Chapter 11
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
Maxim
My fist slammed into Miss Sia Reynolds’ door, and when she opened it, her sweatshirt hung off her shoulder. Flushed, her creamy brown skin radiated just like the rosy color in her cheeks. She had sleep in her eyes, and her bed shorts barely covered her thighs.
I wet my lips. “Get your clothes on.”
I didn’t give her a chance to speak.
I stepped away, and little steps padded down the hallway after me.
Malyshka…
“What are you talking about—” she started, but shot back when I pivoted.
“I said get your fucking clothes on.” I was in her face now, and she shrank in front of me. I growled. “Get them on now and bring the fucking dog.”
I charged down the hallway before I could do or say something else.
I could smell her.
Her soft scent maddened me, and I was pacing by the time I saw her again, clothed now. I didn’t look at her. “Get in the car.”
I already had my Mercedes running and had actually gotten it ready myself. I’d been impatient and hadn’t bothered asking any of my staff to do it.
I didn’t like who I’d turned into in the last hour. What I was capable of…
I felt unhinged and on the brink of doing something stupid. Something like taking my blade and gutting the first person I saw. That person could be Miss Reynolds. It might be if I couldn’t control my demon.
Sia was shaking by the time she got in my car, and I only knew that because of the state of her legs. She’d covered them, wearing too-tight jeans, and they were shaking in my seats.
“Where are we going?” she asked, attempting to strap in. She had the dog in the backseat, but only Sia yelped when I shot off like lightning. She hadn’t had a chance to get her seatbelt all the way on. “Hey?—”
She didn’t dare speak to me, and my gaze was hard in her direction. I revved up, and her panicky hands got her seatbelt on.
She gripped the seats. “You’re going really fast.”
“Yeah?” I laughed, feeling manic. I faced her. “Well, it’s my fucking car.”
Her fear had me dizzy, choking me with adrenaline. It was amping me up. Especially with all that flush coloring her cheeks.
Her neck…
She was rosy everywhere, an innocent little lamb I could easily break.
I charged forward again, the dog unaffected. In actuality, the beast of a thing was laying down on my leather seats like it was having a joyride. Apparently, I’d disturbed its slumber.
Well, that made two of us.
My hand on the wheel, I propelled the car in the direction of Peters & Burg. Val was already on standby. When I came home earlier today, I left some work behind at my place of business. I’d already had a long day and believed it could wait until morning.
That was until I caught Sia on surveillance tonight.
Growling, I shot into the first parking space I saw. Gleb was there, and I didn’t even greet him before launching myself out of the car.
I was too busy grabbing Sia.
I brought her too close, and I realized my mistake right away. I could see that fear right in my face.
I could smell her way too close.
Her aroma changed the air just like the first day I came across her in my daughter’s room, and I think the only reason I was able to hold onto her without losing my fucking mind was because she didn’t smell like sex. Arousal…
She had earlier tonight. I knew because I saw her . I hadn’t noticed her while I’d been swimming, but I had after I’d gotten dressed and gone into my office. I played back footage and watched her fuck herself earlier tonight.
To the sight of me.
Hard as a fucking rock, I directed her to get the dog out of the backseat, but she hesitated. She frowned. “Why?”
She was panting while she asked, sharp, rapid breaths expelling in front of me. It caused more of her scent to waft into the air and shoot straight into my fucking nose. My cock. I got her arm. “You and the dog are going into work with me, and whatever you see…whatever you hear, you do nothing. You understand?”
Shocked, her eyes twitched wide. “See?”
I put pressure into her delicate flesh, managing to bring her closer to me. She was weak like a twig and would be so easy to break. “You’re not to react to anything you see,” I said, then jutted my chin toward the dog. “And make the dog look tough when you bring her.”
“Why?”
“Just fucking do it,” I ground out, and she closed her mouth. I was losing control here. Hell, I’d already fucking lost it. I’d taken this twenty-year-old girl out of bed to teach her a lesson. She’d crossed a line tonight. She fucked up.
And now, she was about to know it.
Sia got the dog out of the car and quickly brought her close. She managed to keep up with my long strides, and I noticed she stayed closer to the dog than to me. Perhaps she thought the dog would protect her from me.
I fought myself from grinning, too angry to give into the sick pleasure I felt from her fear. I passed a shocked Val on the way. Her eyes were wide on both the situation and me. She’d been surprised to hear I was coming back to the office when I called. She knew I’d had a long day.
Well, her surprise managed to grow upon seeing Sia and the dog with me. She lifted her hands. “What’s going on?”
I ignored her question but lifted my hands. “Bring the girl into my workspace in five minutes. She and the dog come alone. Don’t allow anyone else in with her.”
Val’s head shot back. My workspace was sacred unless I called for others to assist, and she knew that. She shook her head. “But…”
“Five minutes, Val.” I left her. I left Sia.
My client sat in the same chair and state I’d left him in. He was bleeding but not broken. He was a former member of the organization, but abandoned the Brotherhood to work for one of our enemies.
He smirked upon seeing me coming into the room. I worked him long and hard today, but again, hadn’t managed to break him yet. He had a few teeth missing from my labor, which showed after he spit blood at me. “I told you. I won’t say shit to you or Natan, you son of a bitch.”
I’d been called worse, and though he thought he was getting the better of me, he actually made my job more fun. I always liked it when they didn’t break easy.
It meant I could use other ways to break.
When breaking someone physically was harder, I often looked toward other means. Psychological fears could be just as effective, and people always gave away what they were scared of when interrogated. One just had to ask the right questions.
And I had tonight.
I waited for Sia and the dog to come into my workspace, and when she ultimately did, she was guarded and not that spitfire I’d come to know.
Perhaps it was the sight of my toys.
I had tools…torture devices everywhere. This space was my candy shop, the tools my candy.
Sia backed up a little upon seeing them and even more so when she witnessed the bleeding man in front of her. The man was filthy, and though he greeted Sia with a gleeful smirk, it faded away the instant he noticed the large as fuck German Shepherd at her side. He instantly bucked in his chair, the legs hitting the floor again and again. I supposed I was correct when I guessed his fear.
I always guessed correctly.
“No! No! No!” The traitor was blind to his fear now. All he could see was the dog. He simply gave me too much information today during our interrogation. Things about his childhood. Of course, he didn’t say he had a severe phobia of dogs, but it was easy to discern considering his reactions to certain questions I had.
In all honesty, I had something more gruesome planned for him after he gave himself away. I’d actually arranged to have other dogs come in first thing in the morning. I planned to let them slowly tear him apart until he gave up the location of a Bratva brother. He and our enemies knew the location, which was why he was here with me today.
Plans changed though, and Sia appeared to be just as freaked out as this man. She gripped the dog’s leash, the man in front of her full-out screaming and crying. The dog at Sia’s side barked at him because of it. I told her to make the pooch look fierce, but she didn’t even have to try with all the man’s carrying on. He had streams of tears flying down his face, and when Sia looked on the cusp of running away, I took a step in front of her.
She froze, her escape blocked, and didn’t dare move from where she stood. I told her to do nothing once she was in this room.
She wasn’t now, not that she had a choice. The man and his noise were clearly freaking out the dog because the hound started jerking at its leash to get to him. This of course made the son of a bitch scream louder, and a pool of piss flooded the floor beneath him.
“No, please. I’ll tell you!” he shouted, facing me. “Just get the dog away. Just get it away. Please…”
He didn’t have my focus at this point. Instead, I studied Sia. This whole display was more for her and less for this pathetic piece of shit in front of me. She fucking pissed me off.
She crossed a line.
She made me lose control, and not a lot of things did that to me.
Deciding to make this quick, I headed over to my tools. My client was still crying, and the dog still barked. This was all becoming a bit much and more drama than I cared to endure at the present.
“Please. He’s with my boss, Bortnik. At his home uptown. He’s got him chained in his basement,” he cried, and when he rattled off an address, I turned around.
I smiled. “Thank you.”
He didn’t get to say you’re welcome. He didn’t get to say anything. I pulled the trigger, the bullet from the gun in my hands landing between his eyes, smoking. The traitor’s screams stopped, and the impact of the bullet sent him flying back. If he hadn’t been secured to his chair, he would have easily landed in the piss on the floor.
I lowered the gun, and at this point, the dog’s barking stopped. I had a silencer on my pistol so that didn’t surprise me, and since the man stopped screaming, the dog was no longer unsettled. It was completely silent in that room and Miss Sia Reynolds was a part of it.
She stared at the floor and the bleeding man in front of her. She was shaking, but I noticed she had her head cocked. Almost like she was studying the man before her.
She and her intense stare were frozen like her eyes couldn’t leave. I thought she might actually approach the guy at one point, but then her hand shot to her mouth.
She raced from the room after that and took the dog with her. Val was at the doorframe and had to maneuver away from it to make way for Sia. Once Sia cleared, Val headed after her, but not before she shot a look at me. My head of security could say so much with her eyes. She’d appeared confused when I initially brought Sia here.
Needless to say, there was no confusion now.