Chapter 11 - Gun #2
“I’m taking you with me,” I answer. “You didn’t think you were going free, did you, Goyangi-ne?”
I make it to the front door of my apartment in Mullae-dong with Elise passed out in my arms. Her unconscious body has started to take its toll after the four flights I had to carry her up due to the elevator being out.
But I refuse to drop her as I stretch a hand out and flick on the lights to the small, modest apartment. It’s a place I visit only sparingly—a second apartment called a “love nest”.
I keep it for the sole purpose of bringing women here. It keeps a separation between where I live, where I work, and where I fuck.
Tonight it’ll be used for an entirely different purpose—harboring my assassin captive who I do want to fuck, but who currently needs to be looked after.
Elise put up a fight even after I unchained her. She threw a weak punch at me, stumbling half off balance before I caught her in my arms.
And then she passed out.
I called us a taxi.
The driver had given me exactly the kind of look I’d expected—suspicious, calculating, the sort of expression that comes with too many years navigating Seoul’s underbelly.
Seven times the normal fare bought his silence and his willful blindness. He looked the other way, and me and the unconscious woman I was with rode in silence.
My knee collides with the corner of an end table, sending a sharp jolt of pain up my leg. I curse under my breath as I finally locate the switch and flood the small space with harsh overhead lighting.
The apartment looks exactly as I left it weeks ago.
Sparse. Functional. Clean in the way that only places devoid of real life can be.
I employ a gajeongbu—or maid as Americans call them—to come by and scrub the place down. Make sure the kitchen and bathroom are sparkling and a new set of sheets replaces the old ones.
As I carry Elise down the narrow hallway, the entire apartment smells like lemon cleaner.
I dump her onto the bed with less ceremony than I probably should, stepping back to survey the damage that bastard inflicted on her.
She’s filthy, her clothes torn and bloodstained, bruises already darkening along her cheekbones and throat and what I can see of her ribs.
She needs medical attention.
I thumb away the locked screen on my phone and send a quick message to Dr. Song, the Cheongryong’s private physician.
I’ll have to make it clear he’s to tell no one. If word got out that Elise is Black Silk, then they’ll be as hungry as Gi-tae to make her suffer.
This must stay between the three of us.
I crouch beside the bed and ease her boots off her feet. Her breathing is shallow but steady, the rest of her body limp and almost lifeless.
But when I reach for the hem of her torn shirt, her eyes snap open like she’s been struck by lightning.
The scream that tears from her throat is raw and desperate.
Suddenly she’s all fists and feet, striking out with the kind of panicked violence that comes from waking up in an unknown place with unknown hands on her body.
I catch her wrists and pin them firmly against the mattress, using my weight to still her thrashing.
“Calm down, Goyangi-ne,” I say. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m trying to help; you need to be cleaned up.”
Her breathing comes in ragged intakes, dark eyes wild with confusion and fury. Gradually, the fight goes out as reality settles in.
“What do you want with me?” she rasps.
“I want you to be the feline I’ve come to know,” I answer. “And right now, like this… you’re not. So let me take care of you and bring her back.”
She says nothing, though she clearly doesn’t trust me. The glare she gives is so sharp and deadly it could cut glass.
But she doesn’t fight when I slowly lift her shirt over her head. We work together to slide her filthy cargo pants down her legs.
Her normally luminous dark brown skin is cut up, bruised, and streaked with dirt.
My chest tenses with the same kind of rage I’d had in the warehouse—while we may have fought earlier, most of these markings are from Gi-tae.
And judging by her swollen lip and jaw and bloodied nostrils, he’d gone anything but easy.
“How does a bath sound?” I ask. “This place only has a tub. No shower.”
She gives me another wary look as I help her stand, draping her arm around my shoulders. I’m supporting most of her weight as we walk to the bathroom.
The space is small and compact like the rest of the modest apartment, but everything we need is already within reach.
The faucet to turn on the hot water. A selection of soaps. Epsom salt and fresh towels.
I check the running water to make sure it’s warm enough to soothe but not too scalding to shock her battered system.
Steam begins to rise from the surface, and I turn expecting to see her still in her bra and panties.
A different kind of heat floods me; Elise has unhooked her bra and slid it down her arms. At the way I’ve gone still and started staring, she gives a half shrug.
“You’ve already seen them,” she mutters. “But if you don’t mind, some privacy?”
I’m trying my best not to look, not to let my instant attraction for her take over the moment.
But it’s hard when her perfect tits are now exposed and my mind jumps back to the last time I’d seen them.
…the last time I’d sucked them into my mouth.
I draw a deeper breath and run fingers through my hair. “You sure you can get into the tub yourself?”
She takes a step forward as if to prove me wrong, then staggers sideways. My reflexes kick in, my hand stretching out to clamp shut on her upper arm and steady her.
“If it makes you feel better, Goyangi, I won’t look.”
She eyes me suspiciously for a second or two before she nods.
I keep my word, however hard it is to do when a woman as beautiful and attractive as she is is stripping down in front of me.
My gaze focuses on a distant corner of the room. Out the corner of my eye she slides out of her panties.
Together we step toward the tub, and I serve as a pillar for her. She clutches my forearm as she gingerly climbs into the warm bath. She sinks low enough that the soapy suds obscure her nakedness the next time I fully glance over.
“Better?” I ask, brows raised.
“It would be better if you weren’t around,” she says icily.
“Ouch. That’s cruel, feline. But you should probably get used to it. If you think you’re going free, you’re mistaken. Finish bathing. My physician’s on the way. He’ll take a look at you.”
I walk out of the room to finally give her some real privacy.
As I do, I’m fully aware I’ve got no fucking clue what comes next.
I can’t let the feline go. She’s an assassin hunting the syndicate. She’s out to kill not only me, but my father and everybody else high ranking.
But the longer I keep her identity a secret, the more deep shit I’m going to be in.
Father didn’t mince words when he issued his warning. If I’m caught withholding information or seen as betraying the Cheongryong in any way, it’s my fucking head on the chopping block.
I scrub a hand over my face, the pain in my head throbbing away.
“How the fuck am I going to get myself out of this one?”