by Lea Griffith
Dmitry had contacts in London so he’d suggested utilizing them. Rand and Adam were working on what came after. Dmitry’s prime resource in London was an old doctor who had saved Dmitry’s life more times than he cared to admit. Gunshots, knife wounds, even an attack by a hook-wielding terrorist who had almost finished him off for good.
He knew the old man would do his best to save her. If he could not, Dmitry would brave a hospital setting for her, though the gunshots would be reported. Trident wanted no trails but for Bone he would brave whatever government he had to.
”The babies are safe?” she asked.
“Do not talk. Save your energy,” he admonished. “Yes, they are safe. Your sisters are safe and so is Raines. You saved them all, Bone Breaker.”
“We must warn Blade,” she said before she passed out again.
Dmitry could do nothing but watch her struggle to breathe. Her life’s blood soaked the sheets beneath her. He counted the seconds and minutes until they landed and did his best to will her to survive.
Somehow she managed and when they arrived at the Dr. Moshe Vernon’s home, he put her under, operating with an efficiency Dmitry hadn’t realized such an old man capable of. She was transfused with more blood, the bullet was removed, the bleeding stopped and then she was resting.
“Can we transport her?” Dmitry asked.
“Not yet,” Moshe said. “It wasn’t bad with the exception of the blood loss. Her scar will not match yours, I dare say, but I would prefer you stay here so I can make sure infection does not root. I will do my best to get her well soon.”
“You are still safe?” Dmitry asked in a hard voice.
The old man glanced at him over the edge of his glasses, his look saying it all. Dmitry had saved his daughter ten years ago from a life as a sex slave within the Bratva. The good doctor would do whatever Dmitry asked him and not expose him to any threat.
So many Dmitry had saved because he’d not been able to save his own sisters.
“She is from my homeland?” Moshe asked.
Dmitry glanced at him, gaze narrowing. “She was born there.”
Moshe hummed and the sound was curious. “She has the look of my people but the shadows following her seem to be from a hell I cannot comprehend.”
“Do shadows not follow us all?” Dmitry asked.
Moshe nodded, a frown on his face as he walked once more to stand beside Bone.
Dmitry went to find the others. Moshe had checked Saya and Gretchen, declaring Dmitry a wonderful apprentice though his hands were too big for delicate work.
“It will be another few days before I can move her. Go ahead to Sydney. I will be behind you,” he said to Rand as he walked into Moshe’s small living room.
“I don’t like leaving you alone,” Rand admitted.
Rand and Adam had found a place in Australia. A resort built on an abandoned silver mine property in the Blue Mountains about fifty miles outside of Sydney had gone bankrupt three years ago. Trident had made the purchase of a main house and the corresponding eleven hundred plus acres within the last few hours, spending an exorbitant amount but fully willing to do so for the safety the terrain provided. Raines had gone ahead, scouting and getting the essentials in place. It was fully furnished according to Rand but the place needed safety upgrades that would take longer. Raines would also begin that process.
Dmitry had never been to the Blue Mountains of New South Wales but had heard of their beauty and remoteness. This property served three purposes—protection, distance from the U.S. and proximity to where they believed Ken was hiding.
“We will be fine. Take your women and the children and get them to safety,” Dmitry told him. “Did you speak with your contact in the Australian government?”
Rand nodded. “He will keep the purchase silent. We bought it under a shell corporation so the trail is much harder to follow. There is no way to ensure complete safety but we have time to plan how we’ll respond to President Locke as we give our women time to heal.”
“He has to be Joseph’s,” Dmitry mused. The Collective’s reach knew no bounds. It was truly a one world order type of entity.
“Then he will die,” Adam said in a voice that carried vengeance.
Within hours, the others were on their way to the compound in Sydney and Dmitry was left with Bone and an old, crotchety physician who enjoyed reading poetry aloud to his patients. Dmitry hated poetry.
He watched over Bone for the next four days, bathing her through her fevers and changing her IVs and bedclothes.
He prayed. He cursed. He prayed some more.
And on the third day, Bone woke.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The brittle sounds of an old man’s voice sifted through her mind, his words grabbing her attention and not letting go.
It was an Emily Dickinson poem. I Cried at Pity. Bone enjoyed poetry and Dickinson’s works, more than any others, had always spoken to her. So she listened to an old man she did not know, speak words that told the story of her life and as the darkness began to part, ushering her up through layers of pain, she sighed and tried to find her way.
Bone squinted against the low light, breathing silently lest the ropes tethering her to reality snap. She opened herself up to the pain instead of fighting it, though she was pretty fucking sick and tired of waking up in pain. It seemed it was all she ever woke to since she’d met Asinimov.
His head rested beside her on the bed. Soft snores fell from his lips and she smiled.
He wouldn’t like her pointing that out she was sure so she’d have to make sure and do that very thing once he awoke. Bone was unable to resist the draw of his hair and so she slid her fingers into it remembering how it had been to hold him to her in the heat of passion.
It seemed hot pokers stabbed her in the side, and she shifted to get away from the agony but all that did was make the pain worse.
“Don’t move.” His gravelly voice washed over her.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” she bit back.
His eyebrows rose and his jaw slackened. Disbelief was written all over his face followed quickly by anger. “I will damn well fucking tell you what to do. You’ve been shot in the gut and have been kissed by bullets on your shoulder, hip and side. You’ll fucking stay still or I’ll sit on your ass.”
“So my ass is pretty much the only place that didn’t take a bullet?”
His brows lowered. “That’s not funny, Bone. Not at all.”
“I’m the one who got shot, Asinimov. If anyone can laugh, it should be me,” she informed him.
“Why did you do it?”
His gaze burned into hers, the light blue of his eyes darker than she’d ever seen it. Worry? Possibly. She mentally shrugged. “They were mine.”
He nodded. “For once, I understand you.”
Shock ghosted through her. “You do?”
“Da, because you’re mine and I would destroy the world for you,” he answered simply but it set her heart on fire. His language reverted to his native Russian when he was upset. She did not know why this made her heart sing but it did.
“Where have they gone?” she asked, searching for more solid ground.
When last they’d talked, she’d been rough with him, denying the living, breathing thing between them and seeking refuge in her pain. She’d had many days alone with her sisters to contemplate her future.
“Where we will be heading tonight since you’re finally awake.”
“So it’s my fault we took an excursion?” she asked with a smile.
Dmitry cocked his head. “Well, I sure didn’t take on an entire combat troop of Spec Ops soldiers and get my ass shot up.”
“Touché,” she said lightly.
“I need to know why you did it,” he tossed into the silence between them.
“What?” It was the same question he’d just asked her but she thought she knew what he was getting at.
“Defended a home that wasn’t yours,” he answered.
“
Because my sisters were there. The babies were there. And I was desperate.”
“I don’t understand,” he voiced his confusion.
“Joseph gave me many things, Dmitry, but the best gift was desperation.” She drew in a rough breath. “There were times when Ninka failed in her tasks and I would rush to her, afraid that I would not make it in time to take her punishments. Desperation made me complete my own tasks faster, better. Desperation made me a better killer.” She paused for a long moment, letting the past catch her by the throat. “When the first RPG hit the house and I saw Arrow unmoving on the floor, I became desperate. Nobody takes what’s mine, Dmitry. It’s why I didn’t tell you about your mother and why I could have never told you about your father.”
He didn’t respond and she wondered if he’d even heard her. She was growing tired again but wanted to hear the deep, clear baritone of his voice. She loved Asinimov’s voice.
“I told you in Russia my father could have been a good man, but he was not. All the ‘could haves’ in the world cannot change the fact that he did horrible things to all manner of people. I used his death as a mantle to cover me from a truth I still can’t face—I failed my sisters.”
Bone thought about sitting up and rejected the idea but she rubbed the area over her heart because his words hurt her. “You did not fail them. Your bitch of a mother failed them.”
“I could not have killed her. When I realized who she was, whose life you held in your hand, I knew I could not kill her. Then she threatened you and I thought perhaps I could. So when you speak of desperation, moye, I understand the concept well. Now sleep, we have had enough talk for now. I will get things ready for us to travel and by tomorrow night we will be somewhere safe.”
She didn’t want to tell him that nowhere was ever, truly safe.
He rose and walked away and Bone thought they’d crossed a hurdle. Perhaps something had changed between them. Best she not read too much into it. She would not survive him looking at her as if she’d ripped his soul from his body again.
So she knew another kind of desperation—one that demanded she stay far away from Asinimov and all the feelings he could force her to feel. It would be better that way.
Sleep took over again and before she could think on it any more, her eyes closed and she fell asleep.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The Blue Mountains had welcomed Trident Corporation and three members of First Team with a bounty of gorgeous scenery. The property was nestled in a valley with two enormous mountains rising on either side. It was too far off the beaten path for anyone to randomly wander in, and the lush vegetation and greenery kept them hidden from the air. To the west was Jamison Valley and further from there was the tourist draw of The Three Sisters sandstone rock formation. The dense eucalyptus trees in these mountains gave a characteristic blue haze that was dramatic to witness during sunset.
And there were koalas and other wildlife that never failed to make him wonder how a God that created such beauty could also create Joseph Bombardier. The main house renovations were moving along well. A panic room had been forged from a former cellar and the babies, as First Team called them, now inhabited the remainder of that lower level. The property had tunnels running amuck from the main house, giving credence to the fact that it had once been a silver mining operation.
He knew a certain peace, though the back of his neck never stopped itching and his shoulders never lost their tension. This was somewhat like running and Dmitry didn’t run well. He’d much rather have stayed and fought. Rand and Adam assured him the U.S. government would have annihilated them so retreat was the better part of valor. And it had allowed their women time to recover just as Rand suggested.
But the clock was ticking and Dmitry felt it moving toward something he could not control. It made him wary.
His gaze found her at the edge of the in-ground pool. He inhaled deeply as he watched her stretch, admiring the flex of her ass and the curve of her hips. She had lost a lot of weight but after two weeks of nothing but rest Dmitry had been unable to keep her from exercise. She didn’t move fast but she moved with purpose.
He should not be surprised. After the things he’d seen her do, nothing should ever surprise him.
She avoided him when she could, and he had allowed it but all that was going to end soon. He’d given her his worst. It was time to visit his best on her.
A smile broke over her face as Bullet said something from the water. Bone glanced in his direction and her spine stiffened, smile disappearing and he thought now was the perfect time to make his move.
He made his way to her, hiding his smile at the way she tried to look at him while hiding that she was looking at him. “Bone, how are you feeling?”
He’d start off slow, work his way up. Bullet stepped from the pool and made her way to the house.
“Fine.”
Oh, the killer wasn’t going to make it easy.
“How am I, you ask?” he teased.
She turned her nose up in the air and narrowed her gaze on him. “Actually, I didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?”
She huffed. “Ask how you were.”
He smiled and bowed to her. “I’m doing great, thanks for asking.”
“What do you want, Asinimov?”
“Right now?”
She nodded.
“For you to call me, Dmitry,” he answered.
She inclined her head. “Dmitry, I think it best if we keep our association less personal.”
He stepped into her space then, not giving her time to think or contemplate her next move. “By less personal what do you mean?”
She stepped away and placed a hand on his chest trying to ward him off. The feel of her small hand over his heart undid him, rearranging pieces inside the organ until they all clicked together in a perfect, solid piece.
“Don’t do this.” It was a plea for something he couldn’t give her.
He moved forward. She was so tiny yet she fit him just right. His cock hardened in a painful rush, and he did his best to suppress the reaction though her scent wouldn’t allow it. “You always smell like apricots.”
“Huh?”
Her head tilted and she licked her lips. He traced those lips and breathed in again. “How are you feeling, moye?”
“I already answered that,” she reminded him.
And she had. “No, you said ‘fine.’ And that is no answer at all,” he told her.
“I hurt, Dmitry. I am better though. Recovering. Is that all?” Impatience rode the line of her shoulders and the set of her mouth now.
She thought to place distance between them. He was unwilling to allow that.
“No,” he said, stepping into her until the points of her nipples branded his chest. “That is not all.” He leaned down, brushed his lips across her once, twice, and then he sank in deeper, twining his tongue with hers and demanding she respond and she did.
This was what he needed—her body’s reactions telling him everything her mouth would not. He pulled away as quickly as he began his assault.
She stood there, the expression on her face much as it had been on the plane when he’d kissed her the first time. “Don’t do that,” she commanded.
“I will do it. Again and again and again just as I promised you in Virginia,” he said before he turned on his heel and walked away.
She stuttered once, cursed, and then walked into the house. He watched her go and laughed softly.
“That will only work for so long. Then she’ll put you on your ass and you definitely won’t be laughing,” Rand said behind him.
Dmitry turned and waved away his friend’s concerns. “I know what she needs and I know how to go about giving it to her. After what she’s been through, I must woo her.”
“I’m not sure,” Adam said on a laugh as he walked up. “But I think you just used the word ‘woo’?”
“Fuck off, Collins. If I remember correctly your version of wooing was fighting with Saya. How man
y times did she hand you your ass before you tasted her kiss?” Dmitry needled.
“As many times as it took. Look, man, I’m not knocking that you want the killer, I’m mocking your use of the word ‘woo.’ Man the fuck up and just take her. She can’t keep her eyes off you when you’re around,” Adam said on yet another laugh.
“Maybe you should do something somewhere in between,” Rand advised. “Woo but take her quickly or some shit like that.”
Dmitry shook his head. “How the fuck did you two ever get laid? You have to read your woman, figure out what makes her tick and then you move in, giving her what she wants and taking what you need.”
“Yeah? Well what makes all of those crazy bitches tick is death. So how you gonna use that to your advantage, Russian?” Adam chortled and then clapped him on the back before he walked away.
“I think it’s a solid plan, Asinimov. Woo her. She is fragile right now and you must teach her the softer things. She’s never had them,” Rand reminded him.
Dmitry nodded and then Rand left as well. Dmitry pondered the conversation and decided on his next move. He walked into the house wearing his intent and his heart on his sleeve.
He found her in her room, meditating on the floor. Dmitry knocked and entered without waiting for her to tell him it was okay. They were past that now.
“Sure, come on in.” Sarcasm dripped from her words. “What do you want, Dmitry?”
“You. I want you.”
He waited there, showing all his cards and hoping she’d decide to play.
She stood and turned to him, face blank and he knew a moment of panic.
“I want to touch you and be touched in return. I want to kiss you and feel you kiss me back. I want to sink inside your body, make you forget every bad thing that’s hurt you and I want you to do the same for me. That’s what I want.”
She inhaled and it was shaky. Her body tensed and it was then he knew he’d won.
“Do you remember when I took you from the training field and brought you to my room? I stripped your clothes off, licked you from head to toe and then I slid inside you, taking your virginity and giving you a piece of me in return?”
