“But, what if—”
“That’s it.” He didn’t let her finish, didn’t dare let her put words to the number of fears filling her head. “Come here.” He held his arms out.
His heart skipped a half beat when she hesitated. Then, shoulders slumping, she leaned into his embrace.
Only to stagger mid-step. Her hand shot out, collided with his solar plexus as her knee cracked into his. “Ouch!”
“Christ,” he groaned at the same time, tightening one arm across the small of her back.
Her weight sagged against his forearm, ponytail slapping his face as she bent to rub at her bare foot. “Ouch, ouch,” she muttered, with all the emphasis of a curse. “Damn it!”
He almost laughed. Swallowed it just in time. “Score one for grace and pride. You okay?”
“I stepped on something.”
Shawn’s arm loosened as she bent, and this time, the breath he sucked in had nothing to do with surprise and everything to do with the sight of her blond head swinging all too close to the semi-permanent hard-on he’d been sporting since the moment they’d met.
He cleared his throat. “Er, while you’re down there . . .”
Kayleigh didn’t bother to muffle her laughing snort. But as she came back up, hobbling slightly on the ball of one foot, the glint of metal and matte black nylon in her hand turned simmering heat to a rising tide of embarrassment. “What is this?” she asked.
Knowing his luck, the flickering electric lantern only highlighted his red ears in perfect contrast. “Um.” He rubbed the back of his neck with a suddenly damp hand. How had they avoided finding it for two damned days? “It’s a spiked bracelet.”
“I know what it is,” she replied patiently, eyes snapping with silent laughter. “Thanks. Why is it here?”
And of course, during all the makeup sex and serious discussions, the hours spent helping the refugees and the displaced, he’d forgotten the flimsy excuse that he’d hidden behind to get here. The plan he’d made.
Until she had to go and impale her foot on it.
He frowned down at her slender, bare feet. “Are you okay? Did it break the skin?”
“No.” Kayleigh dangled the black band from one finger. “Did you bring this back?”
He looked up, fingers digging into his own neck. Damn it. Now, it seemed stupid. “Yup.” He dropped his gaze from the blue tarp ceiling when it refused to help him out. “That was me.”
“To leave on the floor?” Her eyebrow hiked.
“No.” Ah, fuck it. Shawn reached out, snagged her around the waist again, and hauled her closer to him; chest to chest, thigh to thigh. She gasped, hand flattening against his chest, and he trapped it there with his free hand. “I don’t have a ring.”
She blinked at him. “Sorry?”
For a doctor, Kayleigh Lauderdale could be a little dense. He took a deep breath. “It was the only thing I had to work with,” he explained, mentally wincing at the taut strain filling his own voice. Around them, blocked by the thin tarp, the city crackled and hummed. Voices chattered, even a tinny radio played music from somewhere, but he blocked it all out.
Who cared if they could hear him make a fool of himself? She was worth it.
He focused only on her. Her face, her wide eyes. The shape of her mouth, slightly parted, as if she were forever on the verge of interrupting.
The woman he loved.
“I know it’s not your usual style,” he continued, pushing on despite the fire heating up the back of his neck now. “But it was so damned hot when you wore it before, and I thought, Jesus, what the hell did I have to lose?” Except everything. “I thought I’d give it all I had, ring or not. It was a stupid excuse, but damn it, woman, you’re all I want.”
Kayleigh’s fingers tucked into the buttoned seam of his shirt. “Shawn?”
“I was hoping that you’d think it was cute enough to at least let me get a foot in the door—”
Her eyes lit with laughter. “Shawn!”
“—and I couldn’t bear the thought of letting you—” Shawn stilled. “What?”
Her body leaned into his, the hand holding the spiked bracelet sliding over his shoulder to curl around his overheated nape. As her beautiful face dissolved into smiles, she asked huskily, “Anyone ever tell you that you need to relax?”
“More than a few times.” His hand mapped the small of her back, shaped the warm skin beneath her sweater. He couldn’t help himself; didn’t even consider stopping.
He had her. All he had to do now was keep her.
“Kayleigh Lauderdale.” He cupped her cheek, thumb grazing over her bottom lip. “Will you take this spiky, badass bracelet and—” His throat closed. “And marry me?”
The bracelet hit the floor with a tiny, muted ping. Her fingers tightened on the back of his neck, her other palm somehow tucked between his askew buttons and flattened, warm and soft, over his heart. It thudded against his ribs. “I’ll marry you,” she whispered, her lips so close, his mouth tingled as her breath warmed his skin. “You’re going to have to sweet-talk me into the spikes.”
“Good enough,” he rasped, and kissed her. His heart surged into a frantic beat; his blood warmed, his body stirred.
This was it. This was forever.
Somehow, the buttons of his shirt came undone. One popped free, clattering to the ground. Kayleigh’s sigh, muffled against his mouth, coaxed an answering, uninhibited chuckle from somewhere deep in his chest. Someplace he’d thought he’d lost years ago.
He’d thought Laurence Lauderdale had taken that part from him.
Now, a Lauderdale was showing him that he’d never lost it. Not really. Her fingers splayed over his chest, dug lightly into the muscle. Her eyes shimmered as her lashes rose, color high in her cheeks. “Did they tell you about my newfound abilities?”
He nodded. “Some.”
“Okay.” She dragged her tongue over her lips, and his cock tightened all over again. Never, ever enough. “Just so you know,” she whispered, “you made the right choice.”
“I know.” Threading his fingers into her loose ponytail, framing her head, he tilted her head up, smiled down into her cloud-blue eyes. “I don’t need witchcraft to tell me that.”
A tear caught on her lashes. “I love you, Shawn.”
“Yup.” He caught the damp bead with his thumb, smoothed it away. “See what you get when you relax, Doctor?”
Her laughter filled the tent, his heart; that aching place in his soul that had festered for too long. Clutching her to him, Shawn breathed in her warm, clean scent. Held it until his lungs ached.
Next year, he’d take her to the ashes of his old home. Of his parents’ home. By then, he would be ready to finally say good-bye.
With Kayleigh by his side, he could start his life—their life—fresh. There was no better time to do it.
No better woman to do it with.
“So, you’ll marry me?” he asked, desperate to be sure. “Really?”
Her mouth hiked up into a sexy, mind-altering curve of wicked promise. “Really. And if you’re lucky, I’ll even wear the spikes.” Her teeth nipped at his bottom lip. “And nothing else.”
“That’ll make it awkward for our friends.” Seizing her by the hand, he dragged her deeper into the tent. “Best ceremony ever.”
God, he loved it when she laughed.
Want to know how it all began?
Check out
Before the Witches
An e-original novella from
Karina Cooper
and Avon Impulse
Chapter One
“What’s her name?”
The voice came as if through a fog, each syllable laced with a leer so thick she could practically taste its acid on her tongue. Ekaterina Zhuvova blinked away the thick cotton of exhaustion filling her head, gaze focusing with some effort on the two men standing at the back of the small living room.
“Elena,” Ivan said, nodding with almost paternal pride at the red-haired woma
n leaning back against the couch, her full breasts pushed up by her position. She raked a lascivious gaze over the stranger’s tall body. “She is most experienced with making a man forget a few hours, eh?”
This man wasn’t like the others Katya had seen come and go from this house before. He wasn’t as tall as some she’d entertained, but he was clearly strong enough to hold his own and still a foot taller than her petite five feet and two inches. His shoulders were broad, chest tight with muscle beneath a navy blue cotton T-shirt and a button-down open flannel shirt. Long legs encased in worn denim planted with near military precision, though his shaggy, slightly spiky black hair told her whatever his demeanor, he wasn’t active duty. Ex-military? Private contractor?
A taste for foreign girls developed overseas and couldn’t kick the habit? She knew that type, all right.
“Her?” The man’s gaze settled on her, and Katya looked away. Please, don’t pick me.
“Katya,” Ivan said, and the warmth left his voice as he turned his head. She lowered her eyes before he could see her anger as his mouth worked, but he didn’t spit. She knew he wanted to.
“No good?” the man asked, his tone lazily assessing.
“Ved’ma,” Ivan explained with a shrug. She barely kept from wincing, schooling her features into calm.
“Is that her name?”
“No.” Ivan eyed her. “She is strange one, even in my country.”
“Strange.” One eyebrow rose.
Ivan grinned. “She is knowing exactly what a man likes. This is both good thing and bad. I save her for the men who are less sure of self. She is very good with first-time, eh?”
She was beyond blushing, but the flush staining her cheeks now was anger. She ducked her head before she said something guaranteed to put her in lockup.
Ivan was half right. She’d always been good at reading people. She didn’t know how or why, but she always knew when a person was lying. It wasn’t the same as what Ivan was suggesting, but she’d gotten damned good at that, too.
Her talent wasn’t the gift he made it out to be. It had made for a rocky childhood in St. Petersburg’s destitute streets. Cast out by the neighborhood children, they’d hunted her into the desperate sanctuary of her mother’s single-room flat, forced her into frightened isolation. Their jeers still haunted her dreams.
Ved’ma, ved’ma! Ubyeii yee!
She’d found no solace from the adults who felt threatened by a little girl with an uncanny grasp of deceit. It was no wonder she’d bartered everything she had, including her own body, to get to America.
In America, they didn’t care about witches. That belief had proved true.
They were too busy paying for her physical prowess to care about any other talents, and the time they spent lying to her meant she got damned good at reading between the lines. She knew a lot. She knew what was truth and what was lie. She knew how to ask the right questions, and how to translate the half truths and lies. Men spent a lot of time lying to themselves. Especially when screwing a strange girl in a dingy house.
Her gaze flicked back to meet the client’s, and this time, she didn’t look away.
His mouth tightened. “What about the one in the chair?”
Dismissed. Thank God. Katya angled her shoulder against the wall. If she sat, if she so much as perched on the end of the couch by Elena, she knew she’d fall asleep. She was beyond fatigued. Brutal nightmares had filled her dreams all night long, and she’d dragged herself out of bed this morning feeling as if she’d been awake for years.
Every time she closed her eyes last night, she’d dreamed of death. Fires, floods, scenes of wildly absurd apocalyptic chaos. It was as if her brain had taken all her plans and launched off into a thousand worst-case scenarios, each culminating in the ludicrously detailed destruction of the world. She woke up at least a dozen times, sweaty and shaking.
Now, it was all Katya could do to keep her eyelids open as a Russian pimp and a stranger discussed human beings like they were at some kind of flea market.
Tomorrow was the day. The day she and all the other immigrant girls trapped in this hellhole would be free. The day that all her plans would come to fruition. Almost everything had fallen into place, with the sole exception of the police aid she’d tried to ask for only this morning. They’d denied her. Refused to believe her.
She hated this country, sometimes. It would be different once she was free. Once they were all free. The girls knew what to do. They were ready.
Terrified, but ready. One more day.
And every hour closer made moments like this feel impossible to handle.
Another man. Another sweaty session on a stained mattress. Another lie batted through her lashes and strained through a smile she’d long since learned to cultivate. She didn’t think she could do it.
“I want her.”
She was sure she looked like hell warmed over, so even with Ivan’s impatient gestures, it took her too long to realize that the mysterious man with the dark hair and five o’clock shadow had chosen her.
Katya straightened again, keenly aware of the client’s assessing gaze as she approached the men. She didn’t dare say anything. This was the bargaining moment, the time when only Ivan could speak. Business, he called it.
Human trafficking was definitely a business.
Ivan was a large man, more girth than height, but he was as hard and worn as brick and not given to patience. His thick jowls and caterpillar eyebrows gave him the appearance of a bulldog; a reputation equally as earned. He was their warden. Their money handler and their guard.
Only he didn’t guard them. He guarded the men who paid to screw them.
And occasionally skimmed from the honey himself. He lowered his head and glared at her in silent warning.
Behave, or she’d live to regret it.
“You tell her what you like,” he said, snagging Katya’s arm. “She will do it. Anything.” She bit her lip, swallowing a startled sound as the large Russian swung her around, then shoved her hard into the other man’s chest.
Large, strong hands closed over her shoulders.
“She is hellcat.” Ivan leered, one fleshy eye closing in a wink.
“Good.”
The only two other girls not already occupied watched with impassive faces as Ivan shook a finger under Katya’s nose. “You be good girl for this one, eh?” he told her, his accent thick enough to serve borscht on.
Unlike hers, his accent was all natural.
Katya nodded, forcing her lips up into a wide, wicked smile. At the same time, she arched her back, forcing the curve of her backside into the stranger’s groin.
His fingers tightened on her shoulders. “What’s the cost?” the man asked.
Ivan arced a fleshy hand through the air. “This one, she is thousand more than negotiated,” he said, and Katya’s eyes widened.
A thousand American dollars more? Impossible. Ivan’s boss didn’t barter his girls for that much, at least not these girls in this ramshackle Renton brothel. Did the always absent Mikoyan know about this arrangement?
Who was this man that Ivan would demand more money? A politician? A new money launderer? Someone with a business angle that Ivan’s boss wanted to squeeze for everything it was worth?
Dark brown eyes met hers briefly, then skated away. “Fine,” he said tightly. “Jesus Christ.”
“Of course, she is more expensive, but you want her. Next time,” Ivan added as he gestured to the room, “maybe you try another.”
“Right.” The man nodded to the small backpack on the floor. “Mikoyan’s cut is in there. Count it while I’m busy,” he said flatly, and didn’t bother with any more pleasantries. Shifting his grip on her arm, he hauled her bodily out of the cramped living room. There was barely enough room in there for a couch and a television, much less five more people.
Katya stumbled as he pulled her purposefully toward the stairs. Behind them, the sudden blare of the television flickered to life.
�
�You are hurting me!” she protested as he jerked her up the stairs and into a cramped room.
The door clicked quietly into place, leaving Katya locked inside with nothing but a dirty mattress and the man who’d just purchased her for the hour.
He didn’t pay any attention to her accented protest, his fingers hard on her biceps as he spun her in place. Her pale hair slid into her eyes as he seized both arms and tucked her tightly against the door.
His dark brown eyes met hers, his face so close she could smell remnants of his aftershave. Something like fresh sawdust and pine. His angular features were suntanned, darkened by a five o’clock shadow that looked more like it was getting on toward ten.
He looked intent. Focused. And he damn well needed to let her go. Adrenaline forced her blood to surge, wiping away all traces of exhaustion.
She twisted; he pinned her shoulders back against the door. “How good is your English?” he demanded.
Katya stared up at him. That was his reason for holding her? He wanted to talk?
Her gaze trailed to the neck of his T-shirt, to the telltale bulge under his left shoulder. A matte black edge peeking from the open flannel made her eyes widen. A gun?
A cop? She sucked in a breath.
Those long fingers dug into her flesh.
She snapped her gaze back to his, her heart pounding in her ears. “Is good,” she managed, deliberately thickening the Russian accent that still colored her otherwise excellent English. Pulling her persona around her like a shroud, she let her body soften against his.
Watched his pupils dilate as the lush curve of her breasts pushed into his chest.
Cop or not, he was a man. And all men had an easy button.
One more day, she told herself. One more man.
“I am understanding English very well,” she purred. The tension at her arms lessened. Deliberately, she drew her tongue across her full lower lip.
His gaze pinned there, a whole lot warmer than it had been a moment ago.
“Well enough for hearing what you are wanting,” she added huskily. A muscle leaped in his jaw as she leaned forward, pressing her lips against his chin. “Well enough for obeying. You like me?” Her mouth brushed against his whiskered jaw. “You want me, you are asking just for me, da?” Her lips drifted lower, explored the cords tense at his neck.
Karina Cooper - [Dark Mission 05] Page 29
