Something almost like curiosity.
“We’re not going to hurt you,” Ilya says to her in Hungarian. “You don’t need to be afraid, malyshka. We brought you here because we want to talk.”
I remain silent, letting him do all the reassuring. He’s better at it—not that we make a practice of kidnapping the women we’re attracted to.
She’s the first one, in fact.
Her gaze flits between us, and I see the exact moment she decides Ilya is more trustworthy—a conclusion nearly everyone reaches, despite my brother’s intimidating bulk and all those tattoos. Somehow, people can sense that about us.
They can tell which of us retained his humanity.
“I don’t understand,” she tells Ilya, her voice panicked. “Who are you? What do you want from me?”
Her words, her posture, her tone—all of it screams of the kind of fear any woman would feel when stolen off the street by two strangers, yet I’m still picking up that peculiar vibe from her. Curiosity isn’t quite the word for it, though.
Excitement, maybe?
Intrigued, I step closer, and she shrinks back—a proper reaction. But I still don’t buy it. There’s something almost… calculated about it, as if she’s making herself act afraid.
I take another step forward, until I’m looming over her small frame. Placing my palm on the wall next to her head, I lean in, effectively trapping her with my body. “What’s your name?” With the other hand, I gently nudge up her chin—which is quivering with appropriate drama, as if she’s about to cry.
“M-mina.” The word comes out on a breathless, fearful stutter, and I can feel my brother tense behind me. He doesn’t like this; we’re supposed to be calming her, not terrifying her out of her wits.
He clearly doesn’t see what I see.
He thinks the girl is ordinary.
Ignoring him, I focus on the pretty mystery before me. “Okay, Mina,” I murmur, stroking the delicate line of her jaw. Her skin is soft, even softer than I imagined, making me wonder how it’ll feel farther down, underneath that puffy jacket and big sweater. “Here’s what’s going to happen tonight. Are you listening to me?”
A terrified blink and a small, jerky nod. Such a good actress. Too bad I’ve always had a sixth sense for what lies under the surface, and with this girl, fear is not it.
Not all of it, at least.
“We’re going to spend the night here, the three of us,” I continue, watching her closely as I drop my hand to her shoulder, squeezing it lightly through her jacket. The tattoo on the left side of her neck is a hummingbird, I realize—small but rendered in exquisite detail. “We’ve got a few beers and snacks in the fridge, some music on our phones. A little house party to celebrate the end of your shift. What do you say? How does that sound?”
Tears fill her big blue eyes. “Please. I just want to go home. I’m… I’m really, really tired.”
I frown. The tears are also part of the act, I’m sure, but this close up, I can see the thick layer of makeup under her eyes, meant to hide the dark shadows imprinted on her creamy skin. She’s not lying about the tired part; if anything, she looks like she hasn’t slept in days.
Fuck. I was really looking forward to having her. I’m pretty sure at least part of what I’m sensing from her is attraction, the same kind of dark, potent pull I’m feeling toward her. If she’s this tired, though, she might not be up for a hookup, and I don’t force women.
A heavy hand lands on my shoulder, pulling me back before I can say anything. “If you’re tired, you can sleep on the couch here,” my brother says, all but shoving me aside to stand in front of her. “We just need you to stay until the morning, okay?”
I barely resist the urge to shove him back, the way I would’ve when we were children. Back then, we’d fight all the time, with bloody noses and split lips as our constant companions. These days, however, our arguments rarely get physical, as with our skill set, things could quickly turn deadly.
We deal violence to others, not each other.
Still, my hand curls into a fist at my side as Mina asks tremulously, “But why? What do you want from me?”
Fucking Ilya. I want her looking up at me with those fake-scared eyes, not him.
“You might’ve heard some things you weren’t supposed to,” my brother answers with all the subtlety of a wild elephant. “So we just want to keep an eye on you until we leave town.”
“Oh.” Her eyes grow round. “But I didn’t… I don’t speak Russian.”
“Is that right?” I don’t bother to mask the skepticism in my tone as her gaze swings toward me. “Not even enough to recognize a few words? Or a name?”
Specifically, the name Ilya carelessly mentioned, that of our team leader, Peter Sokolov—who’s on every Most Wanted list worldwide.
She blinks up at us, the very picture of innocence. “What name?”
My brother glances at me, uncertain, and I give a minute shake of my head. He’s not a good judge of whether someone’s lying, and he knows it, which is why in situations like this, I always take charge.
“Let’s kill her right now,” I say to him in Russian, watching the girl as I speak. “We can dump her body in the river before sunrise.”
Her expression doesn’t change, but I’m not fooled.
She understood exactly what I said.
Ilya’s jaw tightens, and he turns to the girl. “How about we talk about this over a couple of beers?” he says in Hungarian, his tone gentle. “We’re really not going to hurt you, I promise.”
She hesitates, her gaze darting from my brother to me and back. Finally, she gives an uncertain nod. “Okay, I—I guess. But could I have water or tea instead, please? I’m too tired to have alcohol.”
“One tea coming up,” I say with a mocking salute and head into the kitchen. My cooking is shit, but boiling water is within my capabilities.
Maybe if I get some caffeine into her system, she won’t fall asleep before I can coax her into my bed.
3
Mina
“So, how long have you worked at the bar?” the guy with the skull tattoos—the seemingly kinder one—asks when I remove my winter jacket and we sit down in the living room. With its Soviet-style orange wallpaper and brown drapes, this place looks like it hasn’t been renovated since the eighties, but the ratty couch we’re sitting on is surprisingly comfortable. Maybe I will take him up on his offer to sleep here. That is, if they don’t kill me and dump my body in the river before sunrise.
I think my captor was just testing my language skills with that proposal, but I can’t be sure.
“Mina?” the man prompts, and I realize I zoned out instead of answering his question. Now that some of the adrenaline is fading, the extreme exhaustion is back, muddling my thoughts and slowing my reactions. I want nothing more than to stretch out on this couch and fall asleep, but I might not wake up if I do.
The Russians might decide that what I heard merits killing me rather than just keeping me captive overnight.
“I’ve worked there for a few months,” I answer, my voice shaking. It’s easy to sound terrified, because I am.