Pulling on his gloves, he led the way outside and took his first real lungful of fresh night ocean air. He loved the sea. Living by it. The way it thundered at times, the waves racing toward the cliffs, spraying white water high into the air in sheer defiance of holding back. Water couldn’t be held back. You could try, but it would always find a way to escape. He wanted that. Just to go out peacefully. Smoothly. A rhythm, because he loved that beat, but he’d just drift like that tide out there.
“Stop, Player. What is wrong with you tonight?” Zyah all but stomped her foot. “What happened tonight before I got home to put you in such a melancholy mood?” She caught at his arm and tugged at him until he stopped walking, pulling his gaze away from the ocean and back to her perfect, furious face. Her beauty caught at him every time.
“It’s my head, Zyah, it just keeps coming apart no matter how many times you put it back together. I have this weird affiliation with Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and I can accept that. I was reading that story when I was a little kid. We were starving. Freezing. I was fucked up. I’m not going to lie, you’ve seen enough of my memories to know what happened to me.”
He shoved his hands in his jacket pockets and turned away from her, looking out to sea at the angry waves. Now he wanted to feel each of those waves pounding the bluffs, hammering at them the way he wanted to slam his fists into his enemies.
From her front yard, Anat’s Victorian house faced several other homes, but her backyard had only a street between it and a very long strip of headlands. She had a gorgeous view. That piece of real estate was worth a fortune, which made it look as if she were very wealthy and probably brought her to the attention of the gang of thieves still looking to get something valuable they thought she had.
Zyah stepped close to him, so close he could feel her body heat and smell that fragrance that was unique to her alone. Her fingers slipped into the crook of his arm. She remained silent, allowing him to marshal his thoughts. He liked that about her. Their first night together, when they both had been so free with each other, talking and laughing as if they didn’t have a care in the world, she had done that as well, waiting for him to speak, listening attentively.
“Player, tell me about that first time with Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. I know you detest those characters coming to life. You did when the other children loved it so much, yet you created it for them. I watched your face. I know you hated it. Tell me why.”
They stood together in the dark, the roar of the sea traveling across the waving expanse of grass while he debated whether he was going to tell her the truth. She knew so much about him already, none of it good.
He shook his head. “I hate this, Zyah. I want so much for you to find something to like about me. The more you know, the more you’ll loathe.”
“That isn’t true. You’re in my head as much as I’m in yours, Player. You know I don’t loathe you, or even dislike you. If anything, I have to struggle all the time to try to distance myself from you because you’re the one holding back. You don’t want me, Player, and I don’t want to throw myself at you, but it’s damned hard when I’m so connected.”
She was so fucking honest with him. It was hard not to admire her. She was so much like her grandmother, and that was all good. And she came right out and called him on holding back.
“Don’t think for one moment I don’t want you, Zyah.” He knew by just looking at her she took his statement wrong—she thought he meant physically, but he was determined to tell her what she needed to hear. He also wasn’t certain what he was going to do about their relationship, so he didn’t try to explain to her what he really meant.
“Sorbacov was a man who never wanted to be the president. He liked being the power behind the throne. He enjoyed secrets and fear. He had so many secrets of his own. He had a perfect family. His wife and son. He didn’t like women. He much preferred young boys. Very young boys. He also got off on torture and watching rape. He was highly intelligent, so he rose fast in politics, chose the perfect wife and a candidate to back and then became a very powerful man. He was smart enough to bide his time and keep his deviant proclivities under wraps until he could let them loose, and even then, he was extremely careful to make certain no one would live to tell.”
Zyah started walking down the road, tugging on his arm, moving him around the bike. His head pounded like the waves battering at the bluffs. The road tilted a little toward the sea. The surf rose up, wild and calling to him. She didn’t rush him to get to the part about Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. She just let him talk. Start where he needed to. He appreciated that in her.
“Sorbacov established four schools to train assets, meaning orphans, children of the murdered political opponents. In some cases, as in mine, Sorbacov saw me and liked the way I looked and wanted me for himself. My father was in his army and had his own depravities. I didn’t find that out until much later. He sold me to Sorbacov. Sorbacov took me to the school. I was four.”
Her arm tightened around his waist. “Player.”
She said his name so softly, so intimately, he felt her in his mind, stroking him there. She made him feel as if he wasn’t so alone, the way he’d felt he’d been for so damn long.
“They say you really can’t remember anything that clearly at four, but I remember every detail. All of it. What we were all wearing. The weather. That watch of Sorbacov’s. He took it out and looked at it when they were beating my mother as if it was boring him. Her screams. The blood. He was annoyed when some of her blood splattered on his shoes.”
He tried to push the demons back, the ones escaping from the doors he kept closed and nailed shut in his mind. “I showed a unique ability for making bombs. It was insane, and no one could explain it. I tinkered with tools and could take apart and put things back together, and Sorbacov noticed. He brought in several instructors, and they would lay out simple bombs at first, little ones, and he would stand behind me while I put them together. I didn’t know what they were. It was fun. A puzzle.”
He stopped walking and faced her, looking down at her, pleading for understanding. “We were raped every day, repeatedly. Beaten. Not just with fists. Forced to perform all kinds of acts. To sit at a bench and put together a puzzle was a respite; it took my brain somewhere else, away from pain, away from something so horrific I could barely keep from going insane.”
Player had no idea why he expected Zyah’s dark eyes to hold censure, but he did. He felt guilty enough for both of them. He always would. Instead, those dark chocolate eyes of hers, so beautiful, held compassion for a little boy; not just the little boy but the fucked-up man as well. He didn’t deserve it, and she’d understand why in just a few more moments.
“Sorbacov was in a particularly sharing mood over the course of a week, and I was in a bad way. His friends weren’t gentle, so much so that he even made them stop a couple of times and I found myself feeling grateful to him.” He hated himself for that.
He stared at the crashing waves as they broke over the rocks just before they made it to the bluffs. He’d not had his fifth birthday, and he loathed himself for being grateful to Sorbacov, the man who’d had his mother beaten to death and who’d raped him and given him to his friends to rape, just because the man had told his friends to be more careful of him.
Player turned his face away from her, afraid that terrible burning sensation behind his eyes was something he would regret forever. “I was told to build a series of bombs over the next couple of weeks, and I was so happy. I could barely walk. Everything hurt, and I knew as long as I pleased him, built each one faster than the last, he wouldn’t give me to his friends, even if he used me himself, which he did, every time I finished one of the bombs.”
He swallowed down bile. “I made five bombs. He told me for my birthday, he was taking Czar and me to a party. It was a big deal. There was going to be all kinds of good food and cake and ice cream. I would just have to do a couple of things for him and then I could eat anything I wanted
. I could even bring food home for the others.”
They began walking again in silence, Player threading his fingers through Zyah’s. He needed to feel close to her at least for these last few moments. They had crossed the street and were following the path that led through the grass of the headlands to the bluffs overlooking the ocean.
The sound of the sea rose up, and he realized he loved being close to it because it felt cleansing. The roar of the waves drowned out the voice of guilt in his head that told him he was never going to be good enough for the world Czar wanted them to fit into. He could never forgive himself for his sins, the sins he’d committed when he was five years old and kept committing for the sake of his own survival.
“I carried each of the bombs into the party wrapped like a gift and gave them to Czar. When all five were in, Sorbacov took me to a table and introduced me to a family. They were very nice. He said I was a friend of his family. He had told me to use my manners and to say exactly what I was told: My name, Gedeon Lazaroff, which is my real name. That I was a friend of the family, a friend of his son, Uri. Czar joined us at that table, and if I started to say anything I wasn’t supposed to, he would grip my leg really hard.”
Player realized he’d never told Zyah his name. “I should have told you that the first time I met you, that my name is Gedeon Lazaroff. I did tell your grandmother. I think she knows all of our names, but before anyone else, you should have been told.”
She tilted her head up at him and smiled. Yeah. He should have told her. That meant something to her.
“Sorbacov sat at the table talking to the adults. There was a boy about twelve, and Czar talked with him, although I noticed Czar was quiet and kind of stilted. Mostly, he looked after me. I talked to the girl. She was eight or nine, and she had a book.” He took a deep breath. “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. It was the coolest book I’d ever seen. She showed me all the pictures and read some of it to me. Sorbacov had told them all it was my birthday, and she was very excited for me. I really liked her. Her name was Irina.”
He swallowed down bile again and stared at the white foam as it shot into the air. “Sorbacov got an urgent call, and we had to leave early. She gave me that book and wrote, ‘Happy birthday from Irina.’ I carried it out to the car. The driver pulled the car to the curb just up the block where we could still see the big hall. Sorbacov took out his pocket watch. I’ll never forget that. The way he smirked when he looked at that watch.”
His hand tightened around Zyah’s. Again, he stood silently, working up the courage, although she had to know the rest.
“The explosions rocked the ground and our car, the bombs going off almost simultaneously. Dirt and debris filled the air. Rubble, bricks and cement hit the ground. We could see the flames glowing orange and black, and Sorbacov had the driver go back. He was smiling so big. He got out and started laughing. He made Czar and me get out and walk up to the ruins. We could see some of the bodies. I could see Irina’s dress and part of her leg. Czar put his hand over my eyes and dragged me back to the car. He kept telling me not to cry. Over and over, he told me not to let Sorbacov see me cry.”
“Player,” she whispered and rubbed her head against his chest. “I’m so sorry. That must have been so terrible for you. How very traumatic.”
That was the last thing he’d expected of her. “When we got back, the others took the food Czar gave them and Demyan, Absinthe’s older brother, grabbed the book and began to read it. That day, Alena had slipped out of the dungeon. We called it that, but it was really a basement. She was so little and thin. Starved like the rest of us. She could slip through this crack and go out into the forest and harvest roots and berries and sometimes mushrooms. These mushrooms were different.”
He gave her a faint grin. “All of us started having hallucinations, but all of mine had to do with what Irina had read from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” He rubbed at his pounding temples. “I started seeing the things in the story, all the different characters running around in the dungeon with us. Everyone thought it was so cool and funny. After that, they wanted me to do it every time things were at the very worst. That’s how the Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland characters came about, and that’s why I detest them. That’s why my brain always goes to making bombs. They saved me, and it’s my go-to when I’m in a bad place.”
“Player? What did you see that first time, when everyone else was laughing about the Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland characters running around the room but you saw something that scared you? What was it?”
Her voice was music, moving through his mind like a breeze. Of course she would have noticed that when she’d been in his head. He glanced down at her, not answering her question. “You know the things you see in my head, you shouldn’t know about, right? They can get you killed.”
He hated telling her the truth of that. He really hated that it was the truth. She knew too much about the club. Their history. The fact that they were assassins. The fact that they hunted and killed pedophiles. They were all alive because they never left witnesses.
She looked up at him, her eyes dark with absolute trust. “I’m well aware.”
“You ready to ride?”
She nodded.
“We need to go to Czar’s. Tonight.”
“It’s late.”
“I know, but we need to go. He has to know what’s going on. You willing to go with me?”
“Is he going to take out a gun and shoot me?”
“If he tried that shit, I’d stop him.” The moment the words were out of his mouth, he realized it was true. Anat Gamal was right, and Gedeon Lazaroff knew he’d just made a commitment. He was going to stay and fight for Zyah Gamal with everything and anything he had for as long as it took because she was worth it, and she was definitely the woman for him.
“Then let’s go,” Zyah said.
ELEVEN
The moment Player was riding down the ribbon of Highway 1, Zyah’s arms around his waist, her hands clasped together near his cock, his motorcycle roaring between his legs and the wind in his face, he felt alive. Totally, absolutely alive. He felt free. The world felt a completely different place on his bike. It always had.
After a lifetime spent in the freezing, rodent-filled torture chamber of a basement in his native country, a captive, a puppet forced to do a cruel master’s bidding, riding in the open air with the blue of the sea throwing misty salt into the air on one side of him and wildflowers, trees and grasses of all colors on the other gave him a sense of absolute peace. He had never considered putting a woman on the back of his bike. He’d never wanted one there. If someone had asked him for a ride or touched his bike, he would have felt murderous. Zyah only added to that sense of perfection. Of well- being.
Her arms tightened around him as if she sensed what he was feeling—or thinking. And she probably was. They were that connected. He dropped his hand down to cover hers, just for a moment, needing to press her even closer. Her body moved with his, matching the smooth line of the motorcycle as it took the long, sweeping turns or the sharper, narrow ones. She never hesitated to follow his lead. They were in perfect sync, just the way they were in bed.
His Harley was a powerful machine, souped up, and eager to run when necessary. The machine rumbled between their legs, the vibration stirring already inflamed bodies. It was impossible to get near Zyah without wanting her. Having her on his bike made that need so urgent he could barely think. He felt her tits pressed against his back. It should have been impossible with the combined thicknesses of his jacket and hers between their skin, but he felt every movement, every bounce and jiggle. That just put extra stiffness in his already aching cock.
He swore she moaned. A soft sound in his mind. Intimate. Needy. Bordering on desperate. Just the way he was feeling. Now he could feel her thighs around his hips. Pressing into him. Her pussy tight against him, feeling hotter with every movement of the bike. For a brief time, it felt like agony, and then it wasn’t. Then it was perfect
ion. Beauty. Just like Zyah. That’s what she was to him.
To a man who had been trained to never have normal erections, finding Zyah was a miracle. A gift. Realizing she was much more to him than a sexual partner, one who would always inflame his body with just a thought or look, that sex alone wasn’t enough for him and never would be, was enlightening— and equally shocking.
He had known he wanted her for himself. He just hadn’t known it would be this—the feeling of wanting her for so many reasons. Knowing that his past didn’t matter and that she was still there. Zyah was more than worth fighting for. More than worth putting himself on the line for. Anat Gamal was a very wise woman, and he vowed he was going to listen to her, no matter what.
Once he accepted the way Zyah made him feel, she became part of the experience of the night. Of being on his motorcycle. Of the ocean rising up toward the bluffs and stars overhead. It was clear and cold, the way it often could be on the coast. The wind was biting and capricious, whipping through the leaves of the trees and the long grasses, turning them a strange silvery color as they rushed past, just adding more magic to the jeweled blue of the sea.
Player didn’t want the ride to end. There wasn’t much distance between Sea Haven and the farm where Czar resided with his wife, Blythe, and their children. The farm was enormous, and Czar co-owned it with five other families. Each family had five acres to themselves, and the rest was planted with crops or groves of trees or rows of greenhouses. Two other members of Torpedo Ink owned the farm along with Czar, Blythe and the others.
He hesitated before he made the turn to the road leading to the farm. He really wanted to spend more time on the bike alone with Zyah, just having that experience, savoring it. He hadn’t had too many great happenings in his life, and he wanted this one to last, but it was extremely late and it wasn’t fair to Czar and Blythe to have to wait up long hours because he wanted to run the highway with his woman. Mostly, he was reluctant to betray Zyah to Czar. He was going to have to do that in order to protect the other members of his club, and he would have to make her fully understand the stakes before they went in.
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