Chapter 22
LUKE
Christ, it’s good to be on the water again.
I hit a four-foot swell and let the wind catch the sail, shooting me into the air above it. I twist and land on the next wave, scooting along the crest for as long as it holds.
Mak’s beach house is in Tarifa, which has some of the best kiteboarding breaks in Europe.
Roman and I rode down here on two brand-new Kawasaki Ninjas he apparently bought just for the occasion, a thrill-seeking rush through mountain roads that left Roman satisfied enough to open a beer with Mak, and me itching for more adrenaline.
I can just make out their two figures on the cliff high above, leaning over the fence of Mak’s house as I take another wave.
Let’s face it: while I’m definitely looking forward to a stiff drink, I need this even more. The mindless space and solitude only the ocean can give.
I need anything that will take my mind off Zinaida’s naked body, and the fact that she’s managed to avoid me for days now.
I hit another wave and cast the board into the air, suspended in the sunlight for a seemingly endless moment.
Emails. Texts. One-sentence exchanges.
That has been the sum total of communication between Zinaida and me since Avonmouth.
I’m torn between wanting to push her to talk to me and the uncomfortable fear that if I do, I’ll find myself locked out of her life for good.
I’ve no doubt she’d do it either. What I don’t know is if she’s avoiding me because she regrets what happened or because she wants it to happen again.
I know which side of the aisle I sit on that one, I think grimly, leaning out from the board and skimming across the surface at a fierce speed. There’s no chance it’s not happening again.
But although I might know that much with a cock-hardening certainty, what I don’t know is how it works from here.
And I’m definitely not enjoying that kind of uncertainty. Let’s face it, as someone who likes to plan for every contingency, I definitely didn’t fucking think this one through.
Because you weren’t thinking in that shipping container.
I fly up the side of a wave and into the air.
Your brain left the fucking building around the same time Zinaida’s clothes left her body.
The board comes crashing down, and I turn the sail toward shore.
I know I can’t treat Zinaida as a client anymore. The idea of taking her money makes me want to punch a wall. The only way I can still put on a suit in the morning and turn up at her door is if I know it’s my choice.
But I also know that is an unsustainable situation for us both. And if I know that, so does Zin.
Which is the other reason I haven’t pushed her for answers.
Well, that, and the fact that, if I’m honest, I’m still reeling from the intensity of being with her.
Even days later, the memory of her gasping under my hands and mouth licks through me like lightning every moment I’m not focused on anything else.
I’ve been almost grateful for the frenetic pace that has kept me glued to screens and in meetings.
Work has been the only barrier between my sanity and a savage longing that makes me want to break Zin’s door down, throw her on the bed, and show her exactly why avoiding me isn’t a good idea.
Christ.
I turn the sail back into the waves.
I need to wear myself out completely if I’m going to get through a night under the twin laser beams of Mak and Roman’s scrutiny.
“Three hours riding back roads, two on the water, and you still look grim as hell.” Roman pulls a beer from the cooler and throws it to me as I come through the house and out onto the sleek, modern terrace. “I take it working for the lovely Miss Melikov has had its challenges, then?”
That didn’t take long.
“Nothing I can’t handle.” I take an extremely welcome mouthful of the cold stuff and stretch out on one of the long lounges set around a central table, upon which is an enormous platter of seafood on ice. “This looks good.”
“Feel free to destroy it at will, Luke.” Mak gives me a dry look.
“It’s the first of several courses I ordered from a local restaurant, being as familiar as I am with your appetite after you’ve been out on the water.
He keeps his kiteboard and Jeep here,” he adds to Roman.
“Tarifa is a mecca for kiteboarders, apparently.”
“That it is.” I grin at him. “I’ll get you out on the water with me one of these days, Mak.”
“Not a chance, friend.” He raises his martini glass in my direction.
“I far prefer the après-sporting celebrations to actual participation.” Despite the mellow afternoon sun and relaxed environment, he’s impeccably clad in a linen suit and a hat set at a rakish angle, one leg folded over the other in a wide chair.
“Except for hunting, right?” I give him the ghost of a wink. “You’ve always been pretty good with a rifle.”
“Speaking of hunting.” Roman, still in his bike leathers, stretches his arm across the back of the lounge. “Have you caught Zinaida’s would-be assassin?”
“Not yet.” I smile blandly at him.
He grins. “You like to play it close, don’t you, Macarthur?”
Oh, you have no idea how close I like to play it.
Mak tops up his martini from a silver shaker. “I heard you had a touch of fun at Avonmouth this past weekend. Luke had a little run-in with the Port Authority,” he adds for Roman’s benefit.
“Port Authority?” Roman’s eyes narrow as they settle on me. “Hunting traffickers is a dangerous hobby. One I thought you might persuade Zinaida to give up.”
I give him a rather dry look. “And I thought you said you knew Zinaida?”
Mak coughs into his martini, then turns a palm up when Roman glares at him. “The man has a point, Roman. We both know Zinaida won’t ever let that particular hunt go.”
Roman shakes his head, still frowning. “Chasing ghosts can be just as dangerous as running from them. Especially when the ghost is more of an obsession.”
“Ghosts?” I look between the two men. “Is there a particular ghost, then, that she’s hoping to find?”
Roman shoots Mak a surprised glance. “Didn’t you include this in your brief?”
Mak tilts his chin in a slight negative, eyeing Roman with interest. “It seems that you may, for once, be in the rare position of knowing something I do not.”
I cock an eyebrow at Roman.
“Sophie’s House.” His eyes slide sideways. If I didn’t know him better, I’d think he almost looks guilty. “It’s named after Zinaida’s sister. Or cousin.” He frowns. “I can’t remember which. Either way, Sophie went missing a long time ago. Zinaida has never stopped looking for her.”
And how, exactly, do you know that—and I don’t?
It’s only years of training that keep my attitude relaxed and my expression bland. “Interesting.” I take a slow mouthful of my drink, my eyes not leaving his face.
“I’ve known Zin a long time.” Roman takes a very large mouthful of beer, then another. “Since we were both teenagers, actually.”
Oh, he’s uncomfortable, all right. I’ve known Roman for several years, but I’ve never seen him squirm quite so visibly.
I wait.
The good thing about a lifetime of specialist operator training is that it teaches the value of silence. Roman Borovsky may be one of the hardest men I know, but he doesn’t have the same training I do. And right now, it shows.
“We—well.” His eyes shift between Mak and me. “We had a night once. Back in the day.”
For a split second, I can almost feel my fist landing squarely in Roman Borovsky’s face. See his eyes widening in terror as I smash the bottle in my hand and open his throat with the jagged remains of it.
“Luke.” Mak stands up, momentarily blocking Roman from view.
“Let me take that for you.” He plucks the empty bottle out of my hand, his eyes settling briefly on my own, and then goes to the cooler to take out another one.
By the time he’s shifted out of my line of vision, I’ve put the savage inside me back on the leash.
Roman glances at me and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. I notice that it’s shaking just a little.
“So you think that finding this Sophie is what still motivates Zinaida?” I ask the question calmly. As if I didn’t just seriously consider throwing his bleeding, battered body over the edge of a fucking cliff.
“I couldn’t say for sure.” Roman twists the bottle between his hands. “But I do know that back then, there was . . . nothing she wouldn’t do to uncover information about Sophie’s whereabouts.”
Suddenly, my murderous impulses are replaced by a sneaking suspicion.
“Nothing she wouldn’t do, huh?” I take the beer Mak hands me, eyeing Roman surreptitiously. “I take it the night you shared was Zinaida’s idea, then?”
If I had any doubt about how that night might have come about, the sudden, dull flush of red coloring Roman’s neck lays it to rest.
Mak almost chokes on his martini.
Roman looks between us. His mouth tightens, and for a split second I see the bastard in him, fighting the urge to punch us both.
Then he relaxes back in his chair with a rueful smile.
“Ah, well.” He lifts his beer in our direction.
“I was sixteen, with a gun in my belt and about as many brain cells as you’d expect from a kid that age when a beautiful woman offers to buy him a drink.
It never occurred to me that I might find myself handcuffed to a bed with a knife at my throat. ”
I can see it all too clearly: Roman Borovsky, ruthless and ambitious, seduced by a tiny, seemingly harmless blonde, only to find himself helpless in the hands of an apparent psychopath.
And despite having wanted to kill him only moments ago, suddenly I’m fighting the urge to laugh.
Mak makes a strangled sound that indicates he’s struggling with the same impulse. Roman glares at us both, then his lips twitch, and suddenly we’re all laughing together, a proper, huge belly laugh that goes on for long enough to clear the air entirely.