by Nana Malone
I was in trouble. Marcus Black was dangerous to me, because instead of thinking ahead to my mission and my partners, people depending on me, I wanted to be on this Ferris wheel with Marcus Black forever.
I wasn’t thinking about logistics or identifying the target. No, I was only thinking about Marcus and how to get more of what he just gave me. Something told me that I would be safe with him, that if at any point I wanted to be free, he would give me the freedom I needed.
I’d always thought Tyler had broken me. But I could see it clearly now; Marcus Black would be the one to destroy me.
Suddenly, sitting there on the Ferris wheel wrapped in Marcus’s arms, both of us panting and breathing hard, I could hear Addie’s voice in my comm unit.
“It’s showtime. Switch to channel A.”
I tapped my earring to change the comm channel and then tapped it twice more to let everyone know that I was on and listening but couldn’t speak.
Tyler’s voice came on next. “We have a sighting on Mads McLean. He’s with a woman. Not sure who it is, but she’s blond, tall, and has a scar on her left cheek.”
And then it was Kira’s voice in my ear. From her vantage point she could see them. “He handed something to the woman. He’s doubling back and leaving.”
I tried to keep my face neutral until I knew what to do. I waited for Tyler to come on with the command.
When he came back on, it wasn’t good news. “The woman is Sasha White. She’s a member of Victus, and she’s been given her card for the private auction.” That was when all hell broke loose. “Lyra, you’re up. Get that card.”
The Ferris wheel car came down to a stop, and Marcus helped me out. Desperate for an excuse, I asked him, “Do you know where the bathroom is?”
He frowned as he glanced around. “I think there is one over there.”
He was pointing in the wrong direction. “Oh, okay, let’s go.”
Then I asked the ride attendant, “Is the bathroom over there the nearest one?”
She shook her head and pointed the other way. “No, there’s one just right there.”
I turned around in the direction I needed to go. “Okay, thanks.” I turned to Marcus. “Do you want to wait for me here?”
Marcus frowned. “Uh, sure, okay. I’ll wait for you.”
I tried to give him my brightest smile. “I’ll be right back. Don’t you move. After this, I want funnel cake and a latte.”
He nodded and then pushed me lightly in the direction of the comfort room. “Go, I’ll be right here. Funnel cake, latte, and more rides after you get back.”
I gave him a cheery smile. “You’re on. I won’t be long.”
I prayed I was right.
Chapter 11
Marcus
I’d been on the lookout for Mads and waiting for a status update while we were on the Ferris wheel.
When I hadn’t been occupied with Lyra.
This is a dangerous game you’re playing.
I knew the game was dangerous, but I couldn’t stay away from her. Not now that I knew what it could be like with us.
I wanted more. More of her, more time, but I’d never, ever once come close to blowing a mission.
Everything was going to shit in my comm unit. I could hear everything going wrong but couldn’t respond until Lyra excused herself to the ladies’ room.
“What the fuck is going on?”
When he responded, Rhodes sounded like he was running. “Stannis is a no-show. I repeat he’s a no-show. Mads had a private auction meeting with someone else. A woman. He handed her something and then took off. I repeat, Mads has left the premises.”
“Fuck. Do we know who she was?”
Becker’s voice was clear and direct. “I’m running the facial recognition software now. It’ll still take a second. But we have bigger problems.”
My heart hammered as I searched the crowd for Lyra. “What do you mean?”
“We have confirmed agents from The Firm onsite. Sniper on the roof. They are likely also trying to grab Mads and Stannis.”
“What’s the call? What are we doing?” I scanned the crowd, looking for Lyra. She’d been gone just a little too long.
Rhodes was silent for a moment. “Instructions are to return to headquarters. If Mads is in the wind and Stannis is a no-show, we need to regroup. We are not to engage with Firm agents.”
The hell we wouldn’t.
It was almost as if Rhodes could hear me disobeying a direct order. His voice was very clear and suddenly very British. “Let it go, Marcus. Follow the mission command.”
I didn’t want to listen to reason. Didn’t want to follow orders. The only thing that kept me from doing something stupid was worrying about Lyra. I glanced around, looking for any potential Firm agents. If they started shooting at someone they thought was a target, she could get caught in the crossfire, and they wouldn’t care who died.
I had the simplest egress route. Just go out the way I’d come in. My only job tonight had been to tag Mads and Stannis. But things hadn’t gone that way. I kept wondering what would have happened if I’d hadn’t had my fingers inside of Lyra. Would I have seen them?
Maybe. But the point was that the meet had started earlier than it was supposed to and hadn’t gone as planned if Stannis was a no-show. Where the fuck was Mads McLean going?
Rhodes was right. We needed to regroup and figure out what the fuck went wrong. But first, I had to get Lyra to safety and then walk through what in the world had happened tonight with my team. I started to get nervous about Lyra when it had been ten minutes since she’d walked away. And we still didn’t have any confirmation on how many Firm agents there were.
When I went after her, I couldn’t believe what the hell I was seeing.
* * *
Lyra
I turned my back on Marcus, trying to stroll as nonchalantly as I could while also hustling. Addie’s voice came in clear. “Yup, Lyra, she’s up ahead, about fifty meters.”
My voice was croaky as I said, “On it.”
Jesus, what had made me think this was a good idea?
Get your shit together. Do this. Get the card from Sasha White, find out what happened to Prochenko and where Mads McLean went, and then maybe you can go out with Marcus for real.
I hoped I could fucking go out with Marcus for real, because I really did like him.
I looked in the women’s restroom, but I didn’t see anyone. What had gone wrong and why were they meeting early? “Are you sure she’s here?”
Addie said, “No, she’s in the alley behind the bathroom.”
I ran out to the darkened alley and found it to be a dead end.
What was I missing? I looked for a door that led into some other building, but I couldn’t see one. Maybe it was further down. “Ad—”
I never even heard the metal pipe until it sliced through the air with a whoosh. I jumped out of the way just in time. Sasha had overshot her mark. Before she could even whirl around to swing at me again, I kicked her in the kidney. With a grunt, she dropped the pipe, and it made a clanging sound.
“We don’t have to do this. I just want a little information.”
“You won’t get it out of me,” she spat as she came at me again. This time, she tried to grab me around the midsection to pick me up.
She could have too, since she had three inches and several pounds on me. But as she wrapped her arms around me, I brought down my elbow and tackled her back. She grunted, but she didn’t release me. A couple more well-placed elbows, and her hold finally loosened. As soon as it did, I reached my arms out wide and then clapped my palms hard over her ears.
She swung at me again, and I blocked it with my left arm, bringing my elbow in and then dragging it up as far as I could, right next to my head to block her. I delivered a punch, which she blocked easily.
It was then that I heard footsteps. “Lyra?”
At that single moment of distraction, my attention was split.
I could hear it
, the twang of metal, and I called out to him to keep him from coming toward danger. “Marcus, no, I—” I blocked the knife, hit her again, and then tried to turn around to stop him from entering the alley.
But he headed toward me surprisingly fast as he yelled, “Lyra, what in the—”
I never even saw her fist coming. Sasha got me right in the jaw. I instantly fell to the ground, dizzy. It made my eyes sting and my jaws clang together.
Oh fuck, that was going to bruise.
“Oh my God, Lyra.”
Marcus. I had to think of something fast. I yelled at Sasha, “For the last time, I have no intention of ever having anything to do with your boyfriend. He’s all yours.”
When she saw Marcus, I sensed momentary indecision on her face. She probably contemplated whether to strike me again with him added to the equation or go. And for some reason, she opted to make a run for it.
Fuck. I tapped my comm and whispered, “Target is in the wind. I repeat, target is in the wind.”
In all the commotion and the noisiness of the fair rides, I didn’t think Marcus heard me.
He was too focused on coming for me as I lay on the ground.
In my earpiece, I could hear Addie, Tyler, and Roz as the pandemonium set in and they went after Sasha.
They knew my location. Hopefully, they could fucking get her. I’d failed. After all that, I’d failed.
Marcus kneeled down next to me. “Jesus Christ, what in the world is going on?”
I groaned as I held my jaw. “Oh God, that really hurt.”
“Who was that?”
“Um, new girlfriend of my ex. Tyler. You met him. A bit of a dick.”
His eyes went wide. “What?”
“She saw me by the bathroom. When I was coming out, she cornered me. You know, a stay-away-from-my-man kind of thing.”
He frowned. “That’s ridiculous.”
“I know, right?” Ugh, I really needed to get better with my lies.
Luckily, in the dark he couldn’t really see me that well.
“Jesus, do you want to call the police?”
“No, I just... I need ice.”
“Yup, coming right up. How come every time we go out something wild happens?”
“I swear to God, it’s not me.”
He laughed. “Jesus, we need to get you some basic self-defense class or something.”
“Yeah, that’s something to think about for sure.”
Thirty minutes later, we were in Marcus’s apartment. Me with an icepack on my face, him with heat lamps on, checking me all over to make sure that I didn’t have any other injuries.
My ribs were tender, so I really hoped to God he wouldn’t press too hard on them. “Did she hit you anywhere else?”
“Well, she tried to hit me with a pole, but I ducked away, and then I dropped and hurt myself a little.”
“God, Lyra, I mean it. We really need to get you in some basic self-defense course.”
“What, now you’re an expert on self-defense?”
“No, not exactly, but I know when someone’s going to get hurt one day. And you are that woman.”
Not if I could help it.
Chapter 12
Marcus
For fuck’s sake, it was like danger followed Lyra around. I helped her settle the icepack gently over her cheekbone, and I frowned as she winced.
Not your circus, not your monkeys.
I wanted them to be my monkeys. She’d nearly gotten herself in trouble.
“Why don’t you tell me her name?”
Lyra’s brows rose. “Why?”
Why was she so stubborn about this? “So I can file a police report. She tried to assault you.” When she shook her head vehemently, I added, “Okay, then tell me the surname of your ex. I can look him up. Maybe reach out to him and let him know his girlfriend is crazy.”
“Oh no you don’t. I’ll deal with this.”
I laughed. “Why won’t you let me help you with this?”
“I’m fine. Honestly. She didn’t hit that hard.”
I laughed at that. “Sweetheart, I don’t think you can see your jaw right now.” I lifted the icepack away from her face. “It’s going to be a big bruise. It’s going to match the one under your eye.”
“I can see it in your face. You think something is happening to me. Honestly, nothing is happening. I am just clumsy, and you saw it today.”
“Yeah, I saw it. Obviously, I’m just really worried.”
She sighed and reached up to touch my face. “Do you realize no one has worried about me this much in years? Not since my parents died.”
It had been a long time since I was aware of my heart, but right now it wanted to do anything and everything to make Lyra feel better.
“Well, maybe someone should.”
“I’ve learned to be independent.”
“It’s not all or nothing, Lyra. I reckon your ex did a number on you. And we don’t have to talk about it yet, but one day you’ll open up to me about him. In the meantime, I want Tyler’s surname. I would like to have a conversation with him about his girlfriend, as well as whatever the hell he did to you that makes you keep your guard up so high.”
“Well, we don’t always get what we want, do we? I’ll deal with it. I don’t want you involved because that sends the message that I can’t deal with things on my own and need some hero to swoop in and take care of me.”
I gritted my teeth. I wanted to fix this for her. And by fix, I meant making that asshole ex-boyfriend of hers pay for everything he’d ever done to her and then getting his current girlfriend to come do his dirty work.
You’re not thinking clearly. If she doesn’t want you to fix it, don’t fix it.
The thing was, she clearly needed someone to take care of her.
“Okay, if you won’t let me talk to him and you won’t call the police, then at least let me teach you some self-defense moves.”
She lifted a brow. “Well, first of all, I don’t think I need self-defense moves. Secondly, you’re going to teach me self-defense?”
I nodded slowly, wondering how much I could tell her and why in the world she sounded incredulous. “Yeah, I did Krav Maga for years.”
She blinked in surprise. “Oh. I didn’t know that.”
I shrugged. “It was years ago. But I still remember the basics enough so that you can defend yourself and never leave yourself open.”
She ran a hand through her hair and looked a little doubtful.
“Let me do this. It’ll make me feel better.”
She looked like she was going to argue some more, but then she didn’t. “Fine. If you insist.”
“Good, maybe tomorrow we’ll get started, okay?”
“Where have you been hiding, Marcus Black?”
“You keep asking that. I’ve been right here.”
“And what, I just didn’t notice you before?”
“That must be it.”
“Believe me, I’m pretty sure I would have noticed.”
“Sometimes we don’t see things that are right in front of our eyes.”
“If you say so.”
I placed a thumb over her bruised cheek, and she frowned. “You’ve got that look on your face again. The one that says you want to ride in on your white horse and save me or something.”
“Yeah, well, I want to save you, but I don’t think you’ll let me.”
“How about we pretend I don’t need saving? Or even better, let’s pretend I’m saving you.”
“I can’t help it. There’s something about you that makes me want to protect you.”
She pulled back a little. “And if I told you I don’t need protecting?”
My fingers dusted over her cheek again. I didn’t dare touch her jaw because I didn’t want to hurt her. “I think we all need protecting sometimes,” I said with a wink.
She swallowed and then tilted her chin up. “Marcus?”
“Yeah?”
“Maybe instead of worrying about me,
you could kiss me again.” Her tongue peeked out to moisten her lips a little.
The roar of rushing blood in my ears made it difficult to think clearly. “Lyra, you’re making this impossible.”
“I know. Kiss me anyway.”
“I want to be the good guy.”
She shook her head. “Right now, I don’t want a good guy.”
So I leaned down and showed her just what a bad boy I could be.
* * *
Marcus
The scent of coconut and lime wrapped around me. Lyra tasted sweet with a little chaser of something spicier. She parted her lips with a gasp, and I deepened the kiss, licking into her mouth. I wanted more.
I knew this was a bad idea. I knew I wasn’t good for her and that if I did this, I wouldn’t want to let her go. And the truth of it was that at some point I might have to, because being with me might be dangerous for her.
Like a fool, I didn’t stop though. I just tortured myself by pulling her tighter against me, my hand smoothing over her back and dragging her against me, fitting her body to mine and making sure she could feel every inch of how much I craved her.
I angled my head with a groan, dipping my knees slightly as I lifted her so that our bodies fit together and I could capture her mouth better. She was so small in comparison to me, but she was strong. I could feel the muscles in her thighs as they gripped my waist. There was nothing delicate or dainty about her, and I loved it.
My tongue stroked over hers, darting, and playing, and sliding. She kept making these sexy little mewling sounds at the back of her throat like she was bloody well egging me on. Daring me to take more and deliberately trying to drive me mad.
My hands slid into her hair, enjoying the soft, bouncy feel of her curls in my grip. Desperate for her, I tugged just a little and she gasped, lifting her face to mine. When our eyes locked, her lips curved up into a secretive smile. And I knew it then… Lyra Wilkinson was going to kill me.
Her smile was luminescent and immediately had all the blood rushing to my cock. There would be no ‘just this one time.’ There would be no casual fling with her. The way I responded to her, my blood pumping through my veins, burning me up as lava chased desire, I knew she was going to end me. And right about then, my dick didn’t care.
