He settled on the bed again, his body against theirs. He stroked Neven’s shoulder, then drifted to her arm, then back. It wasn’t meant to stimulate, she realized, even though his touch sizzled. He had relaxed to the point where he was doing what he wanted, without thinking about it.
“It has been a long time since I felt this way.” He said it casually, with an indifferent tone, although he met neither of their eyes. He focused on what his hand was doing instead. “More than two hundred years,” he added softly.
London could almost feel Neven’s caution rise. He didn’t move, though. He didn’t even turn his head to look at Remi. “The Revolution, yes?” He said it in a way that made it sound as though he was only mildly interested in the answer, yet his heart thudded beneath London arm. She slid her gaze to Neven’s face, without moving herself. His black gaze met hers and he made a tiny motion of his head from side to side. She understood. Don’t startle him.
“I lost everything that night,” Remi said, his tone still distant. “My wife. My beautiful children. Aimée, Edgard and Micheline. I thought that was the worst of it, that my life would never be the same without them and it wasn’t. I can still hear them screaming.” His voice choked.
London drew in a shuddering breath. The agony in his voice! Her eyes ached with unshed tears. “Oh, Remi…”
Remi shook his head and sat up and for a moment, acute pain seared through her. She had halted the flow of words. She had stopped him from speaking and getting it all out.
Remi startled her by picking up her hand and kissing the back of it. “You don’t understand,” he said. “Yes, I lost them. It was terrible and I have not forgotten a moment of it, but until right now, I had not truly realized all that I had lost.”
“Good sex, you mentioned,” Neven said dryly.
London held still. Would the humor drive Remi back into his shell?
Remi laughed, instead. “I believe I may have to recalibrate my expectations in that regard, after today.”
“What happened, that night, then?” Neven returned, with the same light tone.
London realized what he was doing. He had put Remi off guard, made him relax with a joke, before asking the direct question. She found she was holding her breath again, waiting for Remi to answer. At the same time, she felt a profound well of feeling for Neven and his sensitivity and his deftness.
“1798,” Remi said absently. “November thirteenth, in the old calendar. Roderick, my neighbor, came to the house. I thought he was a friend, yet he brought the village with him. He’d fed them lies, told them I was secretly in communication with the King and aristocrats in England, conspiring against the Republic. It was he who was conspiring, of course. He’d told me over cognac only days before. He lied to save his own family, to make himself look like a loyal citizen. It worked.” Remi shrugged and plucked at the line of chenille on the bed cover, concentrating on it, a deep furrow between his brow.
London stayed silent. She could hear her heart beating in her ears.
“They pulled me out into the yard and they burned the house down while my family were still in it. They made me watch. As punishment, they said. Then they ran me through with pitchforks and left me bleeding on the gravel. I lay there. I couldn’t move. I lay and listened to my children screaming…” He closed his eyes and dropped his head.
“Someone turned you,” Neven said softly. “That night.”
Remi drew in a breath and lifted his chin. “Christoph found me. He was a farmer, who stayed out of the way and took no sides. Only now do I realize why. He found me and dragged me into the woods and turned me. Then he told me my life as I knew it was at an end and that I must leave France, for it was lost to me as a count and as a human.” Remi swiped his hand across the spread, smoothing the chenille. “I did as he said. I have not stopped moving, not in all these decades, until I met Kristijan.”
London sighed. Her tears prickled and she blinked furiously to avoid having them drop and reveal her horror at Remi’s story.
Remi picked up her hand again. “No, no,” he said quickly. “Again, you do not understand.”
London shook her head. “No, I don’t,” she confessed. “All I can see is the terrible loss you’ve gone through.”
“It was not the only loss,” he said gravely. “I lost more that I did not know I had lost until right now. This…” He patted the bed. “Us. Together. Peace that eases the heart because there are no hidden agendas.”
“Just incredibly good sex that slices the top off your head,” London finished softly.
Remi’s smile was easy. Wicked, even. “I suppose I could withstand more of such sex, for a few more moments like these,” he said, with an air of self-sacrifice.
Neven laughed, his body shaking beneath London, which tripped off her own laughter, as Neven pulled Remi up against him and held them all together.
Remi had spoken for her, too. She had not known such moments, either. The dry, lonely years of her life were the poorer for that absence. Now she knew what she had been denied.
* * * * *
London had mistaken the tiny shower stall in the corner of the kitchen for a pantry cupboard. It was the full extent of bathroom facilities, yet the shower was hot and the water pressure good.
She stood on a towel next to the Formica table and dressed as Remi handed her the clothes he had retrieved from the lounge area, while Neven stepped into the shower behind her.
Remi was sitting on the table, instead of one of the chairs. He tended to do that, London realized. A counter or a sideboard, or a table were his preferred seating. Did he prefer the additional height it gave him?
One day, she would ask. Not now, though, for Remi was still talking. It was as if a dam had broken open.
“I don’t trust many people,” Remi said, speaking loudly so that Neven could hear over the noise of the running water. “Usenko, though, puts me to shame. He trusts no one, not even Sofiya.”
“He’s paranoid,” Neven concluded.
“Cautious,” Remi corrected. He picked up London’s shoes and lifted them to point at the heels. “These should be higher,” he said, then handed them to her. “Usenko’s caution has let him keep his head while his competitors have all fallen around him. That’s why he won’t leave Russia unless he has to. The deal he set up with Kristijan was all done through intermediaries. Sofiya and others.”
“Which is when she got her claws into Kristijan,” London said.
Remi grimaced. “He considered it worth the price. Fuck dollars, he said.”
London turned her mouth down. “Ugh.”
“Better him than me. I couldn’t have touched her without screaming. Kristijan had no nerves when it came to that sort of stuff.” Remi shrugged. “It got him the deal. That’s the thing, though. Usenko won’t move out of Russia, where he knows everyone, has deals all over the place and can keep his head. He doesn’t have the alliances outside Russia that would help him survive if things go wrong. That’s why he was so keen to set up a partnership with Kristijan. I think he saw Kristijan as a version of himself, but in Eastern Europe.”
Neven leaned out of the stall, his hand on the door, water running from his long body. “Your point?” he asked patiently.
Remi crossed his legs and gripped an ankle. “We’re about to jump back to that odious woman and her demand that you fuck her or else.”
London drew in a breath and let it out, hiding her hot rush of anger.
Neven shook his head and returned to the shower. “It’s not going to happen,” he said. “It wasn’t going to happen before we got here. Every known world and timeline would have to come to an abrupt end for me to even consider such an idea now.”
“If every world and timeline ended, you’d be dead,” London pointed out.
“Exactly,” Neven said.
She tore her gaze away from his body and the way the water was rolling off his olive skin. She looked at Remi.
Remi was also watching him shower. His gaze was thoughtful.
N
even turned off the water and stepped out, dripping. London put her towel in front of him to stand on and handed him a dry one.
Remi jumped off the table. He was still naked. He padded over to the shower stall.
“Remi,” she prompted. “You have a plan? To deal with Sofiya?”
Remi turned on the water and held his hand under it. “I have a plan to end this. All of it.”
“And that would be?” Neven asked, lowering the towel.
Remi shrugged and stepped into the water and sighed as it hit his chest. “We jump back. You refuse Sofiya, in as insulting a manner as you can manage.” He looked at Neven. “I can help you with that. You make her so angry, she hauls Usenko out of Russia, just as she’s threatening to do. When he gets here—I mean, when he gets to Božidarko, we kill him and her. Simple.”
London’s heart beat hard. She looked at Neven.
Neven swallowed. “I can’t kill someone. Not cold like that, Remi. I don’t care how much they deserve to die, I can’t do it.”
“He split a timeline because he couldn’t,” London added.
Remi stepped out of the running water to look at them. He wiped his face clear of drops. “I’ll do it,” he said, his voice low. “If it brings an end to what they’re doing, what they plan to do…I will kill them.”
London stared at him, dismayed.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The drawing room was still empty when they returned to it. The light was so much less intense here in Serbia, Neven realized. The house was still cold. Actually cold—it wasn’t just his mental state making him feel cold. He could feel the cool air against his skin, which was damp from the shower.
He let go of Remi and London. “Upstairs,” he told them. His heart was working too hard. The ache of fatigue settled over him once more. He looked around the room. “I had not realized how much I dislike this place,” he said.
“Then we end this now,” Remi replied. He held out his hand to London, who hesitated, then put her hand in his. They hurried up the stairs, as Neven heard Sofiya’s voice outside the door. She was angry. Still.
The door pushed open, as Neven settled himself on the arm of the nearest armchair and tried to look as though he had been waiting for long minutes.
Sofiya strode in, her white jacket gaping open with each swing of her arms. She was scowling, her lips pouting furiously. “What is it to be, Kristijan?” she demanded.
Neven got to his feet.
* * * * *
London hugged the wall as she had before, listening for Neven’s response to Sofiya’s question. She felt sick. She turned around so she was facing the wall and looked at Remi. “We can’t do this,” she murmured, her lips close to his ear. “If we kill her, it will make us as bad as her.”
“I am as bad as her,” he breathed back.
“No.” London shook her head. “You’re not even the same species, Remi. You’re human.”
“I’m vampire,” he said coldly. “I can do this.”
“You were human first and you’re human still, inside. She never was. We can find another way.”
“What do you think you are doing?” Sofiya shrieked, from below.
London couldn’t stand not knowing what was happening. She pushed off the wall and moved over to the railing and looked down.
Neven had a grip on Sofiya’s neck, from the front. His finger and thumb were digging into the carotid arteries, exactly where Remi had taught him to place them. Sofiya was tugging at his wrist with both hands, only Neven was strong for a human. She couldn’t shift his grip. Her face grew gray and her eyes fluttered closed. She slumped.
Neven let her go and she thumped onto the carpet heavily. He looked up at them. “It worked.”
London didn’t know if Neven was happy or not about that. His voice was…odd. She hurried around the railing to the stairs.
Remi, though, hurdled the railing and dropped down the twenty feet to the carpet with a soft sound and stood up. He moved over to Sofiya and looked down at her.
London almost ran to where they were standing. “We can’t just kill her!” she insisted.
“Not until she brings Usenko here,” Remi agreed. He looked down at her still form. “Although, killing her now would guarantee he comes here.”
Neven swallowed. “No. That’s not the plan. She’s coming around again. Get her into the chair.”
“The ties are in the left-hand drawer of the desk,” Remi said.
Neven headed for the office, while Remi bent and picked up Sofiya as if she weighed nothing. She hung over his arm like a rag doll.
“Pull a chair out for me,” Remi told London.
She moved through the arch to the dining room and pulled out one of the chairs from under the table.
“Further away from the table,” Remi said. “We need to be able to move right around her.”
She moved the chair again and Remi dumped Sofiya in the chair and held her upright, as her head lolled. She made a soft sighing sound.
“Hurry!” London called.
Neven almost ran out of the office. He had a bunch of black zip ties in his hand and was frowning. “I don’t know how to tie someone to a chair,” he confessed.
Remi took the ties. “Out of the way,” he said shortly. He yanked one of Sofiya’s arms down behind the chair and threaded the zip tie around the leg of the chair and her wrist and zipped it closed.
“Tie her ankles to the legs,” he told them.
London took one of the ties from Neven and bent to slide Sofiya’s ankle over to the chair leg. Her leg was surprisingly heavy and she struggled with it. Remi had moved the woman around like a child manipulated Lego.
Neven was struggling as much as London was, while Remi already had her second arm pinned back.
At last it was done. London stood up, swallowed against the sickness in her belly.
Neven wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, looking down at her.
“She’s coming around,” London said heavily. “We need to move.”
Remi nodded. “Coming.” He patted Neven’s arm. “One last big heave and you’re all done.”
Neven nodded.
Remi ran up the stairs. London followed more slowly.
At the top, they looked back. By moving right to the end of the balcony, they could just see Sofiya through the top of the arch. Neven stood in front of her as she stirred. His hands were curled into fists.
Sofiya yanked at one arm, then looked down at it, puzzled. Then she glared up at Neven. “I will have your testicles for this! I will roast them and eat them! While you watch!”
She tried to kick at him and discovered her ankles were tied as well. The Russian she spoke sounded angry and threatening.
“Inventive,” Remi breathed, his brow lifting.
Neven crossed his arms. “You can’t break the ties,” he told her. “Struggle all you like. You’ll just cut into your skin. You know that. I’m sure you’ve used them yourself. Here’s the deal, Sofiya—”
“There is no deal!” she raged.
“Keep your voice down, or I’ll gag you, too,” Neven said.
She grew still. “What is your deal?” she said softly.
The quietness of her voice made the small hairs on the back on London’s neck try to stand up. She shivered.
Neven didn’t seem to be affected by Sofiya’s silky tone. “I’m going to let you go in a moment.”
Remi stiffened next to London. “What the hell?” he breathed.
London gripped the railing. Neven was changing the plan.
The news that she would be released made Sofiya smile. “You’ll be dead the moment after that,” she said sweetly.
“Right. I forgot.” He bent and dug inside her jacket and she arched herself, as if she was thrusting her breasts into his hands. Neven stepped away again. He held up a switchblade. “You won’t need that anymore. I’ve also removed your gun from your coat, the pistol from your purse and the butterfly knife, too.”
Sofiya’s
jaw worked. “I’ll still kill you,” she ground out.
“You won’t. You’ll get up from that chair. You’ll go back to Russia and you’ll tell Usenko the deal is off. No shipment. Nothing. We’re done.”
Sofiya laughed softly. “What on earth makes you think I would say anything so insane to Arkady?”
“You’ll tell him that if he doesn’t comply, I’ll kill him. If I ever see you again, I’ll kill you. Do you have any doubt that I could not do it? I just dropped you to the floor in thirty seconds. Think about that. Think about the type of organization that could pull together a shipment like the one you saw out at the depot. Think about the resources at my disposal that make that possible. I can turn all those resources and use them to destroy Usenko and you.”
London pressed her hand to her belly, hope flaring.
Remi shook his head. “It won’t work,” he whispered.
“It might,” London returned.
Sofiya grew still, considering Neven. “Well, you have a backbone after all,” she said with a smile.
“I don’t give a damn what you think,” Neven replied. “Go back home and tell Usenko what I said. I will consider this to be our last conversation ever.” He picked up the knife and opened it, then sawed through her restraints, freeing her. He held the knife in his hand and stepped back, watching her.
“I presume I can pack my bag?” Sofiya said, standing up.
Neven backed up even farther. “That’s all you get to do before you leave,” he told her.
Remi pulled on London’s shoulder. “Move,” he breathed and pointed to the nearest door. It was Kristijan’s suite.
London pushed the door open and stepped inside. Remi shut the door behind her and leaned against it, his head turned to listen through the wood. Then he relaxed and stood up. “She’s gone to her room,” he said, in a more normal voice.
Then he cocked his head once more. He leaned back and opened the door again.
Neven stepped through and stopped in the middle of the floor. He was still holding the knife. He looked at it, his mouth pulling into an expression of distaste, folded the knife up and put it on the bureau. He rubbed his hand against his hip.
Kiss Across Worlds (Kiss Across Time Book 7) Page 30
