Prologue 1
Prologue 1
LIAM
ONE YEAR AGO
I look at the bloodied man kneeling before me, his face swollen and grotesque, one eye bulging out of its socket. He tries to whimper out the answer to a question I’ve been repeating for the last twenty fucking minutes, but he can barely form words since I cut out his tongue.
Growing impatient because I have somewhere to be, I pull out my gun and shove it into his mouth, cracking and breaking a few of his teeth when I do.
“Let’s try this one more time,” I tell him, pushing the barrel down his throat until his gag reflex kicks in and he is forced to breathe through his nose, which he struggles to do because I broke that too. “Why were you following her?”
I only know this because I’ve been following her as well. Seems Alexandria Rossi has caught the attention of several interested parties, Declan Levine included. That’s why I’m here.
The guy moans something and I hold up a finger, telling him to wait. With brute force, I yank the gun out of his mouth, breaking more teeth. The man coughs and splutters as he drags in much-needed air. Two incisors dribble down his chin in a river of blood.
“I’m waiting,” I tell him, tapping my gun to my thigh.
The backroom we’re in at the club is dark and smells of cleaning supplies. It was the most secluded place I could find when I caught him creeping through the back entry door to the club. No one would be able to hear him scream back here over the loud bass of the music blasting throughout the place. I hate fucking nightclubs. But this is where she is. It’s also where I followed this asshole to. He’s been stalking her for about a day now.
“Mister… Rossi… sent… me,” he chokes out.
Shit. Declan isn’t going to like hearing about that.
I consider my next move while torquing the silencer for my gun. “Thank you,” I tell him and pull the trigger. A neat, round hole appears on his forehead, blood oozing out. His eyes roll just as his head lilts to the side.
Even though I’m wearing gloves, I wrap the dead man’s hands over the handle of my weapon just in case. There’s an air vent on the floor that I’m able to loosen and toss the gun inside. Nobody can shoot themselves in the head and then hide the weapon afterward. However, I’m always careful not to leave my prints behind. Call me paranoid. I have to be in my line of work.
And because I feel like it, I open a couple of bottles of concentrated bleach I find on the floor and pour their contents down his throat and over his face. I don’t envy whichever unlucky bastard happens to find him first.
Silently opening the door to the storage room, I make sure the coast is clear before exiting. After a quick check of my appearance in the men’s restroom, I take off and tuck my gloves into my pocket and make my way back to the main area where the bar and the dance floor are located.
Within seconds of sidling up to the end of the bar, one of the bartenders, a fuck-me brunette with voluptuous, ruby-stained lips, appears and takes my drink order. My eyes briefly travel over her pushed-up tits trying to escape the tank top she’s wearing before I tell her to bring me a Qu?llfrisch.
While waiting for my beer, I scan the crowd for her . I know she’s close. I can feel her.
Dance clubs aren’t my scene for many reasons. The mass of sweating bodies and the smell of cloying perfume mixed with sex pheromones. The godawful thump of techno dance music and strobing lights that are quickly giving me a fucking migraine. The glazed, euphoric faces of those high on whatever fad party drug is being passed around. But I didn’t come here for any of that.
The bartender places my drink on the bar top in front of me. I casually take a swallow while trying to find my quarry in the middle of the crowded dance floor. A white strobe of light flashes, illuminating everything for a brief second, and there she is. My attention locks onto Alexandria Rossi. The woman I was sent to Switzerland to find.
My eyes compulsively track Alexandria’s every movement. How her dress molds to her body. How she sensuously slides her hands up the column of her slender neck. How she lifts her mass of long, blonde hair damp with sweat, away from her heated skin. How she tips back her head and closes her eyes as her hips gyrate to the beat of the music. How her plush lips part slightly as she gets lost within the throngs of people. Alexandria Rossi is a fucking goddess, long-legged with luscious curves on a tight body made to sin.
Unfortunately, the woman, who became my instant obsession from the moment I saw her three days ago, is an assignment; a job I was sent to execute by my boss, Declan Levine. For the past several days, I’ve followed her, watched her, shadowed her every step. I know Alexandria keeps to herself. She loves to go for long hikes on the nature trails close to her boarding school. She recently graduated but is still residing in the school’s dormitory, and she has one friend, Tessa Goodwyn. I’ve already sent Declan information about Tessa. She has certain skills that I think he would be interested in.
I’ve also become familiar with Alexandria’s habits and routines. The husky, melodic sound of her voice. Every nuance of her facial expressions. You can learn so much about a person in just three days’ time. And right now, I know she’s hurting. I can see her pain and her anger seeping out of her pores with every sway of her hips. Her brother Kellan was buried today.
Yesterday, I listened in on the phone call she received from one of her father’s men, threatening her not to return home for her brother’s funeral. From my phone, I watched the feed from hidden cameras I placed around her room, as she destroyed every belonging and piece of furniture in a fit of rage. I heard her anguished cries and saw her tears. I listened to the words she spoke to her dead brother. Her promise for revenge. Alexandria didn’t come here tonight to have fun or to let loose; she came here to forget. And to plan.
My time with her is coming to an end. Declan wants me back tomorrow.
Finishing the rest of my beer, I place it on the bar on top of the modest cash tip I leave for the bartender. Never taking my eyes off Alexandria, I stroll onto the dance floor. Every synapse in my body is firing the closer I get to her. Her back is turned to me, and she doesn’t notice me at first. Not until she turns around and accidentally knocks into my chest.
“I’m so sorry,” she says loudly over the music.
Jesus, she’s fucking gorgeous as she gazes up at me with those light violet eyes.
“No need for apologies,” I assure her. Bending down to her ear, I let my breath skate across her flushed skin and notice how goose bumps erupt along her neck and shoulder. “I’m Liam.”
Alexandria seems to consider me for a long time. I wish I could crawl inside her head, see what she’s thinking. Can she tell I just tortured and killed a man mere moments ago? Does she see the blood that mars my soul and the scars that crisscross my hands? Does she sense that I’m the weapon that Declan Levine wields, her father’s enemy?
I watch Alexandria’s expressive face, and my heart rate kicks up when I see her make a decision.
She presses herself into my larger frame, her delicate hands curling into the fabric of my shirt. I circle her waist with one arm and possessively grasp the back of her neck, forcing her to keep eye contact with me. I won’t allow her to look away. I want her to see me. See how much I want her. Declan should never have trusted me for this assignment.
We dance for over an hour to our own music, ignoring the pumping, vibrant beats of what the DJ is playing. We don’t try to make small talk. She needs to lose herself in me—a complete stranger she just met at a club but one she seems to feel comfortable with—to drown out the voices inside her head. To help her escape from the loss of her beloved brother. And I’m more than happy to play that role for her.
The air inside the club is stifling from the heat given off by tens of dozens of people. Alexandria and I are both slicked with sweat, but it enhances how her skin glows and the way it smells. Something faintly floral, like jasmine or honeysuckle.
“Want to get out of here?” she asks, spearing her hands through her hair and fisting the locks with one hand in a makeshift ponytail. An image of me doing the same thing while pounding into her from behind has me almost groaning out loud.
In answer to her question, I grip her hip with one hand, turning her around, and guiding her toward the front of the club where the main exit is located. She leans into my touch, seeking comfort from a man she just met. I know exactly what this is and what’s about to happen. I couldn’t give a shit that the only reason she’s going to fuck me is because she needs something to help her forget and take away the pain that she’s in, even if only for a few hours. This girl has no idea the things I would do for her.
Once outside on the sidewalk, the music lessens, not by much, but enough so we don’t have to shout at one another to be heard.
I don’t trust valets, pay-by-the-hour garages, or taxis because they’re just another way for people to track you if they know where to look. Instead, I parked my motorcycle down the street in an alleyway that has no security cameras pointed at it. I don’t need it for where I’m taking her. Declan owns one of the hotels a couple of blocks within easy walking distance from where we’re at. Officially, the towering Luxem Grand Hotel in the heart of the city is owned by a British financier with ties to the monarchy, so if Rossi decides to go digging as to the whereabouts of his daughter, seeing as he’s put his own men to follow her, he won’t connect it back to Declan. He’ll just think Alexandria spent the night at some fancy place in Geneva after partying at a nightclub. His man he sent to spy on her, however… well, once Rossi finds out he’s dead, he’ll know something is up. I’m on borrowed time to get Declan what he wants.
It’s ironic that Alexandria happened to go to one of the nightclubs in Geneva that is located near one of Declan’s Swiss properties. It solidifies that tonight, what’s about to happen between the two of us, is fated. I’m Irish, after all, and we believe in all that destiny, magic shit.
“I don’t normally do this,” she confesses, snuggling to my side to help ward off the chill of the night air, a blush creeping up her cheeks as we walk along the sidewalk.
Even at two in the morning, the city is alive and bustling. The bars and clubs in town stay open until five in the morning, just as nine-to-fivers wake up and get ready for work, and children prepare for another school day.
Springtime in Geneva is rather cold, temperatures hovering in the low-to-mid forties. Everything in Europe is Celsius and not Fahrenheit, so it takes me a second to convert between the two. I may be Irish, but I’ve spent my entire life growing up in the States.
“Neither do I,” I reply, and she cocks her head to the side to look up at me, an incredulous smirk on her heart-shaped face.
“I highly doubt that’s true.”
Placing my hand on her lower back, I feel the tremor run through her at my touch. “How so?”
Instead of answering, she bites her bottom lip, the sensuous nature of it causing my dick to take notice.
When we get to the Luxem, she stops and peers up at it. The golden glass sparkles and reflects the lights of the city. A brisk breeze flutters her hair across her face, and she shivers. Neither one of us has on a jacket.
“You have a room here?”
I nod in answer and quietly watch her as she continues to take everything in.
We stand in silence for a few minutes, and then I feel the soft caress of her hand down my arm, her fingers threading with mine, so we’re holding hands.
“I’d really like to see your room.”
We crash together as I roughly shove Alexandria against the wall of the penthouse suite, a framed painting rattling at the impact. I kick the door closed and shuck off my shoes, our lips fused together, my tongue fucking her hot mouth. It’s dark inside the room, faint light coming from the glow of moonlight spearing in through the floor-to-ceiling window.
Alexandria’s face comes into view, and I pull back to look at her. So goddamn breathtaking. Her pale indigo eyes are black with lust. Her lips bee-stung and kiss-swollen. She’s panting lightly, the smell of her arousal a heady scent that intoxicates me.
Palming her face, I gently brush up her cheek with the pad of my thumb, a sweet touch compared to the violence of desire that she must notice is churning in my stormy gray eyes. Her head lilts, just a fraction, accepting the small piece of gentleness I’m giving her, knowing that soon, the turbulent maelstrom between us will sweep us away.
My touch that was seconds ago so tender, circles her neck and grips her throat. My lips take hers once again in a kiss that is both pleasure and pain. Alexandria immediately opens for me when my tongue demands entrance. I’m claiming her, branding her as mine. I plan to ruin her so that she remembers tonight for years to come.
She brings her hands up to tightly grip the front of my shirt and sighs into my mouth, showing me that she wants more.
As my fingers curl into the pliable skin of her neck, my other hand slides along her bare thigh, bunching the silk folds of her dress up until a thin strip of red lace is uncovered. The sight of it makes me almost lose my fucking mind. I slide a finger up her slit, testing her, and am pleased when I discover her panties are soaked. Pulling back sharply, my nostrils flare, filling my lungs with her musk. Alexandria cries out when I rip off her thong and roughly thrust two fingers inside her sweet cunt, impaling her to the wall.
“I’m going to fuck you until your voice is hoarse from screaming my name. I’m going to take everything from you, Alexandria, until all you taste, see, and feel is me.”
“Yes,” she moans low, pulling me closer so I can feast on her body.
While my fingers fuck her to a quick orgasm, I bend to latch on to a sensitive patch of skin exposed by the deep V of the bodice of her dress. Her breath hitches when I bite down, marking her, and her back arches off the wall. She thrusts her hips against my hand, her body seeking its own pleasure and demanding more.
While my fingers pump her, her responding moans are music to my ears.
“ Oh, god . Liam.”
I tug down the material, exposing her fully to me and suck her nipple into my mouth. “Say it again.”
She shakes her head, not willing to concede to my demand but desperate for the release only I can give her. I unhook the button of my pants and let them drop to the floor.
“ Say my name! ” I sharply command, gripping her ass to lift her up and slamming my cock deep inside of her.
“Liam!” she screams, climaxing almost violently.
For the next few hours, I give her what she needs, and we fuck like mindless animals as she tries to exorcise the demons that are haunting her. When she finally passes out on the bed in a boneless, sated sleep, I lie next to her for a while and just stare at her.
“One day soon, bella ,” I whisper in her hair, breathing her in one last time.
Getting up to locate my pants that are lying on the floor near the door, I pad over to grab my phone from the back pocket.
Me: Got what you need. Heading home.
Reluctant to leave her, but knowing I have no choice, I quietly dress and walk out the door.