Midnight Alpha

by Carole Mortimer

  The woman gave Gaia a fierce glare before turning her charm on Nikolai.

  “Our agreement was that I wouldn’t work this evening. I think I owe it to Rick and Claude to personally explain why that is— Oh not the real reason,” she snapped her impatience with his frown. “I’m not stupid, Gregori, but I was brought up to have manners.”

  “Meaning I was not?”

  She gave a shrug of her bare shoulders. “Take my comment in whatever way you choose, Gregori. You usually do anyway!”

  His mouth thinned. “I have already spoken to both Rick and Claude, explained that you had a small accident.”

  “And I’m going to speak to them both again. Personally,” she added, knowing how much the idea of her talking to the other two men seemed to annoy him. She was so angry with him at the moment she just wanted to get away from him.

  “They need no further explanation than that you walked into Utopia at my side,” Gregori announced arrogantly.

  Gaia was already well aware of the speculation about them because she was ‘at his side’. According to the gossip she had heard before meeting Gregori, he never brought women to Utopia with him. Not only had he brought a woman with him tonight, but she also happened to be one of his employees, and wearing a gown that probably cost more than she earned in a month.

  She gave a stubborn shake of her head. “You just carry on doing…whatever it is you do, and I’ll catch up with you later.” She didn’t give him time to object as she turned on her heel and walked off in the direction of the bar.

  “Follow her,” Gregori instructed Nikolai tersely. “Mr. Smith can accompany me upstairs,” he added with a rueful glance at the ever-watchful Lijah Smith who had insisted on accompanying them into the club. “He can hardly remain down here, Nikolai,” he added at the other man’s look of displeasure.

  Nikolai showed his disapproval of the arrangement by walking off without saying a word.

  “Miss Miller seems a…headstrong young lady,” Lijah commented as the two men traveled up to the third floor in Gregori’s private lift.

  “Yes.”

  “Remind you of anyone?” he added mockingly as they entered Gregori’s office.

  Gregori knew exactly whom Lijah was referring to. “Katya was never this rebellious,” he dismissed hardly as he turned on all the security screens.

  “No?” Lijah made himself comfortable in the chair where Gaia had been sitting three nights ago before swinging his booted feet up to rest on the front of the desk.

  “Perhaps since meeting Dair,” Gregori conceded distractedly as his attention homed in on one security screen in particular where he could see Gaia in conversation with both Rick Turner and Claude le Coeur.

  The two men were being far too attentive in his opinion. Rick was obviously ogling Gaia’s cleavage, while Claude appeared to be using the excuse of the graze on her cheek as a way of touching her.

  “I thought tall, icy blondes were your usual taste?”

  Gregori didn’t even bother asking how Lijah Smith knew that: the man may have been sent here by Dair Grayson, but he would not have come without knowing everything about the two people he had been sent to protect.

  And Lijah was right, his tastes usually did center on tall, icy blondes, and Gaia Miller was so obviously none of those things.

  But she brought out a hunger inside him those women never had, a yearning for her warmth, her irreverent laughter, and the primal passion between them that made him forget everything and everyone else.

  His scowl deepened as Claude obviously complimented the earrings Gaia was wearing as yet another way of touching her.

  He should have marked her earlier, bitten her or sucked on her throat where other men would see the mark and know that she belonged to him—

  “Gregori, did you know that you’re actually growling?”

  Gregori turned to give Lijah a narrow-eyed glare. “I am merely being…protective. Have you forgotten she was shot last night?” he added harshly.

  Lijah gave a shrug. “Isn’t that the reason I’m here?”

  Of course it was.

  “You seem to be a little…obsessed with our Miss Miller,” Lijah added conversationally.

  He was more than a little obsessed with her. Damn it, seconds ago he had been thinking that he should have marked her as his earlier, like some fucking caveman staking a claim on his woman.

  “She is not ‘our’ Miss Miller,” he bit out icily.

  “Your Miss Miller,” Lijah corrected with a slow smile.

  “She is not mine, either.”

  “No?”

  “No.”

  “Frustrating for you.”

  “You find something amusing, Mr. Smith?”

  The other man grinned openly now. “Just enjoying watching another mighty man fall.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Gregori moved to sit behind his desk.

  “Please yourself.” Lijah shrugged uninterestedly. “Dair tells me you also have a drug problem at Utopia? Connected to Orlov?”

  “Nikolai says so, yes.” Gregori was too relieved at the change of subject to question how his brother-in-law knew so much about his business. Dair Grayson was a law unto himself, and totally ungovernable. As, apparently, were the men who worked for him at Grayson Security.

  Lijah nodded. “I’m checking into it too. As I also checked on your Miss Miller,” he added softly. “Which was probably as well when you’re obviously far too close to this—to her,” he indicated the security screen, “to be able to form an objective opinion.”

  Gregori’s jaw tightened. “Miss Miller is off limits to you, Mr. Smith.”

  Lijah dropped his feet to the floor and sat forward in his seat, all pretense of nonchalance gone as he now looked every inch the trained killer that he undoubtedly was. “Until I have certain proof of that, I’ll be the judge of what Miss Miller is or isn’t, Gregori.”

  “You—”

  “I also have resources Nikolai couldn’t even begin to tap into, plus he seems to be dealing with rather a lot of different things at the moment.” He shrugged. “While I was waiting outside to drive the two of you here I received a phone call. Did you know that Gaia Miller had the same father as a woman called Angela Grant, a woman who also worked at Utopia until her death from a drug overdose?”

  Gregori felt ice slither down the length of his spine.

  That was Gaia’s connection to Angela Grant?

  “As I see it, there are two possible reasons why Gaia Miller came to work here after her half-sister’s death,” Lijah Smith continued.

  “Which are…”

  “Both sisters were involved in the sale of the drugs—”

  “The problem still existed for the two months after Angela Grant’s death and before Gaia came to work here,” Gregori bit out stiffly, still trying to take in the fact that Angela had been Gaia’s half-sister.

  Lijah glanced up at Gaia on the security monitor. “The second reason could be that your Miss Miller doesn’t believe her sister’s death was a suicide either, and the reason she’s here is to look for whoever killed her.”

  Now Gregori turned sharply to look at the security screen where Gaia was laughing at something Rick Turner had just said to her.

  The Gaia he had come to know these past few days was far too forthright for him to believe she was involved in the sale of drugs.

  But trying to discover who had killed her half-sister?

  Oh yes, Gregori could well believe Gaia was reckless enough in regards to her own safety to do that.

  No wonder she was now so furious with him for having all but accused her of knowing Ivan Orlov…

  Chapter 13

  “What on earth is the matter with you, Gregori?” Gaia hissed in protest as he kept a tight hold of her arm as he marched her out of Utopia.

  He only released her after bundling her into the back of the car waiting outside, the Stetson-wearing Lijah Smith once again visible behind the wheel through the smoky gla
ss of the privacy window.

  “You didn’t even give me a chance to say goodnight to Rick and Claude before you dragged me away,” she accused once Gregori had walked around to the other side of the car and slid in beside her

  His eyes glittered in the darkness as he turned to look at her, and the car moved away from the front of Utopia and into the flow of late night traffic. “I ‘dragged you away’, as you put it, before you were able to take any more risks than you already have!”

  Gaia stilled at the unspoken accusation in his clipped tone. “What do you mean?” she prompted guardedly.

  His gaze met hers coldly. “I now know exactly who you are.”

  She swallowed. “I’m Gaia Miller—”

  “I also know the reason you deliberately sought employment at Utopia,” he continued as if she hadn’t interrupted him.

  “I told you, I needed a job—”

  “What you needed was to find the person you believe to be responsible for the death of your half-sister!”

  Oh God, oh God, oh God…

  The tension in the back of the car was palpable as Gregori continued to look at her with icy black eyes, her palms becoming damp as the seconds ticked silently by.

  “Nothing to say in your defense, Miss Miller?”

  There were several things she could say. She could deny all knowledge of everything he said. She could ask if he’d been drinking.

  She didn’t say either of those things.

  Why not?

  Because the challenging expression on Gregori’s face dared her to even try denying his accusations. At which point he was angry enough—a seething, roiling anger Gaia could feel beneath that cool exterior—to enjoy verbally ripping her into tiny little pieces.

  Gregori may have accused her of being reckless, but she wasn’t stupid, and only someone very stupid would attempt to try to lie to him now.

  “Well the positive thing is that you no longer think I’m working in cahoots with the man who shot at us last night!” she lamely attempted to shrug off the tension.

  “That is all you have to say?” he bit out softly as he moved to rest his arm casually along the back of the seat behind her.

  A casualness Gaia didn’t believe for a moment.

  Mainly because his eyes were still glittering with fury, and he was baring his teeth in a facsimile of a smile that actually bordered on the feral. “Why didn’t you come to me and ask for my help?”

  Gaia swallowed, the space in the back of the car seeming to have shrunk, the air so heavy with tension it was barely breathable.

  “But of course,” he continued conversationally in that dangerously soft voice, “you couldn’t come and talk to me about this because no doubt I’m on your list of suspects.”

  He had been, yes.

  But not anymore, not since a few minutes after she met and spoke to him for the first time, in fact.

  Yes, Gregori was The Markovic, and she had no doubts that he could be ruthless when the situation demanded it. But Gaia simply couldn’t believe he was capable of having an innocent young woman killed.

  But maybe that was just because she didn’t want to believe he had been involved in Angela’s death?

  Because of the way she now felt about him?

  Gaia shied away from examining those feelings: it was here and now, this conversation that she needed to concentrate on, and not any feelings she may or may not have for Gregori.

  But your suspicions regarding him were no less insulting than his were in regard to you earlier, a little voice taunted inside her head.

  The little voice was right. Gaia had been furious with Gregori earlier for even suggesting she might somehow be connected to this man Orlov. As furious as he now was in regard to her suspicions about him…

  “Well?”

  Gaia flinched. At the fury in that one word. The accusation. The utter disgust.

  Gregori’s anger was as warranted as her own had been, she accepted that, but she also knew he was using this conversation as a means of pushing her away. Because he had let down his guard with her this evening. A guard he usually kept firmly in place, but one he had let her see right through earlier.

  And she had seen him. Gregori the man. Gregori the fierce and demanding lover.

  This, the cold disgust in his expression and voice, was his way of regaining that mask, of shutting her out. In the same way he shut everyone out in order to prevent them from seeing his depth.

  Her heart ached with the knowledge that he would probably never allow her to see him again.

  She moistened her lips before speaking, her throat so dry now that her voice came out as a soft rasp. “How long have you known?”

  “About your sister? Or that you aren’t what you claimed to be?”

  “Both.”

  “You from the beginning—you were obviously searching my office that first night,” he shrugged as she gasped.

  “You knew that and yet you… Has this all been some sick game to you, Gregori?” She looked at him searchingly. “Have you and Nikolai been laughing behind my back this whole time, knowing you only intended to take what you wanted from me before calling me a liar?”

  His mouth thinned. “I do not laugh at people—even liars—behind their backs. And do not bring Nikolai into this,” he dismissed hardly. “What were you looking for under my desk that night?”

  She turned her gaze away from his, knowing there was a guilty blush in her cheeks. “Someone knows who killed my sister.”

  “And you thought you would find evidence of it under my desk?”

  “I thought there might be a hidden drawer or—or something where you kept records—” she broke off, shaking her head, glad she hadn’t given in to the temptation to search his home today. No doubt it would all have been caught on one of those security cameras anyway, and that would have been too humiliating. As it was, she felt utterly stupid now that she had actually voiced what her intention had been that first night. It sounded so—so damned amateurish.

  But she was an amateur when it came to the world Gregori lived in on a day-to-day basis, a minnow in a tankful of sharks, with Gregori at the head of those sharks.

  Which was probably why she should have stayed well away from him and Utopia, no matter how deeply she wanted to find Angela’s lover and expose him for the murdering bastard he was.

  Instead she had jumped in with both feet, and by doing so she met Gregori Markovic and came to care about him.

  And it was all over now. All of it. Gregori would never allow her back into Utopia to search for Angela’s lover and possible killer, any more than he would allow her close to him emotionally ever again.

  “I didn’t know you then!” she choked. “I thought… For God’s sake, you’re Gregori Markovic, head of the Russian Mafia in London. Everyone knows that.”

  “We are not talking about what everyone else knows about me, Miss Miller, just you. And you obviously know nothing about me,” his voice positively dripped ice now, not so much as a tiny fissure in the hardness of his expression. “For your information, the Markovic business holdings and interests are all run within the broad spectrum of the law, and have been for many years, much to my father’s disgust,” he added without amusement. “I also own several other clubs in London, most of them not as upmarket as Utopia, all of them catering to the…needs of my customers. But I do not deal in drugs or prostitutes. Ever.”

  “The police wouldn’t listen to anything I had to say and—Angela was my sister,” Gaia repeated emotionally.

  And Gregori knew what it was to love a sister. People had paid, and paid dearly, for hurting his own sister just five short months ago, and the facility where Katya had been held against her will had been demolished brick by brick to ensure that would never happen to anyone else ever again, for whatever reason.

  He knew what it was to love a sister.

  He just couldn’t reconcile that knowledge with the risks, the danger Gaia had placed herself in, in an effort to solve the death of her
own sister.

  He gave an impatient shake of his head. “And what do you think would have happened to you if I had been responsible? If I had been the ruthless, cold-hearted bastard you believed me to be and I discovered what you were doing? Ah yes, I remember now—you mentioned something about being fitted for a pair of concrete shoes!”

  “Don’t mock me, Gregori,” she choked.

  “You think I’m mocking you?” he ground out harshly. “I assure you, in my father’s day such an outcome would not have been so implausible.”

  “You’re just trying to frighten me again now—”

  “Think yourself lucky that is all I’m doing, because what I would really like to do is wring this delicate little neck!” His fingers curled about her nape, firmly enough to hold her in place, but not enough to bruise as he loomed over her in the darkness. “If I didn’t know how much you would enjoy it, I would give you the spanking you deserve for your reckless behavior!”

  “Do it,” she groaned. “Punish me if it will make you feel better.”

  Gregori looked down at her searchingly, noting the fever in her eyes, the flush to her cheeks, her lips still slightly swollen from their lovemaking earlier this evening. “Are you wet just at the thought of it, Gaia?” he prompted huskily.

  “Yes, damn you!” she choked.

  “Let me feel for myself how wet you are.” He pushed her gown up to run his hand along the length of her thigh until he reached the dampness of her panties. “Do you want me to touch you, Gaia?” He could feel the pulsing of her clit as he ran his fingers along the outside of the lace thong.

  “Yes. Please!” Gaia gasped as she arched up into that too-soft contact.

  “Are your nipples still sore from earlier?”

  “Yes…” she breathed softly, letting out a hissing breath as Gregori first cupped her breast and then rolled the swollen nipple between his finger and thumb.

  “Pleasure as well as pain,” he mused huskily.

  “Yes…” Gaia was so aroused at this dual assault on her nipple and those stroking fingers.