by Holly Hart
"Until we what, Val? Until we marry?"
He grimaced and nodded, chewing his lip with anguish before he summoned the strength to speak. I knew that I should apologize to him. It wasn't his fault that I'd come crawling to his door, nor that my father was more monster than man. But my jealousy of the difference between our paths in life festered still, goaded on by a burning shame.
It didn't matter that Val had done nothing but offer his charity, because he wasn't the problem. Whether I knew it yet or not, my anger was aimed at myself. The problem was that I was deflecting, and my anger was shooting off and hitting everyone around me.
"You can leave whenever, Kitty too. I just want my men by your side to keep you safe, that's all."
I pushed him away. As I walked off to my room, desperate to throw myself under the covers and hide from his accusing gaze, hot tears prickled at the corner of my eyes. In reality, his look was one of concern more than accusation, dismay more than anger. But my fury poisoned me until I didn't see it.
"I'm sorry, Cara…" I heard as I let the door to my room swing closed behind me. Or at least, I thought I heard it. But that too, I pushed away.
I lay on the soft, goose-down mattress, muscles taut with anger. My body was on fire, blazing and crackling and sparking, and I resented it, too, for betraying me.
Val's apologetic face came unbidden into my mind. I tried to blink it away, but it was there, right behind my eyelids. My mind's eye lingered on his strong, defined cheekbones. It pictured me grazing my face against the stubble that peppered his cheeks, sent the sensation whispering across my body.
I smelled him, as well; sharp, clean and masculine.
"Why can't you just fuck off and leave me alone," I cried under my breath. I was furious with my brain for betraying me, and I tried to think about something else – anything else. But try as I might, nothing worked. The longer I pretended I hated him, the more his face imprinted on my mind; the more his eyes burned their way into my soul; the more my body longed for his touch.
I was drunk off him.
I needed him.
I'd never felt this much chemistry with anyone in my life. No matter how I denied it, he wormed his way back into my mind. But how can you have chemistry with someone you hate? Someone who's lived a life of luxury while you've been struggling to pull yourself out of the gutter? What kind of fucked-up mixed-up body message is that?
"It's not chemistry," I whispered, lying to myself in the vain hope that it might somehow help me believe it. "It's just a crush. Stop being such a girl about it."
But as I breathed in, I smelled him.
As my body brushed against the bed, I felt him.
As the silence built, I heard his deep, accented words in my head.
As I licked my lips, I tasted him.
My body burned, but not with anger; this time, with desire. Every nerve ending sent sparks crackling through pathways that flooded from every inch of my skin, and combined as one. A need built within me, a pressure that demanded release, like Mentos in a damn coke bottle. I tried to ignore it, tried everything – but the longer I avoided it, the larger it became.
I closed my eyes and I saw him.
I opened them and I longed for him.
I squeezed my legs together, and a jolt of fire exploded around my body. It broke my resistance like a hot knife going through butter. My fingers inched their way down my body, my breath already ragged, and I'd barely started. I shut my eyes and tried to block Val's now grinning face from my mind, but it was fruitless.
"Fuck you," I moaned. "Fuck you for doing this to me."
That was the last thing I said. My right fingers did battle with the fly on my jeans, unzipping it and deftly undoing the button that held them fast. I kicked the denim down my body, pushing with my hands to hurry it, but gave up once my left leg was free. It was all the space I needed, and I needed this fast.
My breath escaped my mouth in hot, uneven bursts as I squirmed out of my panties; still plain, but no one except me had to see this. And of course, Val's triumphant face, watching in my mind.
I stopped fighting his presence, let his smug expression watch over me, and wished he was really here. My left hand slipped under my top, speeding to my nipples which were two nubs of fire, and I chewed my bottom lip, biting down as the hand between my legs searched for the siren calling it. And found it.
Tiny shocks of electricity crackled and sparked throughout my entire body, and my ankles twisted themselves into knots around each other as my hand stroked the slit between my legs. My thighs pressed together, and a heat built between them.
I was beyond seeing now, other than stars bursting behind my eyelids.
I smelled Val's scent on me, as clean and sharp as if he was there by my side.
I felt his stubble grazing my belly, then his head sliding down, to between my thighs, and I knew it was a lie, but I hoped…
And my world exploded.
10
Val
Six AM came and found me staring at the ceiling. It was white, just like it had been for the past six hours. I wasn't tired, at least, not yet. Instead, I was on edge. For years now, meditation had been my refuge – the only thing that quieted the voice in my head. But ever since Cara careened round the corner and back into my life, I hadn't been able to clear my mind.
Now I couldn't sleep.
In the cell, sleep was never a problem. For the first year, they didn't turn the lights out once. I slept with my head cocooned by a thin, threadbare pillow that did little to hide me from the harsh overhead bulbs.
But it didn't stop me. My life was governed by a simple schedule back then – one meal a day. I lost thirty pounds, maybe more. I slept eight hours a day, but that still left sixteen hours of nothing to fill.
Sixteen hours a day, seven days a week, for twenty-four months… You do the math.
I worked out every day; let's say it took an hour. So, fifteen hours left to fill. A man can lose his mind in the silence of fifteen hours a day, seven days a week for twenty-four months. I nearly did.
In films, a prisoner wheels the book cart around the cells. But no one ever gave me a book. I'd have started writing, but no one gave me a notepad. Hell, if they'd given me a pen, I'd have stabbed the hand that fed me.
So I started telling stories. At first I thought keeping all that shit in my head would mean I was crazy – or send me over the edge. So I told them out loud. I never did find out if the camera that looked down on me every day recorded sound. I made up some crazy shit, but if I thought that having imaginary friends was weird, then it didn't take long to figure out that filling an eight by six cell with the sound of my own voice was a stairway to hell.
I didn't speak the second year.
Something thumped against my bedroom door. In an instant, my body was on high alert. I had the finely honed reflexes of a predator, and before my conscious mind took control, I was already on my feet. I reached into the cabinet by my bed and pulled out a gun.
Fuck, the kid.
No guns, then. I ejected the magazine and cleared the chamber and hid the two pieces of the weapon in different places. It wouldn't do to get shot with your own gun. I slid my hand – carefully – under my mattress and pulled out a Japanese blade. It was in Sergei's office the night I took his life. Though this was no time for reminiscing, I will never forget the look on his face when I slipped that blade between his rib cage.
I heard another thud.
I crept towards the door, blade held reversed in my right hand. My heart beat slowed to a crawl, no matter how much my brain screamed danger.
I pulled the door open, ignoring the sound as it clattered against the wall. As I moved, I crouched, minimizing the open area of my body to prevent taking a bullet or blade. I dropped my shoulder and prepared to charge –
– only to immediately stop dead, rock back like a punched sand bag, and quickly reassess the situation.
"Well hey…" I said, looking down at the floor, and the two-year
-old girl, called Kitty, sitting right in front of my door.
"Heeey," she grinned, bubbling with happiness. "You wanna watch 'Toons? Momma likes 'Toons, too!"
Momma?
I dismissed it, assuming she'd got things mixed up. I couldn't blame her – how many two-year-olds would know the difference between a real momma and a big sis who takes care of them every hour of the day. Not many. Hell, until I was six, I thought the nanny dad had hired was my mom!
It wasn’t until much later that I learned what really happened to mine…
As I glanced at my wristwatch – a sleek Italian model that told the time and not a whole hell of a lot else; just the way I liked it – I became very, very aware of something heavy in my other hand. Oh, no problem, it’s only … A Fucking Knife.
"Jesus, Val," I muttered, leaning against the door frame. I looked down at Kitty, but she didn't seem to have noticed. I supposed she was a bit young…
There's out of your depth, I thought. And then there's this…
Kids weren't my thing. I never had a problem with them, or anything – not like some people – but I just never knew what to do with them. Like, what the hell was I supposed to do now, cook her breakfast? What did a two-year-old eat, anyway?
Or do they drink? How long are they on milk, anyways?
"Isn't it," I smiled, hoping she'd agree, "a bit early? Hey, let's say we take you back to bed. Whatta ya’ think about that?"
Please say yes, please say yes…
She frowned and scrunched up her fingers into little fists.
Oh Jesus, don't cry!
"Okay, Okay, no, no," I hurried, desperately trying to fend off what seemed like inevitable tears. “‘Toons. I can do ‘Toons. What about that?"
She nodded, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I became aware of sweat glistening on my palms, and realized my heart was now beating like I'd just won gold in the triathlon at the Olympics. I didn't understand it. How the hell could I go toe to toe with some of the meanest assholes out there, and this little girl had me quaking in my boots. Well, I was barefoot, but the point still stood.
But first things first, I had to get rid of the knife. I was about to toss it to the floor when I had the sudden, horrifying thought that Kitty might get her hands on it. The terror of a new parent ripped through me. Especially as she clearly didn't have a problem trundling around the apartment on her own two feet.
Or does she still crawl?
The knife was so finely honed I knew that if she got her hands on it, the best case scenario was a deep cut. I hefted the blade in my hidden hand, and tossed it without looking, straight as an arrow.
The blade made a thumping sound as it landed dead center, five feet up on the sliding door to my walk-in closet. Out of height, out of mind. Or something like that…
"Okay, kiddo," I grinned, leaning down and picking her up. I don't know why I did it, but I was so out of my depth that I was reaching out and grasping at straws like they were life preservers.
Hell, she seemed to like it, giggling the whole way up. I flew her, swooping up, down, and around my legs a couple of times for good measure, and then spun her around my body. Her giggles filled the hallway, and I glanced left and right suddenly, aware of the time.
I held my finger to my lips. "Shhhh... Your big sis is sleeping."
Looking slightly confused, Kitty copied me, bringing her left hand to her mouth and shushing me – at least, trying to. Her attempt mainly ended up covering me in tiny flecks of spittle…
"So, kiddo – what do you want to do," I grinned, acting dumb.
She grimaced, and frowned like a woman with thirty years on her. "I told you already," she grumbled. "‘Toons!"
"All right, all right," I grumbled good-naturedly, hefting her along with me as I walked to the living room. "But you're going to have to help me figure this out. You know, it's crazy, I –"
I stopped talking, and braked to a halt. I realized I was talking to her like I would Cara, and not, well – a two-year-old. A part of me, a very big part, wanted to run down the hallway and shake Cara awake. And not just so I could see her tight body in whatever pajamas she wore to bed…
If she wears anything at all.
I didn't know what the hell I was doing. But the way Cara was acting yesterday, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to wake her up. She looked like she needed a week's worth of sleep, at least. Once again, I wondered exactly what the hell had happened to her while I'd been away.
There wasn't anything I wanted more than to tell her everything that had happened to me. The way my dad – Arkady – handed me over to Sergei's men as insurance. The way he abandoned me, allowing me to rot in a cell for two years.
My lip curled back, and I realized Kitty was looking straight at me, a worried look on her face. "Ev'wything okay?" She asked, grabbing my arm with both tiny palms. She grinned. "I can make it better! You know 'da Doctor Game?"
I had no idea what she was talking about, but I nodded anyway. Whatever the Doctor Game was, it sounded a whole hell of a lot better than ‘Toons.
Whatever they are…
I tossed her down onto the couch, and she giggled as she bounced off the soft gray material.
"Okay," she ordered, pointing. "You sit there."
I did as I was told. In the back of my mind, I wondered what the hell my men would say if they could see me now. I was just glad that Anatoly, for one, was nowhere to be seen.
"Okay, so I'm the doctor, right?" I asked, a cheeky grin on my lips.
Kitty frowned and crossed her arms. "No!" she barked. "I wanna –"
I held my hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay," I chuckled, relenting. "Your way or the highway, I guess?"
She cocked her head, eyelids half-closing. "Where are your toys?" She asked, looking around the room.
From her perspective, I guessed, it was a reasonable enough question. I didn't know how to tell her that the only toys I had were in a walk-in gun closet – and that they weren't the kind of toys she could play with. Not unless I wanted to get my head ripped off by Cara, anyway…
"No toys, I'm afraid kiddo. Can you treat me without them?"
Kitty grimaced and pressed her lips out, thinking. "Lie down," she ordered.
I thought about telling her that she could stand to work on her bedside manner, but it didn't seem like she'd understand. Maybe in a couple of years …
Why the hell are you thinking like that? A couple of years this, a couple of years that. The only thing that's supposed to be on your mind is putting a bullet in your dad's head.
But the blazing, all-encompassing rage that had powered me forward, that had broken me out of captivity and had driven me to within a hair's breadth of the summit of the city's organized crime networks, now seemed like from a smothered candle’s dying wick. For the first time in over two years, I didn't need my meditation to feel at peace.
Hunger pangs started to sound – growling from my stomach – just about the time Kitty tired of the Doctor Game. Judging by the pained expression on her face, I suspected she'd been struck by them, too.
"Want something to eat, kiddo?"
She nodded.
This was a problem. I had precisely zero idea of what a toddler was supposed to eat. "What's your favorite?"
"Lucky charms!" She grinned, clapping the palm of her tiny right hand to her mouth to staunch a fit of giggles.
I raised my eyebrow. "Oh, yeah? Does Cara let you have those?"
She bowed her head, shaking it solemnly. "Nuh uh. But," she looked up hopefully. "It's a special occa–, a special occas–." She stopped, stumped.
"Special occasion?"
She nodded happily.
"Well you're shi-, I mean completely out of luck, kid. We don't do Lucky Charms around here, you know," I said slowly, clattering through every drawer in the kitchen, and every shelf in the fridge. "Unless you want takeout, you're in trouble …"
She crossed her arms. "But I'm hungry!"
I had a sudden flash of inspiration, r
emembering a bag of flour, a couple of eggs, and the last of a quart of milk. "Do you like waffles?"
She nodded. I was getting used to this dynamic, and I wasn't quite sure whether I liked it. She was already pushing me around worse than Cara ever did …
As I reached up to grab it, the bag of flour fell out of the top cupboard and exploded onto the counter. "Godda –," I started to swear, before catching myself just in time. "I mean… Shucks."
Kitty giggled. It was infectious, and I couldn’t help the grin that stretched across my cheeks.
"Aren't you going to help?" I asked frowning at her. She shook her head. I liked the cut of this kid's jib.
"Now, Kitty," a soft, familiar voice purred from the other end of the kitchen – or, at least, it seemed that way to me. "That's not nice. Uncle Val's been kind enough to take us in; aren't you going to offer to help?”
I spun, startled, to see Cara leaning against the kitchen counter, arms crossed, a slight grin toying on her lips.
"How long have you been standing there?" I asked, feeling as if I had a giant neon sign stuck to my forehead. A sign that read: “Dork”.
Cara didn't respond, at least, not at first. Her face was shrouded in an expression which – if I didn't know better – I'd have called guilt.
"You okay?"
It disappeared in an instant, like a summer squall. She replaced it with a mask of happiness, and I knew that she wasn’t lying, not completely. Right now, Cara is happy, but the darkness inside her lingers, and I don’t know what I can do to fix it. If I just knew what to do, I’m there faster than a heartbeat, but the not-knowing cuts as deep as a knife.
"I’m good," she says, and I bask in the warmth of her reassuring smile. It’s sad that something so small can shift my mood in an instant, but it can, and does. "You've got flour all over you."
She reaches forward and brushes the white dust from my cheek. Her touch is hot, and singes my skin. I flinch. I’m not used to someone showing me affection like this. It feels so wrong –