But this was different. In an unnerving way.
Andrea, unlike the women he’d been with in the past, was soft and happy and almost indulgent in her humor. She didn’t snap or push him away. And even with her black hair and demure costume, she was a ray of sunshine.
She rolled over and groaned, reaching into the empty space where he’d just been laying. Her eyes barely opened in the low light coming in under the heavy curtains, and she glanced around the room. When she saw him, her smile unfurled like a big flag, until it danced widely on her gorgeous features.
His heart flipped over and he felt something pulling on him, like she’d activated a homing beacon and was calling him home. He offered a small smile in return. “I didn’t want to wake you.”
“You didn’t.” Andrea pushed herself up and the blanket fell from her shoulders, revealing alert nipples.
Vadik’s tongue slipped between his lips. He wanted to taste her again. “I was going to go for a run.” He gestured around. “But I appear to only have expensive suits in here. I should head to my room.”
“I heard my phone buzz. I think that’s what woke me.” She looked around, her breasts swaying with each movement. His hands flexed with the memory of their weight on his fingertips.
“I didn’t hear it.” He lifted the now-wrinkled suit pants he’d discarded the previous night.
She tapped the side of her head. “Wolf hearing.”
“Right.” He shifted in the chair. “I guess you probably have some abilities I don’t have, then.”
She leaned over the other side of the bed and came back up with her phone in her hand. “Our senses are more sensitive, when we really need them, and of course, the long life.”
“Long life?”
She swiped at the screen. “Yeah, we heal supernaturally, so we have longer life. Plus, y’know, if you bond. Then you get a hundred years.”
“What does that mean? Bond?” He folded the pants and his own phone slid from the pocket and thudded to the carpet. On the screen, he saw a notification from Luther pop up, and reached for the thing.
“It’s Niko,” she said absently, typing something into her phone. “We need to meet him downstairs.” She shook her head, as though remembering. “Yeah, bonding. When you meet your mate, you bond your life force together, and then you have a hundred years together. It’s…” Andrea looked up and her expression tightened. “It’s part of the original curse.”
Vadik nodded. “Wolf stuff.”
“Sorry. I just don’t usually talk with humans about this stuff.” She pulled the blanket up to cover her breasts. “My father drilled in to us from an early age, we never talk about it with humans.”
“I get it.” He opened up the text message from Luther. Meet us in the lobby when you’re up. “Luther said the same thing as Niko.”
“Maybe your phone woke you, too.” Her smile was automatic, like she was trying to cheer him up.
“No. I was awake for a while before I got out of bed.” He picked up the silky shirt he’d been wearing the previous day and slung it over his arm.
A flush crossed her cheeks. “You didn’t have to stay on my account.”
Vadik grabbed the suit coat. “I didn’t want to leave, or anything. I just get restless when there’s someone in my bed.” He froze, glancing up at her. “I’m not used to waking up with someone.”
Her hands tightened on the blanket. “Trust me, I get it. I haven’t woken up next to someone in years.”
He leaned against the dark wooden armoire and watched her whole body tighten at some memory. “He must’ve been something else.”
Her blue eyes met his, all innocence, but there was something behind them. Something she was holding back. “Who?” she asked.
“The guy you woke up next to.” Vadik crossed his arms, clothes hanging from them like wash on a line, and something heavy caught in his throat and stayed there. Flashes of some other guy in Andrea’s bed. His shoulders tensed. “He snagged you, so he must’ve been something else.”
She stepped out of the bed and the blanket fell away from her body. She had the long, lithe body of a runner, but her breasts were full, and, if he hadn’t felt them himself, he would have sworn they were fake. They were so perfect.
Andrea lifted a hand to his cheek. “You’re somethin’ else, Vadik Nabatov.”
A long silence hung between them, and the place where her skin touched his sizzled with heat. Vadik caught himself dipping toward her and stopped. “Not that I want you to cover up, but I saw your shirt on the other side of the bed. We should get down to Luther.”
Her smile made him want to smile back. She slapped his chest and he jumped. “Did Luther say what was up?” She walked around the bed, her perfect ass bouncing with each step.
Dammit. He wanted to grab that ass.
“Only that we should come down as soon as we’re ready.”
“So they all assumed we’re together.” Andrea sighed. “Of course, they can probably tell.”
“Is that another wolf thing?” He picked up his shoes—or rather—Ilya’s shoes, and walked toward the door.
“It’s more like a nosy thing.” She opened her suitcase and threw the previous day’s discarded clothes in. The bags of Sasha clothes were littered around, some empty and some untouched.
He nodded at the bright red Diva Dallas bag at the foot of the bed. “You’re going as Sasha? Or as Andrea?”
By the time he looked up, she was fully clothed. Jeans, light t-shirt, and she had the coat in her hand. She picked up her shoes and gestured to the door. “I’m always Andrea. Even in Sasha’s clothes.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Babushka would say, ‘a song without one word is not the same song’.”
“You’re Vadik,” she added, closing her door, “Even in Ilya’s clothes. That’s why we failed at training. We are who we are, and dressing us up as someone else doesn’t make us someone else.”
He smirked and walked into the hallway, all of Ilya’s clothes in his hands. Bright lights illuminated the tiny pinstripes in the pattern of the fabric. He was lucky he even knew what pinstripes were. “Maybe you’re right.” Vadik pulled the hotel key card from the pocket of Ilya’s pants and opened the door to his room. “But I don’t know if we failed at training.”
“Let me guess,” Andrea said, leaning against the door frame and holding the door open. “You never fail at anything.”
“Oh, I fail constantly. Failure isn’t the problem.” He set Ilya’s clothes on the bed and reached for his duffel bag. “It’s how you fail.”
He pulled on a pair of jeans and looked over his shoulder.
She was openly checking him out, a smile tugging at the corners of her lips. “So we failed wrong?” Her hand moved up the door jamb, stretching out the length of her body.
Vadik clenched his fingers, willing himself to stop looking at her body. Instead, he yanked a t-shirt over his head and picked up his bomber jacket. The fur lining was plush under his skin. “I don’t know yet.” He slid the jacket on and sat down to pull on his socks and shoes. “I guess it depends on where we end up.”
Andrea slipped one shoe on—a graceful move, like a dancer—and then leaned on the other side of the door to put on the other. There was such an ease to the way she moved and he found himself wondering if all wolves were like that, or if there was something special about her.
Other than…well…everything.
“Shit balls, you two.” Luther’s voice echoed from somewhere behind Andrea and soon, his friend was also framed by his door. “Are you still having sex up here? Or what’s taking so long?”
She laughed, almost a giggle, and it sent little shards of energy racing through Vadik’s body. She turned to Luther and kissed his cheek. “Good morning to you, too, jerkface.”
“Seriously, we need to go.” He thumbed behind him. “We’ve got to get back out to the airport before the jet concierge is too full.”
“Why?” Vadik rose and crossed his hotel roo
m, slipping his phone and wallet into his pocket. “I thought we didn’t have anything until Niko’s grandma’s.”
“We’re not doing more training. Are we?” Andrea’s pout was… let’s face it… adorable.
Dammit.
“No more training for a while.” Luther nodded at Vadik. “I need his help, mostly, and the rest of us are along for the ride, I guess.”
“Ah.” He nodded and pushed the two of them out into the hallway, closing his door. He looked around to be certain no one was listening. “The body.”
“Right.” His buddy gestured for them to follow. “Dr. Lee said it’s not quite cold enough on the plane, although they’ve opened all the vents.”
“It’s going to be gruesome.” Vadik glanced at Andrea. “Are you sure you want to come along?”
“If it gets me out of pretending to be somebody else for a couple of hours, I’m in.”
Vadik glanced around the concierge intake room. Only two people huddled in one corner, the woman dressed in a thick fur coat, and the man in an expensive suit. Two uniformed staff sat at a desk in the far corner, but they were too engrossed in their own gossip to notice Luther and Maggie standing in front of them.
“Go on,” Andrea said from behind him, but Vadik held up a hand.
Between the two of them sat a large suitcase with Sasha inside, and she had more of a smell than he’d anticipated.
“As soon as both staff are busy,” he said, pretending to check something on his phone. He and Andrea stood just outside the door to the jetway, trying to look inconspicuously engrossed in technology. “I can’t risk anyone coming too close.”
“What about those two?” She nodded at the ritzy couple in the waiting area.
“I’m not worried about them. They’re in their own world.” He typed at the blank phone screen. “Just tell me when the staff are busy.”
Her phone buzzed. “Niko’s right outside. We need to go now.”
Vadik took a breath. The first uniformed staffer glanced up at Luther and smiled, and the second one looked around the room. He flipped his eyes back to his phone screen. “Just wait.”
Maggie interrupted whatever Luther was saying and pointed at the second staff woman. Finally, both of their focus was elsewhere, and Vadik whisked the door open. He kept looking at his phone screen, but his attention was focused on the staff. He quickened his pace when one of them stood.
Maggie’s laughter cracked the air and Vadik tried not to move too quickly.
“Can you get in front of me and open the door?” he whispered to Andrea, slowing just a touch. The weight of the suitcase dragged behind him and Andrea’s steps clipped a bit faster as she scooted in front of him.
She pulled the door open just as one of the staff called out to them, “Excuse me!”
Vadik kept walking, leaving Andrea holding the door, but he didn’t slow until he hit the sidewalk.
Niko had the back of a black SUV open and Vadik threw him a nod. He reached the curb, and Niko hefted the suitcase into the back.
Andrea clambored after him, calling his name, and when he stopped, he turned to face the staff with a tight smile. One he imagined Ilya would have worn.
“I’m sorry, sir, but you can’t leave the jet in temporary parking more than twenty-four hours.” She handed him a packet of papers and gestured at Andrea. “I was just explaining. We need to have flight arrangements registered if we’re going to leave your jet where it is.”
Andrea gave the woman a sweet smile and took the paperwork. “Let me just handle that.” She walked to the front of the SUV, where Dani was waiting, and climbed in.
Vadik saw Dani’s head move and his chest tightened.
Good thinking.
“We intend to take off in the morning. But I have a meeting I’m late for, currently. Is there someone I can call?” He forced all the bastard into his voice he could muster. If Ilya didn’t care for his own slave, he certainly wouldn’t have cared for the staff at a jet concierge.
“It shouldn’t take your pilot long to fill out the flight request.” The uptight woman folded her hands in front of her. “Where will you be traveling, Mr. Petrov?”
Vadik waved at the woman like she was a nuisance bug flapping around his head. “My assistant handles these things.”
“Well, as long as your pilot knows.” She offered a tight smile.
Niko’s foot tapped a rhythm against the curb and Vadik could feel the ramping tension in his body. The cramped quarters would begin to smell like decaying flesh soon, and they needed to get a move on.
Andrea fluttered to his side and handed the paperwork back. Vadik turned on his heel without acknowledging anyone and climbed in to the vehicle. A collective sigh of relief took the whole car as they pulled away, leaving the staffer there to stare after them.
“I knew she wanted to stop us for something,” Vadik said, swiping at his forehead. “I can just tell.”
“We’re lucky that’s all it was,” Dani said from the front.
“Can you tell Luther to take a cab to my grandma’s?” Niko said, making a sharp turn onto the airport drive. “I don’t dare go back for them with Mrs. Hitler watching.”
Dani began punching things in to her phone and Vadik tried to catch Andrea’s eye when she looked over her shoulder, but he couldn’t.
She wasn’t exactly ignoring him, but she wasn’t acting like the attentive, invested Andrea who’d woken up flashing him in her hotel room.
As happy-go-lucky as she could be, she had a habit of going inside herself when she thought no one was looking. But he was always looking.
She was his partner. He had to know her tells. They didn’t have much time to establish short-hand, but it would be invaluable in the field.
His hand raised, as though drawn to her skin, but he stopped himself from touching her. The sex had put him in a place with her that confused him. He was drawn toward her, inexplicably, at all times, but she’d pulled back from him, and he wasn’t always certain what had caused it.
Vadik couldn’t afford to have strangeness between them once they got on that island. He was going to have to talk to her.
He hated talking.
The women he usually worked with were masters at burying their feelings during combat and missions. But while Andrea covered hers up with smiles, there were those unguarded moments where she went inside herself and hid somewhere, and he needed to understand.
“Where are we going now?” she asked.
Niko glanced in the rearview and met Vadik’s eyes. “There’s an old, abandoned crematorium in Wicker Park. We don’t use it, because everyone in the neighborhood knows it’s abandoned. But it’s also near enough to the eraser factory, my uncle thinks we can get by with using it one night when they’re burning off their waste.”
Andrea’s body tightened. “So… We’re just going to leave her there? In an abandoned building? Like…we’re dumping her?”
Vadik touched her shoulder. “Don’t think of it that way. We’re going to put her in the crematorium and when it’s appropriate, Niko’s uncle will give her a send-off at night, when they can do it safely.”
“If we try to light her up in the middle of the day, the cops will show up.” Niko shrugged. “I’m sorry, Andi. There’s just nothing we can do.”
Andrea settled against the seat, but didn’t push Vadik’s hand off. “I don’t like the idea of dumping her, Niko. She’s a wolf, too.”
A wolf, too.
He let those words sink in for another long moment. He didn’t understand a lot about this culture, the wolves who were also human. There was so much about Andrea, and about her life and family that he didn’t know.
Yet, he felt such a strong pull to her, deep inside. Like, wherever she was in the world, he was always going to want to be there.
What the damn hell was wrong with him?
Chapter Eight
Vadik sat at the long, heavy table in Vanya Lupesco’s dining room and did his best not to follow Andrea’s ev
ery movement, breath, swallow, and bite. He’d seen the disappointment on her face when they’d left Sasha’s body in the old, hollow crematorium and closed the door on it.
She wanted something better for Sasha.
Even though they’d all agreed, it was the only option, Andrea had been on edge since they pulled away from the abandoned, cracked-face building. She’d withdrawn, and her smiles were vacant.
This mission was getting to her. She kept trying to blend in to the crowd around her—he could see it—but she was only sticking out to him even more, with every lowering of her eyes and ever pulled in breath at a comment about the mission.
He wanted something better for her.
The dining table seated twenty that he counted, and it was packed, plus a children’s table in the family room. Everyone sipped their cabbage stew in relative silence, as if tension was the order of the day.
Niko’s uncle, Janosz, sat at the head of the table, and Vanya—who Niko called Babcia, which he assumed meant grandmother—sat at the foot. The families seemed to be crowded together.
Niko’s father with his children and wife. Janosz with his wife and sons. Another brother, Tomek, sat with two sons and their wives. The team was scattered between Lupescos, and everyone watched Janosz with at least one wary eye.
Except Vadik. He didn’t give an ass rat about the stocky Pole. Whatever it was they all thought he could do to them. Vadik could fight his own battles, and he had one to fight with Andrea, of that, there was little doubt.
She wouldn’t have been so silent, otherwise.
“Have Milla bring in the hams,” Vanya croaked out, her elderly voice breaking in to the clink of utensils and the slurp of liquid. One of Tomek’s daughters-in-law hopped up and ran in to the kitchen.
Vadik’s stomach still growled, even after a full bowl of soup and an assortment of nibbled breads he’d scarfed down trying to ignore the desire to look at Andrea. It was always possible that his hunger wasn’t for food.
But he didn’t want to entertain that thought.
“Both of them, Babcia?” came a voice from the kitchen.
Broken Wolf: Moonbound Series, Book Seven Page 7
