Driven to the Edge: A Bad Boy Hitman Romance (6 page)

I
probably shouldn’t have done
that.

Yet I feel better now that I have.

Getting Alicia a little drunk, loosening her up, then making her come with my fingers alone... strangely, it’s done wonders for my mood. Maybe it’s because I’ve been so focused on nothing but revenge for my brother that I forgot what it was like to enjoy the little things in life, like making a beautiful woman writhe underneath me.

Maybe it’s just good to feel like I’m in control of something other than killing people.

Alicia was so disobedient before, but she seems like she’s finally fallen into line. Relieving.

She’s not going to be happy when I cuff her to the headboard later tonight. But I hope she understands. It’s nothing personal. Well, except I suppose it kind of is. She’s proven she’s the type who’d risk dying to the elements in the desert to get away, and even though I’m not entirely sure what I want to do with her, I know I can’t have her reporting me to the authorities.

When she comes out of the bathroom, she’s wearing one of the hotel towels that’s not entirely long enough. Her long, shapely legs are only barely covered at the uppermost parts of her thigh. It’s cute, how she’s trying to be so modest after what we just did.

Her cheeks are flushed--from the bath or the tequila or the orgasm I can’t say. She catches her teeth on her bottom lip and peers up at me from across the room.

“I’m feeling pretty sleepy,” she says, trudging towel-clad across the carpeted floor. She sinks down onto the bed that she chose earlier, yawning theatrically into an elbow. I admire the cascade of her wet auburn hair down her back, over the contours of her shoulder blades.

If I let it happen, I could distract myself with her body for hours.

But I’m also pretty tired. Although I’m not sure if I’ll be able to sleep at all tonight, given what the last few days have been like. Given the police may be looking for me. I just don’t know.

“I’m sorry I don’t have any clean clothes for you,” I say, glancing sideways to Alicia. “We’ll pick up some tomorrow.”

For now, once I enter the city, she’s just going to be my cover.

I grew up in North Vegas, and while I’ve been out of the city proper for some time, enough people there might recognize me that going in solo is a bad bet. Coming in as part of a couple, though, diverts eyes. The Jakob all those fuckers know is a loner, a rough type, known for cracking skulls on behalf of his brother’s “accounting firm.”

If I show up dressed all nice with a fake wedding ring and a blushing fiancee, that will avert a lot of eyes.

Or at least I hope.

I look back over at Alicia and wet my lips. As far as arm candy goes, I could have done a lot worse. Even if this plan was improvised.

“All right. If you’re ready to sleep, put your hand up against the headboard there.”

Alicia can tell what I’m about to do. Her face falls. Her mesmerizing hazel eyes flash with anger.

“What! No! I promise I won’t try to run.”

She protests, stammering as I reach into the pocket of my discarded suit jacket and withdraw another zip tie. She looks like she might try to fight me at first, but modesty wins out. She won’t let me see her naked, won’t try to wrestle me free for fear of dislodging the towel.

Funny, considering I had my fingers inside her just a few minutes ago. But that was almost certainly just the booze. Because when I hover over her, securing her wrist to the headboard, I can see a glimpse of contempt in her eyes.

“Sorry, sweetheart.” I flash her an apologetic smile. “Maybe tomorrow night.”

She drags her teeth along her bottom lip again, her body down beneath me on the bed. It would be so simple to throw a leg over her, pin her down, explore even more of that gorgeous body with my hands...

“So long as you let me go when this is all over, you can do whatever you want to me,” she says. She looks like she’s being sincere. But there’s a hint of tequila fog over her eyes. I lean down and peck a kiss to her hairline.

“We’ll discuss that in the morning,” I say. There’s an implied promise there. Or maybe a threat, depending on how you look at it.

I double-check all the locks, cut the lights, and strip down. I leave one of the handguns on the nightstand--though not the one between the beds. I don’t trust Alicia not to wave that around like an idiot in some harebrained escape attempt.

That would end poorly for her.

Laying back in bed, listening to the ambient noise of the parking lot outside, I run over the last few days in my head, starting with the disaster in La Jolla.

I’m not usually so emotional. I told myself I could go about this mission in a cold-blooded way. But I was kidding myself.

Down in La Jolla, I did the same thing to a man that someone did to my brother. A man who might not have even been involved in his murder. He was a shitbag, sure. A Császár guy. Guilty of all sorts of things. But in my quest to dig up dirt, I lost my cool.

Ray Bennett was the CFO of Taurus Logistics, one of the many Császár corporations that my brother worked on. When the IRS flagged them for an audit, someone in the Császár leadership lost their cool. They had my brother killed. So naturally, Taurus Logistics was my first stopping point for finding out what the fuck had happened and who the fuck had done it.

I cracked kneecaps and skulls all the way up the Taurus chain ‘til I got to Bennett, cornered him at his vacation house in La Jolla. I broke in and waited in his living room ‘til he wandered back in from his morning surf session.

Then I beat him so bad that his wetsuit was probably all that was holding him together in the end.

I left him sniffling and bleeding on the floor of his million-dollar retreat, Martinsen’s name stashed away in my pocket, then stole his phone and opened up all the gas lines in the place.

I watched it burn, Bennett still inside it.

Everyone I’ve ever hurt has deserved it. That’s how I can still live with myself. Every asshole I ever kneecapped, every fucker I’ve downed on my way to avenge Alain. They’re all bad people. People the world won’t miss. Shit, sometimes I feel like I deserve a medal.

Some nights though, like tonight, I can’t help but wonder if I’ve become one of them.

I’ve got a hostage zip-tied in my hotel room. Since when was I the type of guy who did that?

Desperate times call for desperate measures,
I tell myself as I begin to drift off to sleep.

Tomorrow will be the first real test. I need to be rested. I need to be on the top of my game. Alicia doesn’t know, but she might be instrumental to my plan, although I’m making it up as I go along.

Tomorrow, I’m hitting one of the Császárs’ casinos. Just for recon. Nothing dangerous. At least not intentionally.

But who knows how badly it could blow up.

I can hear Alicia breathing in the next bed over. Her breath has finally gone slow and rhythmic. She’s finally asleep. For a half-second, I imagine what it would feel like to just crawl into that bed beside her. To feel a little warmth and human comfort during a black and bloody time of my life.

But why do I think that?

I’m like a comet hurtling toward the planet’s surface. The only possible ending is flaming out and wiping out everything in my path. It’s not a human comfort sort of time.

I
come awake gradually
. My arm hurts. No surprise, as it’s pinned over my head by that stupid zip-tie.

When I peek my eyes open, I see that Jake is already moving around the room. He’s dressed and changed and is tidying up every trace of our presence. Fortunately, I’m at the stage now where I don’t worry that every time he cleans, he’s getting ready to dispose of my body.

But it still sets me on edge.

When he notices me looking, he smiles just a bit. I remember the night before. The way his powerful fingers worked me into a frenzy. The way I let him do it, tequila or no tequila.

Part of me says it’s all right, it’s just the plan. I’m seducing him so he’s less tempted to murder me, right?

But the other part of me knows how much I liked it. Heat rises to my cheeks; I blush and look away from him.

“Good morning, darling.”

He beams a grin at me, then wanders over to the bed. I slept in nothing but a towel, which has long since come undone while I slept. I don’t try to cover myself with the blanket or my one free hand. I let him look all he wants. The swell of my breast is barely covered by the thin hotel sheet, which is only wrapped around one of my legs.

He takes it all in before he leans down and cuts away the zip-tie, freeing me once more.

“You’ve got a big day ahead of you,” he warns me.

I have no idea what I’m in for. The entire time I shower, there’s cold dread pooling in my stomach.

It turns out that by “a big day” Jake means... shopping. It’s not what I was expecting.

He forces me into the Maybach--at least not at visible gunpoint this time--and has me drive him into town. As we pull in toward Vegas, all the glam and glitter of it muted by daylight, I wonder again what he’s here for. Is he involved in some sort of mob gambling debt thing? He looks like he could be, given his size and build.

But I know better than to ask questions.

Jake instructs me to look up the closest high-end shopping center on the GPS, and I pull into the parking lot a mere twenty minutes later. I sit in the driver’s seat, arms folded, and look to him for instructions.

“We’re going to be working incognito a bit while we’re here,” he says. “Plus it’s quite rude of me to drag you all over the desert without a change of clothes.”

Clean clothes have been the absolute last thing on my mind.

I’ve been far more concerned about not getting murdered.

We lock up the Maybach and he leads me into the mall, one of those sun-drenched, palm-lined outdoor pavilions that would fit right in at The Grove or Beverly Hills. I haven’t spent much time in Las Vegas, but even I know it’s synonymous with “conspicuously throw money around.”

The mall has a fake creek running through the middle of it. Jake takes my arm and walks beside me, keeping close. I know it’s for security reasons--he doesn’t want me running off--but I can also sense the change in his body language.

I’m not his chauffeur anymore. He’s pretending I’m his girlfriend or his wife. Or at least his temporary Vegas arm candy.

Which means I’m going to have to dress the part. Oh.

We reach an area rife with little boutiques, from names I haven’t heard of up to names like Kors, Chanel, and McQueen. Jake puts one hand on the small of my back and pops a glib little smile down toward me.

“What will it be, love?”

Frankly, I don’t have a clue. Even when my studio was doing its absolute best, I didn’t shop at places like this. Ever the frugal small business owner, I stuck to basics and a lot of fine wool that could withstand years and years of use.

“You look a little lost,” he says. He picks a shop and guides me inside. It’s one of the smaller buildings, framed with giant potted plants outside, the exterior done up in some sort of faux hacienda style. Inside, it’s bright and airy, lots of terracotta and white paint.

I’m used to shopping at stores where things are organized by style and size, but that’s apparently not how they do things here. Each brand has its own little display and alcove. And it’s names I’ve only ever heard on Academy Awards dress review articles in magazines.

“What strikes your fancy, hm?” Jake keeps hold of my arm, a continual reminder that I am not free, that I am not here of my own volition.

“I don’t even know where to start,” I admit.

“Well, price is no object. I’d say you need one or two daytime dresses and one evening dress. At least to start. I hope we’re not here long enough to require more.”

The idea of spending more than a few days held hostage in Las Vegas is just as weird to me as shopping at a boutique where the price tags read in the four digits.

Thankfully, an assistant comes to my aid. Wearing a smart black uniform, she swoops in like an off duty guardian angel to rescue me from my own cluelessness.

“Can I help you with anything?” she asks. And it’s so strange to say, because there is a lot more help I need than just picking out clothes right now, but all I say is a “yes, please.”

Is this what Stockholm Syndrome feels like? Why aren’t I crying for help?

The sales assistant eyeballs my measurements and asks what sort of attire specifically I’m looking for. I defer to Jake with my eyes, looking to him, almost pleading.

“Ah, something light for lunch and maybe a cocktail dress for this evening,” he says. “You can’t ever be overdressed in Vegas.”

“So true,” says the girl. Then she dimples a quick smile at me and flutters off.

When she returns, she has all sorts of exciting fabrics draped over her arms in colors and patterns I’d never even dream of wearing. I glimpse a six thousand dollar price tag on one of the dresses, a blue and gold monstrosity I’d never wear, and I feel a little faint.

It’s every girl’s dream to get the
My Fair Lady
treatment, right?

Why did I have to get mine at the hands of a gun-toting madman?

Shopping is exhausting. And also harder than it looks. And also, the worst thing about trying on six thousand dollar dresses is finding out that a lot of them look just as blah on you as forty dollar dresses.

But the ones that
do
actually fit? Damn.

Pinned into the fitting room, Jake waiting to the left of the door, the sales assistant to the right, I feel more trapped than ever.

But when she hands me The Dress, I can’t help it, there’s a permanent reduction in stress.

It’s navy, faintly floral-patterned, although not garish. Almost a sort of vintage fifties style cut: narrow waist, flared skirt.

I wiggle into it, then zip it up most of the way. Before the zipper even reaches my neck, I can tell this is The One. Or at least The First. The smooth silk-lined cotton is like a cool caress over my skin.

I look in the fitting room mirror and feel like I’m looking at a stranger. I admire it on myself for a moment, then admire the detailing on the print. The hems are pristine. The stitching is so tight and invisible.

It’s Oscar De La Renta. It costs thirty-nine hundred dollars.

But when I step out of the fitting room, Jake’s face lights up.

“We’ll take it,” he says in a heartbeat.