by Juniper Hart
“Why would you waste all that on her?” Kelly complained, eyeing Berlin.
“Because it will look like she and Josh were getting high together, and then she overdosed. No one will think to look at us. If Damien finds out, he’ll hunt us down and kill us. Anyway, he’s got a huge stash in here. We just have to find it.”
Kelly’s brown eyes widened, and she nodded eagerly.
“Oh, good thinking!” They both looked over at Josh, who had fainted from blood loss, and then at one another. “Let’s keep looking and get out of here before Damien gets back,” Kelly urged, scratching at her pale arms viciously.
“I found a safe in his room. Let’s see if we can’t break it open.”
The duo disappeared from the living room, and Berlin was just barely able to turn her head as a small, thin line of saliva pooled out the side of her mouth.
They ruined my chair, she thought as her heavy lids closed around her clear green eyes. Beans spilled obscenely around the dull wood floor from the red vinyl seat. They have ruined my chair, and they have murdered me. I have failed my mission. His Highness will be so displeased.
19
Aaron had been having a very bad day, which promised only to get worse. When he had met with Demir and the other associates at their social club downtown, he had been in for a rude surprise.
“Strip,” Demir told him as soon as he stepped foot into the Turkish club.
“What?” Aaron protested, his heart racing.
“Strip. Take off all your clothes.”
“All of my—what the hell is this?” Aaron demanded, trying to buy time. He was heavily wired and carrying an ankle holster. If he removed one article of clothing, he would be found out.
“Are you refusing?” Demir’s inky eyes were sinister, and he drew near. There were two other captains in the room, each scrutinizing Aaron with the same suspicion as Demir.
“I just want to know what is going on,” Aaron stalled. Where was this coming from? He had been hanging out with them for weeks now, and they had never tried to search him before. Was it a test?
“You don’t ask questions around here, Damien. You are paid to follow orders. I thought you understood that.”
Swallowing, Aaron nodded and tried to smile.
“Of course, boss,” he said in a light tone. Heart hammering, his mind racing, he considered his options.
You have a better chance if you run. Don’t look back. Casually, Aaron went to remove his light jacket. Someone’s cell phone was ringing, but he was too distracted to notice.
“You know, if I had known it was going to be that kind of party, I would have brought some beer,” he choked. As he pivoted on his heel to leave, one of the other captains barked out something in Turkish, causing the others to stare at him. Aaron seized the opportunity to reach for the door, but no one seemed to notice.
“What?” Demir snapped, his face pale. “What are you saying?”
“Charlton has to get the hell out of here. Someone broke into his apartment,” Aslan said in English this time. Furiously, Demir glared at Aaron.
“You better make damn sure they haven’t stolen any product,” he hissed. “Get home and find out what happened. I don’t need to tell you what will happen if law enforcement gets involved, do I?”
“No!” Aaron cried, both elated and concerned simultaneously. He hurried for the door and was in his car before another word was exchanged.
What happened? Was Berlin there? He drove maniacally toward his building, his distress mounting. The twenty-minute drive back to his home took ten. On the way, he continuously dialed his home phone number, but there was no answer. Come on, Berlin, answer the goddamn phone.
Upon his arrival, he noted that there were no emergency vehicles in sight. Exhaling, he flew up the stairs to his apartment. The splintered door was slightly ajar, and he approached, reaching into his sock for his revolver. Pausing at the door, he listened for sounds. Hearing nothing, he gently eased inside. His face paled as he recognized Berlin sprawled on the floor next to Josh.
The apartment had been ransacked, the robber obviously looking for something specific, but Aaron was less concerned with the state of the room, and more concerned with the state of Berlin. She appeared lifeless beside Josh, who was soaked in blood. His heart in his throat, Aaron rushed toward Berlin and dropped to his knees, checking for a pulse. Her face had turned translucent, and he saw a needle mark in her exposed stomach. Gasping, he pressed his lips to hers, beginning CPR.
“Come on, Berlin, stay with me,” he begged, tears welling in his eyes. He started chest compressions and continued pumping air into her lungs until his persistence was finally rewarded. She took a slow breath, and Aaron scooped her up in his arms.
I have to get her to the hospital, he thought with urgency. No sooner had he lifted her featherweight body into his arms than he heard a rustling from the bedroom. Momentarily unsure of what to do, Aaron stared down at Berlin’s waxy face. Her breathing had improved, and she didn’t seem as dead as she had when he’d walked into the horrific scene.
Gently, he placed her on the battered sofa and picked up his gun from where he had put it on the floor. Cautiously, he crept toward the bedroom door. Inside, Phil and Kelly stood, frozen like deer in headlights. The safe which had been hidden behind a landscape on his wall was exposed, the picture thrown carelessly onto the floor as Phil and Kelly whispered urgently at one another. They had not figured out how to unlock it. They were both in an acute state of withdrawal, Kelly trying to fix a syringe with severely trembling hands.
Aaron’s eyes widened, but for a sickening reason, he was not surprised to see them there. All three of them had been calling his phone incessantly since he had been promoted, and he had not bothered returning their phone calls. He should have foreseen the retribution.
“It’s not what it looks like!” Kelly shrieked, her hands dropping the heroin over the comforter. She put up her palms as if to ward him off, and Aaron realized that he was pointing his weapon at them.
“What the hell are you doing in here?” he hissed, closing the space between the them. He already knew the answer to his own question. They were there to rob him, and they had almost killed Berlin in their drug thirsty fog. Rage was building within him, a deep fury which he had never experienced before in his life. From the open bedroom door, he could see Berlin laying on the sofa and hear strange noises emitting from her shallow breathing.
“We—we just came looking for you,” Phil faltered, understanding how lame his words sounded. They had been caught red handed, and there was no escape.
“What did you do to Berlin?” Aaron snarled.
“Put down the gun, man,” Phil begged. “We were just partying. It got a little out of hand, that’s all.”
“You were partying. With Berlin.” Aaron’s tone was dull and furious.
“Yeah, man! She invited us over. She’s no angel!” Kelly babbled. “She just can’t handle her shit!”
“You gave her heroin?” Aaron recoiled at the thought. The thought of that poison touching her was enough to put him over the edge. He raised the gun higher and cocked the chamber.
“Woah, come on, Damien! It was an accident!” Phil pleaded. “She did it to herself!”
“She would never touch that shit.” Aaron’s voice was barely audible.
“She would! She did!” Phil argued, covering his face with his meaty hands. He recognized something in Aaron’s dark eyes, something sinister and relentless.
“No! Damien! No! She wanted some! She begged us!” Kelly screamed, rushing toward him. “You think she’s something special, but she’s no different than us!”
Aaron’s eyes traveled back toward Berlin, and to his surprise, she had sat up on the sofa. Her transparent green eyes watched him, but she said nothing. He turned back to Kelly and Phil.
They are junkies, days from death. They don’t know any better. You have to let them go. They are not filled with malice. They are just fucked up. You are not in a
ny danger from them any longer.
Again, he looked at Berlin and then at the two panicky faces and made his decision. A series of shots rang out as Aaron emptied most of the chamber into Phil and Kelly. He turned away before the figures crumbled to the floor and returned to the living room, where he looked at Josh’s unconscious body. He fired off the last shot, ensuring the weasel’s death.
Berlin stared at him as he picked her back up in his arms, unspeaking, and carried her out of the apartment. He did not care about the repercussions of his actions. It did not matter that he had blood on his hands, the blood of people he was trying to protect.
They had tried to kill his Berlin, and for that, there was no mercy.
20
They were on the run.
In the day following the incident with the addicts, Berlin had been in and out of consciousness. Damien had taken her to a hotel in the neighboring town of Brookline, and she had spent the afternoon and night shaking and vomiting. She had never experienced such sickness, and her comprehension of what had occurred was limited in the strange fog which had overwhelmed her body. There was sluggishness and dizziness, accompanied by bouts of fuzzy vision.
She assumed that she had been poisoned by the intruders, but by what, she was not sure. She had been certain that she was about to die when the potent drug had been released into her bloodstream, but as she had begun to float away from her figure, strong hands pumped against her chest. Seconds later, her core energy shot back into her frame. She had lain still, waiting for her strength to return, slowly becoming aware of her surroundings.
She heard Damien’s voice ring out through the apartment, his tone laced in fury. As she became more conscious, her iridescent eyes opened, and she watched Damien.
We must leave, she silently pleaded with him. As if he had heard her, he turned to look at her. Their eyes met, and he glanced uncertainly at the intruders, people he obviously knew. Again, she reached out to him telepathically. Leave them. We must go.
Her immediate concern was finding safety where she could recoup her strength and not vengeance on those who had tried to harm her. There would be time for retribution later. And retribution was something she did very well.
In the back of her mind, a voice was warning her that she needed to connect to her team, but before that, she knew she needed to gather herself. She watched in fascinated surprise as he raised his weapon and fired easily on the three assailants before carrying her off away from the scene and into his car.
As the night broke into the pale arrival of dawn, Damien slept. Weak, gray light tried to filter through the heavy draped on the hotel room window, but it barely created a glow in the darkened room. Berlin was finally able to sit up without weakness, her body gaining energy with every passing moment. She quietly slipped out of the king bed and walked toward the window, carefully drawing back the curtains to stare into the early morning. Stars still littered the sky, and Berlin felt herself staring heavenward, a lonely feeling of melancholy overcoming her.
He ended their lives for you, she thought with wistfulness. It means that Damien is drawn to me for reasons of protectiveness and love. He has chosen me with free will.
She glanced over her naked shoulder, watching Damien’s rhythmic breaths, and was filled with a sentiment completely foreign to her. He had been at her side since they had arrived, carrying her from the car to the bed and laying her tenderly to sleep on the crisp white sheets.
Throughout the day, he had spoon-fed her small sips of water and soup, none of which stayed in her system long enough to digest, but he continued to repeat the process until her nausea finally diminished. At midnight, she had woken to a warm washcloth slowly stroking her shivering body. Damien dipped the towel in a large plastic bowl and continued to wipe down her naked body from head to toe as she lay there helplessly. When he was finished, he wrapped her in a terrycloth robe and drew her near him. Berlin had turned to him, trying to depict her gratefulness in a form of intimacy, but he had quickly stopped her, kissing her neck softly.
“Shh,” he whispered. “Just sleep. You need to rest.”
And she had fallen asleep in his arms against her most basic instincts.
I’m in love with this demon, Berlin realized, shame and worry filling her body. He has risked everything to protect me. Now I must do the same.
Aaron knew they were in a world of trouble. He could not go back to Demir now that he had left a massacre back at his apartment. He had not even had the foresight to remove the stash of heroin from his safe before fleeing with Berlin.
Local cops are going to be all over that place. I didn’t blow my cover, but I may as well have. Averson is going to flip his lid!
His cell phone had blown up with calls from Demir, Averson, and unknown numbers Aaron instinctively knew were from law enforcement. He finally rolled down the window and tossed the burner cell onto the highway. Nothing mattered to him in those moments but Berlin. He had thought to bring her to hospital, but that was before he had shot Kelly and Phil. Now that was much too risky a move. His first plan of attack was to get them both out of town. Berlin was still in and out of consciousness, though she was breathing normally.
She was going through withdrawal, that was all. He had to help her through the next day or two, and she would be fine.
He had found a Holiday Inn in Brookline where he could tend to Berlin undisturbed. The first hours had him frantic with worry. Her heartbeat seemed to fade in and out, but as time slipped by, she seemed to grow stronger, and his concern lessened. She slept in a fitful slumber, and he finally sat back and considered his next move.
If she is under Averson’s command, he needs to know about this right away. Did those idiots figure out who we are? Is that why they came to the apartment? Or did they just get greedy because of my stupid move, dropping Demir’s money at the flophouse? And if they did know who we are, did Demir know, too, or were they just hoping to cash in on the knowledge?
It seemed unlikely that Demir knew, as Aaron was still alive, but he had no certain answers. All he knew was that Berlin was safe, and that was all that mattered. When she was feeling better, they would have a long talk about what to do regarding Averson.
“Damien, I am hungry.” Aaron glanced up from the newspaper he was keenly reading and looked at Berlin. He had been actively looking for any information of what had happened in Arlington to Phil, Josh, and Kelly, but the media had been eerily silent about the entire affair.
I guess when two undercover cops go missing, everyone wants to cover their asses, Aaron thought wryly. He idly wondered if he would be easily replaced, if someone would be sent in to cover his untimely absence. Demir and Averson must be losing their minds right now.
“Okay, I’ll order room service,” he answered, rising to his feet limberly and folding the newspaper. Berlin shook her straight strands and widened her mossy eyes.
“No, I have a… craving,” she said. Aaron arched an eyebrow with interest.
“Oh, yeah? For what?”
“Seafood,” she replied honestly.
“Okay, I think there’s a steak and seafood restaurant not far from here. Do you feel like going out?”
Berlin shook her head again. “No. Will you go and retrieve some food for us?”
Aaron was torn. Not only did he want to keep a low profile, but he also didn’t want to leave her alone after everything she’d endured. On the other hand, the woman wanted seafood. He tried to remember the last time they had eaten anything that wasn’t fast food, and it was becoming harder and harder to recall. Making the decision, he grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair and the keys off the dresser, the thought of a hearty meal dancing in his head.
“Okay, what do you want? Lobster? Crab?”
“Anything. Just seafood,” came her response.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can. Anything else you want?” he asked before he left. She nodded and stared intently at him.
“Yes.”
“Well, speak now
, and I’ll grab it on the way. Don’t forget, I don’t have a cell anymore.”
“I want you.”
The words had a bigger impact on Aaron than he was expecting. Perhaps it was the extreme stress he had been feeling over the days, or the fact that Berlin had never truly voiced her feelings toward him, but he was overcome with a feeling of such love for her, he almost sobbed.
I hope I haven’t put you in danger bringing you here, he thought. I only ever wanted to keep you safe. He walked over to her and brushed a stray strand of blonde hair from her forehead, leaning over to kiss her softly on the lips.
“I don’t know where you came from, Berlin, but I hope you never leave,” he whispered as they parted. Berlin began to squirm slightly under his weight, and he instantly sat up, apologetically. “I’m sorry! I was crushing you!”
She laughed as he slipped out of her and pulled on his clothes.
“I will live,” she said. “Provided you bring me nourishment.”
Aaron joined her laughter.
“Yes, ma’am, right away.” He leaned in to kiss her sweetly once more. “I’ll be back soon.”
The moment the door closed, Berlin was on the phone, dialing out to where she knew Amphur was staying.
“Berlin. Where have you been?”
“Never mind that,” she snapped impatiently. “Have you any news on the prince?”
“He has been located. We’ve been waiting for you to check in.”
“Where is he?” Berlin asked, a knot of mixed emotions in her gut. If he was found, then this mission would be over.
“Lexington,” Amphur replied. “He seems to be living in a small house with his captor.”
