Chapter 6
vera
I lay on the couch for some sleep, and I was just drifting off when I jolted back into wakefulness at a movement in the room.
I sat up fast, reaching for my gun on the table, but I almost laughed when my eyes adjusted and I saw it—the damn cat, positioning itself to jump up onto the couch.
Herself. Apparently she was a girl. Elaine was full of surprises.
I grunted when the palm-sized fluffball jumped up onto the couch with me, sniffing curiously at me.
“Don’t look at me. I’m not your mama.”
She didn’t seem to care. Curled up against my chest and lay down for some sleep.
Unbelievable. I was a bringer of death. My hands were soaked in blood from the days I could walk. Some people sang, others danced, and I killed.
Weren’t animals supposed to have a preternatural sense for danger? Maybe this one was broken.
“Fine,” I sighed, and I rolled onto my back, cupping the kitten and holding her on my chest. She slept soundly there, and with the small ball of warmth on me, I slipped into sleep too.
I dreamed I was sitting at the piano. On one side was Petrov’s body, a rose of blood blossoming on the floor beneath him. On the other was my mother, blurry and dark, a crumpled form too far away to see clearly even though she was right next to me.
“Play it again, Vera.”
My father’s voice. He spoke from across the piano, and I tried to read the sheet music, but it was blurry.
I didn’t need the sheet, though. I knew the piece by heart. Tchaikovsky’s Opus 39, number 7. A simple one. I played, but my father slammed his fist down.
“Again.”
I played it again. His face twisted in anger.
“Again!”
I played it again. Tears were hot on my cheeks as soft, delicate caresses of the keys turned into angry pounding, slamming down on the notes, until I realized it wasn’t the keys I was slamming my fists down on, but the back of the piano, and it was me standing there where my father had been, my face contorted in a mask of rage, and on the bench, it was Elaine who quivered in fear, her blue eyes full of tears.
I woke up with a start when I heard a sound from the next room, and I flew to my feet, snatching the kitten from my chest and setting her down on the table, my heart hammering. Something in Elaine’s room.
I picked up my gun from the table and crept towards the door, my finger near the trigger but not on it as I eased the door open, looking inside.
I relaxed at the sight. Elaine, thrashing in the sheets, had just knocked a book off the nightstand. Nothing else in the room. I set the gun down and slipped into the room, and the kitten snuck in after me, squeezing in before I could shut the door.
She was clearly having a nightmare. It was to be expected. It had been her first time having someone try to kill her. I still remembered my first time.
I sat on the edge of the bed, my hand on her shoulder.
“Elaine,” I said, and she gasped, waking up and pulling in closer to me.
“Vera…” She swallowed, eyes quivering as she looked up at me. I brushed her hair back from her face.
“Just a bad dream,” I said. “You’re safe.”
“I thought… the assassins again…”
I kept stroking her hair reassuringly. It felt like the least I could do.
I’d never had someone care for me like she’d done with my injury, not when she wasn’t a Blackbird physician who had to do it.
And maybe it was the part of me that felt guilty that I was going to have to kill her anyway that made me want to spoil her.
Or maybe I just wanted to touch a beautiful woman in bed. I was already feeling pent-up, and Elaine had clearly taken off her bra to sleep, judging from the outline of her breasts under her shirt. But I had to hold it together.
She might start to suspect ulterior motives with the marriage proposal if I told her how badly I wanted to rip her clothes off right now for a quick fuck that didn’t mean anything. The wrong ulterior motives, but still.
“No one’s going to get to you here,” I said. “You’re safe. I’m with you.”
“Stay here,” she whispered. She moved closer and wrapped her arms around my waist, and my body reacted immediately to the sensation of her pulling me into bed. Heat pooled in my body. I only had two weaknesses as a professional. One was that I was scared of heights. Two was this.
“You’ll be okay. You don’t need me here.”
“I feel safer next to you. Stay here…” She pulled me into the bed with her, and she pressed her face into my shoulder as soon as I hit the mattress, drawing herself in close to me and falling back asleep in an instant.
Shit. She was sleeping more soundly, too. Her movements slowed right away, and she slept peacefully.
I could feel her breasts pressed into my back… they were bigger than I’d realized. Her hand on my waist… I wanted it just a bit lower.
It wasn’t about attachment. I’d never been attached to anyone. The capacity to love had been surgically extracted from me at a young age.
But it was always like this. My body could pull off supernatural feats compared to even the rest of the Blackbirds’ trained operatives. Not a person alive but Quayle who could do what I could. And apparently this was what the power of adrenaline asked in return.
I wasn’t getting a bit of sleep like this. But if I left, neither was Elaine. And neither of us could afford to operate on bad sleep tomorrow.
What the hell did it matter? I was going to kill her before long anyway.
I focused on the sensation of her body pressed against mine as I reached down under the band of my pants, and I found myself needing.
My fingers against my clit were sweet release, and I bit my lip to keep from making noise as I touched myself, finding relief before long in an intense, throbbing orgasm that made my body arch, a small moan escaping my lips.
I ripped my hand back out of my pants when I heard Elaine stir behind me.
“Vera?” she whispered. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m… all good. Just a dream. Get back to sleep.”
“Okay…” She slipped back into sleep, and slowly, I let myself relax.
Close one. She’d never need to know about it.