In For the Kill (30 page)

She bit her lip. “I'm with you,” she whispered. “I trust you.”

That took him apart, unexpectedly. He had to sink down and hide his face against her breasts. His shoulders shook. What suck-ass timing. Right now, when he was trying to be all masterful and studly, to show her she was in such good hands. Right now he had to fall apart?

Sveti's arms tightened around him. Then her legs, a whole-body hug. He felt her soft lips, pressing his forehead. Sweet benedictions. She'd ended up comforting him. How fucking backward was that?

When he finally dared to lift his face, her eyes shimmered with tears. Her mascara was long gone, just a shadowy smudge accenting her eyes. No major landslides this time. He brushed her tears away. Sucked them greedily off his fingers. Hot, wet, salt. His.

“Sorry,” he muttered gruffly. “Lost it.”

She smiled, luminous. “Anytime. I like to be trusted, too.” She lay back, squinting at the sunlight flooding in the window. “It's so bright.”

“Does it hurt your head?”

“No,” she said. “It just makes me feel so naked.”

“Good. That's exactly how I want you.” He stroked tenderly down her body, inside her thighs. Spreading her gently open.

Sam made a low, choked sound. “Look at that sweet, beautiful thing. All pink, in the sunshine,” he murmured. He spread her labia, exposing her most intimate parts. “I want to suck on your clit.”

The words racked her, a shudder of emotion. “Oh, God, Sam.”

“It'll calm me down.” He grinned mischievously. “It'll make me sweet and tractable. Can I have my dose of happy juice?”

She shook with half-hysterical laughter. “Stop it. Don't joke about that, after all the drama! It's not fair!”

“I know, but hey, you laughed, right? I'll do or say anything to make you laugh. And if you came for me, ahhh. Right against my face. Pure heaven. That would be it. I'd be your helpless slave forever.”

He put his mouth to her, stroking his tongue up her folds. She gasped. Swirl, suckle. Stroke and plunge. He got his hand into the action, fingerfucking her. Engaging all the hot spots at once.

She was tense and quivering for a few minutes, but she finally gave in. Trusting him, even when he drove her to that naked leap into the void. He pressed his mouth to her clit while the waves pounded her. Fingers shoved up deep into her pussy. Squeezed with each hot pulse.

Now she was ready. A lake of slick, hot lube to ease his way.

Her eyes popped open as he settled over her. She moaned softly at the nudge of his cock, forging inside her. She clung to his shoulders.

He kissed her hungrily, his tongue dominating her mouth. It was majestically slow for many sighing, trembling minutes, but soon the hot, electric lick of pleasure got them both going. She started bucking under him, inciting him with her body to ride her harder. He obliged.

It was deep, pounding, amazing, every stroke. She whimpered and gasped as her pussy licked and clutched his cock. More. Harder. Each thrust more impossibly awesome than the one before. Winding them both up again to that terrifying swell of energy. He muttered incoherent encouragement into her ear as she bucked, wailed, throbbed.

He exploded. Energy blazed through his chest. He was unmoored, lost in the void. She was the cord thrown out to save him.

When he came back to who he was, where they were, she was petting his damp back, as if memorizing the shape of his muscles, his bones. “Sam,” she said softly. “There's something I need to clarify.”

His eyes popped open. His body tensed. “Yeah?”

“About what you said this morning,” she said. “When you went all scary alpha on me. And you said that it makes me feel safe.”

“Uh, yeah. I did,” he said. “Sorry about that. What of it?”

“It's not your alpha vibe that does it for me. That's fun, in bed, and I get off on it, sure. But that's not what makes me feel safe.”

“So what's your point?” he demanded. “What does?”

“You, Sam. Just you. Who you are. The way you treat me.” She cupped his face. “You make me feel safe. And it's keeping Yuri away.”

The realization hit him all at once. The weight of that tremendous responsibility. Someone so precious, so wary, trusting him that much.

What if he fucked it up? Failed her?

He hid his face against the satiny coils of hair on the pillow and hung on, to her, to himself. His body hummed, like a power source that had switched on. He blazed with it, like a torch.

He'd keep making her feel safe if it killed him.

C
HAPTER
21

T
hey were quiet on the drive to Castellana Padulli, careful not to disrupt the truce they'd established. Sam had grumbled, but he'd gotten ready without a fight, thank God. She couldn't face another one, though the make-up sex blew her mind. She crossed her legs, squeezing the hot glow. Her body's constant, tingling animal awareness of him.

Her phone rang, not long after the first signs announcing the highway exit that would lead to Castellana Padulli.

“Who is it?” Sam asked when she hesitated, staring at the phone.

“It's the same number from this morning,” she replied.

He shot her a blazing glance. “Don't answer this time.”

She hit ‘talk.' “Misha? Is that you?” she asked in Ukrainian.

In the silence, Sam cursed and pounded the steering wheel.

“I wish you would talk to me,” she said into the phone. “Maybe you're afraid of being overheard. I understand. I know you're in pain. I want to help. I'm here if you need me, Misha. Just call.”

The line clicked. The caller was gone. She let the phone drop.

Sam exploded. “What the
fuck
makes you think that asshole is Misha? You've got ten different bad guys breathing down your throat right now! This is sloppy wishful thinking! Use your goddamn head!”

She stared at her lap, biting her lip. He was right, but the impulse had been so strong, she couldn't reason it down. She shook her head.

“Babbling sweet nothings to a manipulative pervert is dangerous!” Sam raged. “Whoever it is, you're encouraging him to jerk you around some more! If it's Misha, he can find his balls and announce himself, like a normal person!”

“Normal? Misha?” She snorted. “That's a lot to ask of him.”

“Don't even start. I'm sick of your excuses for your damaged mafiya soul brothers.” He flipped on the turn signal for the exit ramp.

Castellana Padulli had a walled historic center on top of a steep hill, with cobblestoned streets. The
centro storico
was a traffic-restricted zone, so Sam parked in a garage, and they strolled up the road that wound around the hill and through the arched gate into the center.

Sun-bleached vistas spread out around them, an undulating patchwork of orchards, fields. The sun beat down. She sweated in her white linen sundress and the crocheted cream mohair shrug she'd tossed over it in case it got cooler. Cats who were the same silver gray as the lichen-mottled stones darted like shadows. Fragrant wild herbs and flowers hung in ragged bunches from joints between the stonework.

Sam took her hand as they went inside the ancient arch that marked the entrance to the old town. He wouldn't meet her eyes, still pissed about the phone call, but his hand felt good. Her fears and doubts were flooding in as she remembered Misha's panicky hostility. This could be a trap, and she was dragging Sam into it.

And this might also be a blank, anticlimactic letdown.

But she couldn't share her doubts with Sam. She'd maneuvered him into this against his will. She was so grateful for his brooding presence, but she wished they could be real partners, brainstorming, bouncing ideas back and forth. Supporting each other.

But she couldn't impose her agenda on him by force. She cared so desperately about finding her answers, and he just didn't. All Sam cared about was her. Keeping her safe. Making her come.

Right. And she was complaining? God. Life was so weird.

The Gelateria Del Corso was on a piazza near the town's cathedral, in a small, lovely shopping district. There were tables, umbrellas, a handful of people having coffee or ice cream. Inside, behind the counter were two adolescent girls with hairnets and pimples, scooping gelato. Neither seemed good candidates for questioning. Where was the man who'd answered the phone? He at least was an adult.

They sat down, ordered. He had coffee-flavored gelato. She had crème caramel. She stared out at the pigeons strutting, the blueness of the sky behind the cathedral's bell tower, wishing her fiction was reality. That she really was just wandering the charming hill towns of Italy, eating fabulous gelato with her gorgeous, complicated, demanding lover between bouts of incredible sex. Instead of . . . well, hell. She wasn't even sure what she was doing, but whatever it was, Sam disapproved of it, with all the force of his outsized personality.

A dark-skinned man, Indian or Pakistani, entered the
gelateria
's sheltered area, carrying an armful of long-stemmed roses. He proceeded to offer roses to all the women at the
gelateria,
flashing white teeth at each of them as they refused. He left a rose on each table, including theirs, and made the rounds once again to collect the unsold flowers.

Sveti picked up the rose he had left beside her and passed it to him with a smile.
“Grazie, no.”
It was the full extent of her Italian.

The man's white teeth flashed, and he gave Sam an apologetic look. “No,” he said.
“Lei è bellissima. Tenga pure.”

He backed away without taking the rose.

Sveti looked at Sam. “What did he say?”

“He's just giving it to you, because you're so goddamn pretty,” Sam said, disgusted. “He's got quite the racket going.” He dug into his wallet, pulled out a ten-euro note, and held it out.

The guy wagged his finger in denial. Sam stood, towering over the guy, and held out the money again.

“Tenga,”
he said in a voice that made the man's eyes go big.

He extended his hand and Sam slapped the ten-euro note into it.

“Buona sera,”
Sam said sharply.

“What was that about?” Sveti asked, when he was seated again.

“No guy gives you flowers when you're with me,” he said. “You get flowers, I pay for them. Assuming he wants to keep those pretty teeth.”

“Wow,” she murmured. “That's very primordial of you.”

“Babe, you have no idea.” He gave her a look that zapped her to her core. “There's the guy I talked to, behind the counter.”

Sveti let out a measured breath and got up, tossing her half-eaten gelato into a waste bin. Sam followed close behind as she went inside. It appeared he was not going to volunteer his linguistic skills for this encounter. On principle. Whatever. She'd be a grown-up and manage on her own. She gave the man a big, radiant smile as she approached the counter. That got his notice quickly. He smiled back.

“Excuse me, sir. Do you speak any English?” she asked.

“Little bit. Little
francese,
little
tedesco.
More, for the pretty girls.”

“That's wonderful. I'm looking for someone who might have been here recently. A young man named Sasha. He's thin and pale, with dark hair and dark eyes, and he has trouble speaking. Have you seen him? Or heard of him?”

The man's smile vanished. His eyes darted out toward the street. “No.” The warmth in his voice was gone. “I don't see nothing like that.”

She pulled out her card. “If you do see him, could you give him—”

“No!” He waved her card away. “I don't tell no one nothing.”

Sam reached for his wallet.
“Mi faccia almeno pagare il gelato.”

“No, no, no,” the guy babbled. “No,
il gelato è gratis. Offre la casa. Vada ora.
Get out. Now. Please.”

Sam slid his arm around her waist and pulled her against him as they walked toward the exit. “Smile,” he muttered. “Kiss me.”

She obeyed without a thought, but was startled by his brazen answering kiss. He let her come up for air as they walked into the piazza, and leaned in to her ear. “Someone got there before we did and scared the living shit out of him. Which suggests that we're being watched. Keep smiling, sweetheart.”

She smiled as fear settled into her belly like lead.

“Congratulations, babe.” He grinned at her, eyes glittering with razor-sharp concentration. “This is special. Only with you.”

“Stop it, Sam. I'll apologize later, I promise. On my knees.”

“Ah, now there's a happy thought.” He spun around, just a carefree guy on vacation with his girlfriend. “If we live through the afternoon, you'll spend a long time on your knees to make up for this.”

“Don't be crude,” she snapped.

“Stop looking scared. At least pretend to look forward to your apology. Kiss me again. Grab my ass. Laugh. Act.”

“Stop jerking me around,” she hissed. “You're pissing me off.”

“I get this way under stress,” he said. “I default to sex, my favorite coping mechanism. Could be worse, right? At least sex is life affirming.”

She snorted. “Right. So now what?”

“We fuck off, fast. And once we're someplace safe, and your long, yummy oral apology has calmed me down, I will kick my own ass for letting you talk me into this.”

She realized that she was clutching the rose so tightly, she'd snapped off the head of the flower. The red blossom hung limp and forlorn. The sight gave her a pang of premonitory dread. She put her finger under the bloom to hold it straight, which was when she felt the shred of paper wrapped around the stem.

She glanced down.
Svetlana
was written on it in Cyrillic.

She let the hand holding the flower drop. “Sam,” she said.

He hustled her swiftly along. “What is it, baby?”

“The flower the guy gave me? There's a note on it. Wrapped around the stem, right under the blossom.”

He didn't react or look at her. “Could it just be a piece of tape?”

“It has my name written on it.”

“Oh
fuck,
” he hissed. “Don't look at it til we're in the car.”

Once in the car and speeding away, she unrolled the scrap. “Via Savoni 84, Torre Sant' Orsola. It's an address.” She typed it into her smartphone GPS. “A town about twenty kilometers from here.”

“Tell me you don't want to go there now, Sveti,” he said.

She stared at him. “Of course I want to go there now! Why did you think we came here at all, Sam? For my health?”

“Yes! You saw the guy in the ice-cream shop! This address is probably just a more discreet place to shoot you in the head and stick you in a hole than the main shopping district of a tourist town!”

“Why would Misha go to the trouble? He had me in his clutches in Rome! If he'd wanted to shoot me, he could have done it then! Easily!”

“Yeah, I know! I remember every second of it, believe me.”

“He could have killed us, but he didn't. He threw me a clue.” She craned her neck to look behind them. “No one appears to be following.”

“The look on the ice-cream guy's face was enough reason not to go to the address on that note.”

Sveti held up the paper. “And the look on Misha's face is enough reason to go. This is my only possible point of contact with Sasha.”

“Well, it's burned now, babe.”

“My point exactly! If not now, then never!”

“You think Sasha will never be able to find you again? That's stupid! You don't hide, Sveti! You damn well should, but you don't!”

“Sasha would only go to such insane lengths if he were scared to death. He's trying to protect me with this cloak-and-dagger spy stuff.”

Sam flipped the turn signal on and jerked the car to a stop at the side of the road. He reached for Sveti's phone. “Give me that thing.”

She handed it to him and waited as he stared at the digital map, eyes darting between it and the rearview mirror. Constantly monitoring.

“We should be taking this to the police,” he said.

“That won't help Sasha,” she said.

“You're so sure? How are you supposed to help, if they can't?”

“He'll tell me when he sees me,” Sveti said quietly.

Tires squealed as the car surged into movement again. “Yeah, baby, I just bet he will.”

It took a couple hours to get to Torre Sant' Orsola by the route Sam took. He circled, backtracked, puttered around on back roads, even parked the car in the alley of a small town and dragged Sveti into a bar for a tense twenty minutes, while he stared at the street outside and gnawed a prosciutto sandwich. She was too tense to eat anything.

By the time they finally arrived at Torre Sant' Orsola, he was as convinced as he would ever be that they had not been followed. It was insane to drive into this rendezvous with no idea what they would find. It was a peculiar sort of torture, to feel so responsible for her while at the same time having no veto power over her decisions. If he refused to play, she'd do whatever the fuck she wanted, alone. She'd demonstrated that this morning. She never backed down. He'd have to restrain her physically to keep her from her suicidal bullshit. Nor could he distract her with sex. He'd tried, but it didn't matter how many orgasms he brought forth. As soon as she caught her breath,
boing,
she bounced right back. Up and at 'em again. More pigheaded than before.