Chapter 42
Prague at Christmas had transformed itself from a beautiful old city into a snow-covered fairytale.
From the rooftop, Dario could see the Vltava River, dark and glittering below, the bridges strung with light, the spires of Malá Strana rising black against a sky heavy with snow that was due to start falling again.
Somewhere down in the streets, near the entrance of the Charles Bridge, a brass band was playing carols badly and with great enthusiasm. The smell of mulled wine, smoked meats, and cinnamon pastries came up from one of the Christmas markets two blocks over.
It was magical, but it was also freezing, and Dario had been leaning against a decorative stone grotesque for two hours.
Across the river, warm and gold behind its baroque facade, the Grand Prior's Palace of the Knights of St John was hosting a Christmas party for two hundred people who had paid ten thousand euros a plate.
Somewhere in that gilded building, enjoying excellent wine and the company of people who would be appalled to know what he actually did between his humanitarian photo opportunities, was Viktor Horák.
He liked to use his philanthropic networks and political connections to move women out of rural Slovakia and into situations from which they never returned.
Three women from a village outside Bratislava had gone to a Midsummer festival, and they hadn't come home.
Their families had pooled every resource they had and sent a petition to Frederica, along with the promise of a large batch of medovníky, a soft honey gingerbread.
It was the gingerbread that got her. Frederica had told them to keep their money and make two batches of medovníky, and they had a deal.
Dario had spent Christmas Eve in some strange places over the years. He had never spent one on a Prague rooftop with an assassin who had accepted a contract in exchange for cookies. This, he thought, studying the back of Frederica's head, was exactly what he loved about her.
He had been watching her for two hours and had been hard for at least one of them.
She was stretched prone across the low stone wall, her modified VSS Vintorez balanced on an old carved corbel that happened to be exactly the right height.
Her eye was at the scope, her feet on the rooftop gravel, the rest of her arranged in a relaxed patience that told Dario she would wait like that for days if she had to.
She was wearing a dark beanie pulled down over her ears, a long black leather jacket, and jeans. Her breath fogged in the cold. She hadn't moved in eleven minutes except to flex one gloved hand and then return it to the stock.
The target was late, but she wasn't anxious, just waiting. She made a small adjustment that had her ass pointing directly at Dario, and his dick throbbed.
He got up from where he had been sitting and moved to stand behind her. His hands found the back of her leather jacket and stroked down her spine.
She made a humming sound that wasn't annoyance. He knew what that was from experience.
"What do you think you're doing?" she asked. She hadn't moved her eye from the scope.
"Keeping myself amused." He kept his hands moving, slowly, along her sides. "You look cold."
"Is that so?"
"Freezing, probably. I should warm you up."
"You should sit back down and stop distracting me."
She was smiling. He could see her mouth twitching in the sketchy light. She hadn't told him to stop.
"You just keep your eyes on the prize, Spartana." He slid his hands around to her hips, and his thumbs found the waistband of her jeans. "I'll take care of the rest."
"I am literally on a job—"
He undid her belt and worked it open before taking care of the button and zip.
"That's why you need to keep watching," he said, low against the back of her neck. "You're a professional."
"Dario, what are you—"
"I know what stakeouts do to you." He kept his voice soft and close to her ear.
"The waiting. The anticipation. What it's going to feel like when the moment finally comes.
" His hand slid inside her jeans, beneath the thin fabric of her panties, and found her warm and slick.
"I know what the kill does. You're already so fucking wet. "
"I hate that you know me this well," she said, her voice slightly unsteady.
Dario stroked her slowly, watching the back of her neck flush. "It doesn't feel like you hate it."
"The target—"
"Isn't here yet." He pressed two fingers slowly through her folds, feeling her hips rock fractionally toward his hand before she controlled it.
He rubbed his groin against her ass before holding her there so she could feel how hard he was for her.
"You keep your eye on that scope. You're the professional. I'm just keeping you company."
She exhaled something that was almost a curse, but did as she was told.
He worked her slowly, leaning into the rhythm that made her breath stutter, the pressure that made her thighs tighten. Dario would never get enough of the soft feel of her perfect pussy and the way it gripped his fingers with every stroke inside her.
She was shaking already, a fine tremor she was fighting to control, and the sight of it went through him like a wire pulled tight.
Dario pulled her jeans down just enough. The cold hit her skin for one second, sharp and clean, and then he was under her jacket, his mouth on her soaked pussy.
"Fuck, Dario…"
"Don't you stop focusing on your target, baby," he growled in warning, his hands gripping her thighs tighter and pulling her back against his mouth.
She bit back a sound, and her whole body shuddered with the effort to stay still.
He was thorough. He wasn't gentle. Neither of them ever wanted gentle.
He knew exactly what she needed and how she needed it.
He had spent weeks learning her body to the point of obsession.
He used every piece of that knowledge against her now.
His tongue stroked over her pussy all the way up to rim her tight little ass and back down again, while his finger worked her in the slow circles that made her legs shake.
He only pulled back when he felt her getting close.
"Don't move," he murmured against her. "Don't make a sound."
"You bas—" The word cut off. Her knuckles were white on the rifle.
She was right at the edge, and he knew it by the tension that ran through her just before she came. He held her there because he wanted her desperate and to feel her fall apart all at once.
He got back to his feet and pulled his dripping dick free of his jeans, lined himself up, and pushed inside her in one long, slow thrust.
Her exhale was sharp and involuntary, turning into a moan.
"Eyes on target," he said against her ear as he covered her with his big body. He held her hips, sliding her on and off him, slowly and deeply. "There we go. Now we are nice and warm, aren't we? I might actually start to feel my balls again soon."
"I'm going to—" Her voice broke into a breathy stammer. "I'm going to kill you after this."
"Sure you will." He pulled back and thrust again, deep and measured, making her inner walls flutter around him. "Eyes. On. The. Target. Spartana," he said, punctuating each word with a hard thrust.
Frederica watched the building through the scope, her body giving her away in every other way while her eye stayed steady at the glass.
Dario fucked her slow and deep, watching her fight to keep in control. The cold air moved over them both, a sharp contrast to their heated skin and the trickle of sweat that slid down his spine. Somewhere below, the brass band launched badly into another carol.
"When he appears," Dario said, low in her ear. "You're going to take the shot." He reached around her, found her clit with his fingers, making her whole body jolt. "And we are going to come at the same time."
"That's not—I can't—"
"You can." He circled slowly, and her hips pushed back against him, the control she was maintaining crumbling at the edges. "You're perfect at this. All of it." He picked up the pace, his hips rolling into her harder, his fingers matching the rhythm.
The pressure was impossible, and he knew she was close. He was struggling to hold on, but he wanted to make it last, keep her on edge the same way he had been all night.
Light flooded a window on the third floor of the palace across the river.
"There he is," she breathed.
Dario pressed harder on her clit. "Take the shot, Spartana."
A figure crossed the lit window. Unhurried. Oblivious.
Frederica breathed out. The rifle popped softly. Glass shattered across the river. The target dropped.
Dario bit her on the neck, and Frederica came with a full-body shudder that she couldn't contain, a sound quickly smothered by his hand, and her whole body clenching around him. Dario followed her over the edge with a groan he could barely contain.
They stayed exactly as they were, both of them shaking, the cold air around them and the distant noise of a Christmas market and somewhere, far below, the first thin wail of a siren.
"We need to move," Frederica groaned, her voice was wrecked.
"Yeah."
"Now."
"I heard you."
Neither of them moved for two more seconds, then Dario pulled out, and they both dealt with their clothing.
Frederica was already breaking down the rifle, the scope off, barrel folded, and into the case in under forty seconds, while Dario had the rest of the kit packed and the stone cleared of any trace of them.
Another siren joined the first on the other side of the river.
They went down four flights of cold steps and hit the street door just as lights began appearing in windows across the square.
Two blocks to the car, not running, walking hand in hand like people who had nowhere else to be. Dario's pulse was in his ears, his body still thrumming in post orgasm bliss. Frederica's hand was trembling slightly when she opened the car door.
The sirens were louder now, coming from the direction of the river. Frederica put the rifle case in the back seat before climbing in the front, and Dario started the car.
They pulled out into the empty Christmas Eve street, steady and unhurried, heading for the extraction route Leo had mapped three days ago, and the sirens faded behind them. Dario started laughing.
"What?" Frederica was still flushed, still breathing too fast.
"Nothing." He grinned widely. "Just the best stakeout of my life."
She sighed. "You are insane sometimes."
"I told you I'd warm you up."
She punched his shoulder hard enough to make him swerve slightly as she started laughing too, the one she couldn't stop once it started.
"You could have gotten us caught," she said, wiping her eyes.
"We didn't get caught."
"We almost got caught."
"Almost only counts in—"
"If you finish that sentence, I'm leaving you at the airport." She dropped her head back against the headrest, still laughing. The sirens were gone behind them, heading in the opposite direction.
They pulled up at a traffic light, and she pulled him close and kissed him.
"I love you," she said. "Your insanity is a bonus. Light is green."
Dario drove through the intersection, a little dazed, and reached over to take her hand. He lifted it and pressed his mouth to her knuckles.
"I love you too."
Frederica laced her fingers through his and looked out at the Prague night sliding past.
She pulled out the bag of her cookie payment from the glove box and started munching. "Let's go home."