Hitman's Hookup: A Bad Boy Romance (21 page)

Cruz looked helplessly over at Corina. “Rina, tell Matthew. Talk him down,
please
.”

She gave a single shake of her head. “Cruz. It was her. She’s the one who put the drain cleaner in the cocaine.”

All the color drained from Cruz’s face. “You planned this. This is why Matthew was here. You
want
him to be like us?”

Corina gave him a somber nod. “He’s got to finish this, Cruz. It’s his fight to have.”

I felt my heart pounding as I stared at Victoria. She disgusted me.

Cruz looked sick, his gun still trained on Matthew, who was now crying silently. “You know how this works, Matthew. She was just following orders.”

Victoria laughed. “Oh, Cruz. I thought you were supposed to be the best? How are you always a hundred and fifty steps behind? I was the one who gave the order for Eric to die. Not my idiot father. I’ve played puppet master for far too long.” She smiled at me, her beautiful face looking like a poisonous viper. “You know how it is, right? As women? We’ve got to stick together.”

Victoria flipped her long hair over her shoulder. “I’ve been the one moving the pieces on this chessboard since I was a teenager. First for my father and then the last decade with my completely incompetent vegetable of a husband.” A look of scorn crossed her face. “Honestly, I can hardly tell the difference between the coma version and his previous state.” She shrugged callously. “The world won’t miss him. I’m just sorry I couldn’t have knocked him off sooner.”

I thought about how she had callously ended her husband’s life. About what I’d said in the car to Cruz. About how if I had the opportunity to kill the person who had killed Eric, I would take it. I wouldn’t miss the chance.

I didn’t even need to think about it.

It was like something possessed me. The scent of lavender bath oils filled my nose and I was back in that Chicago bathroom with the man who had been sent to kill me. I pushed through Corina and Matthew, knocking him to the ground, and ran for Victoria, throwing her into the glass coffee table with a crash. She reached up to my throat, wrapping her talon-tipped fingernails around my throat. I reached into my back pocket for the syringe that I’d stolen from Cruz when he’d hugged me next to a dead Romano.

I felt the air leaving my lugs as Victoria squeezed harder and harder.

“No, Lily!” Cruz screamed.

I slammed the needle into the pulsing carotid artery in Victoria’s neck and pushed the syringe. The clear liquid delivered its magic almost instantly. Victoria’s hands fell from my neck and onto the ground, as limp and dead as she now was.

I stood up and dropped the syringe, wiping my hands on my jeans. Cruz was staring at me, awestruck. Matthew looked like he was going to be sick. Even Corina was awestruck, her gun still in her hand but hanging in shock next to her thigh.

I stared into Cruz’s eyes as intently as I could. “I told you I’d kill the person who killed Eric if I had the chance. She was a monster. Eric was innocent. She didn’t deserve to live.” I cleared my throat loudly and looked at Matthew. “I’ve already killed people. You don’t need that on your conscience. You’re just a kid.” Matthew leaned over the side of the sofa and vomited onto the floor. Corina walked over to rub his back, whispering to him lovingly. I looked back at a still-silent Cruz. “You were right. I love playing God.”

“Jesus Christ, Cruz,” Corina said from her place next to Matthew. “Looks like we have a new recruit.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

ONE YEAR LATER

CRUZ

My toes pushed through the soft, white sand, each tiny, glistening flake erupting up around my skin. The cold, wet glass in my hand was a sharp relief against the burning equatorial sunshine. Lily was unbothered by the weather, sprawled out in full sunshine in her black bikini, her ebony skin glistening with a thin veneer of sweat.

Her breasts seemed fuller than usual, but it might have just been the fact that we’d been reunited after separate assignments for the last month. I ran my tongue along my lips in anticipation. I was hoping for one more round of thorough fucking today before we had to be at dinner. Lily’s arm was covering her eyes. I held her margarita glass suspended over her perfect stomach. A single, cold drop of condensation splashed onto her skin.

She went from dead asleep to having my wrist in a deadlock. I nearly dropped the margarita glass. “Don’t wake me up from my nap,” she whispered, a smile playing at her lips. She squinted up at me in the sunshine.

“Your reflexes are getting better,” I said, kissing her full lips and then planting a kiss on her nose. I set the margaritas safely into the white sand.

She gave me a challenging smile. “As if my reflexes needed any improving.”

The salty ocean breeze buffeted her hair, which she wore curly and loose in a beautiful puff around her face, her long braids abandoned. The wind fluttered the pages of the
Bourne Ultimatum
open on her chest.
Her sun-kissed cheeks glowed under the sunshine.

“I wouldn’t mind testing your reflexes back up at the house,” I murmured into her ear.

A sexy giggle escaped from between her lips and tickled my cheek.

I laid down next to her on the chair, stroking her hair. “God I missed you,” I whispered against her collarbone.

She wiggled her body closer into mine. “I missed you too,” she murmured. “How’d your mission go?”

“A good hitman never kills and tells,” I replied. “That said…how did yours go?”

She shrugged. “I’m in one piece. You have anything that needs sewing up this time?” She ran her fingertips across the tattoos on my forearm, playing around the deep scar that had been left from Corina’s knife wound and the subsequent infections. It had taken three months of antibiotics and constant care from Lily to get it healed properly.

“No ex-girlfriends tied me up, I’m sorry to say,” I said jokingly.

“Ah, pity,” she replied, reaching up to kiss my lips, slipping her tongue into my mouth. I moaned and felt my swim trunks get tight. I tossed the
Bourne
book into the sand and lifted Lily into my arms. She shrieked and kicked her legs as I ran into the water.

“Ocean sex,” I said, tossing her into the waves. “Was on your bucket list, if I recall correctly.”

Lily looked at me challengingly and untied her bikini top, tossing the wet fabric onto the sand. “You next,” she teased.

I pulled off my swim trunks but before I could finish, she was naked and had her legs wrapped around me. Her gorgeous, curvy tits pushed against my chest, trapping salty water between us. The waves were warm and gentle against us as my hands found her puffy, soft nipples. I was already hard. “I don’t have any condoms tucked anywhere,” I said, hoping she would take the hint. I felt a surge of nervousness as I said those words out loud.

She bit her lip. “The horse is out of the barn there, I’m afraid,” she whispered. “It’s not like you can make me
more
pregnant.” She tried to hide her smile but it was impossible. Her arms were wrapped around my neck and the water crashed into us. All I could see was her.

I felt a surge of adrenaline similar to when I was on the hunt for my targets. “No way,” I replied. “You’re fucking with me.”

“No, I’m not fucking
with
you, but I
am
about to
fuck
you,” she teased.

I brought her up closer to my lips and kissed her forcefully, running my hands to grab her ample ass underneath the water as I drove into her softly, feeling more connected to her than I ever had before.

I was going to be a dad.

An hour later we were wrapped in towels and spooning on the sand. The sun was setting over the water. I brushed Lily’s soft curls out of her face. She was glowing. “You went on a mission
pregnant
and didn’t tell me,” I said as sternly as I could, which wasn’t much at this point. This woman had me wrapped around her finger.

“I didn’t
know
I was pregnant when I took the mission. I found out when I was on the mission. And why should that matter?” she retorted. “
You’re
the one who ends up injured most of the time. I’m clearly a much better assassin than you are.”

I laughed at that. “You sure are cocky for a new recruit,” I reminded her. I kissed her full lips, biting the bottom one softly. I stared into her brown eyes. “We’re going to have a
baby
,” I said incredulously.

“We’re going to have a baby,” Lily replied gleefully. I kissed her again, my tongue gently exploring the places between her lips. I moved my hands down to her stomach. She let her towel fall away from her warm, soft skin so I could find more of her.

A voice interrupted us from the cliff above. “Are we having a threesome for dinner? Because I didn’t exactly dress for that and my nephew is here. So that would be sort of weird.”

Corina stood on the cliff’s edge in a long, black sundress, her hair in uncharacteristic double braids. The orange sun lit up her face. She was grinning devilishly.

I looked at Lily, who pulled the towel back up around her chest. She bit her lip and grinned. “I
might
have recovered two important
someones
on my mission. Did I forget to mention that?”

CHAPTER THIRTY

LILY

“Pass the chicken,” Matthew said hungrily.

Me, Cruz, Matthew, and Corina were ensconced in the outdoor wicker plush seating overlooking the turquoise water and white sand. A full spread of aromatic food lay in front of us, prepared by the chef services that had come with the rent of the mansion and island. It was a veritable feast. A hundred wax candles fluttered softly in the nighttime breeze, the sky filled with a thin sliver of moonlight and a million visible stars.

Cruz had his hand on my knee underneath the table. He kept stroking my leg and smiling at me from time to time when Corina came to a lull in her lurid tales of missions gone wild. “So I’ve got the guy tied up, right? And in his boxers – which, by the way, next time you see a certain Senator from South Carolina, just know that he is wearing underwear with Bart Simpson emblazoned on it – and he’s so fucking excited that I’m about to fuck him, right? And then, my hand to God, his wife walks into the room.”

“No!” I screamed, laughing.

Corina nodded. “Seriously. So there goes my blackmail attempt and leverage right out the window. Like, how can I hold it against him that he has a smoking hot mistress on the side if his wife already knows?” She bit heartily into a perfectly spiced leg of curry chicken. “Though the fact that she gave him a black eye while he was butt-ass naked and tied to a dining chair is a vision that will forever live on in my memory.” She stared wistfully into nowhere.

“Jesus, I thought the punchline was going to be that you killed them both,” Matthew said, sounding relieved.

Corina flicked her napkin at him. “Assassins don’t
only
assassinate. I’m more of a secret agent anyway. Most of the time. Unless people cross me.” She winked at Cruz. “You should ask your godfather what happened the last time
he
disagreed with me.”

“How about we save that story for another joy-filled, normal family gathering,” Cruz said sarcastically. The wind fluttered through his hair, which was beach-salty and wavy. His face was more relaxed than I had ever seen it. It made me happy to know that he was happy. Cruz wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Neither of you assholes have explained to me how you ended up here on what was supposed to be a
private
island. My private
sex
island, to be exact.” Cruz grinned at me and bit his lip.

“Keep that shit to yourself,” Matthew groaned.

I spoke up. “Alright, alright. So Corina and I crossed paths, you could say, on our latest mission. She said she had a bit of a housing crisis situation and needed to lie low for a bit.”

“See aforementioned Senator story,” Corina explained. “I’d been living in his mistress apartment the last month and a half. That plan was sort of scuttled when Mrs. Senator walked in on me whipping him.”

I nodded. “And Matthew is on summer break from university. I got a call from him that he wanted to see us. So I sent a plane to get him.”

Cruz beamed. “Even though I thought this was going to be a sex-filled private month for just the two of us, I can’t say I’m upset to have you all here.” He squeezed my thigh and then moved his free hand on top of mine on the table. “And since you
are
here, Lily and I have an announcement to make.” Cruz cleared his throat. Corina sipped her wine and Matthew looked hopeful. “We are having a baby.”

Corina and Matthew waited a beat too long to feign surprise. “Wow, that’s wonderful news!” they said simultaneously.

I groaned as Cruz’s face fell. “Guys, you really could have practiced that better,” I said, laughing.

“They knew before I did?”

I shrugged sheepishly. “Well, you know how I said I found out about the pregnancy on my last mission? And how I’d sort of
run across
Corina while I was there? She was the one who made eight hundred phone calls to track down a pregnancy test. Where we were…well. It was in an odd location, I’ll just leave it at that.”

Matthew spoke up. “I had to overnight a pee stick to her.”

Cruz looked at all three of us in shock. “Basically you all had a fucking mini-mission that you kept secret from me? All three of you?”

Corina held up her wine glass. “To friends, family, and to pulling the wool over this asshole’s eyes as a team.”

“I’ll drink to that,” I said amiably, clinking my glass of sparkling water against hers.

Matthew raised his own wine glass together with ours. He put on a dramatic, solemn voice. “To the three musketeers. May we continue to befuddle and lie to Cruz for all our days.”

“Hold the fuck on,” Cruz interrupted, shoving his glass with Pellegrino into the mix. “Here’s to the four of us as a team committed to killing any fuckweasel who tries to mess with this baby or any one of us.”