Hard Target

by Marquita Valentine

  She has a point. “Not your fault.”

  “See, even you agree with me. And you were the worst one about the rules. So freaking strict.”

  “Lower level employees liked to gossip, eh?”

  Morgan grins. “They liked to talk about your tight bum and your big… paycheck.”

  “My paycheck is not for public consumption.”

  She eyes me. “Am I allowed to confirm that your paycheck is bigger than we all thought?”

  If there is one thing I can say about Morgan is that she keeps me guessing with what will come out of her mouth next. “I’ll pay for a full spread in The Daily.”

  She snorts. “You are so conceited.”

  “Wait. What? You’re the one who brought up the size of my paycheck, not I.”

  “Oh my gosh.” Her eyes are full of mirth as she giggles. “Say that again.”

  “Say what?”

  “That.”

  I give her a look. “That what?”

  “You’re so posh.”

  “You’re bloody confusing.”

  “I’m sorry.” She sighs heavily. “I’m trying to keep a positive outlook and when I get nervous or scared, I like to joke around.”

  I glance at her, and then back at the road. “I’m the same way. Well, I used to be worse, actually.”

  “Really?”

  “Truly.” I laugh a little. “I used to annoy the shite out of my brother, but what he didn’t know was that I was afraid Grandfather would send me back at any minute because I wasn’t cut out to be an assassin like Nikolai and wasn’t earning my keep. I thought by telling jokes that I would make them like me so much that they’d forget about what I wasn’t good at doing.

  “Didn’t need to worry though,” I add.

  “Why is that?”

  “Grandfather said he had enough assassins. He said that Romanovs needed to look to the future. I was the future of the Bratva. The next day, there was a laptop sitting on my bed when I woke up.” Yet, he still taught me how to take a life.

  “That was how I felt with my parents and granny. I was there to entertain them or they didn’t pay me any attention. When my dad would come around, I tried to make him smile, tried to be the boy he wanted… that’s how I learned to shoot, load, and clean guns. But I couldn’t please anyone. Couldn’t make them love me.”

  “Didn’t need to worry about that though,” she says, repeating me almost word for word.

  “Why is that?” I grin at her, wriggling my brows. I cannot wait to hear her answer. Surely, she showed them how wrong they were. Surely, she left town in a blaze of glory as she headed across the ocean and started a whole new life.

  “Because I learned to be happy and love myself without them,” she says, momentarily stunning me with her confession.

  You make me happy. “We have a lot in common, you and I.”

  She gives me a sad smile. “It sucks, doesn’t it?”

  “Not at all.”

  “You’re just saying that because you want me to blog about your massive paycheck.”

  “Shut up.” I take her hand in mine and kiss the knuckles, something I’ve been doing at least two or three times an hour.

  As we get closer to the bank, I check the rearview mirror.

  Dmitry pulls back, the distance between us growing. He takes the next left and that’s the signal for all’s clear.

  “There it is,” Morgan all but squeals. “I’ve never been so happy to see a bloody cross in my life.”

  “It’s not supposed to be bloody,” I point out.

  “I know,” she says wryly. “I was attempting to be English.”

  “Point made.”

  As we inch closer, the feeling that this is a very bad idea grows in the pit of my stomach. While I don’t think we’re driving or walking into a trap, I can’t in good conscience had over something information worth killing over to the bad guys.

  Even if I used to be considered one.

  A parking spot opens up and I pull in, then just sit there, letting the sports car idle. Flexing my hands as I rest them against the wheel, I can do nothing else, but wait.

  “Why aren’t we getting out?” Morgan asks, her voice thin. “The bank is right there, Ben. Right there.” She points at the Depository, as if that will help me move.

  “I don’t know what’s on the drive.” Violet hasn’t responded to any of my emails and I’m worried. Either my messages were intercepted… or she’s been silenced.

  Neither conclusion sets well with me.

  She tugs on the door handle, but I’ve locked the car down. No one can get it or out. “Please, Ben, I just want this done and over. We’re so close.”

  “I’m sorry, love, but I can’t.”

  Her chin quivers with her effort not to cry. She wipes at her eyes, at the tears that want to fall because of me, and whispers brokenly, “I don’t want to die.”

  Reaching over the console, I pull her to me as best I can, running my hands up and down her back. “I don’t want to die either, but this is too easy.”

  “Who cares?” she says with a sniff. “Leave the stupid package and let’s go.”

  “We don’t know what’s on it, and from what I have seen, it doesn’t look good. Why in the world would a criminal organization want a drive containing pictures of single cells?”

  “They want to start a new dating website and need customers?”

  I groan. “Morgan. Be serious. Bad guys want scientific information that they are willing to kill for. Think about it.”

  “I don’t want to think about it. I like my version better.” She sniffs again. “Please, let’s just go inside and finish this. Afterward, we can go on with our lives and have lots of sex.”

  “And then what? Watch our backs? Wait for the inevitable, ‘they know too much and need to be silenced’? That’s no way to live.”

  “At least we’d be alive,” she counters, sitting up. “I can live with that.”

  Straightening, I frame her tear-stained face in my hands. “No, you can’t. Trust me. I’ve lived that life, that constant looking-over-your-shoulder bullshit. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.”

  “You’re a hacker. Isn’t that part of your job description?”

  “I used be apart of an organization far more dangerous than Wraith.”

  She licks her lips. “What one is that?”

  “The Bratva.”

  “Who?” Her nose scrunches. She genuinely has no idea.

  “Russian Mafia.”

  “Oh.” Her lips turn down. “Did you have a choice?”

  “Yes and no.”

  “Did you enjoy killing people?”

  “You don’t want to know the answer to that.” With a sigh, I let her go and put the car into drive.

  “I don’t think you did,” she declares. “I think it tore you up inside because you’re a good man at heart. Good men don’t relish killing people, even the bad guys.”

  She’s right. I never enjoyed killing, never relished seeing the light fade from another’s eyes as they drew their last breath. Later, I would always ask myself what would have happened if I had made a different choice. If I had decided to gas them instead of put a bullet in their head.

  But I knew the answers.

  Those men wouldn’t have stopped until I was dead. Or my brother. Or Everly. Or anyone else I ever cared about.

  However, the fact remains that I enjoyed making my aunt and uncle pay for what they did to me as a child. And I sure as hell enjoyed killing the man that almost executed Morgan. While I can excuse one, I cannot excuse the other.

  “Let’s get this sorted, yes?”

  She nods.

  “I killed my aunt and uncle, slowly, mind you, and I enjoyed every fucking second of it.”

  Morgan shrinks away from me. “You—you did?”

  “For nearly five years, they starved me, beat me, and… did things that no child should ever have to endure.” I stare off into the distance. Memories clawing at the box I’ve put
them in, demanding to be let out. My chest grows tight. Panic sets in.

  A child screams. Not a child. Me as a helpless toddler.

  Morgan touches my face and it takes everything inside of me to not strike out at her. Instead, I slowly turn to face her again.

  Her eyes flash with anger. “They got what they deserved.” She peers at me from beneath her brow, as if trying to convince me of her opinion. “Some people need killing, Ben. It’s not a popular thing to say, but evil exists in this world and good people have to take it out.”

  “What happens when evil no longer exists? What will good people take out then?”

  She gives me a sad smile. “Evil will always exist in a fallen world.”

  I don’t want to debate religion or a fallen world with her, but I do know that her words have eased the tightness in my chest. While she can’t possibly give me absolution for my sins, she’s given me the second best thing.

  Understanding.

  There is no possible way I can allow her to continue on this journey with me. “We have to leave.”

  “I understand.”

  God love you for it. “We’re to meet Dmitry. Like you, he won’t be happy, but he will go along with Plan B.”

  “What’s Plan B?”

  “I’ll let you know as soon as I figure it out,” I lie.

  *

  “I’m sending you away.”

  Hurt and betrayal flash in her eyes. “You want to get rid of me?”

  I scrub my hand over my face. This is not how I imagined things would go with her. Thankfully, we’re sitting in the living room of one of my safe houses and not in a hotel. Dmitry sits in a nearby leather club chair, his casual pose of leaning forward with his elbows on his knees deceptive. His green and gold gaze misses nothing.

  “No, I want you to be safe and I need to figure things out.”

  “By leaving me with someone I don’t know?”

  “I’m not leaving you,” I insist, when in fact I am. “I’m sending you to Grandfather. He will keep you safe. Arrangements have already been made.”

  “Is this the Plan B you said you’d let me know as soon as you’d figured it out?”

  “It’s sorted, which is why I’m telling you.”

  “You’re lying to me.” She shakes her head, her blue eyes water, then fill with fire. “Why didn’t you just tell me when we were parked by the Depository?”

  “Because I thought you would fight me on it. Perhaps make a scene.”

  “I would have argued with you, but eventually, I would have understood.” She shakes her head. “We’re supposed to be a team, Ben. I’ve spent almost four days with you, running from and to bad guys. The very least you owe me is honesty and you promised not to keep me in the dark.”

  “I can’t tell you the exact second I made up my mind.”

  “But you could have told me about the possibility of it.” She gestures to Dmitry. “I assume you planned with him since he’ll most likely be the one taking me to…”

  “Russia,” he supplies.

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s for the best, mllaya moyna.”

  She yanks at her hand, then throws something at me. “Don’t you mllaya moyna me.” The wedding band I gave her hits me in the center of my chest. I catch it as it falls. “You can take this with you.”

  I shake my head, moving to her and gently grabbing her hand. “No.”

  She shoves at me. “I don’t want it.”

  Dmitry gets up to stand by the door. His face is pinched. He doesn’t like this anymore than I do.

  “I have to be able to keep watch over you even while you’re with a man I trust almost as much as I do you.” With a heavy heart, I watch the fight go out of her.

  She allows me to put her ring back on, but she doesn’t allow me to take her into my arms. “If you trusted me so much, you would have told me as soon as you and Dmitry planned everything.”

  “Please understand.”

  “Oh, I understand. I’m in the way.” She stands, grabbing the Louis Vuitton suitcase. “I took your stupid guns and ammo out and put my clothes inside instead.”

  Dmitry clears his throat.

  “Fine,” she says with a huff. “I kept one gun and three clips. Happy?”

  Dmitry nods.

  “Very happy,” I admit. My Morgan is not a willing victim.

  “Is your car in the garage?” she asks him while ignoring me.

  “Da.”

  “Is it safe to get in?”

  “Da.”

  “This trip is going to be ah-mazing. I know it.” She glares at me one last time, then leaves the room.

  Two doors slam.

  “You owe me,” Dmitry says, grabbing his coat from the back of the chair.

  “For what? It was your idea, not mine.”

  “I offered to transport her. It was the polite thing to do.”

  With a shake of my head, I roll my eyes. “Get her there safely, cuz.”

  He pauses by the door. The same door Morgan slammed shut a minute earlier. “She’s right, you know.”

  “Of course she’s right, but I am only trying to do what’s best for her.” I pick at a piece of nonexistent lint on the cuff of my shirt. “She’s a distraction and she might also be the reason why Violet hasn’t contacted me.”

  “Perhaps what’s best for her is to stay with you,” he says.

  Arrogant arsehole.“You can’t know that.”

  “The future is uncertain for all of us.”

  “Keep your bloody fortune telling to yourself. Even better, don’t talk to me until you have to send away the woman you—”

  Dmitry cocks a brow at me, and I fight the urge to punch him.

  “The woman you’ve given your word to protect,” I finish through gritted teeth.

  A ghost of a smile flickers to life on his face. “Your woman will be safe. Grandfather is sending an escort once we reach the Russian border.”

  “Tell him thank you.”

  Dmitry inclines his head, the platinum blond of his hair catching the light.

  “And I hate the color of your hair. Die it black again.”

  My cousin flips me off, then exits the room.

  In my office, I watch them drive away. My heart fucking aches, as if someone has stomped on it a thousand times. However, no matter the pain, I know sending her to Grandfather is the only way to keep her safe until I learn what’s on the flash drive.

  *

  Two days later, I’m sitting in an Internet café in Brussels when Violet finally pings me. Suddenly, my screen blacks out only to be replaced with the all too familiar face of one of my former co-workers—Dr. Tansy Bhamra, assistant lead scientist at PharmGen.

  “You’re joking.” This has to be a joke. Tansy and I spoke nearly everyday for over a year and yet she never let on who she was.

  “Nice to see you, too, Likho.” She smiles. “Whose luck have you taken away this time?” My online name comes from the Slavic Mythology belief that a spirit called Likho is responsible for the bad fortunes of everyone, especially a hero on a quest.

  I thought it brilliant to name myself after that, especially considering that to see my avatar was the worst luck of all. I could drain a government’s treasury in the time it took for them to assemble a team to counteract my programs.

  “I need your help with this one, V.”

  “Fantastic. I’m behind you, by the way.”

  Twisting in my seat, I watch as Violet… that is, Tansy makes her way towards me. She slips her phone into her pocket as I stand to greet her.

  She kisses me on one cheek, than the other. “It’s been ages.”

  “I thought I’d done something to displease you.” I pull out the chair beside mine. “Join me.”

  “Thought you’d never ask.” Tansy sits down, crossing long, elegant legs and capturing the attention of more than a few men in the café. She’s stunning in her clinging, vibrant blue dress, with her dark hair pulled back from her face.

&
nbsp; “You look different.”

  She leans forward. “No lab coat.”

  “No purple hair either, and you’re decidedly less cartoonish,” I say, referring to her avatar.

  “You’re such a charmer.” Her smile falters. “I wish I had better news for you.”

  My hands clench into fists even as my jaw tightens. “Tell me,” I order through gritted teeth.

  “The codes and images?”

  I nod.

  “They’re of a prehistoric virus that Dr. Clark and I managed to bring back to life last year using a single-cell host.”

  “A virus?”

  “Yes.”

  “What the bloody hell does PharmGen need with a prehistoric virus?”

  Tansy arches a brow, her displeasure with me loud and clear. “At the time, we thought it was to find a cure for common cold.”

  “But?”

  “The cure is worse than the illness. No matter which type of counter virus we introduced, PhV-1 destroyed everything. Simulation models concluded that should this be introduced into a human host, the host would die in less than ten hours.”

  Blowing out a curse, I rub my hand across my jaw. “Please tell me there is a cure to the cure.”

  “There is. If we harvest the waste left behind by PhV-1 and inject it into the bloodstream… it can render the PhV-1 harmless. However, the vaccine must be administered within the ten hour period.”

  My mind races at the possibilities. “How would anyone know if they are infected?”

  She gestures to my laptop. “May I?”

  “Of course.”

  While Tansy types, I scan the room. No one seems to be paying the slightest attention to either of us.

  “This is what happens to in a human host,” she says quietly.

  I focus on the screen, horror dawning as I realize the simulation is actually a real person. “Who is that?”

  “Volunteer.” Tansy’s face pales a little beneath her light brown skin. “He was… a homeless man. Pinter insisted he’d volunteered. We were so damned arrogant.”

  The look of regret on her face is enough to convince me that she’s truly sorry, but none of that helps anyone. “Is that why the press was contacted?”

  Slowly, she shakes her head. “No. A buyer interested in acquiring the virus contacted him directly months ago. Clark had massive gambling debts. Loved to take his holidays in Las Vegas, so he considered the offer.”