped the boy, whack. “Stop crying! I watched the footage. You knew about the hidden cameras. I saw you playing to them. That screaming and carrying on, so overdone. Not like you, sullen, constipated clam that you are.” Whack. “You turned your back to the camera in the library to write on her card. And throwing the card onto the street? How did you plan to justify that to me? Svetlana Ardova’s cell phone number might have saved me time. I don’t suppose you memorized her number?”

  “No,” Misha whispered. “I didn’t even look at it.”

  Pavel took the baton from Ivan’s hand. Crack, he brought it down on Andrei’s scapula. Misha’s moan was drowned out by Andrei’s shriek.

  Pavel panted as he stared at the man twitching on the floor, ruining the fine Persian rug. Rugs were replaceable. Sons were harder to come by. But when a thing was ruined, it was ruined.

  He would give Misha one last chance, for Marya’s sake. Not that he owed the bitch anything. She’d been weak. Giving in to despair. He’d worked so hard to make it up to her, but even Sasha’s return from the dead did not slow her descent. From the grave, she kept her grip on him. Guilt, shame, at being powerless to protect his family.

  He hated her for it. He hated them all.

  “Where are the thermal generators located?” he demanded.

  “I don’t know! I don’t know anything about—”

  Whack. The slap rocked Misha’s head back. “Why are you helping Sasha?” he bellowed.

  “I just . . . wanted to know he was alive.” Misha sobbed, silently.

  Pavel leaned into his son’s cringing face. “What did you write on the card you threw down to her?”

  Misha’s eyes were full of mortal dread as he raised them to his father. “I . . . I didn’t write anything.”

  Pavel picked up his letter opener, an antique stiletto, its hilt adorned with precious gems. “One more lie . . .” Pavel said, nudging the side of Andrei’s bloody face with his shoe.

  Misha hesitated. “If I tell you, you won’t hurt him anymore?”

  Arrogant little shit, daring to bargain with him. Pavel forced his voice to softness. “Of course. Tell me, and his suffering will end.”

  “It’s a phone number,” Misha admitted. “Sasha sent me a note, one day, when I was at school. It’s a gelateria. In Castellana Padulli.”

  “Tell me what is special about this gelateria.”

  “He checks it. If I show up, he sends a message. Where to meet.”

  Pavel’s hand contracted around the jeweled hilt. “So you have been in contact with Sasha. And you said nothing.”

  “I met him, just once,” Misha whispered. “Two days ago.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know.” Misha’s voice was strangled. “He wouldn’t tell me. He has a remote camera set up, to watch for me. He has organized it so I cannot ever know where he is. To . . . to protect us both.”

  “Protect you? Hah.”

  “I’m sorry,” Misha said brokenly. “Can I go? Please?”

  “To warn Sasha? No, you stay here until this is finished. You are a liar, and a traitor, and stupid. I despise stupidity.”

  “Father, please—no!”

  Misha’s wail of protest choked off as Pavel drove the stiletto through Andrei’s eye. He hesitated. There were precious gems in the hilt, after all. He pulled it out and wiped it on Andrei’s suit coat.

  “Wrap him in the rug and take him away,” he said to Ivan and Yevgeni, who stood watching. “Take Misha downstairs, to the room.”

  Misha’s mouth was slack with horror. “But . . . you said . . .”

  “I said, his suffering will end. And it has ended.” Pavel patted Misha’s clammy cheek. “But yours, my son? Yours is just beginning.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Sveti stared out at cliffs of silvery stone that glowed pink with reflected tints of the sunset. A cool breeze scented with aromatic wild herbs blew in the window. She wore a gorgeous evening gown, she was in a sexy
car with a hot guy in a tux who made her delirious with pleasure, about to receive a prestigious award for her achievements, to be fêted at a lavish party—and she was still capable of feeling miserable.

  Leave it to Sveti to tie the pretty bow on top of her present into an unbreakable knot that could only be released with the slash of a knife.

  She glanced at the car that was following them. Silvano, Hazlett’s security agent, and his driver were in it. Sam had insisted on driving his own car. This was the compromise they had struck, with great difficulty and a lot of incomprehensible male snarling, all in Italian.

  “This isn’t sustainable,” she said.

  “What’s not sustainable?”

  “This security situation,” she said. “How much does it cost, to pay someone to follow you around all the time?”

  “Hazlett would only hire top-of-the-line people, so you can be sure that it costs a fortune. What do you care? You won’t be paying.”

  She shook her head. “It won’t work. There’s a point of diminishing returns. When people decide that I’m more trouble than I’m worth.”

  She regretted saying that the second the words left her mouth. As if she wanted to hasten the day that he made that decision, too.

  “You underestimate the cosmic mega-bullshit people are disposed to tolerate in order to be close to you, Sveti.”

  “Oh, stop it, Sam.” She stared out the window. “Don’t try to soothe me or flatter me. I’m just trying to think this through.”

  He made little smooching sounds. “That’s the sound of me kissing your ass. Wow, all I do is think of your ass, and boom, my pants don’t fit. What’s a little mortal danger or a few pesky trust and intimacy issues when I can peel down your panties and—”

  “Stop.” She blocked her ears. “I need to concentrate on what I’m doing tonight. Don’t melt my brain with your sex talk. Please.”

  “No, actually. I disagree. I think it would do your brain some good to be melted. You’ve got concentration totally nailed, Sveti. What you need is to chill the fuck out. You need to laugh.”

  She stared down at her lap. “I’ve never been great at that,” she said. “Please, don’t make it a requirement. I can’t do it on command.”