Bound to the Bounty Hunter

by Hayson Manning

  His body strung, holding himself back. Her hips flared, her body tightened then collapsed, and she shuddered around him on a low moan. He gave in to the sensation, ground into her, and came seconds later.

  He gently held her hips and slowly withdrew from her body. She collapsed on the bed. He reached over her and kissed her neck. He then walked to the bathroom, grabbed a towel, and gently cleaned her, kissing a trail across her thighs.

  He turned her over to find her dark eyes on his.

  “I’m okay.” A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “More than okay.”

  He swept damp hair from her face.

  He curled into her body, one arm around her waist. She snuggled back, gripping his arm. His thigh imprisoned hers. He kissed the back of her neck then moved his mouth to the side and sucked the skin. He nipped at the spot.

  “What are you doing?” Her fingers flew to where a welt was rapidly appearing.

  “Been wanting to do that for a while. Mark you. Make you mine.”

  She sat up in bed, her eyes flashing, her mouth open.

  Pongo landed on the bed followed by a string of farts that would wake the dead.

  “Good timing, Pong.” He dropped a kiss on Sophie’s head. “Got a phone call to make.” After he got out of bed and pulled on his jeans, he grabbed his phone from his back pocket and checked in. Babic was still in the wind. His phone had never been reactivated.

  During breakfast, Sophie caught up on one of her television shows. She turned to him, her mouth open. “Can you believe what Victor said to Sharon?”

  “No idea who you’re talking about.” When she started to explain, he leaned forward and kissed her. “And I’ll never want to know.”

  Her arm curled around his neck, pressing him closer. She surprised him by kissing his neck, hard.

  He pulled away, his fingers trailing the spot.

  “Marked you and made you mine,” she said, eyes sparkling.

  “Yes you did.” He couldn’t help the grin stretching across his face. Zeb and Iz would give him hell at the bruise on his neck, but being marked by Sophie felt right.

  He pulled his phone from his pocket when it pinged a text. He froze, then called Petrov, his eyes never leaving Sophie.

  “We’ll be there.” He swiped his finger across the screen.

  Sophie’s head shot up. “Where will we be?”

  “There’s someone who wants to meet you.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sophie tensed when the Viper came to a halt on a circular gravel driveway. After the mysterious phone call, they’d driven for hours. Harlan had given short, evasive answers to her questions until she’d given up. Harlan the PI now sat beside her.

  She hadn’t had time to finish her coffee. He’d grabbed her jacket and all but dragged her out the door, leaving the cup on the counter.

  She shivered, wrapping her jacket around her as if it could shield her, from what she didn’t know, but the world she’d woken to this morning had changed.

  She tried again. “Harlan, where are we—”

  “We’ll talk later.”

  She pressed her lips together to anchor the scream of frustration.

  She turned her head. She was deep into Harlan and yet, again, the man from this morning had morphed into a total jerk. Her heart dropped in a painful thud, and she wiped her sleeve across her eyes.

  She opened the car door, stepped out, and crossed her arms, anger hiding the hurt.

  “I am not going another step until you tell me what’s going on.”

  He stopped, his face blank, but his eyes flashed. “Do you trust me?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  She looked at the man who only this morning had held her like treasure and the man who stood in front of her now. He pissed her off, infuriated her, and made her feel more than she’d ever thought she’d feel for a man. Bottom line, she trusted him. She worried her lip. Deep inside in the locked box she kept in her heart, she knew she loved him.

  “Sophie?”

  “Yes,” she said in a whoosh, “but we’ve got to talk about your Jekyll and Hyde personality. Get you some help.”

  Harlan’s hand on the bottom of her spine pushed her toward a New York style brownstone that sat nestled in a backdrop of towering trees. Wind whipped the branches, which bowed to their master. Gunmetal gray clouds muscled white ones out of the way.

  His fingers flexed on her spine when a solid, wooden door opened before her foot hit the front step. Harlan’s hand disappeared, close but not touching.

  She shot him a quizzical look, but his face was a mask.

  They walked into a massive living area. Thick rugs were scattered over a gold- and brown-flecked marble floor. A massive nude painting stretched from the ceiling to the floor. Rich leather chairs in different colors were dotted around the room, each pointing toward a huge hearth fireplace that ran the length of the room. A Kansas City Chiefs flag draped across the back of a ratty chair, completely out of place in the opulent room.

  She stared, transfixed, at the red and white. A feeling of security stole over her. She jolted at a memory that rose to the surface, then sank.

  “My name is Vladimir Petrov.”

  Sophie spun, blood roaring through her veins.

  An elegantly dressed middle-aged man stood across from her, his hands tucked into the pockets of expensive jeans. A light-blue collared shirt flared against a dark-blue cashmere sweater, tan casual leather shoes on his feet.

  The man to whom she owed every last cent.

  And Harlan had brought her here?

  Why?

  Sticky breath caught in her lungs.

  “Come. Sit.” Petrov indicated a sofa where she sank onto the soft tan leather, her whole body trembling.

  She craned her neck. Harlan nodded once, his intense stare never leaving her. The hairs on the back of her neck rose like soldiers. She attempted to swallow but couldn’t.

  Petrov sat across from her, poured two glasses of wine, and placed a glass in front of her.

  “I have a daughter.” Petrov leaned forward, hands between his knees, his intense, dark gaze on her.

  He had a daughter. She knew as much as Google gave up about the man, but the disappearance of his daughter and the death of his wife years later from grief were well documented.

  “The last time I saw her she was two, nearly three.”

  She nodded.

  “My wife was religious, very religious.” Petrov took a sip of wine. “My line of work became a constant problem in our marriage. Due to an inherited condition, I couldn’t have children, so we adopted a little girl. The love of my life.” Petrov’s face softened.

  Sophie twisted her fingers in her lap.

  “Ekaterina took our daughter to a religious revival in Malibu not far from our home, hoping for strength to stay in our marriage or the strength to leave. She slipped out without her bodyguard.” Petrov’s hand shook slightly when he placed the glass on the table. “I blame myself. I didn’t see how unhappy she was. I had a lot of responsibilities.” He cleared his throat before continuing. “Ekaterina met a preacher, and she told him about me, about my business dealings. The preacher told her he’d pray for her, and everything would work out for the best. A short time later, in the crowd, our daughter was ripped away from Ekaterina’s grasp.”

  “Oh no.” Sophie’s hand went to her throat, for the loss of his daughter and the fear holding her spine rigid at the mention of a preacher.

  “A missing person report was filed. I have been searching for my daughter ever since. My wife blamed me, my business dealings. Though I set about becoming an honest businessman, she never forgave me.” He looked lost in thought. “She killed herself two years later. She couldn’t live without our daughter.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Sophie said, not knowing what to say when there were no words. The pain pouring out of the man tainted the air.

  “I’ve had a likeness drawn of her every year. One of my men saw you and reported back. The likeness is
startling.”

  Wait.

  Sophie shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts.

  “The day before she was taken from us, I’d given my daughter a snow globe. Dorothy and her ruby slippers. We’d watched the Wizard of Oz the week before. We loved that movie. She loved the snow globe so much, she wouldn’t let it go. She held it in the bath and when I tried to pry her fingers from it when she went to bed, she stared at me fiercely and said ‘no.’ He shook his head.

  What?

  Sophie blinked slowly.

  “It was one of her birthday presents, but I couldn’t wait and gave it to her the day before.”

  Petrov stared at her, like he could reach into her head and read her tumbling frantic thoughts.

  “May seventh.”

  “I have a snow globe which has the seventh of May engraved on the bottom,” Sophie said slowly, “but my birthday is September twenty-ninth.”

  The intensity burning in Petrov’s dark eyes pinned her.

  A bad feeling started kicking around Sophie’s intestines.

  “S. You are my night and day.” Petrov paused. “The S is for Seraphina…my Sarah.”

  Wait.

  “The man who took me thought I was Sarah. My Dorothy snow globe has that inscription.” She leaned forward, gripping the table. “What’s going on?” Her voice rose with each word.

  Petrov stared at Harlan, his face stony. “We will be discussing that later.”

  Sophie stood and paced, pulling on her ponytail, her stomach in a twisted, massive knot. “Will somebody tell me what’s going on?”

  Petrov pushed an iPad across the table.

  Sophie stopped pacing and stared at the photo on the screen. A family photo. A younger Petrov held hands with a little girl with dark, unruly hair. A striking woman held the little girl’s other hand—a happy, smiling woman who looked at her daughter with love.

  With trembling fingers, Sophie swiped her finger across the screen.

  The next photo showed a toddler sitting on Petrov’s lap in a chair that resembled the old chair in the next room. Petrov and the girl wore matching Kansas City Chiefs T-shirts. One of Petrov’s arms held the girl close, the other raised in victory. A bowl of purple dip and crackers were on the table. The girl in the picture was laughing and staring up at Petrov.

  Sophie closed her eyes. A memory swam to the surface. The smell of beets, an arm around her waist, laughter, red and white letters.

  A girl with black ringlet hair in a red dress and black leather shoes clutched a snow globe in one hand. The girl clutched Petrov’s hand. Love radiated out of the picture.

  Sophie zoomed in on the snow globe.

  Dorothy and her ruby red slippers.

  At the fourth swipe, Sophie dug her nails in to her palms.

  Petrov lying on a sofa, sprawled on his chest lay a baby in a diaper.

  “I don’t understand,” she whispered.

  Petrov smiled at her, a tender look on his face. “You used to get bad colic. Nothing would calm you except being walked. Ekaterina came looking for us and took this photo. You were six weeks old.” He paused. “I have no doubt, Seraphina, that you are my daughter right down to the heart-shaped birthmark on the top of your left thigh.”

  Sophie’s body jerked.

  “What?” she whispered.

  Petrov’s dark eyes drilled into hers. “You have a heart-shaped birthmark on the top of your left thigh.”

  “How…how do you know that?”

  Petrov indicated the iPad. “If you zoom in, the birthmark is visible.”

  Her head spun to Harlan, who stared at her, none of the intensity left his face.

  Oh God, no.

  She closed her eyes and clenched her fists to stop from collapsing. If she pressed her hand to her chest, her heart would be visibly punching against her skin.

  “Franco Security has been guarding and gathering information on you until I was sure. I’m sure, Seraphina.”

  Sophie kept her eyes closed, too many thoughts and emotions suffocating her brain, but one real answer to a question steamed ahead of the other thoughts and landed front and center with a soul-jarring thud.

  From the beginning she’d been nothing but an assignment. A paid assignment. A mark in the ledger. Her body convulsed at the pain slicing through her heart.

  “Oh God,” she whispered, rubbing her chilled arms, opening her eyes.

  “Sophie, we’ll talk later.” Harlan’s words were like fingernails down a blackboard.

  “No we won’t.”

  “Sophie, we will.” At Harlan’s barked words she turned.

  “No we won’t, because we never do,” she screeched, hating that she screeched, but unable to stop it.

  She turned her head at the sting of humiliation. And she’d trusted him. Completely.

  Only this morning she thought they’d made love. Not just had sex, but made love. She’d given him all she had to give—body and soul—and it meant nothing to him. He’d faked everything.

  She dug deep. Harlan was not going to see pain circling her body like sharks, taking painful chunks out of her heart.

  She wrapped her arms around herself to stop her teeth chattering, held her head high, and looked him straight in the eye. She’d give him what he’d never given her.

  The truth.

  “I let you in. You worked your angle until I stood in front of you emotionally naked,” she whispered. “I gave you me. I loved you.” Her hand pushed against her chest, dragging out the now hot, ugly words. “And you took, knowing what it meant. You took it anyway, knowing we had no future.” A thick, suffocating bubble of emotion slid up her throat. “You said you’d rather skin yourself than hurt me.” Her voice cracked. “You lied.”

  Something flared in his heartache-blue eyes before he seemed to process it and shut down. “Sophie. We’ll. Talk. Later.”

  Useless tears pounded her sinuses, but she sucked them back. She needed out, and only one man could help her. Sophie turned to Petrov. “Can we talk, the two of us?”

  He nodded once to Harlan, who stalked to her side.

  Close, but not touching. On the job.

  “I’ll be outside, then we’ll talk,” Harlan said, his voice strong, confident.

  No more bullshit.

  No more being used.

  She wrung the raw final words she’d ever say to Harlan Franco.

  “We’re done.”

  Sophie dropped into the driver side of the car and threw her bag on the passenger seat, then carefully placed the folder Petrov had given her on top. She looked up at Petrov, her words thick. “I need to get away. This is a lot for me to process, and I don’t know what to do.” Her voice crumpled. “May I borrow the car? I’ll pay you back.”

  “Take the car for as long as need. One of my men will escort you until you reach your destination.” Petrov passed her a phone. “Contact me on this phone when you’re ready.” He reached in and squeezed her shoulder. “I have no doubt of who you are.” Tears blurred his dark eyes. “It is time for you to come home.”

  She nodded, unable to speak, then gunned the car into life. Following Petrov’s instructions, she left the property via a concealed exit. Soon she hit asphalt, and the Audi started eating up the miles. She concentrated on hugging the white line.

  One thing at a time.

  She swatted at the tears on her face. All the men in her life who’d meant everything to her had used her. Her preacher father and now Harlan. Used her to their own advantage.

  God, I am so stupid.

  Her bruised heart kicked against her ribs. She’d fallen in love with Harlan. A man who she thought would protect her, cherish her, love her.

  Rain lashed the car in silver sheets. She let the tears fall.

  She let anger take control of her heart, because if she didn’t she’d pull the car over and dissolve.

  No I won’t.

  Getting over Harlan wouldn’t be easy and would take time, but she would, because she had to. She’d progra
mmed a new European Nancy to head home. She drove not thinking, only doing. Compartmentalizing one thing at a time. She needed to get home, get safe.

  Turning into her street hours later, she spied a black SUV parked in front of her house.

  Damn.

  Harlan had positioned one of his men outside her house for reasons she didn’t know and didn’t care. It had been tough to lose Petrov’s tail, but she’d eventually ditched him thanks to the Audi, some well-timed, illegal turns, and Karma playing nice.

  She uncurled her numb fingers from the steering wheel, her throbbing knuckles protesting.

  I need time away.

  Only one place came to mind, and it was a long shot. But she didn’t have many shots to take. Staying with Annie or Gemma wasn’t an option with Zeb and Thor constantly around. Titus needed peace and quiet.

  Twenty minutes later, she pulled into a crowded parking lot and found a space in the back. She entered through the back door, and without knocking, walked into Pipe’s office.

  Glasses were perched on his nose, a stack of papers in front of him.

  The adrenaline filtered from her body as she slid into the chair in front of his desk.

  “Stay as long as you need. There’s a flat above. If you need someone or something dealt with, let me know.”

  “Can I borrow a phone? I need to let a couple of people know I’m safe.” She pulled in a fractured breath. “Then I’m going away for a few weeks.”

  She didn’t know or trust Petrov enough at this stage to use his phone. It would stay untouched and turned off until she wanted to make contact.

  Pipe pulled a string of keys from his pocket, selected one, unlocked a drawer on his desk, selected a phone, and passed it to her.

  “Burner,” he said by way of explanation.

  Not long ago he’d made it clear he didn’t want her working there.

  Tears threatened at his kindness. “I don’t understand. You—”

  “You put up with my shit and didn’t walk.” He leaned back in his chair. “I didn’t think you had it in you. Didn’t think you’d fit in. I’m not wrong often. Glad I listened to my niece.” He shuffled papers. “Now get your head cleared and your ass back here. I need you back at work.” He pushed a pen and piece of paper across the desk. “Anyone you don’t want bothering you?”