by Sadie Jacks
“Wait!” Nik shouted. “Wait. I need to talk to Tali. And only Tali. This is to keep Arkady safe as well.”
Arkady looked at me, one brow raised.
I shrugged. “She’s not an alarmist. If she says that, she means it.”
He studied me for a long moment. Finally nodded. He stuck his fingers in his ears and hummed.
He had a nice voice. Low and gravelly.
“Go, Nik.”
“I’ve pinged the phone. Now that you’ve called twice, I’ve been able to narrow down the sector. But the signal is bouncing all over kingdom come. A general area is still too much for Foster and Mas to cover without a better idea. Is there anyway for you to open a document on the phone? I could deliver a packet. Get a real time location.”
I looked at the phone. “I have no idea. Can you do that without me having the internet or an email system or something?”
“I can. Are you ready?”
“Yes. But hurry. I don’t want to test our luck. Mine has sucked royally the last however many days I’ve been here.”
The line was silent.
I pulled it down, checked the screen. “You still there? Hello? Nik?”
“I-I-I’m here. Sorry, you just took me off guard. Yes. And…sent. Check your phone.”
I pulled it down, checked the screen again. It looked unchanged.
“Is it supposed to be instantaneous?”
“It should have been. I’m routing through the collective. There shouldn’t be any la—”
The phone buzzed. “Got it. Hang on.” Pulling it down to look at the screen one last time, I saw a new notification icon at the top. I tapped on it. “It says I need a password.”
“Girls’ night. All one word, no apostrophe,” Nik said immediately.
I smiled as I typed it in. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“I love you, three,” Jessa added.
“And I love you all, four!” Willow shouted. “Tali, you better stay alive. I won’t have you dying on me, you hearing me?”
“I hear you, Chase.”
“Good.”
“Tali, look at the screen. What does it show you?” Nik said.
Looking at the screen, I read off the series of numbers and letters. “Is that what you meant?”
“Nailed it in one, babe. Thanks. I’ll get this to Foster. See if we can see what’s really going on here. You good?”
I felt the tears prick my eyes, but I swallowed them down. “I’m good for now. I’ve got to sign off. Ark is looking like he’s about to have a heart attack.”
With the chorus of ‘love you’ and ‘goodbyes’ all finished, I ended the call and powered it off. I tapped Arkady on the shoulder.
He pulled his fingers from his ears. “All good?”
I smiled as he repeated Nik’s words. “For now.” I winced as I moved. “My body is making her displeasure known, that’s for damn sure.”
He nodded. “I have no doubt about that. You look a little like a kaleidoscope. A beautiful one, but too colorful all the same.”
I smiled. “Thanks.”
We sat there in silence for a long moment.
It got awkward.
“Well, I’ll call my guy. Tell him to bring down some ice packs and water.” Arkady stood, took his phone from his pocket.
“What’s really going on here with you, Arkady?” I asked softly.
He looked at me. “I’m a member of the wrong family, Talia.”
I shook my head. “No. You’re not. I know Family men. I have no doubt that you’re a made man, but you don’t believe in what these men do. You don’t act like they do. You don’t follow orders very well. What’s really going on?” I couldn’t believe the questions that just came out of my mouth. But I wasn’t willing to take them back.
I sat there and watched him. Watched him watch me. He was debating with himself. I could almost see the gears grinding in his head.
I also saw the moment he decided to keep his silence. “Just be happy that I’m not like them, princess. Keep your nose out of my business, and we’ll both get out of here alive.” With that, he paced to the far side of the room. All of eight feet away.
He stabbed at his phone, lifted it to his ear. After a quick conversation in Russian, he lowered the phone. “My man will be here in ten minutes.”
I nodded. “I promise I won’t ask you anymore questions like that. You can sit back down.” I patted the mattress beside me.
He shook his head. “I can’t afford to get any closer to you, kitten. You’re bad for both of us.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets, leaned back. One knee bent with the foot flat against the wall.
My lips quirked. “Afraid of me?” Considering how much my face hurt, I could only imagine what it looked like. If he still thought I was desirable like this, then maybe I didn’t want to have him get any closer.
“No.” He shook his head but didn’t elaborate.
I nodded. “Okay. Then tell me about yourself.” I wiggled on the mattress, trying to find a more comfortable spot.
“My name is Arkady. I’m a high-level enforcer for the Night Terrors. That’s all you get to know. I’m not sharing information on them, Talia. Not to you. Not to your family.”
The way his tone faded at the end of his sentence made me think there was something else to that statement. “But you are sharing the information with someone.”
He was across the room so fast, I could hardly believe it. His hand wrapped around my neck and squeezed. Using his wrist as a platform, he lifted my chin so I was forced to look up into his eyes. “Say something like that again, and I’ll kill you myself. Do you understand me?”
I searched his gaze. Saw the truth. I also saw that it wasn’t because he wanted to kill me. He would do it, but he wouldn’t enjoy it.
I nodded. “I promise.” I forced the words out.
He dropped my throat but didn’t step back. His fingers trailed over the exposed inner angles of my collar bones. “Your skin is so fucking soft. How is it this soft? You’ve just been beaten. You shouldn’t be this soft.”
His voice held an edge of mystery, of disbelief.
I held myself very still. I didn’t know what made this man tick, but I could certainly feel that he made my ticker thump and spin. That it was ridiculously bad timing, that he was one of my jailers, one of the men supposed to torment me didn’t escape my attention or notice either. But something about him…
He bent at the waist. Pulled up my chin with ease. From inches away, he studied me. Read every reaction my body had to give. I felt exposed. But seen. Only one other person had made me feel that way. Well, one other man. My girl squad saw me. But not like this.
Lowering his head by degrees, I felt the brush of his breath on my cheek.
My eyelids fell to half mast of their own volition.
He slid his free hand over my cheek, weightless as a shadow. But the heat. The heat seduced me.
“I want to devour you.” His voice was as light as his touch. “Strip you bare. Feast my eyes and hands on your body. The scent of your sex drenching my senses as I slowly eat your pussy.”
My lower body clenched.
“The first time I make you cum will make you whimper. The second time will make you scream. The third time, my name will be the last thing on your mind before the darkness takes you.”
My mouth tipped up at the corner. “You think so?”
He pressed his nose to mine. “I know so. Lay down. Take your pants off.” His golden eyes glittered in the low lighting. The stark cast to his features had zings and chills rippling through my body. My mind. My pussy.
“I could kill them for hurting your mouth. I’ve had fantasies about your mouth. Wrapped around my dick. Your lips spread wide as I fuck it.” He pinched my chin. “Are you going to let me taste you?”
I nodded. Caught up in the web he spun with ease. Leaning back, I raised my hips. Let him pull the bottoms off my body.
He groaned as my leg
s came into view. With a rough push of his hands, he spread my legs wide. “You’re so fucking pretty.”
He wasn’t looking at my face.
Sliding a hand down the middle of my body, I winced as I hit a couple sore spots. They could go suck it. I was about to hit nirvana while in the middle of hell.
My fingers slid over the rise of my pubic bone. Dipped down and into the flesh he hadn’t stopped staring at. As I danced my fingers over my sex, I watched as he fisted his hand over his jean-clad dick.
I licked my lips. If what he was packing was even remotely as big as it looked, he would give me that sweet stretching feeling as he pounded into me. I couldn’t wait.
He moved from the bed next to me down onto the floor. His knees pulled up under the frame as if he were about to start his prayers. With a tight grip on my unbruised hip, he turned me until I was the altar at which he paid devotion.
“Pull your knees up. Put your feet on the edge of the frame. I want you open. I want to see all of you.”
I tried to do what he said. Tried to get my body to participate. But in the confined space, I wasn’t in any shape to make that happen. Not without some kind of stabilizing force to help me.
With a snarl, he jerked up. Grabbing the pile of blankets, he pulled me forward gently. Shoved the blankets behind my back.
“Up. Up,” he said as he sank back down to his heels.
Pulling my knees up to my chest, I let him direct where he wanted my feet to go. A good foot on either side of his shoulders, apparently.
“I want you to touch your cunt again. Spread the lips wide.”
Even as heat rushed over my cheeks and misted my body, I did what he wanted. He was sexy in his dominance. Much like someone else I knew. I shook my head, tried to keep that other face from invading my mind.
All thoughts but the man in front of me faded as Ark lowered his head. His eyes flicked up to watch me as he ran his tongue from bottom to top. Somewhere in the middle, he stiffened his tongue and slid it inside my opening a couple times.
My head tried to tip back as pleasure washed over my senses. All the parts and pieces of me that were in pain were suddenly awash in endorphins and dopamine.
He bit my clit gently, a low rumble of noise coming from his throat. “Don’t look away from me, princess. I want you to watch me devour you.”
Looking down the length of my bruised body, images and flashes of nightmares covered my mind like fog.
“Stay with me, Talia Maria. I’m Arkady. Not them. If you want me to stop, simply say it and I will. As much as I want to consume you, I will not torture your mind to satisfy my own needs.” He blew out a breath over the flesh he’d just licked and suckled.
I nodded, blew out a breath. Pushing the horrors from my mind, I wouldn’t let them ruin sex for me. Ever. I was in control of who I made love with. Foster’s face flashed in my mind like an atom bomb.
My brain stuttered and stalled.
Made love?
I didn’t make love. And purposefully. It was always sex. Always a transaction. No feelings to get in the way of a biological necessity.
Arkady sighed, nodded. “You have changed your mind.” He eased back. Closed my legs.
“No. Wait.” I reached for him. Wanted to explain. To tell him to keep going.
He pushed back, out of reach. “I think we are not destined for each other.” A sad smile pulled on his mouth. “But that’s okay. I’ll still help you get out of here.”
How was I this confused? I’d turned down sex before. This hadn’t been one of those times, though. I’d wanted it. Wanted it with him.
But it wasn’t his face I saw in my mind as he licked his tongue through my core. It was a different color of eyes. A darker set of brows.
“I-I-I-I…” my words trailed off as I shook my head.
He smiled again. Got to his feet. With my sweat suit bottoms in his hands, he threaded my legs into the pants. Helped me sit up so I could pull them up the rest of the way.
He grabbed my chin in a gentle hold. Waited for me to look at him. “But you see another’s face. Feel their breath on your skin. See your heart in their eyes.” He nodded. “Temporary escape will make it harder to look him in the eye. You don’t deserve that kind of shame or guilt.”
A distinctive knock pattern thumped against the door.
Arkady smiled, delight dancing in his eyes. “And we are both saved by ice packs.”
Chapter 25 – Foster
Bzzt.
I sat up, gun in hand, as I cleared the room. Blinking the sleep from my eyes, I finally realized it was my phone.
Bzzt.
Grabbing up the vibrating monster, I flicked it open. Not even bothering to check the ID. “Da?” Yes?
“Oh man, I totally should have run a translator program to talk to you in Russian,” Nik said, a pouty sigh in her voice.
I smiled. Dropping the gun to the mattress, I scrubbed a hand down my face. “There’s always next time. What have you got for me?”
“Tali called again.”
My entire body went into hyperalert. “She’s okay?”
“We’ve got her exact location. Encrypted data packet. The whole shebang. Bad news? They are in the middle of some kind of underground tunnel system? Not quite the metro that everyone uses. My research shows that there’s a secondary system. Is that right?.”
“Yeah. Fuck.” The word was more breath than sound.
“Exactly. However, Ryker has a plane headed to you with six guys. Turo and Momma rallied some of the German family members. They are delivering a full medical kit and enough firepower to sink said metro system. Oh, and Mas is on his way to you as well.”
I nodded, finally. Something going our way. “ETA?”
“Less than six hours now. You’ll need to pick them up from the Moscow airport, but their documents are good. There shouldn’t be any trouble that way.”
“What about Talia? Is she okay?”
Nik was silent.
I felt my body freeze up. “Nik. Is Talia okay?”
“She’s been beaten and raped. And, from what I could gather of the conversations, by more than one person for both abuses. But she’s mobile right now. She’s in pain, but she’s still Tali.”
Fire ate at my insides. They’d raped and beaten her? I shouldn’t be surprised. Not really. But the level of sheer hatred that filled me to overflowing was a little out of left field.
I mean, I knew I wanted to smother her with a pillow sometimes. But never actually hurt her. She was…
Memories danced in front of my eyes, slid through my body. Her smile that made my heart stop. The sass that made my dick hard. The cute nose that wrinkled when she wanted to deck me with a sledgehammer.
She was everything. My everything. I fell back on the bed, speechless, a little sick to my stomach, and full of righteous indignation that they would think to hurt my woman. That they thought they could get away with it.
“FOSTER!” Nik yelled in my ear.
I shook my head. “Sorry. What did you say?”
“Get your head out of her lady parts and listen. What was the last thing you heard?”
“She’s in pain, but she’s still Talia,” I repeated instantly.
Nik blew out a whistle. “Damn, man. Where did your head go?”
I opened my mouth. Shut it before I could say anything. I’d get so much shit for declaring my feelings.
“Never mind. You don’t have enough time to explain it anyway. Tali and Arkady think—"
“Who the fuck is Arkady?” I jerked upright on the bed. Every single muscle in my body was ready to fight. To defend. To kill.
“The guy helping her. You really haven’t been paying attention. They think she has a bruised kidney. According to the conversation they had with Jessa, Talia is going to need some kind of imaging diagnostic soon. If Tali has a lacerated or torn kidney, she could die pretty quickly. Jessa didn’t share that bit with them. Said something about the symptoms they both described not making
it a high probability, but the possibility needs to be crossed off the list before Tali can fly back home.”
I nodded, worked to stuff all the machoism back down where it would help fuel me to find her. Not get in my way. “Get her to an imaging specialist. Check. I can make that happen. What other news?”
“I reached out to the collective. Two of them are from the Eastern Bloc. They have some contacts in Sweden. One of them thinks they might have a lead on a person who was in Stockholm at the time. Apparently a family friend’s uncle or brother or cousin was a policeman. The brother/cousin/uncle had his beat on the same block as the brothel. They’re trying to hunt him down now.”
“Thank fuck. Did you find anything on Karine Petrova?”
Nik sighed. “She’s a ghost. All I have are her pristine records. And I’m talking pristine. She even has a couple brushes with the local law enforcement. A bad check on file from her youthful indiscretion days. Her legal stuff, if it’s a legend or a sleeve, are impeccable. I haven’t seen anything this flawless since Antonia de Silva’s data records.”
“Is there a link there? Some kind of connection?” I asked. It wouldn’t surprise me to know that Karine and Antonia had been in league together at some point.
“I can certainl…” Nik’s voice trailed off. “For fuck’s sake! That’s it!”
The steady clicking of keys filled the line. I’d worked with Nik enough not to bother her when she started on a new line of information.
“Turo. You there?”
“I’m here, Ambright. Whatever you did to my woman, it better not be permanent.” He wasn’t altogether joking.
“I hope not either. What else do you have?”
“That’s about it. Whatever rabbit trail you sent Cricket on is going to be the newest stuff. And since she’s cursing at her computer, I’m guessing it’s going to be big. What have you learned?”
“My contacts are all terrified of the Night Terrors. Not quite Soviet, not quite bratva, they operate on their own code. And that code seems to be based on their emotional state at any given time. Fuckers of the highest order. These monsters have raped and killed babies—shared their kills on some kind of black market, deep web chat rooms. Heavy into sex trafficking. They’re end users, not suppliers. But the name of their particular game is keeping the family name feared. In whatever way is possible. Not even necessary. They like going over and above expectations in horror.”