MadetoBeBroken (5 page)

He pulled his lips from hers and she almost cried out with
disappointment.

“Not yet,
krahsniy
,” he whispered.

“What?”

That glorious smile overtook his grim face again. Coco
realized with a start that she had lifted her hips into his, grinding her
crotch against the huge erection that throbbed against it.

“You must beg for me. Is a rule.”

She bit her lip. Beg for it? Coco Fiori did not beg anyone
for anything, not even this steaming hunk of enemy muscle. If she played his
little games and let him have his way with her in exchange for information,
then she was no better than some CIA tramp with GS-1 security clearance. But if
she gave in to her own desires—her keening need to feel those lips on hers
again, the hand on her breast and whatever monster he was concealing beneath
the ridiculous one-legged jeans deep inside her aching pussy—then she was
¼
what? A slut and a lousy agent besides. She
had already fouled up every single one of her precious rules on this case
except the not-dying part. What little power she had was the power to make him
desire her, and if it was strong enough, she might have the pleasure of firebombing
his to-do list as well.

“Never.”

“Little bird with the hard head,” he said. “Say that again.”

Oh god, he had begun to push her down with his loins and
rock his hips against her, each stroke of his bulging erection inflaming her
more. The tough denim rubbed against her clit, over and over, like a long,
rough lick. She opened her legs wider and brought up her knees to intensify the
pressure.

“Oh fuck
¼
”

He took a fistful of her hair. “One more word,” he said
hoarsely. “Fuck plus one more word. Say it. Say ‘Fuck me’.”

She was so close to coming, her body felt as if it were made
of warm water, with a fierce wave cresting at its center. His hand drifted to
her crotch and a tumble of new sensations played across her pussy—his big
knuckles probing as he slid two fingers inside her slick opening, pulling the
panties aside. She let out a gasp of shock, but her traitorous body welcomed
the invasion, clenching around the invading digits. Her head thrashed from side
to side as she rocked with his thrusting fingers.

“Mmm, fuck
¼
Fuck
you!”

He did not stop, but rather chuckled in her ear, his breath
stirring her hair.

“Strong Amerikanski spy, yes? Modern woman. No man will own
you.”

“That’s right,” she gritted between her teeth. Oh god, he
pulled out and applied his wet fingers to her clit, rubbing it with a hard,
circular motion. Her plump, slick button pulsed under his talented fingers. The
wave rose, teetered at the top and when he lowered his lips to hers again, she
exploded in a shower of dizzying sparks, her cries muffled by his mouth.

Ripples of pleasure reverberated through her body, each a
little less strong than the one before. The room swam into focus—Alexi on top
of her, brushing a hair away from her eyes, the dark-gold wood of the walls, a
jovial painted rooster glinting from the mantelpiece as if nothing at all had
happened. As if she hadn’t just made the most foolish and dangerous mistake of
her career.

“Oh god,” she moaned. “What have I done?”

“
Nyet
. I ask questions now.”

Cigarette smoke made her blink. Alexi had cuffed her by
wrist and ankle to the smooth wooden posts of the bed then loped into the dark
maw of the cabin. When he returned he wore only a towel wrapped around his
waist. He ran a hand through his wet hair and now sat on the edge of the bed, a
strip of fresh gauze around his thigh, smoking contemplatively. His body was
hard, bronzed and beautiful, every inch of it.

Alexi blew out a stream of smoke, squinting into the
firelight. He seemed to be a million miles away.

Think,
she told herself.
There has to be a way out
of this.
Quickly but with precision, her mind scrolled through a list of
advantages and disadvantages to her situation. On the minus side—cuffed to a
bed, van keys, cell phone and weapons out of her control, miles from anyone,
unfamiliar landscape. On the plus side
¼

Well, that was a nonstarter. Alexi hadn’t moved except to
bring the cigarette to his mouth. He’d lit a fire and its colors danced over
his chiseled muscles, lighting up the planes and curves of his form with red
and gold. He looked like a dark god at rest.

If she could only get out of the restraints, out of the
cottage. She was still fast and wiry, and even if she couldn’t make it to
civilization, the landscape would surely hide her more easily than it would
obscure his bulk. Once they were both out, she would have the advantage. The
trick, of course, was to get out, and that wasn’t something she could do with
him sitting there, staring into the fireplace, his bronze skin glowing.

“I don’t like these things—handcuffs,” he said quietly,
without looking at her. “You like them,
krahsniy
?”

“No.”

“Is very difficult to make fight in my country for
independence. We have no equipment, you see—bullets, guns, tanks. Is a rough
and poor place.”

He crossed the room to toss the butt into the fireplace.
Even in her anger and shame, Coco marveled at the tiger-like grace of his
haunches as he moved. The bullet seemed not to have slowed him down or made his
movements awkward.

“We were talking about that lazy slut who sucked my dick,
the technique? In Chechnya, we must use other techniques, inside the head.”

“Now the word you’re looking for is tactics. May I have some
water?”

“On battleground, in bed, is same. Psychological tactics.”
He pronounced the last word carefully, as if throwing it in her face. “Is not
so simple as the bonds in that cabinet, whips and collars and clamps, silly
stuff. What I do is more effective, because once you change a person’s brain,
is changed for always. These cuffs, you know—you put them on, take them off.”
He shrugged. “No change.”

“Then I would like for you to take them off me. I’d also
like some water.”

He left the room. Coco could hear him padding around in the
kitchen, gathering plates, slicing something. The tap ran and then stopped.

The bed dipped again as he sat on its edge. He tilted the
glass of water to her lips.

“Is not safe to let you go,” he said. “Eat.”

She leaned her head forward as best she could to take in the
small bites of bread, cheese and sausage he offered. Between feeding her, he
swigged from a bottle of beer.

“I thought you didn’t drink.”

At this, he unleashed his wolfish grin. “Long day,
krahsniy
.
A girl shot me, kidnapped me. We did have nice visit to museum though. I don’t
take alcohol on assignment.”

“Sitting in the Three—uh, that pub was an assignment?”

“To meet my adversary, yes.”

So his poor, rough country had some resources after all. He
had known she was coming, known someone was after him. She was playing into his
hands the whole time. Had he been planning to kill her all along? Was he still
planning it? She thrust those questions aside.
I’m alive for now,
she
thought,
and I will use my time wisely.

“You had already killed Kaminsky,” she said.

“His death did not advance our cause. It was, in fact, great
misfortune.” He sounded genuinely regretful.

“Your mistake, I guess,” she smirked.

“Yes.”

The fire hissed and crackled. Coco longed for a shower—she
was still sticky between the legs, and worse, the memory of Alexi’s hand on her
breast burned like an imprint left by a slap. She wanted to brush her teeth,
scrub her skin, wipe him away and become herself again. Only with his scent
gone could she be free to carry out her assignment, and she would carry it out.
This was only a glitch.

One hell of a glitch though. She had been weak, weak and
willing. Alexi was quite right about what he called psychological tactics. It
wasn’t so much being lashed to the bed that took away her power, but the orgasm
that crashed through her until she saw stars. Any fool could snap closed a
cuff, but it took a being of sublime erotic magnetism to completely control the
body of someone who hated him.

No, not hate. She had a job to do, and hate was too hot an
emotion to allow to color her work. She had to remain neutral and feel nothing.
I deal with facts, not emotions. Never mind the thing that just happened. That
was a normal physical response to sexual stimulus.
That thought made her
feel stronger. It was a nice little arsenal of manipulation he had at his
disposal, but she was way ahead of him. As long as she responded to him
physically, Alexi would believe he had the upper hand. But whatever her body
had done—or would do—her mind was her own, locked away. And he would never know
it.

“Why,
krahsniy
?” he was asking. He had turned to look
down at her and there was a strange expression on his face, almost pained.

“You were an assignment.
My
adversary,” she answered.
“And you were trying to kill me.”

“No, no, not the shooting and,” he waved a hand at the
darkening room, “all this. Why those men in the club?”

She opened her mouth and then shut it. It was not the question
she had been expecting.

“That would be none of your goddamned business. You have no
right to question me about my private life.”

“I don’t like these toys, but I will use them. Don’t be
stupid, girl. You are my captive and Alexi asks the questions. If you lie to
me, it will hurt.”

The golden glitter in his brown eyes was as bright as ever.
She kept her eyes on his, considering how much to give up.

“Is this?” He trailed a finger down the thick, scarred skin
on her side. Ever since it had healed, the area had been an odd combination of
numb and sensitive. His touch was like balm, cool and soothing. He did not look
away from her face, and his hand did not hesitate, just stroked the ugly patch
as if it were as smooth as the rest of her skin.

“If you mean am I a piece of damaged goods who feels so ugly
I can only make love in the dark to strangers, the answer is no. It was
¼
a one-time thing.”

“I see. So men have touched you here. Many?”

“None since it happened,” she admitted.

“We are all damaged, Coco.”

Her head and shoulders flew up from the bed, but the chains
on her wrists jerked her back.

“Oh yes. I know who you are.” Alexi laughed softly.
“Constance Marie Fiori, twenty-eight years of age, in Overseas Security
Operations of United States. But most citizens, they know nothing of you, yes?”
He continued to stroke her scar, spreading his range out to her belly and ribs,
brushing over her navel. “Trained in negotiation, infiltration, martial arts,
hand-to-hand combat and low-caliber artillery. Allergic to chocolate—is funny
for a Coco. I don’t call you that, silly American nickname.”

“So we know each others’ names. I’m shaking in my boots.”

“Specialist in Southeast Asia. One day, this agent boards an
airplane for Indonesia and disappears. Six months, file is blank. Why gone so
long? This ‘damage’ you speak of, it was the one thing I don’t know about you.
Now I know.”

“Please stop that,” she said. “Take your hands off me.”

He gave her nipple a vicious pinch.

“I ask again who is the good guys,” he hissed. “You think of
that when they take your fingerprint, give you fake passports, cover story,
when they tell you mummy and daddy and boyfriend can never know what you do? If
America loves freedom so much, why she keep her means of enforcing it in the
shadows?”

The shadows. That was her own term for the ninety percent of
her life that made up working for the OSO.

“You’re right. It’s much better to just gun down a train of
civilians and firebomb schools. The CRF is much more transparent.”

He ignored this. “Was your mistake?”

“What?”

“This.” Again, he traced a cool finger across her scar.
“Even shadow American agents make mistakes. Or were you ambushed, outnumbered?”

“I was
¼
” How easy it
would be to say that she had been taken by surprise by wily adversaries, to say
that her backup had failed or she had been betrayed by her own agency. One
little lie and she could retain the advantage of being a powerful cog in a
mighty machine of peacekeeping. Maintain the flow of information, be sure it
moves in only one direction. But it was too late for that rule, he already knew
too much about her and something in his eyes told her he could smell a lie.

“The truth,
krahsniy
.”

“I didn’t secure the hotel,” she confessed. “I took it on
faith that it was safe without checking. Only the rudimentary security measures
were in place when I went out on that beach to wind down. I was feeling pretty
smug about the operation. They blew it up while I was drinking a beer.”

“This is burn scar, not shrapnel.”

“It’s both. An umbrella caught fire and fell on me, and the
fire turned the sand into glass shards. They spent months picking out the
slivers and grafting new skin on my side. But that was nothing. We lost three
men that day. I lost them.”

Again he tipped the glass of water to her mouth. “You feel
guilty?”

“Feeling is something I’ve tried not to do since.”

“Little bird.” He stroked her cheek. “The Greeks called it
hubris, Hindus believe in karma. You know that it does not exist, yes? The gods
do not punish one for pride or confidence. They do not raise the humble to
glory. There is only one who judges us all equally, and that is Death.”

“Yeah, well, I’m trying to stay away from him too.”

She awoke to such a strange sensation that it took her long
minutes to realize that her wrists and ankles were free. She sat up and rubbed
the places where the cuffs had chafed. Beside her on the bed was a little pile
of plastic, stomped into jagged pieces. Bits of her cellphone she recognized,
but there were too many shards, some of them silvery in hue. Then it struck
her—the van’s distributor cap. She would not be escaping unless it was on foot.
Alexi’s tactics were rough but effective.

He was nowhere inside the cottage so she stepped into a
large, cedar-scented bathroom for a much-needed shower. Reveling in the gush of
warm water, she felt her head clear. Alexi could remove every means of escape
he liked, but she wasn’t going anywhere. She could not flee this place until
she had the information OSO needed. As long as she was free and unencumbered,
there was still a chance she could get it. The playing field had been leveled.
She was no longer Alexi’s prisoner, but neither was he hers. One well-timed
move would put him back under her power, but she would have to be careful.

A cursory sift through her purse revealed that he had
removed everything but her lipstick and tissues. Even the mirror compact was
gone. Smart move; it would have been far too easy to smash the glass and hold a
sliver of it at his throat, or better yet, his eye. No problem, she told
herself, pulling on a short white robe she found hanging behind the bathroom
door. It was time to switch to what Alexi called “psychological tactics”, to
bring the enemy down with his own weapons.

He wanted her. It wasn’t true that desire made everyone weak
but him strong, he had only been taunting her by saying so. Anyone in desperate
need gives up power, and this man’s need was easy to stoke into a flame that
burned up every ounce of resolution.

Whether she felt any similar need was a question she tried
not to ask herself.

She padded into the big front room then stilled, every sinew
frozen. Someone or something had its eyes on her, and there was a
not-quite-rightness in the air. She willed the rush of adrenaline to subside
throughout her body and slowed her fluttering heart. The sound of something
hard dropping to the floor made her pivot, and there, in the open doorway, a
squirrel watched with regret as its acorn rolled noisily across the wooden
floor.

The squirrel fled without its snack as Coco pushed out the
door and into the gentle Scottish sunlight. The day was warm, with a caressing
breeze, but it was the view that stopped her, her breath hitching in her chest.
They had driven in at night and missed the spectacular beauty of the
landscape—rolling green hills tufted with shaggy clumps of trees and patches of
pale-purple flowers like exquisite throw rugs tossed here and there over the
velvet grass. From somewhere behind the house came the splashing of water and
she followed the sound, rounding a trio of elegant saplings and emerging onto a
grand field that dropped off into nothingness in the distance.

Alexi lay on his back, naked and golden, at the edge of a
small lake, a silver Thermos by his side. Even in its relaxed state, the member
he had teased her with, stroked her with under rough denim, was thick and
smooth, as bronzed as the rest of his skin. She looked away, up to the
waterfall that plunged into the lake, narrow and deeply blue, churning up a
shallow layer of foam as it hit the water. Nothing about this assignment had
been what she’d signed up for when she joined OSO, but this—this was beauty,
peace and sensuality like she’d never imagined. If he had been an ordinary man
and she an ordinary woman
¼

He did not open his eyes as she cast her shadow over his
supine body.

“You didn’t have to do that, disable the van.”

“You should have checked hotel,” he countered mildly. “Take
all security measures.”

“Why didn’t you just take it yourself and leave?”

“Sit with me,
krahsniy
. Look at the water. Maybe we
are both off duty for one minutes, okay? Tell me you were not little bit
relieved to see mobile phone all smashed up.”

She sat, tucking the hem of the robe around her knees. “I
told you I have no superior. And neither do you. Warlords make their own
rules.”

He sat up and shaded his eyes. “Warlord? Is that what they
call me in your shiny American office?”

“That and worse.”

“Yes,” he sighed. “I spoke to you before of home, but your
ears were closed.”

She watched a golden plover dive close to the water and snap
its beak around the body of a dragonfly. It rose into the air and circled once,
as if in triumph, before disappearing behind a screen of leaves. She knew what
home meant better than he did, and for the opposite reason.

America was a dream of home, a place she didn’t see until
she was seventeen. Her uncle would come to visit the family in Bangkok or
Burma, take her fishing on lakes not unlike this one, and tell her stories
about home. Her father never rose far in the diplomatic corps, being shuttled
from one less-than-luxurious country to another, but as a little girl, she knew
no other way of living. Travel light, don’t make too many friends, be ready to
pack up your toys every three years and fly to another place whose language you
did not speak, whose customs were strange and whose kids had already found each
other and had no need for a gap-toothed, red-haired American interloper.

Home was a fantasy of Hershey bars and neon-bright
television shows, soda pop and water that was safe to drink, skyscrapers and
trendy clothes. What she would never tell Alexi was that when she finally made
her way there, it felt nothing like home at all. It was another foreign country
with strange customs, smooth, salty foods, sterile, empty streets and kids who
had already made enough friends. So she built another one in her heart, and it
was this America—this phantom of home—she would kill or die to defend.

“I was listening,” she said quietly.

He shook his head. “Guns, freedom, baseball—pauf! You have
immaterial constructs, ideas only, for which you kill men.”

“I don’t kill—”

“The truth, please. Now we are neither of us at home. Why
not enjoy it?”

“Because the great thing about immaterial constructs is they
travel well. If you need your fearsome mountains to keep you going, I feel
sorry for you. The idea of freedom lives within me, and yes, I will kill for
it. That’s why I won’t run away. I have a job to do. Now answer my question.”

“
Nyet
. I am in control.”

“Control? There’s a bullet in your leg. What’s to stop me
from dropping a big rock on your head?”

“If I’m dead, I cannot fuck you, and you want me to fuck
you. There is tea in Thermos,” he added.

“I damn sure do not want you to fuck me!” she exploded,
leaping upright. His amused expression did not change. “I want to do my job and
get home. You had me chained up last night. I had no choice.”

“No choice but to come like steam train at my touch?” He
grinned and poured tea into the Thermos cap, handing it up to her.

“That was a normal physical reaction to stimulation, nothing
to do with you.”

“And those men on that night.” His face darkened. “You were
not chained up, you were not in love. Is not because of scar, I believe that.
So again I ask why. Or maybe better I tell you.”

She sipped her tea, her lips numb. The sun was rising,
showering warmth on her wet hair, the waterfall splashing across the lake. From
the crown of a shaggy-topped tree, a dark mass of birds took flight all at
once, scattering into specks as they rose into the cool air. Alexi stood before
her, gently pulling the robe from her shoulders to drink in the sight of her
firm breasts, pink nipples pebbled in the breeze. She did not stop his hands.

“Is because you want to be taken by someone you don’t know,
someone you don’t care about. No love, no heartache, nothing to touch you deep
down. This scar,” he put his palm against her torn side, “is just a scratch.
There is bigger one in here.”

The tip of his finger pressed against her sternum.

“Let us make a bargain.”

It was on the tip of her tongue—
The United States does
not bargain with terrorists.
God knows she had said it enough times before.
But she couldn’t speak. His strange eyes with that ferocious scar filled her
vision. There was a slash of skin in the center of his eyebrow where the hair
had not grown back.

“You want Alexi inside you, you want answers. I want to rest
in this wild, peaceful country that looks so much like my home, and also want
to take my pleasure with you until your moans silence that waterfall, until you
are aching and shuddering in my arms. No love, no heartache, just a ‘normal
physical reaction’.” He repeated the phrase back to her with a smirk. “One
answer for every time you satisfy me.”

She tried not to glance at his manhood as it hardened
against his thighs. “You want me to trade sex for secrets.”

“No. I want you to fulfill your fantasies on a mad warlord
and take to your bosses all you have learned. If your body is open to me—if you
do everything I say—I will not lie to you. That is what you want, little red
bird so full of desire, no? To submit to the demands of a strong man.”

Amanda’s words floated to the top of her mind, and the
memory of her breath coming fast and warmth spreading through her body as the
madam perceptively noted that, while Coco may be no whore, she wanted
desperately to be treated like one.
To be taken by someone you don’t know,
someone you don’t care about.
She didn’t care about Alexi, true, but if she
agreed to the bargain, she would know him very well by the time she was on a
plane back to DC.

Or even a direct flight elsewhere, away from her anonymous
Pentagon City efficiency and her anonymous life, and back to Southeast Asia,
where there was action, color, life, where all her senses could be engaged
again while she did the thing that she did best. Get the bad guy.

All she had to do was get
this
bad guy.

“I told you I’m alone on this mission,” she answered,
pulling the lapels of her robe closed over her breasts. “Nothing you tell me
can be verified until I take it back to the head office, and you’ve destroyed
my phone. Why should I trust you?”

“I have hurt people,
krahsniy
, many people. I have
made men and boys, little boys, from villages all over Chechnya into ruthless
killers, and Russian mothers and wives have drowned in tears because of my
actions. This is no secret. But I will not lie to you. One question now, but
after, you must wait until you are completely satisfied.”

“You said before that I was to satisfy you.”

Alexi leaned in and placed his lips on her neck, kissing and
sucking at the soft flesh.

“Oh you will, so much, with that beautiful body, and the
fear and desire in your eyes when you submit to my will. That will satisfy me
greatly. But if I don’t please you with my hands, my mouth, my cock, the deal
is off. Ask.”

She drew free the belt of her robe and let it fall to her
feet in a fluffy white drift. “Who is number two in the CRF?”

He had the nerve to look disappointed. “That is wrong
question,
krahsniy
.”

His cock did not so much as twitch when she drifted a hand
down her neck, between her breasts, over her flat belly. Annoyed, she snapped,
“Answer it.”

He shrugged. “Man named Umarov.”

For some reason, her little display wasn’t working. She had
gotten her answer—possibly a useful one, although she had no idea of
knowing—but Alexi looked at her dispassionately, as if her body were merely
part of the pretty landscape. His cock was at half-mast, waiting for orders
from the rest of his body.

“Umarov, okay. Take what’s yours, Alexi.”

“You are very beautiful, but I cannot take what is offered
to me.” He pulled her up and put a hand under her chin, tilting her face toward
his. “You will not seduce me with silly writhings. No woman comes to me on her
back or her knees. I put them there.”

She could smell the sunshine on his skin, warm and clean.
Wetness gushed between her legs as she thought of him pushing her head down,
training it at his cock, but her naturally contrary nature took over. “This is
ridic—” Her words dried up as he grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked.

“So on your knees.”

“No.”

He smiled. “Even better.”

So this is what he wanted, for her to fight and lose. A
flush pinked her skin from head to toe and his cock responded, thickening
enticingly. She had him now. He didn’t want a submissive, a geisha—he wanted
her
,
feisty, furious and finally, powerless, playing a game she had privately longed
to play.

“Let go of me, bastard!” she cried.

He pushed her down until she knelt in front of his golden
baton, a single drop of desire forming a pearl at its tip. The grass felt cool
and velvety beneath her knees.

“Suck me, you little slut.”

“Fuck you!”

“Oh god,” he groaned. “That’s so good. Open your mouth,
slut, or I will shove my cock in it so hard I will break you in two.”

Delicately she licked the droplet, swirling her tongue
around the head of his shaft. Alexi let out another groan and buried his hands
in her hair, slamming his hips into her face.

He was so big he stretched her lips wide, but he tasted
delicious, like musk and sunshine. She pumped her head, taking in the length of
him from root to tip with each bob. The guttural, helpless noises he made as
she sucked him inflamed her, deepened the ache in the very core of her body.

The sun was warm on her shoulders, caressing her naked body,
and the wet sounds of sucking mingled with the splash of the waterfall in the
distance. It was as if they were part of the landscape, as much of nature as
the flock of birds or thickets of heather, primal beings indulging in the
oldest and most sacred act.