Nadya's Nights: Road to Vengeance (8 page)

Vladimir told her to come home.

Not home to her flat.  To his home, where she’d grown up.

She didn’t argue.

There was no place safer and at the moment she really wanted to be someplace safe.  She hung up and told Ulbrecht where to go then sat back in her seat, sneaking a glance over at him.

She wasn’t going to mention that he’d just given her the first real kiss she’d ever experienced.  He didn’t need to know that and she didn’t want him to know.  And she also didn’t want to admit that sometime over the course of the night, she’d developed some kind of feelings for him.

But she knew that it was true.

She pushed the feelings away, not wanting to think about them and in too much physical pain to deal with any emotional baggage.

Maybe tomorrow, after a good amount of sleep, a fistful of pain meds, a bit of food and maybe even a new pair of shoes…

NIGHT TWO:

Race for the Cure

Chapter Twelve: Waking Up

Nadezhda Valentina’s eyes fluttered open.

She looked up at a white ceiling. A drug-induced haze made it hard for her to remember where she was.  She pushed herself up and her left arm throbbed.  She looked over and saw clean bandages wrapping around her shoulder.

Self-consciousness and suspicion crept into her as she realized she only wore her underwear.  It cleared as ever so slowly her mind allowed her to remember the events that had occurred the night before.

From the bar brawl to the Summoner she’d eliminated and her blobby bodyguard.  Then there were the next wave of assholes that’d come for her and the werewolf who’d been such a persistent pain in the ass.

She also remembered the young doctor-in-training who had saved her life more than once.  The thought of him brought a brief smirk to her lips.

She looked around the room and recognition and safety flooded into her.

She was home.

Vladimir Belikov’s estate where she’d lived from the age of thirteen until just recently.

They’d come to the estate after Nadya had taken out the werewolf.  Her and Ulbrecht, the doctor.

Well, medical student for sure.  He’s too young to be a full doctor.

They had been battered, bruised, and exhausted by the time they’d arrived.  They’d been split up to receive medical attention and that had been the last time she’d seen him.

After getting patched up and having a short chat with Vladimir, she’d come back to her room to find it just as she’d left it.  The only sign that anyone had been in there since was the total lack of dust.  Vlad had apparently been keeping the room tidy in case she stopped in for the night.

She’d stripped down, got under the covers, allowed the pain medication to take over, and surrendered to slumber.  Now she was awake again and looking over at the clock on the nightstand.

The sun would just be setting.

Definitely time to get up.

She shoved the covers away and sat up on the edge of the bed, looking down at her body.  She’d acquired more than a few wounds over the course of the previous night and the various bandages she wore were evidence of it.

There was the thick bandage over her shoulder.  That wound she remembered well.  It was the worst bullet wound she’d taken.  She’d been grazed a few times, but never so seriously.  She absently rubbed at the bandage where the wound was.  If the bullet had taken a slightly different trajectory, she’d be dead.

Lucky.

On the other arm – about midway down – was a smaller bandage covering where another bullet had grazed her.  That one was nowhere near as bad.  She couldn’t even feel it.  Nor could she remember exactly how she’d gotten it.  At some point during her raid on the safe house, but that was all she could remember.

Her jaw felt stiff and a little swollen and she remembered the hard knock she’d received from the werewolf.  Again, luck was on her side.  The Hunter who’d tried to assist her in killing the beast had received a similar blow and had lost her head.  Nadya didn’t think her jaw was even broken, just mightily bruised.

More bandages wrapped tightly around her ribs.  The reason was evident as she drew in a deep breath and felt the bones shift slightly, causing her pain.

She attempted to stand and almost fell face first onto the carpeted floor.  Instead, she dropped to a kneeling stance, letting out a yelp of pain.  She placed a hand over her bruised right knee.  The ribs and the knee were yet more wounds from her encounter with the werewolf.

Crashing an armored car into a creature that was nearly five hundred pounds of muscle was bound to put a few dents into a person.  Clenching her teeth, she managed to stand and limp towards a small vanity set up next to the bed.

Sitting in the chair in front of the vanity, Nadya looked into the mirror and saw the side of her jaw bruised and swollen.  She wouldn’t have to worry about drunken assholes trying to get into her pants for a little while it seemed.  Noticing some smaller wounds along the left side of her face, she leaned forward and examined herself more closely.

They looked like burns.

Confusion crossed her face and she looked down to her left arm to see more of the wounds on her hand.  Then the memory came back to her.  The narrow escape down the alley in Ulbrecht’s Benz.  The sparks had scorched her.  The burns didn’t look too bad though.  If they scarred at all, they’d hardly be noticeable.

She spotted a bottle of painkillers on the vanity with a glass of water next to it.  She took three and chugged down all the water.

Pushing herself up, she hobbled over to the nearby dresser.  She leaned heavily against it as she pulled open drawers and got some clean clothes.  She was a little surprised to find more than what she remembered leaving behind when she moved out.

Vladimir must have had one of the maids go shopping for me to give me more of a choice of outfits.
 

She took out a few things that appealed to her then turned and headed for the adjoining bathroom.

If anything, the bathroom was even cleaner than she’d left it.  The tile was practically sparkling.  She set her clean clothes down on the lid of the toilet and grabbed a towel from the stack, setting it on top of the clothes.  There was a laundry hamper waiting for any dirty clothes to be deposited into it.  At the moment it was empty.

Nadya reached behind herself with her right arm and worked the clasp of her bra, getting it undone and letting it slide down her arms.  She tossed the bra into the hamper then reached down, hooking her thumbs into the waistband of her panties and sliding them down her legs about halfway before letting them fall the rest of the way.  She stepped out of them then bent forward and picked them up, tossing them into the hamper as well.

She glanced behind her and noticed the bathroom door was still open.  She pushed it closed and flipped the deadbolt to the locked position.  Then she turned back to the large, marble tub and pulled the shower curtain back.  She twisted the knobs to get the water running.  She held her hand under the running water until it warmed up to her satisfaction then flicked the shower on.

She moved back to the sink and took a small pair of grooming scissors from a glass sitting beside the sink.  She used the small tool to snip through her bandages, tossing them into a nearby wastebasket.  Once they were gone, she surveyed her damage more closely.  The wound across her left shoulder was a long ragged tear, a bit inflamed.  Her midsection was also badly bruised where she’d cracked her ribs.  The graze on her right arm was just as she’d suspected, barely noticeable.

Stepping into the tub, the warm spray of water collided with her body.  She let out a soft moan of relief.  She tilted her head forward into the water and let it run through her blonde hair, washing through it and plastering it to her forehead.

For a few minutes, she just let the water flow over her.  It washed the grime and sweat of the previous night off of her and down the drain.  Then she reached over and grabbed a brand new bar of soap and washed herself more thoroughly.  After she finished with that, she washed her hair then shut the shower off.

Getting out of the tub, she grabbed a towel and dried herself off.  She put the clean clothes on, sliding into a fresh pair of panties before putting a new bra on and clasping it.  Doing it one-handed was a bit tricky, but she managed.  Then she grabbed a pair of black cargo pants and sat down on the toilet to put them on, minding her bruised knee.  She grabbed her shirt last, a short-sleeved button up which was also black.  Slipping it on, she buttoned it up all the way then went to the sink to brush her teeth and comb her hair.

When Nadya exited the bathroom, she limped a bit less and she looked a lot more refreshed.

As she came back into her bedroom, she heard a knock at the door and went over.  She opened the door and found one of the maids there.  She was a young woman – about Nadya’s age – with straight red hair pulled into a bun.  She wore a bright smile.

“Mr. Belikov asked me to come see if you felt up to having dinner.”

Nadya nodded, feeling sudden hunger flair up inside her.

When was the last time I ate?

She couldn’t immediately recall, so it had to have been a while.  “I’ll be down in a couple minutes.”

The maid nodded.  “Take your time,” she said.  “Dinner won’t be ready for another half an hour.”  She turned away.

“What about Ulbrecht?” Nadya asked.

The maid turned back to her, a blank look on her face.  “Who?”

“The guy I came here with,” she said.  “The doctor.”

The maid shook her head.  “I’m sorry, I don’t know,” she replied.  “You’d have to ask Mr. Belikov.”

Nadya nodded.  “I’ll be sure to do that.”  She watched the maid depart, unable to shake the tingle of dread in her gut.

Chapter Thirteen: Bad News

Nadya didn’t bother waiting for dinner to be ready.  She left her room and headed for Vlad’s office.  She assumed he’d be there.  It’s where he usually was when he was home.  Crime organizations didn’t run themselves, or at least that’s what Vlad kept telling her.  Although he was well connected and well off enough to keep his underlings’ bank accounts flush with cash, it seemed like he constantly had to stomp out some petty dispute or another.

And after the events of the previous night, Nadya assumed he had more than a few disputes to handle.  The Hunters Guild would no doubt be pissed that one of their members had been brutally decapitated.  Then there was the whole matter of why one of Vlad’s crews had been targeted for death so that a Summoner could pad her résumé.  Nadya was curious who the Summoner was trying to find work with.  A rival crime family made the most sense, but there was no telling for sure.

The criminal underworld was a shady and chaotic place.  The underworld of supernatural critters roaming about was even more so.  Then there were the less secretive but equally shady corporations who enjoyed hiring supernatural creatures for security purposes, or research, or both.  Nadya didn’t know much about the companies.  She wasn’t a fan of reading about businesses and Vlad did his best to steer clear of them.

“I may be a criminal,” he’d told her once.  “But those people are fucking monsters.  Can’t be trusted.  Can’t be dealt with.”

The fact that Billy Blob had tried to kill her before she’d even known about the Summoner hadn’t escaped Nadya.  Everything had flown by so quickly during the night that she hadn’t had time to think about it, but the memory had crept back into her head while Ulbrecht and she had been driving to Vlad’s.

The thing had caught her completely off guard and she knew the only reason she’d gotten out of the alley alive was due to her Molotov cocktail wielding savior.  She had no idea who the person was, but as far as Nadya was concerned, she owed them several shots of very expensive alcohol.

She owed Ulbrecht even more.  Despite being so absolutely useless in a fight, he’d managed to save her life more than once. 
Plus he’s cute
, a small voice whispered from the back of Nadya’s mind.  She told the voice to shut up.  Ulbrecht’s aesthetics had nothing to do with it.  She owed him a debt for saving her life, just like she owed Vladimir.

She remembered the brief kiss they’d shared and felt her cheeks grow warm. 
Shared, my ass
, Nadya thought. 
He surprised me with that shit.  I definitely wasn’t giving him any signs to make out with me.
  She forced the memory away. 
It’s not sexual
, she told herself firmly. 
I do not have a crush on him.  I’m Nadezhda fucking Valentina.  I don’t have crushes.  I kill things.

Confident in who she was and what she did – and did not – do, Nadya reached Vlad’s office and knocked on the door.

“Come in,” she heard Vlad call from the other side before opening the door and entering the office.  Vlad sat behind his desk, phone to his ear.  Nadya stood in front of his desk and waited as patiently as she could for him to finish up.  Nadya could hear a raised voice on the other end of the phone conversation, but she couldn’t make out the words clearly enough to follow along.  She could tell by the growing tension on Vlad’s face that whatever was being said wasn’t pleasant.

Vlad took as much of the tirade as he could handle before responding.  “How much?” he hissed into the phone.  “I should be the one charging you for my services.  From what I hear, the only assistance your Hunter provided was the silver bullets in her gun.  If you think I’m going to give you hazard pay because your woman lost her fucking head while doing her damn job, you’re going to be very fucking disappointed.”

Vlad paused to allow the party on the other end to reply.

“I don’t give a fuck if she took the job off the books,” Vlad snapped.  “Last time I checked, your Guild was in the business of dealing with these sorts of things.  I had a problem involving a werewolf.  I hired one of your Hunters to handle it.  She fucked up and got herself killed.  In the future, I suggest training your people better so this doesn’t happen again.  Consider it a very expensive learning experience.”  Vlad slammed the phone down before he could hear any more from the irate person on the other end.  Nadya was fairly certain that the reason why Vlad kept the landline telephone was to angrily hang up in a more visually effective method.  Normally, it amused her to watch her boss do so, but she was too distracted by Ulbrecht to smirk.

Nadya waited for Vladimir to take a couple of breaths.  She watched as the anger in his face melted away and as he looked to her, a gentle smile formed in its place.  It would have been startling to see the rapid transition of emotions, but it was far from the first time Nadya had witnessed it.

“Where’s Ulbrecht?” she asked, cutting right to it.

“He’s in quarantine.”

“Why?”

“He was infected by that werewolf you killed last night,” Vlad explained.  “He had several scratches along his back.”

Dread filled Nadya.

Quarantine was just a friendly way of saying he was locked up until the virus took full effect.  And then he’d either be broken to serve Vladimir or – if that didn’t work – executed.  Werewolves were notoriously hard to train, especially young ones.

Ulbrecht didn’t deserve either fate, as far as Nadya was concerned.

“I owe him,” Nadya told Vlad.  She knew she needed a better argument than that, but she couldn’t come up with the right words.  She was far more accustomed to convincing people to do what she wanted in a much more physical way.  And she wasn’t about to beat the shit out of Vlad.  She just hoped that he understood her well enough to know that she couldn’t allow Ulbrecht to suffer and die without doing something to prevent it.

“Look, I know he helped you last night,” Vladimir replied.  “But having a werewolf working for me is too good an opportunity to pass up.  Besides, if I let him go and he turns, someone else might recruit him.  And if last night proved anything, it’s that we can’t afford to have more werewolves working against us.”

“Why would he work against us?” Nadya asked.  “I thought he was on your payroll.  Besides, from what I could tell of him last night, I bet he’ll be the world’s first vegetarian werewolf.  He’s a doctor, not a fighter.”

“He’s not a doctor,” Vlad replied.

Nadya shook her head.  “Medical student, then.  Whatever.  He’s not going to cause you any trouble if you let him live.”

“It’s not as if I’m planning on killing him,” Vlad argued.  “He’ll have a chance.  If we can tame the beast he turns into, then we can use him.”

“We both know how well that’s worked in the past,” Nadya snapped.  “Do you have any reason to think this time will be any different?”

Vlad didn’t have an answer.  His jaw firmed and he narrowed his eyes at her.  “This is happening, Nadezhda.  I understand that you owe him but this is one debt that I’m afraid you won’t be able to clear.  You’re just going to have to accept that.  Now why don’t you go get ready for dinner?”

Nadya realized there’d be no convincing Vladimir of doing anything different.  That left only one other option, as far as she could tell.

Break Ulbrecht out of quarantine and leave the only place she truly felt safe, most likely forever.  Betraying Vlad in such a way would probably end badly for her.  It was uncharacteristically stupid of her to even consider doing such a thing, but it was the only solution she could think of.

She’d heard rumors about a cure.  A werewolf cure.

If she could find it and give it to Ulbrecht then maybe Vladimir wouldn’t care so much about what she was planning on doing.

At least, that’s how she hoped it would play out.