Chapter 10 Katarina
KATARINA
“We need to leave in case someone comes. It won’t look like a suicide if we’re hanging out with the body.” Massimo’s deep voice reached me through the haze in my head.
I simply nodded. My gaze kept returning to Vargas’s bloated, purplish face. It was fascinating. In the end, it hadn’t been hard at all . . . with the right accomplice.
“Micetta. Time to go.” Father Lucciano’s hand closed around my upper arm, an unbreakable grip.
His expression was unreadable. His forceful hold on me was a reminder of how easily he could kill me, too, if he wanted.
And he had seemed ready to do that not five minutes before.
At least he seemed to have changed his mind about getting rid of me immediately. That was something.
I nodded and let him guide me across the room. My ribs screamed. Fuck, they hurt.
He sighed as if reading my thoughts. Stopping by the door, he tucked his gun into the holster on his hip and pulled the cassock over it, then reached for me.
He swung me up into his arms before I realized his intention. I let out a short scream. My nerves were shot; I couldn’t help it.
“Now you’re scared?” he muttered incredulously. “You just stared down a gun to the temple and murdered someone, but sure, now you’re scared.”
He carried me out into the dark hallway, checking this way and that.
His focus was as precise as a laser. He scanned the empty doorways and listened carefully for any telltale sounds that someone was coming.
This was a man in his element. I’d be impressed by his professionalism if it weren’t so terrifying.
“In my defense, you’re pretty scary,” I said.
One corner of his beautiful mouth lifted in acknowledgment of my words, but he stayed focused on getting us away from the off-limits area of the building. He was heading toward my room.
“I could say the same to you, my little stray.”
Was he going to deliver me back to my bed and stage his second suicide of the night? He didn’t leave witnesses. He was an assassin. A professional. Cold and calculating. I doubted he’d built a business by sloppily leaving witnesses behind.
He might try to kill me as soon as we got into my room. No, not try. In reality, if he’d decided to kill me, he wouldn’t have to try hard at all. He wouldn’t even break a sweat.
So, do something about it, the voice in my head whispered.
I’d missed her.
His knife. He always carries that knife, she reminded me.
Before doubt could steal my courage, I shifted in his arms, sliding a hand down my side. One of his pockets was under my hip. I was almost sure that was where I’d seen him take the knife from the other day when he’d used it to cut the cord on Father Pavol’s TV.
I felt around as discreetly as I could, making sure to wriggle my body to hide my hand movements.
I was sweating by the time I touched the smooth handle of the folding knife and the door to my room loomed in front of us.
We were back. Judgment time.
My heart pounded so hard it hurt as we got to the room and went inside. The goons who had dragged me off earlier hadn’t bothered locking it behind them.
It was dark inside, with just a square of moonlight shining on the bed through the window.
He carried me across the floor and lowered me to the bed, pausing when my weight was on the mattress, but his arms were still under me. He was so close.
This is it. End of the line.
I eased the knife open. He didn’t notice. He was staring at my face as though he’d like to climb inside my head. God, he was beautiful. Death and destruction and temptation all in one.
“What am I going to do with you, micetta?” he murmured, his voice stroking over the words.
“Maybe I should be the one asking that,” I said, my voice a mere breath, and moved my hand.
He raised an eyebrow and then seemed to register what I’d done.
His knife was pressed to the underside of his strong jaw, right against his jugular.
A moment of tension held between us, and then his mouth split into a grin.
“If this is your idea of foreplay . . . I like it. Keep going.”
His grin was disarming, but I couldn’t afford to be charmed by him. I couldn’t forget what he was and what he did for a living.
“You’re going to kill me, and I’m not going to let you.”
His smirk turned wicked. “Is that right? How are you going to stop me?” His magnetic gaze drank me down. “What are you going to bargain with?”
“I-I have a proposition for you,” I stated as confidently as I could.
“Hmm, I’m all ears.” He seemed to be getting closer, closing in, making it harder and harder to breathe.
“I want to hire you.”
There. I’d said it.
The statement stilled the man above me.
His dark brows drew together. “That isn’t where I thought this was going.”
“You kill for hire, right?” I forged on, growing more confident in my plan with every passing second. This made sense. “I want to hire you. I need your services.”
“Katarina—” he started.
“It’s just business. A business proposition. I’ll hire you, and you won’t kill me because I’m just as complicit as you are.”
He sighed. “Being hired means being paid. I don’t work for free. How are you going to pay me?”
Damn it. I’d kind of forgotten that detail. I chewed my lip, his gaze riveted by the sight.
“I don’t know, but I’ll work something out. Just tell me your price. I’ll find a way, no matter what,” I rushed out.
“No. Matter. What. At any cost? Those are dangerous words, Katarina. You have to understand something about owing a debt to a man like me.”
He leaned forward, uncaring about the knife at his throat. It pressed in, and a dark line of blood ran down his neck.
“I always collect. Always.” His words were a dark promise. His body was heavy on mine, his leg nestled between my thighs, and I had the wildest, most inappropriate urge to rub against it.
“The safe!” I exclaimed as the solution suddenly popped into my head. “There’s money in the safe here. Money and all kinds of valuables. I can find out the combination somehow; I work in the office. I’ll find it out and give it to you.”
He studied me for a moment then sighed. “Who do you want killed?”
“Pavol and Benedict. They’re monsters. They deserve to die.”
He cocked his head. “Are you sure you want me to do it? You did a pretty efficient job yourself earlier.”
“Only because of you. I can’t do it without you, I’m not strong enough,” I admitted, breathless from the steady ache in my ribs. “I need your help.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “As unorthodox as my work is, I do have a schedule, commitments . . .”
“Please, Massimo,” I begged with as much quiet dignity as I could muster. It was the first time I’d ever called him by his name. “I need you.”
His hand moved to my jaw and gripped my chin in a firm hold.
“I like the way my name sounds on your lips. Say it again. Tell me you need me,” he ordered.
His voice had dropped, and tension dripped through me. His leg between mine pushed into me, and I felt him. A long, hard line pressing into my hip. I might have been a virgin, but I wasn’t clueless. He was hard, and that was his dick lying against me.
“I need you, Massimo,” I whispered. “No one can help me but you.”
His eyes closed for a split second, like he was savoring my words, and then snapped open with renewed focus.
“Killing two men will cost you. It’s not cheap,” he told me.
“I’ll give you everything in the safe. There’s a fortune in there. It’s all yours,” I vowed.
“It’ll cost you all of that . . . and more. There’s something else I want from you, Katarina.”
“What?” I asked, my skin suddenly feeling too small for my body. I was so aware of his closeness.
He still had my chin gripped between his thumb and forefinger. He used it to tilt my head down so all I could see was his face.
“You. I want you. That’s my price.”
His words took a second to register. He took advantage of that moment of confusion, and before I could move, the knife was plucked from my hand. He twirled it between his fingers and then put it to my throat when I tried to sit forward.
I froze, terrified again.
He really does want your soul after all.
“He said he didn’t want it, though,” I argued softly with the voice.
Massimo looked fascinated.
“Is your angel speaking to you? What does she say?”
My jaw clenched. “She says you want my soul after all.”
He tutted. “I don’t want your soul. I don’t need one where I’m going, but you intrigue me. Keep your soul, I’ll take your mind and body . . . given freely.”
“Why?” I burst out.
He cocked his head at me. “Do you really not know, are you really that naive?”
I shook my head. “I’m not that naive. I know what you mean, but I mean, why me? I’m—crazy. I’m . . . I haven’t had a haircut in three years,” I blurted out.
Long hair was just the tip of the iceberg. I hadn’t voluntarily looked in a mirror in years, but I was sure I fell short of the kind of women who must be interested in a man like Massimo. He was beautiful, strong, rich, charismatic. It didn’t make sense.
“You . . . You’re unique, Katarina, and I like exclusive things. You interest me.”
Like a freak show. He wants to sleep with the freak. For once I didn’t respond to the voice.
“Besides, there is no why when it comes to desire, micetta. It just is. And I want you, end of story. I want to be all your firsts.”
Those words sent a twisted kind of heat rushing through me. All my firsts.
“If we make this deal, you’ll kill Pavol and Benedict, and you won’t kill me after we’re done.”
“Why would I if you’re my client?” Massimo said with a smirk.
He looked like he was enjoying himself now, plotting the death of two men and being all my firsts. I couldn’t even think the words without my skin getting hot.
“I’m your witness,” I reminded him. I needed to know that I was safe from this man.
He nodded. “And now I’m yours. We guarantee our mutual destruction.”
I thought furiously about any downsides to his proposal.
“Do you need to see the full terms and conditions, or are we making an agreement?” Massimo asked, dryly amused.
“When you make a deal with the devil, you have to check the details,” I pointed out.
He chuckled. “Check away . . . make sure you do, because I plan to enforce them and take every single thing I’m owed.”
Then he dipped his head and shocked me by licking my cheek from my jaw up to my temple. I shivered at the wet stripe on my overheated skin. There was something primitive about that movement. Primal. Ancient.
His lips moved over the sensitive flesh.
“Every. Single. Inch.”
His hand found my chin and he turned my face to his, holding me captive with effortless strength.
His mouth lowered to mine and brushed across my lips. It was electrifying, and somehow not quite enough. I panted, and his tongue slipped inside my mouth and stroked along mine. Not exactly a kiss.
A taste.
A faint growl sounded from deep within his throat, like it was hard for him to pull back. Like the beast inside didn’t want to.
“Agree, Katarina. Give me your word and sign this deal with your devil.”
I nodded slowly, the weight of what I was agreeing to hitting me. I was killing two men. I was ordering their deaths. No one deserved it more, but it was still sobering.
“I need your words; I need you to agree.” Massimo waited for me to clear my throat.
Then I spoke.
“I agree to your terms. I need your help; I can’t do it alone. I need you, so I agree.”
“Good girl,” he whispered, and then stole my breath one more time by bringing the hand that held the knife to his neck. The line of blood that I’d spilled was still there. He smeared it on his thumb and brought it to my lips.
“Bargains with the devil are signed in blood,” he said, his gaze fixed on the sight of his blood painted across my lips.
I was frozen there, transfixed by his actions. When my lips were wet with his blood, he sank his sullied fingers into my hair and tugged my head back, baring my mouth to his ruthlessly.
He closed the space between us and kissed me.
No, not just kissed me. He savaged me. He bit into my lip, drawing blood, and I gasped.
His kiss gentled then, and he slid his tongue in my mouth, caressing it against mine.
It was suggestive and wicked. It felt like being invaded by darkness . . . and I liked it.
It was unholy. It was perfect. Our blood mixed between us, sealing our agreement.
For better or for worse.
It was done.