For the first time in what felt like forever, Jack didn’t wish to be somewhere else. Here was the only place he wanted to be. And that was okay, he decided as he pressed a kiss to Ethan’s shoulder. Okay, as well, to want this man, to want to be with him like this, as a friend and occasional companion. Outside, in the real world, it would be different, difficult and dangerous, but here, like this, it was good.
Still, Jack decided to get up. If he stayed in bed, tangled up with this man, he’d probably end up doing something incredibly stupid.
Jack’s first thought—an irrational grasp towards the hope he hadn’t been betrayed—was that Blade had wanted to stop Jack from springing the trap so they could both escape. Reason, however, crashed back in almost immediately, and he knew this was where Blade had been leading him all along.
Mr. Valadian stood on the grass before the Big House, suit impeccable, not one hair out of place, smugly superior expression on his plain face. He looked absolutely nothing like a man who should be running for his life from an assassin. Of course, that could have had something to do with the army at his back.
It wasn’t the full three thousand, but the hundred or so armed soldiers may as well have been for all the chances Jack had of getting through them.
“Put your weapons down, Mr. Reed,” Mr. Valadian suggested, oh so urbanely. “While your death isn’t entirely off the books yet, I’d hate to have the decision made for me.”
Right then, an army-assisted suicide looked pretty inviting, but Blade was suddenly behind him, muzzle of the Desert Eagle pressed to the junction between skull and neck. Swiftly, he pulled the other gun from Jack’s waistband and slid the Assassin X off his shoulder.
“I urge you to not do anything stupid, Jack,” Blade murmured.
“Why should I stop now? Worked so well for me up to this point.”
“Jack.” The warning in the tone sounded honest, though Jack had to wonder if he’d ever had a real reading off Blade.
“Come on down, Jaidev,” Mr. Valadian said. “We need to talk.”
“Yeah.” Jack tried to let go of the anger and open up for the cool serenity of detachment. It didn’t work.
He had to get his head into the game, wanted that rush of calm he needed in order to dive head first into combat and get out the other side alive. It was too personal this time, too close to home. It was like the Maoists had just blown up the school and all he could feel was a towering desire to hurt those responsible for killing his mother. He looked at Valadian and saw the man who’d destroyed so many lives with his criminal empire, who’d ordered those who dissatisfied him beaten and killed, who’d built this place, put the name of a saint on it, and then defiled it with his careless cruelty. He hated that he’d come to laugh at the man’s jokes. But mostly, he hated the fact Blade stood behind him, gun to his head, hand steady, ready to kill him if he so much as twitched the wrong way.
“Yeah,” he said again, then, “No.”
Before Valadian could question him, Jack reached back for Blade. Got hold of his arm and went down on one knee in the doorway, hauling the assassin over his back.
For whatever reason, Blade hesitated, the only reason Jack’s gambit worked. He tumbled over with a startled gasp, which turned into an oof of pain when Jack slammed him down to the veranda. Jack twisted the arm he held, then caught the Eagle when Blade released it. Jack all but threw the assassin back into the house, followed him, and slammed the doors behind them.
Blade was partway to his feet when Jack caught him with a boot to his gut. Another kick sent him back to the floor, at the foot of the stairway.
“You goddamned little shit! What was that—”
Moving faster than Jack could credit, Blade flipped back to his feet. His expression was closed down, cold, full of the detachment Jack wanted but couldn’t find. For maybe a second, he held back, then he was moving.
It took every ounce of skill, training, and luck Jack had just to keep up. Blade attacked with a fluid blend of martial arts, every move precise and infinitely controlled. All of it perfectly aimed to get inside Jack’s defences. Jack held his own, barely. He used strength where Blade used speed, his kicks knocking the smaller man back, his punches getting satisfying grunts of pain, but Blade was always twisting back in, delivering driving jabs and lightning fast strikes.
Blade back-flipped over Jack’s sweeping leg, coming down into a spinning kick aimed at Jack’s gut. Staggering back, Jack turned away from the next hit, collecting it on his ribs, not his aching stomach. Catching the arm under his, he rolled with the blow, bringing his back to Blade’s chest. Elbowed him in the face with all the force he could muster, then continued around, wrenching Blade’s arm out at an unnatural angle, punching him in his bloody nose again.
Head snapping back, then forwards, Blade focused on Jack for a split second and there was nothing relatable in his unchanging eyes. No pain, no anger, no recognition. Maybe they’d been wrong about the Sugar Babies. Maybe they were unfeeling, insane, inhumane. Intelligent enough to mimic acceptable behaviour but that was all it was—an act.
“Blade.” The mad thought he could get through this automaton and find the man he’d known was given a moment of desperate life before it died.
Blade threw his head forwards, aiming to smash his forehead into Jack’s face. Seeing it coming, Jack pulled back enough to take the blow on his jaw. It knocked him back, his head ringing with the power of the impact. Blurrily, he saw the fist coming and tried to move. It slammed into his shoulder, pushing him further off-balance. The follow-up kick caught him on the jaw. He crashed to the floor. Blade was on him instantly, straddling his chest, knees clamping his arms to his sides.
Physical attack seemed to be inadequate, so Jack went with psychological.
“Huh,” he managed, even though his jaw protested massively, “knew you didn’t like getting fucked.”
The fist smashed into his face. His body reacted without thought, thrashing off the floor, lifting Blade up. Twisting, he tried to topple the assassin off. Blade went with the roll, though, legs clamping tight around Jack’s torso. One hand in the collar of Jack’s shirt, Blade punched him again and again while Jack scrambled to get enough purchase on the slick floor to break free. He dug his fingers into the hard, straining muscles of Blade’s thighs, hoping to find a nerve or two.
“Maybe I was wrong about the fuck,” he wheezed. “You seem to like having me between your legs.”
Blade snarled and squeezed with his thighs.
Coughing up the last of his air, Jack hooked his hands into the back of Ethan’s DPDU pants and heaved, trying to break his hold. Blade arched his back, then snapped his legs out straight, tearing Jack away from his clothes. Before he knew what was happening, Jack was flung around again, ending up on his other side. One moment Blade was in front of Jack, the next he was behind him. Legs still clamped around his body, he wrenched Jack’s head back and wrapped his other arm around his throat in a chokehold.
Jack’s scrambling hands found Blade’s arms, his sides, his knees, but nothing worked to loosen the hold. He rolled them into the wall, hoping to knock Blade off. He didn’t budge. The assassin hung on like a parasite, draining the strength out of him with each airless gasp.
Wish you were here?
As his body weakened and his efforts faded away, Jack felt Blade move. He kept the hold firm, pushing him further towards the growing darkness, but pressed his mouth to Jack’s ear.
“Shh,” he whispered, almost soothingly. “It’ll be all right. I’ll protect you.”
And, wondering if he was hallucinating from lack of air, Jack fell into the black . . .
. . . which was ripped away with a painful, strangled cough. His throat tore with the effort of pulling in a breath. Light sparked behind his eyelids, red and white. His head throbbed in time with the ache in his neck, the pulsing of blood through vessels poorly abused.
God. Jack hated waking up like this. Thankfully, it had only happened one other time outside of
military training, and like that time, he came around with a startled gasp, body jerking against the bonds holding it tight to . . . another bloody chair.
He kept his eyes squeezed shut, didn’t want to open them and see the torture shack again. It would do what nothing else had managed yet and tip him right over the edge. If he had to look at that fucking beach again, at those words that had emblazoned themselves across his mind, he would lose his shit once and for all.
“Mr. Valadian, he’s awake.”
That accent roared through Jack like wild fire. He snapped his head up, blinking in the sudden wash of bright light into his dark-adjusted eyes. He wanted to see that goddamned lying face and . . . and . . . kick it.
A door opened before he could see clearly and a shadowed shape entered the room. Valadian. He swam into focus lazily: his overcoat, his bland features, his smug, bloody smile.
The room around them was white walled, empty bar the chair Jack was tied to. No poster, no implements of pain. It wasn’t the torture shack. That much Jack was grateful for. The rest of it could go fuck itself, including the two men standing in front of him.
As he had that night at the shack, Blade stood back, behind Valadian, containing himself to a very small portion of the room. He would have disappeared into the walls if they’d been painted the same camouflage pattern as the DPDU he still wore. Jack sneered at him, liking the look of the bloodied nose, the blackening eyes, the scratches on his cheek Jack couldn’t remember inflicting. His own face probably looked worse, but he didn’t care. He’d damaged Ethan Blade. He’d ask them to write it on his epitaph.
Valadian studied Jack for a long while, then asked, “Were you successful?”
Startled, it took Jack a moment to realise he was speaking to Blade.
“I was. His real name is Jack Reardon. He was with the SAS before leaving on a medical discharge. It was falsified, however, covering his move to military intelligence.” Blade’s cool, steady tone gave nothing away. The lie rolled off his lips as easily as the ones he’d spoon-fed Jack for the past week.
The Man snorted. “And you had to waste forty of my men to find that out?”
“It was necessary. He’s been trained to resist interrogation. I needed him to trust me, and it was the most expedient way. By convincing him I was here to kill you, I made him feel he could confide in me.”
Jack jerked at the words. How much of it was true? Blade was clearly keeping something back from Valadian. He knew Jack worked for the Office, not the military. That was one thing, but was Blade actually here to kill Valadian?
“Did he get any of the information he’d gathered out to his handlers?” Valadian asked Blade.
“No, sir. It’s all stored in a neural implant. We should be able to wipe it easily enough.”
Jack’s head hurt, his throat ached, and there was a buzz between his ears slowly eroding what little control he might have begun with. Was Blade selling him out or not?
Whatever was going on, Jack didn’t like it, and he was getting angry again. “You fucker,” he snarled at Blade. “So that’s what that was? The torture shack, the desert trek, the ‘let’s be the best buddies ever!’ It was all part of the world’s longest foreplay? All so you could fuck me over?”
Blade ignored him, keeping his gaze on Valadian’s back.
Valadian regarded Jack with an almost sympathetic smile. “He’s very good, isn’t he? Came most highly recommended. I’m not even paying him. He asked for the honour of doing this for me.” He shook his head sadly. “I almost feel sorry for you. You put up a valiant fight at the end there, but you were never going to win against Blade.”
With a gesture, he motioned Blade over. The assassin moved without hesitation, coming close to Valadian’s side. The Man cupped the back of his neck, pulled him even closer. With a wink in Jack’s direction, Valadian kissed Blade on the mouth.
Jack’s already jumpy heart skipped and slammed against his ribs. His breath caught in his throat.
Blade’s head tipped back, his mouth opening under Valadian’s. Eyes closed, he leaned into the older man, hands clutching at his coat, melting into the kiss. Soft moans escaped him, his mouth chasing Valadian’s when The Man pulled back. Smiling at the utter submission, Valadian kissed him again, harder.
All the questions about Blade’s actions spun into nothing as Jack watched the man he’d worked so hard to get a surrender from give himself completely to an arsehole like Valadian. They deserved each other, the lying, vicious pair of them. The way Blade moulded around Valadian, it was like they were alone, no witnesses, no crazy ex-SAS soldier ready to attack them both.
This time, when Valadian broke the kiss, Blade sighed and dipped his head into the man’s shoulder, his body shivering with aftershocks.
“What the fuck?” It burst out of Jack on a tide of rage and confusion.
“Precisely, Mr. Reardon.” Valadian’s hand slid down to cup Blade’s arse and squeeze proprietarily. “Go prepare the men,” he murmured to the assassin. “We’ll be leaving as soon as I’m done in here.”
Blade’s “Yes, sir” was breathy and thick with desire, but he left the room steady on his feet.
Valadian watched him go, a smirk on his well-used lips. When the door closed, he said, “Such a doormat.”
A cutting summation, clearly, but in his addled state it whizzed by Jack.
“A what?”
Snickering, Valadian repeated, “A doormat. Some men are like doormats. Lay them right the first time, and you can walk all over them for years.”
It had to be a lie. A game. Something Blade had concocted. But why? What did this all mean? Perhaps he was still unconscious and it was all a mad dream.
“You fucked him?” Jack had to know.
“Yes. I don’t like men that way, though. Women don’t have many uses, but they have that one, at least. Still, the man who recommended Blade to me said fucking him was an easy way to keep him in line. Totally submissive, which is a bit of a turn-on, I have to admit. And I get the services of an assassin for the price of a few fucks.” He smiled, as if expecting Jack to laugh along.
“You’re a sadistic prick,” Jack said instead.
“And you’re a pathetic fool.”
Jack flinched. The Man had nailed it again.
Valadian adjusted his coat. “I am sorry it’s come to this, Mr. Reed. I really did like you. I think I might miss you. Just a bit.”
He turned and left, the door closing firmly behind him.
Alone and so thoroughly gutted he felt numb, Jack slumped in the chair. He didn’t even fight against the restraints. Closing his eyes, he tried to shove everything into the filing cabinet. He got Valadian’s parting words in there, and Blade’s betrayal, but no matter how he tried, he couldn’t get the images of the kisses in there. The shapes and sounds of Blade letting Valadian kiss him, of how the assassin had clung to the arsehole in a show of willing passion, of how Blade had blinked dreamily in the wake of the forceful connection, none of it went into the overstuffed compartments.
The harder he tried, the more they resisted, until his feet were drumming on the floor and his arms were twisting within the plastic ties.
And then it happened. The filing cabinet burst at the seams and all the shit spilled out. All the beatings, the delivered threats, the stealing. Link Rindone’s head snapping back as the bullet ploughed through his skull. The pointless waste of lives at the torture shack. The men with the buggy. Giving in to his base desires. The memory of Blade moving against him. Of Blade holding a gun to his head.
All of it. All at once, spreading like a dark stain across his mind, pouring cold and hard into his heart.
Jack was restless, antsy. He paced, he ran on the treadmill, he spent a good half hour beating the stuffing out of the kick-bag. It was all up in the air and he couldn’t even see the balls, let alone catch them. After the agonising indecision, then the chaos of breaking Ethan out of his cell and the frantic race to get here, suddenly it was all sit down and wai
t.
Ethan was being incredibly Zen about it all. He sat at his work bench and cleaned weapons, his hands and fingers deft and quick as they disassembled rifles and handguns with equal proficiency. Or he made pots of tea and cups of coffee. At one point, he stared into the fridge for a minute, then sat down and made a shopping list.
Watching the seventh-ranked assassin in the world be so domestic was amusing for only so long, and Jack was back to being jittery. That constant nag of pre-combat nausea was making him cranky, partly because he didn’t have a go-time, and partly because Ethan didn’t have any smokes and wouldn’t let him go out for some.
So they argued instead.
“That’s your plan?” Jack demanded.
Ethan, sitting at the table reviewing his shopping list, glanced up at him expressionlessly and then back down, tactfully adding cigarettes to the bottom of the list. “Yes, Jack, that is my plan.”
Jack was back to pacing, along his preferred path between dining table and bed. “The vaunted and feared Ethan Blade’s great plan once he finds out who the traitor is, is to—” he waved vaguely at the Aston Martin “—and then—” making explosion noises, he mimed something blowing up “—after which, it’s a ‘simple’—” the world’s most sarcastic quotation marks “—two-man, no-camel assault on the Office, where we’ll have to face some very highly trained security personnel while trying to find the one person who’ll be doing everything they possibly can to not be caught.” He stopped pacing and gesticulating wildly. “That’s your plan?”
After folding up his list and tucking it into a pocket, Ethan stood. “Yes, Jack,” he repeated patiently. “That is my plan. We will, of course, try for minimal deaths, but it may be impossible, given the circumstances.” As he passed Jack, he winked and patted his cheek. “Are you saying you’re not up to the challenge?”
It was an entirely new sensation for Jack, this anger mingled with an arousal strong enough he knew he was going to act on it. He’d definitely been cranky and horny at the same time in the past, but never on this scale. Never in such a way he couldn’t ignore either impulse.
Where Death Meets the Devil Page 27
