Nix. (Den of Mercenaries Book 3)

by London Miller

  Despite her progress with Kit, she still wasn’t satisfied with where she was. Breaking out of his hold had become easier, though she had yet to be able to do it on the first try. Assembling and shooting a gun was by far the one thing she had almost mastered.

  But knives?

  She sucked.

  Kit made it look so easy when he had his blades by the handles, showing her how best to hold it before he launched it across the room, embedding the metal in its target.

  Whenever she did it, either she would hit the target with the handle and her weapon clattered to the ground.—and if she was able to hit her target, the blade only stuck for a second before it too was hitting the floor.

  But practice made perfect, so here she was.

  Dragging the case from its resting place against the wall, she lifted it onto the table, flipped the locks and pulled it open, revealing the gleaming set of throwing knives inside.

  Picking up the first, she eyed her target, counting each ring as she centered her thoughts. She could do this.

  After watching Kit do it more than a hundred times, she was sure she could manage at least one.

  On her next inhalation, she turned the blade round in her hands. As she exhaled, she cast her arm forward, sending the knife flying end over end. She was almost sure she would make it … until the handle slammed into the target and the knife dropped like dead weight.

  Luna was about to pick up another when a notepad slammed down onto the table beside her, the hand it had been thrown out of scarred and tan, belonging to the last person she was expecting to see.

  Tăcut.

  She was sure he didn’t mean to look as annoyed as he did, at least that was what she hoped.

  Unlike the other three members of the Wild Bunch, Tăcut’s head was shaved close to the scalp which only seemed to emphasize the cut of his jaw and cheekbones.

  And since his expression always remained somewhere between annoyed and disinterested, it only served to make him look more fearsome.

  With a sharpie, he scrawled one word on the paper before pointing from it to her.

  “Wrong,” Luna said aloud. “Are you saying I’m doing it wrong? This is the way Ki—Nix showed me.”

  He shrugged, as if to say still wrong.

  Before she could question him, he plucked one of he knives free, and faster than she could keep up with, he launched it across the room. But his didn’t fly end over end, rather straight like an arrow until he hit his mark.

  No tricks, he wrote, just precision.

  “I’m not trying to do any tricks,” she grumbled as she glared at the paper—easier than glaring at him—picking up another blade. “This may be easy for you, but it’s hard for me.”

  Luna wasn’t understanding what she was missing.

  Tăcut did make it look easy, but so did Kit, and she was sure the others could do the same thing should they need to.

  He scribbled another word.

  Watch.

  Taking his advice, she studied his every move, silently appreciating the slowness in which he moved, allowing her to study exactly what he did.

  He didn’t hold it by the handle for one, but rather held it blade first, with little care that he would cut himself despite how sharp she knew they were. And when he threw it, as the blade left his hand, his arm was straight.

  Easy enough.

  At least until she tried again, only managing to nick her hand, and hers landed on her growing pile on the floor.

  Tăcut tapped his fingers against the table, seeming at a loss for words as he tried to understand what wasn’t working. After a moment, he tore off the written on sheet, crumbling it into a ball as he tossed it over his shoulder. On the new sheet, he wrote something else.

  Who do you hate?

  She thought he would know that answer, but then thought better of it because how would he know? It wasn’t as though she spoke to him beyond casual greetings. Of course, Kit could have told him, but Luna didn’t have a chance to think on the possibility before he was tapping the page again.

  “A man named Lawrence.”

  Nodding once, he started around the table, traveling to the other end of the room where the targets were. Still holding that black marker, he scrawled something on the paper, but his body blocked her view.

  It wasn’t until he took a step away did she finally see what he wrote.

  There was now a speech bubble to the right of the target’s mouth, and inside were three words.

  I am Lawrence.

  He had even gone as far as to include little horns sprouting from its head.

  Had Tăcut not looked so serious, she might have laughed.

  Once he was next to her again, he wrote, kill him.

  She looked from him to the target, palming another knife. This time when she threw, she put as much strength behind it as she could.

  It didn’t hit the target, or even close to any of the circles, but it did stick, and when it didn’t immediately drop, she smiled.

  Progress.

  Luna looked over at Tăcut. She didn’t know what she was expecting—a smile, maybe, or even a nod of acknowledgment, but he offered neither.

  Instead, he handed her another knife with a nod of his head back to the target.

  Practice wasn’t over.

  Chapter Eleven

  Luna wasn’t sure when it happened, but she couldn’t ignore the fact that she was now very much aware of Kit. Not because he was constantly around—rather she started to notice more about him other than the fact that he was the brother of the man that bought her freedom.

  She noticed the way his smile started in one corner of his mouth until spreading across his face—or even how his eyes crinkled when he did.

  And as days and weeks passed her by, she thought less and less of where she had been, and more about the man she was currently under the care of.

  Luna was careful not to change her behavior around him, though she sometimes realized too late that she was staring.

  Worse, he always caught her.

  But, thankfully, he had never called her on it—though she was sure there were a few times that she saw a hint of a smile on his face.

  “What are thinking about?” Fang asked, interrupting her thoughts.

  Though he was usually off with Aidra or doing something for Kit, today he was with her for training.

  Luna had long since stopped questioning who would be training her on what day. For the most part, it was Kit who spent more hours than he didn’t with her whether in the gym, target practice, or whatever else he could think of.

  Maybe that was another reason why she couldn’t stop thinking about him—he was always there.

  “Nothing,” she answered, pushing herself up to a sitting position, wiping sweat off her forehead.

  Though he was the friendliest, he seemed determined to work her to death inside the gym. Physical exercise seemed to be his favorite as he moved her from a treadmill, to pushups, just before he had her propped on her side, keeping her body parallel to the ground.

  “Don’t worry,” Fang said popping to his feet. “Boss will be back tonight.”

  “I wasn’t—” Luna was quick to deny, but Fang raised a hand at her.

  “Aidra gets that look on her face when she thinks of me.”

  “And what look is that, exactly?”

  He cleared his throat, the corner of his lips tugging as though he were fighting a smile. “Usually when we’re about to fuck.”

  “No!” Luna said a little too loudly. “That wasn’t what I was thinking about at all.”

  Even if she had, she wouldn’t be thinking about that around Fang. Especially around Fang—of the four, he seemed to be the most blunt when he spoke.

  Since the other three weren’t as open, it was all the more clear that they avoided certain topics with her—they were being considerate of her traumas. She had been thankful at first, then she had wanted them to treat her as they would anyone else.

  Fang was the first t
o comply though she learned all too quickly that it may not have been her best idea. It seemed his goal was to make her blush.

  And usually, he accomplished that.

  “Bit rude, no?” Fang asked as he tossed a towel over his shoulder. “Here I am putting in all the work and you’re thinking about another man.”

  “By work, you mean making me hate your existence?”

  She had spent the last two hours down in this basement working out with him and he took it entirely too serious. By morning, every muscle in her body was going to be sore.

  Fang scoffed. “I’ve been going easy on you.”

  “This is what you consider easy?”

  “Of course—right now I’m not trying to kill you. This is the easiest you’ll ever have it.”

  Sometimes, Fang had a habit of getting serious when she least expected it—like whatever switch inside of him that kept that smile on his face turned off for a moment. Not for the first time, she wondered about him—about the others as well.

  They were all so close, the four of them, yet they all seemed just a little bit broken.

  As quickly as she thought the mood had sobered, Fang was smiling again. “Unless you ask Aidra—I think her answer would be different.”

  “I think I’ll pass.”

  He laughed in good humor, then motioned for her to resume her earlier position.

  After another hour of squats, weights, and overall sweat-inducing activities, he finally deemed their work done and let her go. Now, the only thing she wanted was a shower and a bed.

  Chapter Twelve

  Everything had changed.

  Not that Kit was complaining.

  From the moment she had invited herself up to his room, she made a regular habit of it, and he found that he rather enjoyed showing her how good it could be.

  He was fucking insatiable for her—to the point that even when he was in the middle of business, his thoughts still drifted to her and the nights they spent together.

  Before, he had been able to come and go with little problem. Now, he was finding it harder and harder to leave her.

  The crescent moon hung heavy in the night sky when Kit ventured from his bedroom in the wee hours of the night for the basement where his pool was located.

  There were trios of lights that were inlaid within the pool, but he rather liked the dark stillness, almost like he was willingly falling into the abyss.

  The pool, itself, was a rather cavernous affair, one that he had spent a fortune getting installed, but he hadn’t minded the expense considering how much time he spent down here.

  Circling around to one end, Kit tossed his shirt aside and dove in, drawing in a breath before the heated water engulfed him.

  From one end to the next and back once more, he pushed himself as he always did when his thoughts were cluttered, pushing himself to exhaustion, if only until the chaos in his head quieted.

  But as he reached the end, his feet landing on the wall before pushing himself off again, Kit just caught sight of Luna at the edge of his vision as she came down and ventured over to one of the poolside chairs.

  “That was thirty-two, I think,” she said once he finally came to a stop, that silky brown hair of hers spilling over her shoulder as she leaned toward him. “Pretty good.”

  “It was nothing.”

  “Maybe for you, but since I don’t know how to swim, anything more than one is impressive to me.”

  His head tilted to one side, he brushed water out of his eyes as he asked, “You don’t know how to swim?”

  “I could say that I never got the chance, but I’ve never been thrilled about swimming in water where I can’t touch the floor with my feet.”

  Kit laughed. “Would you like to learn?”

  “I’m not really dressed for it,” she said with a wave of her hand down to the clothes she wore, or what little there was.

  There was a natural sensuality to her—the way she held herself, and the curves he doubted he would ever get tired of—because he was sure there was nothing about her sleepwear that should have held his attention for as long as they did.

  It was the woman inside them.

  “You can always take that off.”

  Her lips parted in surprise, her gaze shooting over to the staircase that led up to the main house.

  “Don’t worry,” he said, “no one is going to come down here.”

  Fang was undoubtedly busy with Aidra, and the others were gone into the city to do whatever they pleased.

  With careful fingers, Luna tugged at the strings of her shorts until they were loosened enough that she could slide them down her legs before letting them fall at her feet. The top was next, the material pulled over her head in one fluid move and dropped.

  Dragging his gaze up, he took his time as he followed the curves of her hips, the indent at her waist, and high breasts he was already picturing without the sports bra she wore.

  “The water is heated,” he told her as he gestured for her to climb in.

  But she didn’t dive in, instead sat at the edge before dipping her toes in. “I’m not jumping into anything where I can’t see the bottom.”

  Fair enough.

  Kit almost smiled as she gingerly lowered herself into the water, hesitant until she realized her feet could touch the floor.

  “Why do you have the lights off?” she asked coming over to him, not realizing that with each step she took forward, he took one back until they ventured further into the deeper end of the pool.

  “I think better in darkness.”

  Realizing what he was doing, she reached for him, hands curling around his shoulders as she latched on, preventing him from moving further. “Right, cause that doesn’t sound ominous at all. But, ya know, whatever works.”

  “I won’t let you drown,” he reassured as he drew her in, encouraging her to wrap her legs around his waist.

  Luna’s smile was shy, her gaze dropping as she tucked the now wet strands of her hair behind her ear. “I thought you were teaching me how to swim?”

  “We’re getting to that.”

  When they were only a few steps from where the pool’s floor gave way, he pulled away, albeit reluctantly.

  “It’s all about balance,” he said as he kept one hand at her waist, the other underneath her legs as he kept her afloat.

  Luna’s laugh was strained. “Mind over matter then?”

  “You’re too tense.”

  “I can’t float.”

  “I’m right here,” he reminded her. “You have nothing to worry about. Now, close your eyes and try to let your thoughts go blank.”

  There was uncertainty in her eyes as she looked up at him, dark lashes spiked by the water. She told him everything with that look. Her fear. Her trust.

  He didn’t want to break it.

  Gradually, as she began to relax, he was able to slowly draw his hands away. It only took a few seconds for her to lose her balance, bobbing in the water as she tried to catch her footing.

  “You can’t just trust me,” he said with a slight smile. “You have to trust yourself.”

  She waded back over to him, plump lips parting as she said, “Let’s try again.”

  All she needed was a little push—incentive.

  During their first training session, he had thought she would balk, and she did, but he hadn’t expected her to return as soon as she did.

  Kit had been ready to give her a few days, let her work through the demons she battled, but only a couple of hours had passed before he felt her behind him.

  She didn’t apologize.

  She didn’t make excuses.

  She faced him with her head held high and said what he hadn’t expected.

  Don’t go easy on me.

  Maybe it was then that Kit really saw her—saw the potential of who she could be if given the chance.

  The attraction wasn’t immediate—at least not in a way that would have made him act on it. She was a beautiful girl, but there was no ignoring t
he trauma she had suffered.

  Kit didn’t particularly like broken things—especially not broken people.

  It was too easy to break them further beyond repair.

  He valued strength above all else.

  Working for the Lotus Society for as long as he had, he’d seen the varying levels of brokenness in people—that will to live slowly disappearing as the future seemed bleak. They gave up without a fight just because the possibility of winning was so slim.

  It was during those moments that Kit usually put them out of their misery.

  He had anticipated that brokenness in Luna, waiting for the moment when she folded, giving in to what had been done to her.

  But she hadn’t.

  If anything, she held her head higher.

  And it fucking thrilled him.

  “I have a question if you don’t mind answering,” she said moving back to his side, allowing him to lift her once more.

  “Ask.”

  “Did you ever have anyone special, Kit?”

  The question caught him off guard. Of all the things he thought she would ask, that was at the bottom of the list.

  “Not anyone worth remembering.”

  Not anyone quite like her.

  His world was dangerous, more so than anyone realized. It wasn’t because of his former life as an assassin, or even his new work as the Facilitator, but the fact that his last name was Runehart was enough to put a target on his back.

  There had been plenty of women over the years, most one-night stands when he was in the mood. None had been worth more than that.

  Luna, however … he wasn’t sure when she had crawled beneath his skin. In the beginning, he had tried to deny what he felt. There were other beautiful women in the world—he didn’t need to fixate on her.

  But none of them had that charming dimple in their left cheek when they smiled.

  Or played with their hair when they were nervous.

  Even the way her nose scrunched up when she was confused made him smile.

  Kit could think of a million reasons why she was different and why he wanted her, but none that would keep him away from her.

  The night she had come to him, willingly and of her own accord, he had stopped fighting the draw, gave himself over to it.