An Obsession with Vengeance (Wanted Men Book 3)

by Haviland, Nancy

  “I thought you’d be done for the night,” he said.

  “Me, too. I dozed off immediately, but then I had a bad dream,” Sydney replied.

  Something in his chest popped at the childlike response. “Really? Isn’t that what sleeping is all about?” he muttered as he went over to the bar in the corner. “Want a drink?”

  “No, thanks. You have bad dreams often?”

  “Often enough.” He dropped some ice into a glass and poured vodka over it. How could he have touched her despite Vasily’s warning? He was going to have to live with that. After he came clean with his Pakhan. Fuck. How the holy hell had Gabriel had the balls to go behind Vasily’s back and claim his daughter? Maks was having a fucking reaction here, and Sydney was simply a job.

  Uh-huh. A job. Right, that small voice in his head murmured as the sound of fabric shifting came from behind him. Forcing himself not to turn and stare, he wanted to yell at her to get gone. Can’t you see I’m self-loathing over here? he wanted to shout.

  “Maksim?”

  His teeth clacked together, scraping, as her voice and that accent circled his hips to wrap like a fist around his cock. How the fuck did she do that?

  Hating to admit it, but now realizing that she was, indeed, his biggest weakness, he said tiredly, “What is it, Sydney?”

  “Do you dream about . . . that place?” she asked hesitantly.

  He did look over his shoulder then. She was curled into the corner of the sofa, her gaze skipping around, brow furrowed. She hadn’t once complained about any soreness, but she obviously felt it. Was the bruise on her face giving her trouble? And did she have more marks on her body that he couldn’t see? The small bone of her clavicle drew his eye, giving her a dainty, fragile look that made him feel like hell for her cracks about not feeding her enough.

  “Yeah,” he admitted, turning away again. It was clear she needed a distraction, so, for some reason, he gave her one. “If that doesn’t come to me, shooting my best friend’s woman does. If those decide they’ve had enough fun for a while, the education my father supplied me with usually makes an appearance.” He grabbed his glass and went back to the balcony doors to look out again.

  “Do you mean Vincente’s redhead? What’s her name?”

  He nodded, appreciating the gentle note in her voice. Had she sounded careless or as though she were trying to make light of what he’d done, he’d have walked out. “Nika. Did you meet her the night she went to your club?” He couldn’t remember.

  “No. I just saw her on the footage you guys requested to see the following night. Remember?”

  He nodded. How could he forget? “She’s a beautiful girl.”

  “I saw that.”

  “I mean inside. Like you.” Why not be honest? It wouldn’t make a difference in the long run, and she might need to hear it. “What you did for your boy deserves kudos, Sydney. Once he’s old enough to truly understand, he’ll be proud and honored to have you as his mother.”

  He didn’t look back when she made a small sound.

  “I think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me,” she eventually got out. “Thank you, Maksim.”

  He could tell by where her voice came from that she’d gotten up and was moving toward him, so he fled, heading for a refill even though he’d barely taken a sip from his glass.

  She didn’t follow.

  “Will you tell me what you meant by ‘the education’ your father supplied? Was he a teacher?”

  Maks barked out a harsh laugh. “Yeah. He taught me well. I’m a cold, emotionless prick, aren’t I?”

  “No. I don’t see you like that at all.”

  “Then you need to take the blinders off, princess.” He swallowed half the contents of his glass and stared at a gorgeous sculpture of Saint Basil’s Cathedral someone had brought in and placed in the middle of the bookshelves next to the TV. He found himself once again talking to his Aussie about things in his past he’d always thought he’d take to the grave.

  She had that effect on him, and he couldn’t imagine why.

  “When I was twelve, my father moved his new wife into our house and me out. My mother had been gone for four years by then—cancer—and I’d pretty much come to terms with the fact that life as I’d known it was over. But it wasn’t really over until he dropped me off at a private academy that did preliminary training with young boys who were considering a life in the military. I hadn’t been, but apparently that was an oversight on my part.” He shook his hand to make the ice in his glass rattle. “Anyway, we were meant to be the type of soldiers that didn’t make it into the papers to receive medals and kudos for bravery and honor on the battlefield. Micha is one of them—that’s where we met. He’s now a highly decorated veteran no one has ever heard about.” He couldn’t even hear Sydney breathing anymore. “They trained us to kill quickly and surely. They also trained us in the most productive methods of torture—inflict maximum pain without causing death. When there was a lull in the transport of prisoners from Samara pen, a prison quite a trek away, we were forced to do our exercises on each other.”

  He finally moved. Putting his glass down, he went to where she was standing in front of the chaise longue and pulled his shirt from his pants to point at the sails of the schooner he had tattooed between his hip and ribs on his right side.

  “If you look in between the sails, you’ll see scars from puncture wounds where the boys inserted an ice pick. We were learning how not to hit organs.”

  She bent and looked closely, touching him softly as though he might still hurt. “There are dozens of them,” she whispered, abhorrence a living thing in her tone.

  Pulling his shirt higher, he lifted his arm over his head and, bending it at the elbow, ran his thumb over his hairless, scarred armpit, jerking when she did the same. “Razor blades,” he explained, “and then candle flames to cauterize so it could be done again and again. Hair couldn’t grow back after a while.”

  “That’s . . . barbaric. How can a place like that exist?”

  He shrugged. “You’d be surprised what exists right in your own backyard.” He righted his clothes but didn’t bother retucking his shirt. “Quite a few kids died. Most by bleeding out. Some killed themselves because they’d been forced to be there and simply couldn’t handle it—the instructors were . . . not especially nice. The rest of us got through it.”

  She looked up at him, blinking quickly when he glared down at her. “What?”

  “Don’t cry,” he warned. “I’m serious, Sydney. I’m not good with crying. You put me through that, and I’ll never share with you again. Come to think of it, why the fuck I’m telling you this shit to begin with is a mystery. I guess so you know not all parents are like you with their kids. But then, you’d already know that.”

  “Yes, but my story is a rained-out trip to Disneyland compared to yours. How long were you in that awful place?” she asked, moving the conversation along as a good girl should. He appreciated that.

  “Two years.”

  It sounded as if she hiccupped as she walked over to finish what he’d left in his glass. “I’m sorry, but your father was an asshole,” she rasped through the straight vodka burn, shuddering to make it clear she wasn’t used to it.

  He had to chuckle. “Graduation day came along, and I’d just headed out on my hike home when—”

  “Your hike?”

  He paused, and felt the air around him crackle with sudden tension. “Yeah. I didn’t have a ride waiting for me at the gates like the others. Mine came a mile down the road. Truck pulled up, guys shot me with a tranquilizer dart, threw me into the back, and brought me to that cell I told you about before, where I spent the next three months.”

  She just stared at him. “I’m . . . at a loss. I don’t know what to say. What you’ve been through . . .” She shook her head. “This may come out sounding patronizing, but
I’m so proud of you for overcoming such horrific experiences, Maksim. I’m also a little bit alarmed that you’ve told me about them,” she rushed on with an uneasy chuckle. “But at the same time I feel oddly privileged that you trust me not to share with anyone else. Or maybe you know I have no one to share with. No wonder you like control, huh? Wow. Um, I’ve been wondering how you got out of that place? That cell. And I never thought I’d ever say this, but I hope you killed somebody. A lot.”

  How was he not supposed to like this bloodthirsty little thing? “Vasily and his men had that privilege. Vasily also had my father put down for his part in it, which bothered me for some time because I never got to ask him why he’d done what he had to me.”

  She lifted the decanter and poured a couple of fingers of vodka. After carefully replacing the stopper, she brought it over, pressing the glass into his hand. “Maybe that’s for the best. Could be his answer would have been worse than not knowing. What if he’d had no answer?”

  He took a drink and turned away to contemplate that for a moment, never having taken that angle with it before. Boris always was an asshole. He remembered one of the guys who’d picked him up outside the Academy saying that. The guy had also said more throughout Maksim’s captivity that led him to believe he’d known Maksim’s father pretty well. So maybe Boris had just been an unhappy fucking asshole that never should have had kids.

  The lights outside glittered . . . No, Maks thought, narrowing his eyes. It was snowing.

  His breath jammed at the feel of Sydney’s arms coming around him. He swallowed a groan when the softness of her breasts met his back, and then her cheek cuddled in between his shoulder blades. And she held him. He watched the snow fall and allowed her to offer him comfort because he didn’t want to hurt her feelings by pushing her away.

  But he would.

  Soon.

  Bringing Sydney and Andy to the house the following day never did happen. Other shit did. In fact, so much of it came at the organization within that twelve-hour period that Vasily had to call Gabriel in with a crew to pick up the slack. Though, to be fair, the Koreans causing all the trouble had been attempting to infiltrate many of the operations the Moretti family were burying, so they actually had somewhat of a stake in the goings-on.

  Maks stood in the Brighton Beach warehouse, blood dripping off Angelina’s curve. The two men in front of him had caused some grief today. They were responsible for landing one of Gabriel’s boys—a longtime enforcer—in the infirmary at Vasily’s house. Vito was being operated on by the Tarasovs’ MD, and it didn’t look good. Another enforcer had ended up in the morgue, and Gabriel was en route to inform the man’s wife and two daughters. All over some prostitution houses that were all but defunct anyway. Fuckers.

  “I no tell you where device is,” the guy in Maks’s grip ground out in broken English, his eyes wild. They’d admitted to having planted an explosive device in one of the run-down houses currently being shut down, but the guy had refused to give up which one or where in the house it was. “But I find your woman. I fuck her pussy till she bleed out.”

  He spit up into Maksim’s face, but because he was on his back, it fell onto his own as if it were raining. Knowing he wasn’t going to get anything more—there were some men who just wouldn’t break—Maks buried his blade until the concrete floor prevented him from pushing any farther. Third threat against Sydney today. Or, he corrected, against her replacement. Because she would be replaced. Soon, he vowed as he’d done the last two times this thought cycle had passed through his head.

  A shrill scream blocked up his ears, and he saw what looked to be a pinkie land near his shoe. He glanced over to see Micha put his ear to their other captive’s mouth, listen for a moment, and then straighten. “If I had a daughter, she’d be on her way to one deserted fucking island right now after hearing some of the shit these guys threaten. It’s always about the women.” He then rattled off the address to one of the houses in question, which happened to be in the Bronx.

  Vincente, who’d been silently observing from the shadows, disappeared out the door with a swish of his coat.

  “Wait!” Maks yelled. “Go with him,” he said to Micha. “I’ll take care of this. And goddammit—be careful disarming the fucking thing if you find one.”

  Casting him a droll look for the unnecessary warning, Micha followed after V.

  Getting to his feet, Maks considered killing the guy now missing his tea-drinking finger, but he thought better of it when he remembered the knife handle he’d seen protruding from Vito’s eye socket. Lucky the Korean hadn’t favored a longer blade; otherwise there would have been no point in attempting to save Gabriel’s enforcer at all.

  And speaking of tea, had Sydney drunk any of hers? He’d seen the fancy little box on the counter in her loft and another empty one on top of the blue box that had sat next to the garbage. Obviously a favorite. Was she having a cup right now?

  A nudge to his shoulder had him swinging around, his blade whizzing through the air before he knew what he was doing. Thank Christ Vasily’s reflexes were as well-honed as Maks’s. He hopped back as if he were a fucking cat and saved himself from receiving one hell of a boo-boo across the chest.

  “Maksim! For Christ’s sake, get your fucking head out of your ass!” Vasily’s fist connected, slamming hard into the right side of Maks’s chest.

  “I’m sorry. Fuck, Vasily. I’m—”

  “Distracted. I get it.” He nudged the blood-splattered toe of his shoe into the Korean’s leg, at the same time, wiping at the trickle of blood coming from his own rather crooked-looking nose. It looked as though someone had gotten close enough to deal a blow hard enough to break it. “I saw Vincente and Micha leave. They got their location?”

  “Yeah,” Maks answered distractedly. “Where was Dmitri when you got tagged?” he added with a mix of curiosity and anger. Vasily’s personal byki rarely allowed anyone close enough to their Pakhan to allow for an injury.

  “He was dealing with the other two in the quad we came up against.”

  Four at once and all he had was a broken nose? Nicely done, Maks thought, still shaken that he’d nearly added to Vasily’s injuries with what could have been a lethal slice. After moving over to the row of sinks that had at one time been used to wash chicken parts before packaging, he cleaned his blade; washed his face, hands, and chest; and couldn’t wait to get to either the club or the apartment to have a hot shower. An image of Sydney, naked, flawless skin gleaming as rivulets of water ran over her breasts and down her flat stomach and navel to drip between the bare lips—

  “. . . have to bruise your balls for you to pay attention, Maksim? Are you fucking with me here? Or are you seriously that far gone?”

  He met his Pakhan’s incensed stare and didn’t know what to say. Another apology? How many could he offer?

  “You need to take care of this, son.” Vasily winced as he tried again to straighten his nose. “I don’t care what you do at this point. Just as long as it gets your head back in the game, I’m okay with it. Now go. Get out of here before I pistol-whip you for jeopardizing our safety by coming out in the frame of mind you’re in.”

  “Are you going to be—”

  “Go! I’ve had a broken nose before. I assure you—I’m capable of dealing with it.”

  It wasn’t often shit got to the man, but Maks could see Vasily had had it. He shrugged back into his shirt and left without exchanging a word with the four men lining the hallway outside the interrogation room, one of them a grim-looking Dmitri.

  He was still cursing when he slammed into Rapture thirty minutes later. His muscles were screaming with tension, his groin aching, his head pounding. He wanted a shower, a fuck, and some sleep. In that order. And he planned on having it all. Enough of this bullshit. Abstinence. What the fuck for? So he could be so far in his head about a woman that he’d almost knifed the man who meant the most to him?


  Fuck it.

  After showering in record time, he threw on some sweats—knowing he wasn’t going to be wearing them for long—and stepped into the club. Standing in the shadows, he looked to where his dancers usually lingered around a booth in the corner and met the eyes of four of them before deciding on one. He crooked his finger and felt jack shit in the way of anticipation when her expression brightened and she skipped over. He slipped his arm around her anyway, cupped her ass because it was expected, and disappeared into the back hallway and then his office, closing and locking the door behind them.

  Sydney stood at the end of the bar and felt a chill enter her body. It wasn’t an I-need-a-sweater type of thing. More an I-think-you-should-call-me-an-ambulance. Her heart felt as if it had stopped. That would explain the sensation. No more blood running through her veins.

  She forced herself to turn and face Thing One and saw he was tapping on his phone. Her hand came up to stop him, the appendage feeling numb. “Are y-you texting Maksim?”

  He nodded once. “To tell him we are here.”

  She shook her head and feared she might vomit. “No. I’m suddenly feeling so ill. Please. Can we just go back to the apartment? I shouldn’t have bothered him.”

  She had only because she’d been getting snatches of some damn alarming conversations all day and had thought to come by to make sure everything was okay. She’d been alone since before dinner because they’d agreed that morning that Andrew, even though he’d missed school, could attend the sleepover he’d been pestering her about. She was sure it had only received a pass because the family that was hosting wouldn’t be known to anyone who might be watching them.

  After studying her for a moment, Thing One motioned her to the door without a word and shuffled her back into the SUV. Thing Two didn’t bat an eyelash. He just waited for them to put their seat belts on and drove away from the curb.

  Sydney sat there, alone in the dark backseat of the Explorer, and wondered at the power behind this thing ravaging her. She wanted to cry, vomit, scream. She wanted to unsee what she’d just seen. She wanted to go back these past weeks and not do any of what she’d done. She’d have taken back every smile, every touch, every nice word she’d wasted on the man-whore who was no doubt inside that willowy brunette right now. Loving her with his body. Murmuring dirty things to her while he pleasured her.