by S. Ann Cole
Which was why when I saw him enter our house that night, I’d thought for sure he was coming to save us—save me.
Silly of me to still believe in him even after he murdered my family, huh?
But with all that, the comfortable cloak of safety didn’t dissipate.
Whenever that man was around, I felt invincible, I forgot everything. My task, my reason, and all I thought about was kissing his face off.
Not even when he was choking me back in the garden was I afraid. Something was there between us. I just didn’t know what it was yet.
Nonetheless, with the plans I had in mind at the moment, I would never get to know.
I needed my freedom more than I needed…Chad.
On the fifth floor, the doors pinged open and Chad stepped out of the elevator in that quiet, panther-like grace of his. Then, like smoke, he was gone.
I hit my floor number and the doors shut me in.
Who the hell did he know in this building? And what was he empty-handedly delivering at this ungodly hour of the night?
Three more floors up, the doors pinged open and spat me out. Retrieving my keys, I hurried into my room and immediately began stripping while hopping it to the bathroom.
After having the fastest shower in the history of showers, I grabbed a towel and made a beeline to the walk-in closet. Once toweled dry, I threw on some black, pencil jeans, a tight, black, sleeveless T-shirt, black biker jacket, and black combat boots.
With one drag, I pulled out my hair tie, brushed my long black mane, and redid my ponytail, tighter and lower.
Locating the security safe in the back of my closet, I punched in the code, retrieved my Colt .25, and fixed it in the built-in ankle holster in my combat boots. Then I got my throw knives holder belt and looped it around my waist. It resembled a normal belt, except it had hidden slots on the inner side housing throw knives. Grabbing my to-go messenger bag with all the necessary weapons, I slung it across my shoulders, turned off all the lights in the house, went over to my living room window, and waited.
From this window, I had a view from the entry gate to the guests’ parking area. Fifteen minutes crept by before I finally saw him, walking leisurely to his black R8. The tail lights flashed as if he hit the unlock button on his car key. When he got to the driver’s side and opened the door, his head turned as slowly as the revolving earth, then tilted as he looked right up at the exact window I was at.
I almost jumped back, but belatedly remembered all my lights were off. Of course, he could see absolutely nothing.
Sonuvabitch liar. He knew precisely which apartment was mine, which meant he’d known all along I lived at The Chess.
Fucking hell, the person he knew on the fifth floor must be another spy. The asshole had a fucking spy here! Did he spy on all his dancers?
Shit. The longer I took to get this over with, the sooner he’d discover the truth.
If I hadn’t gotten most of my senses fucked out of me under the maple tree earlier, I would’ve thought it better to wait at this window with my rifle and snipe him.
As he dipped his head and folded into his car, I realized how sloppy and inept I’d gotten since I came to San Fran and saw him again for the first time in twelve years. Then when I finally got close to him, with tons of opportunity, his touch, his kiss, had obliterated everything I’d ever learned in training, having me thinking like a smitten teenager instead of an assassin.
The easy kill I could have gotten at this window was gone.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
As his car began reversing out of the lot, I snapped out of it and beat feet out of the apartment, taking the stairs instead of the elevator so I wouldn’t be too far behind.
In the residents’ parking lot, I fished for my bike keys from my messenger bag and mounted my matt black Kawasaki Ninja, jerked on my helmet and roared the thing to life.
Chad knew my car, but not my bike. Plus he’d be more suspicious of a car tailing him than a biker speeding ahead of him.
Waiting until I knew he’d driven a decent distance from the complex, I sped out behind him. I should have sped out sooner, because Chad’s R8 was eating up the miles like he was auditioning for Fast & the Furious. I wasn’t expecting him to be driving this ferociously fast. If I hadn’t been the only other person behind him in the dead of the night, I’d think he was racing someone. Seriously, the guy was driving like he played way too much Need for Speed video games.
Lucky for me, with his kind of madcap driving, I didn’t have to speed ahead and keep circling to avoid suspicions. All I had to do was ride at moderate speed and keep up.
Decelerating, I let him race with himself and lead the way.
The R8 hot-wheeled the quiet streets for a good eight minutes before I realized he was heading to Excelsior instead of Russian Hill. More errands or delivery? Who got this busy in the middle of the night? Unless he was up to something. On to someone.
I followed at a safe distance.
When he turned onto Mission Street, the R8 started to slow down. Figuring his destination was somewhere on this street, I gunned it, zinged past the R8, and broke through a red light like any other cocky biker. To kill time, I rode around for a few minutes, circled onto Ruth Street, zoomed past Dragon House and was back on Mission Street.
Chad’s R8 was parked along the curb of a rundown 24-hour fast-food restaurant that was squeezed between a closed liquor store and a vacant store which had all kinds of spray can graffiti, chipped paint and smashed-out windows. The fast-food restaurant was the only place alive on the street.
Parking a couple blocks from the R8, I hopped off the bike, hooked my helmet on the right handle, and furtively shadowed up the blocks to the crappy fast-food joint.
Slipping behind a white Volkswagen delivery van on the opposite side of the street, I peeked over a rear-view mirror and scanned inside the restaurant through the scratchy plexiglas window marked Hugh’s 24hr Jerk Joint in fading red letters.
Chad, now wearing a black ball cap, stood at the order counter talking to a dark-skinned man with shoulder-length locks on the other side of the counter.
Edging from behind the Volkswagen, I ducked my head and sidled diagonally across the street to the vacant store instead of the restaurant. Once there, I leaned against the column separating the store from the restaurant and subtly ease sideward until I gained clearer view into the restaurant.
Chad was still at the counter, so I scanned the rest of the dingy place. The only other customers inside were a young couple who seemed no older than eighteen, who were both completely oblivious to everything around them as they sucked face, all arms and legs tangled around each other on a single chair they shared.
My eyes jumped back to Chad and the man over the counter, who seemed to be the owner, was laughing at something Chad said, slapping his palm to the counter as if he’d just heard the sweetest joke.
Chad shoved a wad of cash across the surface, which I was pretty damn sure was a lot more than what anything on the menu board cost, yet the man rang the wad of bills into the cash register like it was just another sale. Right.
While he did that, Chad walked off to the left of the restaurant and turned down a narrow, dimly lit corner which had a chipped blue sign that read “Restrooms”.
Taking the opportunity of catching him vulnerable with his pants down and his dick in his hand, literally, I pushed off the column and barged into the restaurant, catching the low beat of Bob Marley’s Waiting in Vain streaming through the speakers.
The man behind the counter glanced up, and his face split into a customer service smile.
“Empress—” he started to greet, but with a grim expression, I pointed to the menu board and held up three fingers to indicate I needed the number three combo—whatever the hell it was.
Dipping into my front pocket, I took out a fifty and slapped it on the countertop, then pointed in the direction of the restrooms to let him know I’d be back.
The man smirked at my non-ve
rbal communication, but nodded nevertheless and went about cashing my order.
I slipped around the ridiculously narrow hallway, while reaching into my messenger bag. The dim light flickered at three-second intervals, and I glanced up and noticed the socket was broken, a naked bulb hanging precariously from a tangle of electrical wires.
Taking hold of my Bersa, I made small, quiet steps to the men’s door on the right of the hallway, directly opposite the women’s on the left.
Using my booted foot to quietly ease the door open, I slowly, steadily raised my gun. But before I could even press a foot inside, I heard the telltale creak of a hammer cocking, as something hard pressed against the back of my head.
Shit.
“Our fuck in the garden really didn’t mean anything to you, did it?”
My body stiffened, froze, and on the inside shivers raced through me like I had a serious case of ague.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Beating the craven bitch inside me into submission, I remained still, gun still aiming at…nobody. Nobody. Because nobody was in the fucking men’s room.
The women’s restroom, that’s where he’d been all along.
Waiting for me.
This was Chadrick Niiveux! How could I have been such a bonehead?
The hard mouth of his gun moved from the back of my head, and relocated at my temple. Then his chest was—unnecessarily—pressing into my back. Not just his chest, but his fucking hard-on.
Seriously? At a time like this he was sporting a fucking hard-on?
Running his free hand down the length of my outstretched arm, he pried the gun from me. I didn’t fight. I let him have it, while struggling to ignore the rigidity of his erection as he shifted a little to tuck my gun in his waist.
“You need to consider a different career path, Blood,” he breathed down my neck, his breath hot and strong with the scent of peppermint. “Assassination is not your strong suit.”
His free hand smoothed down my side now, and tried as I did to not react to his touch, I couldn’t prevent the sharp hitch of my breath. I shouldn’t be turned on by his hands on me, because it wasn’t a caress. It was a search, and a reminder of my ineptitude.
“Playing you, Blood, is not just easy. It’s fun.” As his hand reached my waist, it paused, then moved to the buckle of my belt—camouflage throw knives holder—undid it, and stole it from around my waist. “And a major turn-on.” With a simple flex of his wrist, the belt bounced off the wall and hit the ground in an inharmonious clatter of leather and metal. “I’m so hard and hot for you, I could fuck you into oblivion right here, right now without a flipping care we’re in public…but it would only be a waste of my precious time, wouldn’t it?”
As his hand returned to my waist to resume his search, I took a deep breath, steeled myself, and made my move.
Driving my elbow upward and back, I knocked the gun from his hand, then spun around and rammed my knee upward, aiming for his ribs, but he was too tall for me, so my knee impacted his side instead.
An expletive exploded from him as his hands flew to his side, gripping cotton and flesh, as though he were trying to rip the pain out. Fighting was my fucking forte. I delivered painfully solid blows and could kill in an instant with my bare hands if I were determined. Twelve months with my trainer, and at thirteen I was knocking him on his ass. The man had been astounded.
So Chad would know better next time not to underestimate me empty-handed.
Taking advantage of his distraction from the pain, I crouched down and nimbly tried to free my Colt from the ankle holster in my boot.
Chad’s foot was a black blur as it moved through the air and connected into my side, kicking me over.
Intense pain bulleted through me, and, unable to swallow it, an agonizing cry tore up my throat. It was like dynamite imploded inside me. Abandoning the gun in my boot, I clutched my side and folded at the pain.
“Tit for fucking tat,” he said. No smooth or suave or safe this time. But pissed-the-hell-off. Dark. Scary. Hideous.
Bending slightly at the knees, he hauled me up by my ponytail and mercilessly flung me against the wall like I was just a smelly skunk. Next second, his gun was under my chin.
So black, hard, and cold were his eyes under the visor of his ball cap that a rush of breath blew through me as, something, as heavy as an anchor, tanked inside me.
Who knew fear was this heavy?
Remember when I said I felt safe with him? Well, not this time. This time, I was very, very afraid.
This moment reminded me of the night he’d murdered my parents, how I’d gone from believing he was my savior to realizing he was the Night Rider.
All this time, all this training, so many lives easily and unerringly taken, and I was still an ignorant, incompetent fool.
“I think I’ve given you enough chances,” Chad snarled to my face, and even his breath was so aggressive it stung my skin. “And since our fucks meant nothing at all to you, I don’t see a reason to keep you alive anymore.” He jammed the gun harder under my chin. “Tell me. Who the fuck are you, and who sent you?”
I started to swallow from trepidation, but stopped, brought the saliva right back up and spat it in his face. “Fuck you.”
Like ice cream melting on hot pavement, the rage slowly melted from Chad’s eyes. Tense shoulders relaxing, he lowered his gun, took a silent step back from me, then tucked his gun away.
Run, a voice whispered in my head.
I didn’t dare move.
Removing his ball cap, he folded the thing and stuffed it in his back pocket, then from the other pocket, he pulled out a monogrammed kerchief and, calm as a lazy dog on a rainy day, wiped my spit from his face.
When he was done, he just looked at me with placid equanimity.
Run. Fast, the voice repeated.
My lungs quit its job, and my heart turned in its resignation letter. Shutdown sequence initiated.
What did his sudden calmness mean? Was he sorry? Was he going to apologize? Was he going to let me go? Was he—
Faster than I didn’t want to believe, Chad had both my hands seized and locked in a vice grip above my head, with one hand. All my thoughts of what his calmness meant got scattered in my head when his open palm sliced through the air and connected squarely with the side of my face. A slap so hard my ears rang as loud and mind-numbingly long as a Catholic church bell.
Giving me no reprieve, a backhand across my other cheek ensued, my head whipping to the side.
A repeated slap across the face, then a backhand.
He did it again. And again. And again. Until my vision was nothing but twinkling stars on a black backdrop.
Tears I couldn’t control cascaded, as one slap succeeded the other. As I began to feel like my head had been shoved into a barrel of burning hot coals, I cried out a garbled, “Stop. Please! Stop.”
Immediately, he stopped, dropping my hands.
Raising abased eyes to him, I blinked a couple of times, trying to see through the blur of stars and tears. There was nothing but the same placidity on his face. And I worried what to fear more: when he was raging mad, or when he was abnormally calm.
Gently bringing his hands up to cup my stinging face, he seized me with his stare as he said in an unbelievably soft voice, “I don’t want to kill you, Blood. Believe me, I don’t. But if you continue to fight me when I’ve been nothing but nice and lenient with you, then you’re gonna break my resolve to spare you and give you a chance. And when you do, I won’t just give you an easy bullet to the head. No. I’ll gouge those beautiful emerald eyes of yours, and make your death long and painful.”
As my face throbbed with flaming pain, all I could do was stare up at him. In this moment, I was just a weak little girl who wanted to be rescued. I’d been knocked around, a lot, and thought I’d gotten inured to pain. But apparently, I wasn’t.
And what made this moment hurt so much more than the throbbing was that it was him inflicting pain on me. All that safety I�
�d bragged about feeling around him, was gone.
In this moment, I realized that as bad as my life was, I didn’t want to die. If I could get a second chance at life, I wanted it. I wanted to be normal.
“Do you want to die, Blood?” Chad asked, as though he had direct access to my thoughts.
As much as I could between his hands cupping my face, I shook my head.
“Then stop fucking hurting me, okay?” His eyes softened. Only a small fraction. “If you don’t hurt me, I won’t hurt you.”
When I only stared back at him, he sought, “You don’t believe me?”
As asinine as it was of me, I believed him. So instead of nodding, I answered with a verbal, “Yes, I do.”
Lowering his head, he pressed a soft kiss to my forehead. And I closed my eyes to let it seep into me.
Among all the bad shit that just happened, that kiss, weirdly enough, gave me a strange sense of peace. All my fears calmed, all the pain temporarily forgotten. The result of a single kiss.
How did he do that? How could he make that happen?
I opened my eyes and found his staring down at me. They were warmer now. And a piece of my heart foolishly floated towards him. He was doing something to me, and I didn’t think I wanted him to stop. I wanted him to keep giving me soft kisses, because I needed them. I needed them, dammit.
Did he know I needed them?
“Until I can trust you won’t try killing me again,” he said, “I’m taking you with me. Okay?”
I shrugged, because did I even have a choice?
Dropping his hands from my face to my shoulders, he spun me around to face the wall, tugged my hands behind me, and the next thing I knew, he was cuffing me.
Although I didn’t bother struggling, he brought his mouth to my ear and told me, “This is not to dominate you, make you feel inferior, or trap you. I cuffed you for a reason I can’t explain to you right now. So just work with it until we get into the car. Trust me, alright?”