by Penelope Sky
I pulled my sweater over my head and then put on my shoes.
Vanessa was sitting on the couch with a blanket over her legs while she watched TV. When she realized I was leaving, she sat up. “Are you going somewhere?”
“I’m meeting the guys.”
“Tonight?” she asked in surprise.
“Yeah.”
“It’s almost eight.”
I grabbed my keys and wallet off the counter. “I know. I have a watch.”
“Isn’t that late?”
I killed people for a living. There was no such thing as late. “I’ll be back later.” I headed to the door, not in the mood to say goodbye. I was annoyed at myself right now. Seeing her wear my shirt pissed me off. I wasn’t angry at her for wearing my clothes. That would be a stupid thing to get upset about. But I hated the way it made me feel.
Vanessa followed me to the door dressed in a purple nightdress. Her hair was down, and her face had been washed. She packed her toothbrush, but I forced her to use mine anyway. “Is everything alright?”
“I have to work.”
“You’ll be back tonight?” She followed me all the way to the elevator, the small nightgown barely covering her body.
“Yes.” I hit the button, and the doors opened.
“That’s it?” she asked incredulously. “No other explanation—”
“I’m not your boyfriend.” I stared at the pissed look on her face as the doors closed. When she was finally gone from sight, I took a breath. I didn’t like the way this woman made me feel. When we were together, I forgot about all the shit in my life. When she wore my shirt, it made me feel like I was connected to her.
I hated that feeling.
So I pushed her away—hurting her on purpose.
I hit the button and rode the elevator to the bottom floor. Then I walked to the bar a few blocks away. It was a dark place with guys who looked the other way when they saw trouble. Women were on poles, their titties hanging out.
I wasn’t impressed.
Max was already there, getting a lap dance from a blonde. He grinned like an idiot, entertaining himself until I arrived.
I dropped into the chair across from him. “Get your pussy later.”
He chuckled then excused the woman. “Like the pussy you have every night?” He grabbed his beer and took a drink.
I didn’t like the way he referred to Vanessa, mentioning the heaven between her legs. That was my pussy—and no other man could talk about it. “She’s off-limits. What do you have for me?”
A folder sat on the table, but he didn’t push it toward me. He studied me with his brown eyes, his hand gripping his glass. “Off-limits, huh?”
“Yes.” I challenged him with my gaze, warning him not to cross the line.
“First, you were going to kill her. Then, you were just keeping her. But now, she’s off-limits. The only women who are off-limits are wives and families. So, which one is she? I know she’s not family…”
One of the guys in our crew had a wife. Wives were safe from trash talk and our general perverseness. And we also had a protocol. If the wife was ever captured along with the crew member, she took priority. The man could die—as long as she lived. When I said Vanessa was off-limits, that wasn’t how I meant it. I just didn’t want him to talk about her pussy like he had the right to.
Only I did.
“Do you know anything else about Joe?”
Max let it go, probably because he could feel my rage. “I’m pretty sure it was him. I’ve gathered enough evidence to prove he was in the neighborhood on the night of the murder. That’s an odd coincidence.”
“Too much of a coincidence.”
“So, I think it was him. But you really should take some time to think about this. If you don’t pull it off right, all the Tyrants will be after you. If you really want to kill him, do it without leaving a trace back to you.”
“I do that for a living, so it shouldn’t be hard.”
Max glanced around the bar, making sure there was no one around who was eavesdropping. “You’re putting the rest of us at risk here. And none of us believe avenging your mother is worth our lives, our livelihood. I’m sorry you’re still angry about it, and I don’t blame you for being upset, but you should let it go.”
Letting it go was easier said than done. “What if it were your mother?”
He held his silence.
“You wouldn’t let it go,” I said coldly. “And if you did, what kind of son would you be?”
“And what kind of mother would want her son to risk his life when she’s already dead?” he countered.
We stared at each other while the music played overhead. The bass was loud as the women worked the poles in their heels. Most of them were just in thongs, their plump asses firm. The lights were low, and their faces were barely distinguishable. Like the other men here, I enjoyed watching them dance and move.
But now that Vanessa was waiting for me, I didn’t find them appealing.
Because Vanessa put these women to shame.
Max ended the silence by pushing the folder toward me. “I’ve got a hit for you.”
“Where?”
“Russia.”
I hated going to Russia. It was cold as fuck, even colder than it was here. And it was enormous. It was three times as big as all of Europe combined. “When?”
“Immediately.”
That meant I was leaving tonight. “How much?”
“Twenty million.”
“Wow. This guy has a big bounty on his head.”
“He raped our client’s daughter. He’s paying extra because he wants you to torture the guy before you kill him.”
So it was personal. “Consider it done.”
When I returned to my place, Vanessa was in bed. She wasn’t asleep, but she was playing a game on her phone. Her eyes followed me as I walked inside, and she set the phone on the nightstand. She looked at me but didn’t say anything, obviously angry by the way I spoke to her when I left.
I grabbed my bag and tossed my clothes inside.
She couldn’t hold her silence anymore, not when she realized what I was doing. “Where are you going?”
“I have a job. I’m leaving for Russia.”
“Right now?” she asked incredulously.
“Yes. Right now. I’ll be gone for a few days. I’ll leave my key, so you can come and go as you please.”
She sat up in bed, her hair pulled over one shoulder. She looked sexy making herself at home in my bed, lying on the side of the bed that I usually took. “You’re off to kill someone?”
I stuffed the last of my things in the black leather bag and zipped it up. “Yes.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, turning judgmental.
“My target raped my client’s daughter.” I didn’t have to explain myself. I didn’t have to justify what I was doing. But I wanted her to know that, to know she shouldn’t feel bad for my victim.
He deserved to be my victim.
Her arms returned to her sides. “Oh…”
“I expect that painting to be done by the time I get back.”
“You can’t rush art.”
“But I can rush you.” I pulled the strap over my shoulder then approached her at the bedside. My guns were on the second floor, away from my living quarters, so Vanessa wouldn’t have access to them. I stared at her slender neckline, wanting to sprinkle kisses everywhere before I left, but I knew I should leave. I had a plane to catch. “Don’t call me. I won’t answer.”
“Alright.”
I wanted to lean down and kiss her goodbye, but that felt too domesticated. I usually kissed her when I left, but now that I’d seen her in my shirt, everything felt different. It seemed like this was more complicated than just a master and a prisoner.
She stared at me, like she was thinking the same thing.
I finally had the strength to turn away and walk to the door.
“Bones.”
I stood at the doorway,
still gripping the strap of my bag. I didn’t want to turn around, I didn’t want to look at her. I just wanted to walk off like she meant nothing to me. But I turned around anyway.
She moved to her knees then pulled the purple nightdress over her head, revealing her gorgeous tits, sexy curves, and beautiful skin. Her dark skin looked good under any light, but right now, it looked especially stunning.
Fucking kissable.
“You’re just going to leave without saying goodbye to your baby?”
I never got so hard so fast in my life. My bag dropped to the floor with a thud, and I pulled my shirt over my head. This woman wanted me and was pretty much begging me. My assignment didn’t seem important anymore, not when her tits looked that gorgeous and her nipples were so hard. Her little belly was calling to me, asking for my kisses.
I kicked off my shoes then dropped my pants. Bits of clothing dropped on the floor until I reached the bed buck naked.
Vanessa grabbed me by the arm and pulled me on top of her, her legs immediately circling my waist and her fingers running through my hair. Her mouth was on mine, and she kissed me like a woman who didn’t want her man to leave.
My cock found her pussy like a magnet, and I slid inside her, greeted by her arousal.
“Apologize to me.”
I was so hard inside her, oozing from my crown because I was so turned on. I loved being the master, keeping my prisoner in line. But when she became sassy, needy, it hit the right spot. “I’m sorry, baby.”
“Don’t ever leave like that again.”
“I won’t.”
She kissed me hard, her hips rocking with mine so she could take my cock hard and fast. “Promise me.”
I was sick of making promises. I was tired of making exceptions for her. I was pissed at myself for bending all the rules for her. She was still alive because I allowed it, and I was buried between her legs right this very moment because she made me weak. Our relationship had turned into this combustive explosion of intense chemistry that made both of us stupid and irrational…and made us despise each other more at the same time. I hated her because of what she did to me. And she hated me for making her feel so much shame, for enjoying the feeling of her enemy’s cock deep inside her. But I made another promise to her, a promise I would keep because I was a man of my word. “I promise.”
12
Vanessa
When I woke up the next morning, the shame hit me.
Hard.
What the fuck was I doing?
I’d always been attracted to Bones, but now I was starting to need him. I wanted all of him all the time. Once I got some of that intensity between us, I didn’t want to let go. A man had never made me feel the way he did. I felt so sexy and beautiful, whether I was dressed in lingerie with makeup or lying around in a baggy shirt with a clean face. No man had ever made me feel this kind of addiction, of wanting more and more.
I wasn’t sure if I could quit.
Now I had to wonder if I was doing this because I had to…or because I wanted to.
That’s when I started to cry.
I wasn’t the kind of person who cried. Crying was weak and annoying. My mother never did it, and I wasn’t going to start now. But I felt so trapped. I had no one to turn to for help, no one to talk to. I was stuck in this open prison, feeling things for the man who made me his captive.
I liked kissing him.
Touching him.
Fucking him.
And I knew he felt the same way. Bones felt the same disgusting need I did. He wanted to be between my legs every night and not with other women. He hated me for what I’d done to his family, but he didn’t kill me because he’d become too attached.
I’d become too attached too.
What would happen if I didn’t stop this?
Would I ever be free?
Or would I be the one who wound up dead? I couldn’t be the weak one. One of us had to kill the other.
And I wasn’t going to let him be the one to pull the trigger.
Only one of us could get out of this alive.
And it was going to be me.
Days went by, and I stayed at his place. He left me a key and the code to get in and out. I didn’t have access to the other floors, and I was curious to know what was there. He worked out, so he must have a gym somewhere. And he killed people, so he must have weapons too. But I didn’t find any.
I worked on my painting most of the time, taking advantage of the morning light to get the best colors for the picture. In the beginning, it was strange to paint myself in a sexy way, especially when I knew what happened after this photo was taken.
We fucked nonstop.
But after a few hours, I got over it.
I worked on all the specific details, treating the image as if it were a random person instead of myself. I spent a lot of time working on every single color to make sure it was as realistic as possible. I had to mix the paints and add different concentrations to get the right consistency. Even the smallest touches were a long process because they required so much time and detail.
The days passed, and I kept working, getting so involved in the painting that I became more invested in it than I was at the beginning. I did my best to capture the right tone, to change the colors a little to set the mood. I painted myself exactly the way he saw me, as a beautiful prisoner that he couldn’t torture—but couldn’t release either.
By the time I was done, I couldn’t stop staring at it.
It was beautiful.
It wasn’t stunning because of me. It was stunning because it captured that moment in time so perfectly. That was the beauty of a painting versus a regular photograph. So much more could be captured with the colors and the texture. It wasn’t identical to the picture, and that was because a picture couldn’t capture the mood.
But a painting could.
Anyone could look at this painting and feel exactly what I felt, understand exactly what I felt. There was so much passion and restrained lust. There was so much affection and infatuation. I could feel his eyes on me as I stared at it, remembering exactly how it felt when he stared at me with that brooding gaze.
I didn’t just capture my presence in the painting—but his.
I set my brushes down and continued to look at it, imagining it hanging in his office. It was hard to understand why he would want a painting when he already had me. Why spend time looking at it when he could just look at me in the flesh instead. He wasn’t an art lover or an artistic person.
So why did he want it?
And then it hit me.
He wanted it because I wouldn’t always be around to look at.
Because I would soon be a memory.
And he wanted to remember exactly how it felt to have me, to have me in his captivity, to feel this balance between passion and hate.
My fingers started to shake, but I forced them to steady. Bones had never misled me about his intentions with me. He enjoyed my body, but he would eventually stop my beating heart. He just had to decide when he was ready to do it, after he was finally tired of me.
Maybe that was sooner than I realized.
There was no time to waste.
The next time he was at my apartment, I would have to pull the trigger.
And kill this monster.
I hadn’t spoken to him in four days.
I returned to my place because I didn’t want to be near his stuff anymore. I didn’t want to paint in that beautiful room because it would only soften my heart. He claimed he only gave me that room so I could make his painting, but I suspected he also did it for me—so his plaything would have something to do.
I took the painting to my apartment because I never intended to give it to him. He would come over when he came back to town, but he wouldn’t leave this apartment after he walked in the door.
I’d kill him then call my father.
He’d know what to do with the body. Hopefully, he wouldn’t ask too many questions.
I couldn
’t look my father in the eye and tell him I was sleeping with Bones.
That would be the most uncomfortable conversation of my life.
I wasn’t sure what I would do with the painting. It would be strange to keep it because it was an image of myself dressed in lingerie in a man’s bed. It would be weird to hang it proudly on the wall. I should probably just burn it.
But it seemed a waste to burn something so beautiful.
Something I put so much time into.
Just because it depicted something dark and twisted didn’t make it ugly. It was truthful and honest, transparent in its emotions. Bones had some artistic capability because he was the one who took the photo. I just added the emotion to it.
I placed the gun underneath my pillows where I slept, knowing he would give me no warning before he walked through the front door. He wouldn’t tell me he was back in town until he marched into my apartment and announced it.
I had to be ready.
I was sitting in my living room having dinner with the painting on the easel next to the window when I heard footsteps outside my front door. I stopped eating and listened, my heart beating hard in my chest. I knew it was him before I saw him, before I even heard him.
I could just feel him.
He must have picked the lock because it took him a few seconds before he opened the door and welcomed himself inside.
It annoyed me because he knew I was home. All he had to do was knock.
He stepped inside, dressed in all black. His heavy frame thudded against the floor as he moved, and his crystal-blue eyes landed on me once he was inside the living room. He stared at me with various emotions, different intensities. He seemed angry, but he also seemed desperate.
I wasn’t nervous because of the way he was staring at me. I was nervous because of what I was about to do.
I knew it was just my paranoia, but it seemed like he knew my plan.
He turned his gaze to the painting and stilled as he stared at it. Then he crossed the room to get a better look at it. His back was to me, and he crossed his arms over his chest.
