Dangerous Desire

2

Slowly, the tattooed thug lifts an eyebrow.

I take a breath and roll the dice. “If you think he won’t kill you for touching me, you’re overestimating your worth.”

“And you’re underestimating the situation. I’m not your babysitter, b***h. Short of death and penetration, I’ve been given permission to handle you however I like.”

His voice is low and sandpaper rough, and lilting with an Irish accent.

I’m not surprised Dimitri would have a non-Russian working as one of his enforcers. Unlike the Italian Mafia, where only ethnic Italians can ever be “made,” the Russian Bratva is much more inclusive. I am surprised, however, by the confidence in Killian’s tone.

I might have been bluffing, but he’s not.

Unthinkably, Dimitri has granted his rough enforcer power over me. The power to “handle” me however he likes.

A slick ripple of terror spreads through the pit of my stomach like a snake unfurling its coils.

As Killian notices the change in my expression, his awful smile makes a reappearance. His eyes glitter with malice. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right?”

The comment resonates with me because of all the painful things I’ve endured. Not only the years with Dimitri, but also the earlier years spent training to become a ballerina, when many times my toes would bleed right through my pointe shoes.

I lift my chin. “What doesn’t kill me better run.”

“Tough words from such a little girl.”

He’s not intimidated. I don’t blame him. I’m wearing a white cotton sundress and espadrilles. I have no weapons and no skill in self-defense. I’m trembling from cold and still shell-shocked from being in a car explosion, shooting two men at point-blank range, and making a bargain with the evil bastard who abused me for seven years that I’d return to him in exchange for his sparing Naz’s life.

But that doesn’t mean I’m completely defenseless.

If faith can lead Moses out of the wilderness after forty years, it can certainly help me.

“I might be small,” I say evenly, holding Killian’s gaze. “But I’m bigger than you’ll ever be. There’s nothing you can do to me that hasn’t already been done, and I’m still standing. You can break as many of my bones as you like, but you’ll never break me.”

In the beat of silence that follows, several emotions flash across his expression. First there’s surprise. It’s followed by admiration. Then, most oddly of all, what looks like regret.

Regret?

It’s the last coherent thought I form before he grabs me by the throat.

TWO

NAZ

I jolt upright in my hospital bed, my heart hammering with a sudden bone-deep certainty that something is terribly wrong.

“Eva?”

My call dies to echoes in the empty room. Across from the bed, the bathroom door is open. She’s not in there, either.

Maybe she’s in the waiting room talking to Tabby and Connor. Maybe she’s getting something to eat. Maybe she had to stretch her legs. Took a walk. Yeah, that could be it.

My theories are all shot to hell when Connor barges through the door and announces, “Eva’s gone.”

“What do you mean, gone?”

“I mean Tabby pulled footage from the security cameras of Eva leavin’ through an employee break room door.”

The heartbeat monitor I’m hooked up to goes crazy, screeching as if it’s the one having a heart attack and not me. Connor reaches over and bangs a fist against it. The room falls into silence.

Fighting a wave of dizziness and the rush of adrenaline crashing through my bloodstream, I try to focus. “I don’t understand. Why would she leave? How did she get past our guys? Where the hell is she going?”

“All good questions, brother,” says Connor grimly. “But I’m afraid we don’t have answers to any of ’em.”

Gone? Eva’s gone? That can’t be right. I have to find her. I have to protect her—

“Whoa!”

Connor grabs me by the arms when I stagger out of bed and almost fall to my knees. I’m weak. Too weak. f*****g anesthesia. f*****g car bomb.

Fucking Dimitri Ivanov.

The thought of him sends another rush of adrenaline through my veins. It gives me the strength to steady myself. I shake my head like a dog, trying to clear it.

“Start at the beginning.”

Connor doesn’t need more of a prompt than that. He knows I need all the facts, and I need them now.

“Just after two this morning, I drove Tabby to Metrix so she could get a few hours’ sleep. I checked in with the boys at headquarters, put the word out to all my contacts in law enforcement and the military that we’d been hit, called an old buddy at Langley to see what strings he could pull. The feds are gonna take over the investigation from NYPD, and I wanna be kept in the loop. He’ll give me whatever intel he can as the investigation moves forward.”

I jerk my hand, impatient for him to get to the important part.

“Then I called Smith, one of our guys stationed outside your door. He gave me the all clear. Nobody’d been in or out of your room. Building perimeter was still locked down. No sign of trouble. I came back to the hospital, put my feet up in the waiting room, closed my eyes, caught a few zs ’cause I was fuckin’ exhausted, and I’m no good to anybody if I can’t think. When I woke up, I checked in with Smith again. No change, he said, but I came up to see for my own eyes that everything was good.