"No." His voice is so cold now it caused shivers to run down my spine. I reach out to try to grab the back of his jacket but he shakes me off.
"Your side piece? Is it purely the ass that keeps you here? Because this girl is wanted by someone very powerful, a lot more powerful than you. So let me give you a little advice friend, find another hole to fuck."
Why is it that when my guy says crude shit like that I kind of love it but when this guy says it I need a bath and a body condom? The creep moves closer still causing my heart to drop.
"You know, in my home country, we don't have much. It's cold, people are hateful, and money is hard to come by."
OM fucking G, did he just ask for a payment from this guy before he hands me over to him? My spine straightens and I start looking for something to hit both men with. Yeah, the guy with the gun may shoot me first but at least then I won't have to listen to them barter and trade me like I'm playing cards or something.
"I hear ya man. Listen, the guy who hired us, he can make that happen for you. He'll hook you up with all kinds of money." His words slide out like oil. I slide over closer to the wall and a heap of trash that looks like it might have something promising in it. "Course I can see why a man might not want to let something like this go for cheap."
He runs his eyes over me and I shrink into myself. My stomach rolls like it’s going to revolt.
"I'm betting the guy won't mind if we both sample the goods before he gets his go at her."
If the man in front of me doesn't want to save me then I am saving myself or dying in the process. No way am I going to let the greasy shadow man touch me.
"You didn't listen." Before the shadow can turn his attention back to my man he has taken the gun away from him and shoved him up against the wall I'm standing closest to. "I wasn't finished, fucker. And I really hate to be interrupted." He twists the fucker's arm causing the him to groan and dance around. Part of me feels a little better about not being strong enough to break away from this Russian. This guy isn't doing any better than I did and he's got almost two hundred pounds on me.
"They want her alive?" He leans in, his eyes showing nothing. The man nods because at this point I don't think he can speak. "Why?"
"He got pissed that someone got away. It means more work for him to clean up and cover up. He saw her and knew she didn't get out on her own so he wanted to find who the other person in the café with her was. He thought if he had her he could make a few dollars off of her while he waited for the mystery guy to show up."
Something inside the gray-blue eyes snaps. He moves his face close to the other man’s. "You found him. In Russia, we don't have girlfriends we have what belongs to us and what we plan to take from others so that it will belong to us. She belongs to me now." He rubs the guy’s face against the brick so hard smears of blood show up even in the dim light.
"I really wish I could send you back to your boss with that message but you pissed me off." He moves so fast and lethal that at first I don't see what he did. One minute he had creep up against the wall and the next he had his hands on his chin and forehead jerking so hard the man's tongue sticks out just a little. A snap fills the air and I can tell by the guy's eyes which are still open but nothing is there, that he snapped his neck. I look up into the cold-blooded eyes of a murderer. The scary thing is for the first time since I met him, his eyes are alive with something, something hot and hard.
"I don't share." He lets the body fall in between us. He never takes his eyes off of me. In fact, they burn brighter the longer he looks at me. He pops his neck like he's trying to relieve tension before he steps over the body and takes my hand in his once again.
My hand trembles in his as he helps me step over the dead guy in the alley. I snap out of it enough to pull back and stop him. He turns to me with a look I can't understand. I yank on my hand so he'll let it go and surprisingly this time he does. I run back over to the guy and give his corpse a good kick in the dick.
"That's for saying something about making money off of me, fucker." God, I hope he feels that in Hell.
When I turn around he's still standing waiting on me but his mouth is slightly open and his eyes are drawn in a look of utter confusion.
"He was going to rape me and pass me off to his friends. He's lucky I don't go back and cut his dick off."
"I do have a knife if you would like to take a trophy." For the first time, the man is wearing something other than a frown. The corners of his lips are kicked up in a sexy grin that changes his whole face. He's gone from hella sexy badass to charming sexy flirt.
I don't think he's joking about the knife thing though. I have no doubt he would hand one over if I wanted 'a trophy' and I don't know how I feel about that or what that says about me.
5
____________
Ivan
Son of a bitch this woman can't be any hotter. She kicked a corpse. He deserved it. But damn, did I not expect that out of her. The anger I was holding on to thinking about her wearing that tiny little handkerchief for someone she was waiting for was replaced with lighter emotions I'm not used to feeling.
Want, I am used to. I have wanted things my entire life. As a small boy in Russia, I wanted a better life, as a government official I wanted a break, as a prisoner I wanted freedom and as an American I want peace. As soon as I saw this woman, Kathyrn, I wanted her. Want is nothing new for me but the protective feelings - worry that she will see me as a monster because I killed someone right in front of her, fear that she will come to fear me like everyone else does, wanting her to be proud of me - those have only come with a few close family members.
Pride. I am damn proud of the girl. Anyone else would have been bat shit crazy by now with all the heavy shit she has had to deal with today. In twenty-four hours she has seen more death than she probably ever has before. She watched people she knows die in front of her eyes, been threatened not just once but two or three times. It doesn't make me feel good that some of those times have been from me.
And yet she has held herself together and instead of breaking down and screaming at how unfair this is for her - because it really does suck for her to be pulled into this river of crap and blood - she rallies herself enough to kick the ever-loving shit out of the guy. And don't get me started on that fucker. If I could have killed him twice I would have. I don't regret taking his life with my bare hands. I was only worried that she might see me for the monster I am. Apparently, my Kat has more Russian in her than I first thought.
Seeing the way those shorts, if you can even call them that, hugged her ass when we were climbing down the fire escape I would like to put a whole lot more Russian in her, about ten inches more. Yeah, I lied my ass off and told her I wasn't looking at her ass. I didn't want her to think I was some fucked up perv who was thinking with his dick when her life was in danger. But I was some perv thinking with his dick when her life was in danger. I can admit that.