by India Kells
“He cares about you, and you about him.” Margot sat on the sofa.
Shaking her head, Mac slumped beside her. “Sex isn’t about caring. And I don’t care about him.”
The dominatrix nodded, unconvinced. “I’m curious. Why don’t you want to tie down and take full advantage of this particularly handsome male specimen?”
Mac hesitated. “All three Sorenson brothers have a pretty difficult day job. And something especially bad happened to Wesley. He has mean-looking scars on his back, but it’s what I observed in his eyes that … makes me cautious about him.”
“What did you see?”
“A well of contained pain. That’s why I don’t wish to add to it. I intend to ask Lance about it when he arrives.”
Margot lounged on the sofa. “On the other hand, if he’s a willing participant, if he wants to do it, there may be a hidden reason. He may be searching some sort of catharsis, consciously or not.”
“Catharsis?”
“You helping him fight his inner demons, so to speak.”
That made Mac pause before Margot stood up.
“Now, let’s get down to work.”
Chapter 14
Mac decided that she would never get out of this steamy bath. Ever. Her body felt battered and achy, and she wasn’t even the one receiving the blows! Margot was a badass. She thought the trainers back in the days were the most intransigent people on her; she would have to send apology letters to each and every one of them.
After Wesley left them alone, Margot told her that she had lied to him and arranged for an intensive training session at an undisclosed location, where Sebastian and Lilianne brought some of their most willing submissives. Her head ached as much as her muscles from all the tools, terminology, tones, and topics that the three dominants taught her. Not only the names, but also how to use them, the adequate force and movement in order to inflict minimum or maximum pain. At first, the naked people in the room made her uneasy, and after a while, they became sort of part of the team. Both the students and teachers. Lilianne gave her amazing cues to read the facial expressions, as well as the reactions of the body. Sebastian was a magician at detecting the hidden limits of each submissive. And how much and how hard he could push them even further. Margot was definitely the definition of a dominatrix. Relentless, authoritative with a hint of sadism she relished.
After being not only out, but miles away from her comfort zone, Mac found refuge in her apartment, closed in the steaming bathroom, trying to assimilate what she could and how to live with the rest.
Damn. When she was bone weary and shaken, she almost regretted killing Calvi’s brother. If only she’d been quicker and executed the demon himself. If only she had completed her mission successfully.
In frustration she let her hand fall in the bath, water sloshing over the rim. Behind the bathroom door, a familiar floorboard creaked. A split second later, she was half-kneeling in the tub, her gun pointing at the door.
“Can I come in, or are you just going to shoot me through the door?”
She let out a sigh of relief when she recognized the voice of Lance. It seemed that he had finally arrived. Hiding her weapon in the folds of her towel, she slid back into the comforting heat of the water, grateful that Owen had installed a deep soaking tub in the apartment. She would have to thank the man.
“Go away, Lance. I’m taking a bath.”
As she wished him away, the annoying man pushed open the door. “If you’re taking a bath, why didn’t you lock the door?”
“Hey!” She sank deeper, covering her breasts, grateful for the opaque water. “Go away, I’m naked!”
“So what? I’m already knowledgeable of the female anatomy and there is nothing to be excited about, in my humble opinion. I’m not interested in you; you’re not interested in me. So unless you have sprouted a third breast during the night, I think you’re safe with me.”
Mac laughed. “Oh yeah, very reassuring, a man turned on by a woman with three tits. My mind’s at peace now.”
Lance ignored her sarcasm and closed the lid on the toilet before sitting on it. He faced her, dressed in a black leather jacket and dark wash jeans, his elbows on his knees and a grin on his handsome, Norse god face. He had so many similar features with his brother, Wes, but his older sibling had more burnished golden hair and a more rugged face and body. How could less perfection be so attractive?
“You’re staring. And I think I know why. We’ll return to the topic of Wesley in a moment. I came in to ask you how it went tonight.”
“Lance, I’m tired and have no intention of discussing whips and knots with you.”
“Well, you will need to make time. I just spoke with Gabrielle and she wants to be sure you feel ready to face Rodriguez.”
“Why? You have a plan B? Another solution besides me dressing up as the queen of the night and making a dangerous murderer believe that I’m a professional dominatrix?”
Lance didn’t agree. “There is no other plan. But Gabrielle won’t authorize the mission if you’re not convinced you can pull it off. That you could ensure he would willingly provide information on Calvi’s whereabouts. Beyond this mission, Mac, Gabrielle cares about you. And she’s worried.”
Mac leaned her head back on the bathtub rim, looking at the ceiling. “Since when does a mission have to be so certain? I cannot guarantee how it will work out. I will do my best, through the training and adapting to the scene. It’s the only thing I can promise our dear boss Gabrielle.”
“And she’s concerned about what will happen if this doesn’t succeed. Are you going rogue on Purgatory?”
Mac turned her head to him. “Is this all you want to talk about? Because if that is the case, take the door and keep walking.”
She closed her eyes, but Lance stayed where he was. The stubborn gene ran deep in the Sorenson family.
“You may desperately wish to skip the subject, and I will let it pass for now. Just know that Gabrielle has asked me to keep a close eye on you until you come to your senses.”
Mac snorted, splashing him with water.
“I will ignore that and continue to my other topic. My brother, Wesley.”
“I’m not sure I want to talk about your brother with you, Lance. Not in this lifetime anyway.”
“Well, hear me out. What I’m going to reveal isn’t common knowledge, and as Wes is adamant about being your slave for the test drive, as Margot just told me, you may hold the key to his salvation or damnation.”
“I have no such power, Lance. He suffered a great deal, and I’m not the one who’s going to put him through it again. That I can promise you.”
It was Lance’s turn to snort in derision. “You’re saying that, but you don’t know my brother well yet. He’ll find ways to go behind your back, and just as you take a breath of relief, he’ll appear and win the game.”
“Then, he will undo the entire mission, because I won’t play BDSM on him, not after what I have done tonight, not when he’s clearly still in trauma mode.”
“But maybe you can be a solution to his problem.”
“How?” Frustration started to rise again, not something she liked at all.
“After he was freed, he refused any kind of help, no therapy, no psychological support. He debriefed his ordeal to a superior who made a report, but after that …”
“He carries the load of it, the pain, the nightmare, the horror, on his own. No surprise it affects his temperament. Unless he was like that to start with.”
“No. Wesley has always been the responsible one, less of a rebel compared to Owen and me. That could be rooted in the fact of being the eldest. But he liked to laugh and was an easy-going guy.”
Mac’s throat closed when she saw the expression on Lance’s face. She had guessed right when she had declared to Wesley that his two brothers were suffering, too. And how much she wished she had been wrong. She didn’t know what the Sorenson brothers had gone through when Wesley was taken prisoner, but Lance was st
ill feeling and dealing with the effects.
“Tell me what happened, Lance. Please.”
Lance watched her for a long moment. She was certain that he was debating what could be revealed. Back in the days, clearance had never been a problem, and she had the trust of Gabrielle and even Beatrice. However, loyalty and protective instinct were weighing heavily on her friend. Lance rubbed his eyes.
“Wes was in the special unit, I can’t tell you which one and don’t ask me. His team, they were good. In fact, good doesn’t even begin to describe them. I think their talent was their downfall at the end.”
“How come?”
“You know the drill; the better you become, the more eager brass wants to send you into complicated situations. The problem is, at some critical point, it turns into a suicide mission.”
“And Wes went into one of them.”
“Oh yeah. Mac, I read the reports, and I can’t even conceive how they could accomplish this much and survive this long. At the end, what was supposed to arrive, happened. On that fateful mission, many of the team members perished. Wes and one other were taken captive. When I heard about it, my reflex had been to jump in the first plane, with Owen on my heels. We were kept away and in the dark. At least in the beginning.”
“Where was he imprisoned?”
Lance looked at her. “Middle East, in the mountains. Well, I think nobody was quite sure if he was alive. And if it was confirmed, where he could have been incarcerated. Him and his teammate. When I finally got the okay to participate in the research mission, five months had passed.”
“And Owen?”
“His talents are more in Intel. He came but decided to chase other clues, especially those that could guide us to the possible leaders who captured him. It took us one more month to finally have a solid lead, and it wasn’t even from one of our informants.”
“Who tipped you off.”
“Owen discovered the body of one of Wes’s team members … well, what was left of it, in a nearby village, planted on a pike. A war trophy and a warning, I guess. One by one, we found a trail of breadcrumbs bringing us back into a bigger town. Wes and his companion were held in a basement. It took us two more days to plan the raid. They wanted me out, but I was damned if I wasn’t being part of it. Owen came as the second team. He’s a good sniper; you would like him.”
The energy changed in the bathroom and Mac shivered in the cooling water. She didn’t dare move.
“Mac,” Lance shook his head, defeated, “you wouldn’t have recognized him there. He was a shadow of his former self. So thin, his muscle mass had melted away and he was covered with blood and filth from head to toe. Huddled in a corner of a cell that was as big as your tub, he didn’t even move when I called his name. He—”
His voice broke and out of support and sympathy she reached for his hand. He gripped it like a lifeline.
“When I came in, he wouldn’t respond. It’s when I touched him that … he recoiled and then attacked. I thought at first he was attacking me. He aimed at one of my weapons. I didn’t expect his reaction. I deflected and he grabbed my knife strapped onto my leg. His intention was clear; he wanted to slice open his throat. When I blocked him, he tried to strike again and he planted the blade in his thigh, dragging it up.”
“Shit.” Mac’s mind was blank with despair.
“Yeah. It took two men to stop him. You should have seen his eyes. Total void. Nothingness, my brother was gone. Maybe forever.” His voice trembled again and he hid it with a cough.
“But he wasn’t. He didn’t.”
“When he calmed down, he was brought to the camp infirmary. After cleaning him up and tending to his innumerable wounds, he remained in his own mind, barely acknowledging the staff taking care of him, and not recognizing Owen or me at all. Then, one day, his senses came back to him.”
“What happened?”
“We don’t know. And he wouldn’t talk about it. And when he returned to us, it was the soldier who resurfaced first.”
Mac shivered, now completely cold, both from the tepid water and the words of Lance. She didn’t want to interrupt Lance, but she forced her brain to assimilate all the information.
“Give me that robe please.”
Distracted, Lance looked around and grabbed a light-blue terry cloth robe. Mac emerged from the tub, and gestured the stunned Lance to help her. Never breaking her stride, she went out of the bathroom to start coffee, questioning Lance on the way.
“Why do you say the soldier came out first?”
Lance crossed his arms as she prepared the coffee maker. “It was as if he recovered at the moment his mission crumbled. He became disoriented and it took his direct superior to calm him down and make him understand where he was and what had happened. It was at that moment that Wes made a full report of the entire time he was in prison.”
“That report would have been confidential if I’m not mistaken.”
Lance’s grin turned feral as she placed a dish of cookies in front of him. He picked one with chocolate chips. “There is nothing I wouldn’t have done for my brothers. At that point, Wes was still pushing us away and didn’t want any help. There is always a way to find information, even if that information is kept locked inside a very guarded room within an impregnable building.”
“I agree with you.” Mac’s smile turned sour as she handed him a cup of steaming black coffee, her mind well away from cream and sugar. “What did Wes’ report say? What happened to him, Lance?”
The cookie stayed suspended for a while before returning to the plate. Lance leaned on the nearby wall, his thoughts lost in his coffee cup.
“It was bad, Mac. When I read the report, I think I felt some of what he suffered. What I know for sure is I wouldn’t have gotten out of there alive. They tortured his mind as much as his body. The worst part was the suffocating and the cutting. They tied him to a chair and … What he endured is unimaginable. He had several fractured bones, both in his feet and hands. Man …”
Bile rose in her throat and she couldn’t ignore the tears he fought to keep hidden. It wasn’t a conscious thought, but she went to Lance and gathered his big frame into her arms, laying her head on his chest. It took a few seconds for Lance embrace her, putting his cheek on top of her head.
“He may have come around, Mac, getting back a sense of the real life, but he’s pushing us away. His body has healed, still I fear for his mind. And we can’t do anything. He accepted Owen’s apartment as a transition, only if we weren’t around. And what about after? He may never be ready to return to the Teams.”
Mac looked up at him. “Thank you for telling me. If there is anything I can do …”
Lance tightened his hug. “In fact, I think there is.”
“What?” Mac waited expectantly for any possibility to help Wes.
“Something inside him changed when you arrived here, especially when you disclosed the reason why you stayed in this apartment. A part of him lit up. The proof is that he accepted to talk to me again.”
“I can’t deny it, but he’s more acting like an overbearing and very stubborn male in my eye.”
Something flickered on his face. “He has a purpose now. He may have taken it from you, but he has a mission. And it’s bringing him back. So far, he wasn’t allowed to have one.”
“And what are the other steps?”
“I believe you had checked one of them already. And maybe more than once.”
His playful tone made her want to smile and she pinched him.
“Hey, don’t go all sadistic on me, woman.” Unfortunately, joy faded quickly. “And I think we have the opportunity to take another step. As a matter of fact, Wes has opened that door himself. For that, you have to use Wes as your slave during your training, before your encounter with Rodriguez.”
That sentence sent ice through her veins as Mac tried to push away from Lance. An impossible feat as he was definitely stronger than her.
“I wouldn’t ask you to consider it if I
didn’t believe you could help. I’m not demanding that you beat him. I want you to bring him to revisit some of his memories. To unload the burden of the ugly from his mind.”
“I’m not a shrink, Lance. And I’m barely a true dominant. Margot would be better—”
“You’re the first one he allowed himself to trust, since he came back.”
“I would break that fragile trust if I do that to him.”
“He wants to be your slave for the training, Mac. That means something. And you would have the possibility to do shadow play with him. I have discussed this with Owen sometime ago and he agreed with me. It’s a sideways method, but one that could work.”
Mac put back her head on his chest. Margot had told her about shadow play in a very general sense and even hinted to use it on Wes. The way of playing with past trauma and exploring their dark side, offering the possibility of taking control over it through a re-enactment.