Ballistic (A Vigilantes Novel)

by Keri Lake

  “You had a nightmare?”

  “I don’t … I don’t remember anything. I got up to use the bathroom, and … I don’t know what happened.”

  I kept contact with her skin, rubbing my thumb across her forearm. “Think you might’ve blacked out?”

  “If I did, it’s never happened before.”

  Sitting back onto my heel, I hiked up a knee and rested my elbow on it. “You said, they’ll hear you. Who were you talking about?”

  A frown flickered across her face, and she rubbed her forehead. “I have no idea.” She pushed to her feet and ran her hand through her hair. “I’m fine now. Whatever it was.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.” Light tiptoes took her back to the bed, where she scrambled beneath the covers, her face still smacked with confusion.

  Unsure if she wanted physical contact right then, I opted for the chair by the window, where I could watch her.

  The second I plopped down on the seat, she sat up on the bed. “Will you … will you lay with me?”

  The question sounded foreign coming from her, and as if I’d taken a hard fist to the brain, I sat dumbfounded for a moment, staring back at her with no response.

  “Please?”

  Sliding into the bed beside her, I maintained my distance, letting her decide what she wanted from me.

  She turned into my chest, tucking herself close to my body, just like a kitten, and as soon as she’d settled, I smothered her inside my arms.

  Up until that point, our affections toward each other had been an awkward dance of upholding boundaries, but for the first time, it felt easy. Felt like she was truly mine and no one else’s.

  She ran her fingers over the hairs on my chest, her light touch stoking up urges I didn’t need to act on right then, as my mind searched for distraction.

  “So, what do you know about the second guy?”

  “His name is Kenny Robicheaux. A real weasel of a guy. He’s on Tesarik’s payroll.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Collecting debts mostly. But he’s been involved in a couple productions for him, too.”

  “Do we know where he hangs out?”

  “All I know is that he’s a gambler, and he likes his gin. Drinks Jenever, from what I understand.”

  “He’s a gambler?”

  “From what I hear.”

  A face took shape inside my head, one I’d seen frequently at Frank’s bar on Friday night’s, when he’d hold poker tournaments in the back. Ugly, bald bastard, with half his face all scarred up. I hadn’t talked to him much, at all, but if memory served me, his name was Kenny, and he often had a glass of gin in front of him. “Where’d you hear about him?”

  “One of Tesarik’s acquaintances. Because I was permitted to attend parties with him, I also got to mingle with guests.” Her hand glided to my back as she spoke, her fingertips dancing over my skin in little mind-jacking circles that made it fucking impossible to stay focused on her words. “There was one who frequented the parties, a lawyer, named Karl Kutscher. In exchange for giving Karl some information on Tesarik, Karl provided me with some general information on Kenny. He’d apparently defended him in a recent lawsuit ”

  Well, wasn’t that some shit? Karl was the bastard father of my buddy Ty’s girl—the one who’d provided the IP address that’d helped me track down Nicoleta in the first place. Funny how it all came together like that.

  “Weren’t you a cunning little shit?”

  She smiled and kissed my chest over one of my nipples, shooting a healthy dose of blood straight to my dick. “Information is power. The more you gain, the more power you acquire.”

  I cleared my throat, trying to ignore what she was doing to me. How at ease she suddenly seemed, as if our little roofscapade had knocked out some of her inhibitions. “So, I might know how to find this Kenny.”

  “The BDSM club?”

  “No. Better than that. I’ll give my buddy, Frank, a heads up. If he shows up for the weekly poker game, he’ll alert us.”

  “You know Kenny, then?”

  Shaking my head, I stole a moment to let a shiver ripple down my spine while she kept on with her maddening tickles. “Seen him around, is all.”

  “This Frank … can you trust him to call you?” She flicked her tongue over the spot that’d remote controlled my cock, and every muscle in my body stiffened to keep from knocking her onto her back.

  “If he had any idea what that pedophile prick was up to? Hell, yes. Frank has three daughters in high school. The trick will be trying to convince the hothead not to kill the bastard himself.”

  “And what’s the plan, if he does show up?” She guided my hand to her breast, enticing me to play along, and let out a sexy little sigh the second my fingertips hit her nipple.

  “We’ll follow him, and strike when he least expects it.” I held on to the peak and tugged just enough to have her arching against me.

  “Sneak attack. Like a shark,” she breathed, eyes hooded with lust.

  “Or a wolf.” I pretended to bite down on her neck, and I growled against her skin, as she squealed and wriggled against me.

  “Dax?” she said, as I released her throat and kissed the shell of her ear. “Do you think you might want to do what you did on the roof earlier?” The way she bit her lip, eyes shying away from mine, was so fucking cute, I wanted to crush her in my arms.

  “Another round?”

  “Yeah. But here in bed.”

  I rolled over top of her, the bulk of my weight braced on outstretched arms, and lowered to kiss her lips. “Baby, I thought you’d never ask.” With another kiss to her throat, I inched my way down her body, leaving a trail of kisses along the way, until I reached the top of her thighs and hid beneath the sheets.

  28

  Nicoleta

  Dax parked his car along the curb in front of the bar, on which a vintage arrow sign flashed Bottoms Lounge, reminding me of something out of the sixties.

  His buddy had told him to keep an eye out for a beat-up gray Astro van, which just happened to sit in the side parking lot of the bar, directly across from us.

  “How do you know him? The bar owner?” I bit into the coney dog Dax had picked up at a small stand along the way.

  “Worked for the Bojanski’s when I was a kid.” Dax chomped down on an onion ring and took a sip of his Coke. “My buddy, Jase, and I would help rough up people who owed them money.”

  “So, really, you do the same thing Kenny does. Minus raping kids.”

  “Yeah, minus that shit.” Shooting me an unamused glance, his lip curled in disgust. “But it’s checks and balances out here, Nic. The line between good guys and bad guys sometimes gets blurred. I never punched an innocent man, though. I can say that, at least.”

  “I’d say you’re one of the good ones.” I lifted his Coke to take a sip, then stuffed another bite of the coney into my mouth. “How long do we wait?” I asked around an ungracious mouthful of bread and meat.

  He lifted a second hot dog from the bag and glanced over at me. The man ate like a horse, which made sense for his size, if not the chisel of his muscles. “Settle in, kid. These poker games sometimes go well into the morning.”

  “If the guy’s a buddy of yours, why not just go in and drag him out the back door?”

  “Too many eyes and neutral territory. You and I are supposed to be laying low, remember? ‘Sides that, we passed a cop about a block back. Someone calls, it’ll be game over.”

  I licked the sauce from my fingertips, savoring the spice of the mustard I’d squirted it with. “So, when you’re not beating up guys who owe money, or pedophiles who send you dick pics, or climbing abandoned buildings, what do you do? For a job?”

  “I worked for a long time, installing floors.”

  “Floors? Seriously? That’s so … boring.”

  The flex of his jaw and bob of his throat when he swallowed held me rapt for some reason. Distracting.

  “Only job I
ever held that felt legitimate, though. Kinda made me feel normal for a while.”

  “So, you quit it?” Popping the last bite, I crinkled the paper and stuffed it into the bag set on the floor.

  “Just found vigilante work more rewarding—financially and spiritually.”

  I reared back at that. “You make money doing this? How?”

  “People like the idea of someone going after scum. I post a video online?” He shook his head and lifted his Coke for another sip. “People go crazy when they see it. I’ve been offered everything from weekends on a yacht, to rent-free living and marriage proposals.”

  “Marriage? You’re a celebrity, then.” I set my feet up on the dashboard and crossed my arms, thinking how many women would lose their shit if they knew how skilled he was in the sack, too.

  “No. I’m a guy who goes to sleep every night wishing the world wasn’t such a shitty place, sometimes.” Dax eyed my legs before tearing into his next bite. “Problem with playing a victim is, you become acutely aware of how many predators there are. It’s fucking depressing.”

  The mere thought of him stalking those vile men roused the urge to hop in his lap. Over the last couple of days, my cravings for touch had intensified, thanks to whatever he’d done on that roof. Probably altered my brain when I’d climaxed. As though he’d cracked open my nerve endings, leaving them raw, my skin burned for the feel of his hands. “You’re a predator, too, though. An apex.”

  “I am. I like to hunt pussies.”

  I smiled at that, letting my knees fall open and catching another sly glance out the corner of his eye. “What time is it?”

  “Ten o’clock. Games usually go until two, but I’ve been at some that go until about five in the morning.”

  “So, we’re looking at about four, maybe seven, hours in here?”

  “Looks like it.”

  Rubbing my hands over my thighs peeled his gaze from the food in his hands. I watched his jaw flex, thinking back to only hours before, when his face had been between my thighs, and something tugged at my stomach, not unlike those seconds before a pink pill had been set against my tongue. I needed him again. The tremble of withdrawals made me all too aware how quickly my body had replaced one addiction for another. “You know, I’ve never had sex in a ‘Cuda before.”

  He cocked a brow and lowered the hot dog from his mouth, his eyes seemingly hungry for something, too. Always ready to offer a fix. “Is that an invitation?”

  Biting my lip failed to hold back the smile tugging at my mouth. “What if it is?”

  “Then, you need to get your eager little ass in that backseat before I finish eating.”

  “Or what?”

  “You’re going to end up with coney sauce on your tits.”

  There was something deeply erotic about watching Dax in the throes of sex. I felt as if I’d been transported back to the days of Greek gods, ascended into the heavens, as he stared down at me, eyes focused, brow slick with sweat, face rouged in pleasure. No one had ever looked at me so intently during the act before—perhaps because it’d been easier to violate me that way. Small and cramped, the backseat offered little room for his massive body, hunched over me like a steel cage.

  The windows had long since steamed, and the car rocked with every punishing drive of his hips. His muscles contracted and stretched beneath my palms, as I slid them across his back. Slicked by my wetness, his piercing skated over my slippery walls with each withdrawal, and damn near hit my womb with every plunge, always nailing that elusive bundle of nerves with just the right pressure.

  Slowing his thrusts, the piercing massaged the sensitive spot, hitting the button that had me arching into him on a warm rush of blood. I’d already climaxed once and was working myself up to round two. It had little to do with the metal itself, and more to do with Dax simply knowing how to use it. The piercing created the right amount of force, but Dax brought the magic in the way he moved and circled his hips. Smooth and controlled, like that of a male stripper.

  Exhausted and out of breath, I reached up to drag my finger down his temple, gathering the sweat from his skin. The veins in his neck pulsed. His jaw clenched, and I braced myself, clutching the handle of the back passenger door.

  My mother would’ve called us sin in the flesh. She would’ve said we were dirty and depraved, immoral, and inevitably bound for hell.

  As needy as I’d become, I’d almost believe her.

  Dax was gentle at times, and rough when I needed him to be, nothing of which felt evil, or wrong. I knew evil. I’d felt it before.

  No, Dax and I were beautiful together—a messy painting, thrown against a canvas, that somehow came together in perfect balance. Both of us an intersecting dichotomy of good and bad, strong and weak.

  The knot building at my core wound tighter, tugging at my thigh muscles, as I inched closer and closer to the edge. His grunts and heavy breaths punctuated each drive of his hips.

  Fucking me into a stupor.

  I smashed my breasts into his chest, and my eyes rolled back, as the orgasm exploded up my spine into a warm burst that spread to every muscle in my body.

  “Fuck!” Dax cried out, still pumping inside of me, his fingers curled tight through my damp hair.

  I’d never had a lover before, never one who connected on a level that transcended me the way Dax had. I smiled as we climaxed together, our bodies trembling, mine both warm and cold with the exertion. My heartrate slowed, muscles sagged, and I basked in the aftershock of pleasure.

  He rested his sticky forehead against my equally clammy neck and breathed, his wide back expanding between my palms clutched at either side of him.

  As the two of us drifted back down to earth, Dax lifted his head to peer out the window.

  “He’s still there?” I asked between heaving breaths.

  “Still there.”

  “We killed about an hour, at least. One down three to go.”

  He snorted and leaned in to kiss me. “Maybe once the windows defog, we can burn off another hour.”

  I laid my cards down onto the console between us, and smiled when Dax sank down into his seat. “Straight flush.”

  “You have a photographic memory. Pretty sure you cheated somewhere.”

  “Don’t be mad, baby. Pay up,” I held out my palm, flicking my fingers until he set a cigarette there.

  “Where’d you learn to play like that?”

  “One of Dmitry’s guards, Aleksey.” I shoved the cigarette behind my ear, next to the one I’d won in the last round, my thoughts turning somber. Scratching the back of my head, I searched for distraction in a bid to keep my memories from pulling me into the black abyss of imagining how brutal his death must’ve been. “Guy hated losing, so I learned to beat him. Quickly.”

  Dax kicked his arm up onto the back of the seat and tipped his head, lip curved into a half smile. “You don’t back down easily, do you?”

  “No,” I said, gathering up the cards into a stack. “I refuse to let someone win simply because they’re more intimidating.”

  “How did you end up on the drugs? Seems like that would’ve compromised your objective with Tesarik.”

  Gaze locked on shuffling the cards, I schooled my attention, to keep from looking troubled by his question. It was innocent enough, but the answer felt far more complicated. Or maybe I just had a hell of a time trying to explain it. “It’s a long story.”

  “We got time.”

  “Dax … you don’t want to know. Trust me.”

  “It’s easier, right? You see something you can’t unsee.”

  His stare burned in my periphery, yet I still kept my attention on the cards, as his words brought to mind the faces of the women during my captivity, and Eden.

  “Something that just keeps spinning and spinning inside your head, and when you try to make sense of it, you feel your instincts kick in. To reject it, but you can’t. So you pop a pill, and then you don’t have to think anymore. The pill thinks for you. Tells you everything
is going to be okay. All you gotta do, is make sure there’s another pill waiting for you.”

  Only another addict would understand. Only someone who’d been through some insurmountable shit would know that fragile line between morals and goals, and just trying to cope and survive. Every moment with Dax felt like another thread unspooling inside of me and latching onto him. It felt good to be tethered to something, yet I knew, at some point, those strings would snap and I’d find myself drifting again.

  “Is that how it was for you?” I asked, in a desperate attempt to reel in the loose threads.

  “You’re lying if you say it wasn’t that way for you. I didn’t tell you a personal experience. It’s every addict’s story. Only difference between all of us is the single thing that pushes us over the edge. So, what was yours?” He brushed his finger across my neck, where the scar of Villam’s knife answered for me. “What made a determined woman fall into that empty space?”

  A shadow moved in my periphery and I lifted my gaze past Dax, to where a fat, bald man stumbled toward the Astro van. “Leaving.”

  “What?”

  “Kenny. He’s leaving the bar.”

  Dax snapped his head back, and when the van pulled forward onto the main road, he fired up the ‘Cuda. “Must’ve cut the game early.”

  “Did you tell him anything?”

  “Who? Frank? Hell, no. Kenny would’ve been dead and buried the moment he set foot inside that bar, if I had.”

  Which would’ve been the sweetest justice, if not for the fact that I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of watching his face strain against agonizing pain.

  As Dax trailed after the gray van, my heart hammered inside my chest.

  My next act of vengeance would be my worst yet.

  29

  Dax

  Keeping two car lengths behind, I stalked the Astro van through the city and down a dark side street, where the houses bore the telling decay of slowly declining economics. Most neighborhoods in Detroit looked that way—as if they’d stood through war and its depressing aftermath.