THE PERFECT TARGET (19 page)

"Tell me what's inside you then," she challenged, wishing he'd chosen anywhere other than beside the bed to stand. "Tell me what you think justifies your actions."

Something dangerously close to disappointment flickered through his gaze. "You haven't figured that out yet?"

The words were smoky, their intent clear. "Seduction won't work anymore, Sandro."

"If I recall," he said with a sardonic curl of his lips, "most of the seducing came from you."

The low blow landed with unerring accuracy. She didn't hesitate. She grabbed her purse, pulled out her knife, wrapped both hands around the hilt and thrust it toward him.

"Call me a romantic fool," she said with cold precision, "but I actually thought I cared about you. I believed your lies. The bit about your grandfather and the abandoned dog was especially good. If you get out of this alive, you might want to try Hollywood."

He sighed, eyeing the knife.
"Bella, bella, bella.
Do we have to go down this road again? Don't you realize if I'd wanted to hurt you, I would have by now?"

The pain was swift and immediate, the truth scalding the backs of her eyes with tears she would never let fall. Chin high, she refused to let him know how brutally he'd already hurt her.

Because in truth, she was the one who'd set herself up for the fall.

"I'm too valuable to hurt," she said instead. "I'm the
prize,
remember? The perfect target."

He frowned, an odd glow coming into his eyes. "You're also a terrible liar."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"There are many ways to hurt,
bella.
Not all of them are physical."

"You haven't hurt me," she said defiantly.

"I haven't hurt your body," he amended. "I didn't crawl all over you at the hotel or the winery like I could have. I didn't use the cuffs in my bag. I didn't tie you up, rough you up."

She narrowed her eyes, fought the emotion stabbing into her throat. "No, you didn't do any of that," she said thickly, holding the knife toward him. Her mind raced for a plan. There was no way she could get out the window or the door without disabling him first. "You're just going to turn me over to a bloodthirsty man who wants to use me to get his son back." Just the thought sent horror convulsing through her. "It won't work," she vowed. "The United States will neither cower nor barter. If you turn me over to that man, all you'll be doing is sacrificing me to some ridiculous cause."

He stepped toward her, his hands curling into fists. "General Zhukov isn't going to hurt you, not your body, nor your spirit."

Miranda swallowed hard. Primed on the balls of his feet, Sandro looked like a boxer ready to pounce, and she was the only opponent in sight.

"If you believe that," she said as steadily as the rain now pouring from the sky, "you're a fool in addition to a liar." Just the thought of the amoral man made her blood run cold. She'd once read he'd cut off part of his pinkie merely to show his men pain meant nothing.

The planes of Sandro's face tightened, his eyes burned with an intensity that sent her heart hammering wildly, but he didn't take another step toward her. He seemed to be physically restraining himself, an animal at the end of a chain that would not break.

"Miranda, please," he said in that sandpaper voice of his. "Listen to me. There's not much time. I've got to get you away from Petros. He's a very dangerous man."

She gaped at him, felt her eyes flare. "And what are you? The Pied Piper?"

"I've told you who I am," he said, and took another step toward her, this one slow, purely predatory. "I'm the man who's not going to let anything bad happen to you. But Petros doesn't share my … philosophy. He's a wild card I didn't plan on."

She cut her eyes at him. "Gee, what a shame."

"Give me the knife, Miranda."

"Tell me there's been some kind of horrible mistake," she offered, pausing when another flash of lightning cut across the darkness. Thunder rumbled more quickly, the storm ever closer. "Tell me I don't understand what's going on here. Tell me this is just a nightmare and soon I'll wake up."

"I can't tell you any of that,
bella."
The remorse in his voice sounded real, but she knew better than trusting illusions. This man was a trained liar, probably a killer. He worked for a ruthless man responsible for the deaths of eight elite U.S. undercover operatives.

"Put down the knife," he instructed. "Don't make this harder than it already is."

"Why not?" she asked a little wildly. With every step he took toward her, the room seemed to shrink. She could barely see the window beyond his shoulders. She could barely breathe without drawing in the cloying scent of honeysuckle and betrayal.

She couldn't let herself care.

She couldn't let him win, either, not when doing so would cost her family so dearly. Better to end it all here, then to put them through the horror of knowing General Viktor Zhukov had possession of her.

"How's it going to get harder?" she challenged. "What will you do, shoot me?" A maniacal little laugh broke from her throat. "The general wouldn't like that much, would he? With his
prize
dead, how would he get his son back?"

Sandro winced. "I'm not going to kill you."

Miranda tightened her grip on the knife, but her palms had started to sweat. And if she quit concentrating for even one second, her hands might start to shake. He wouldn't kill her, she believed that. Not intentionally, anyway. But images flashed through her mind as lethally as the lightning outside, of all the things he could do to her now that he no longer had to pretend. Things that would not involve death. At least not physical death.

There were far, far worse deaths than those of the body.

"Just damage me?" she asked snidely. "Rough me up?"

He swore under his breath. "You don't believe that."

"I don't believe anything right now," she bit out, backing away from his steady advance. He could be on her in two strides, but he didn't seem in any hurry to pounce. She wanted to rush him, to thrust the knife into his black heart and run from the room, but knew he'd have her weapon out of her hands before she made contact.

All she was really buying now was time.

"I don't believe how easily I fell for your lies, that I ever trusted you, let you touch me. I don't believe I'm going to get out of this unharmed, either, so why prolong the inevitable? Why not get it all over with here and now?" She wasn't sure where the taunt came from, but once started, found she couldn't stop the flow. "Why wait for that disgusting little man out there or the general to do the dirty work? You started this—don't tell me you don't have the guts to look me in the eye and finish it."

He stood so still he looked more stone than man. "The knife, Miranda."

She had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, but squared her shoulders anyway. "No."

Sandro moved so quickly he had the knife clattering to the cold wood floor before she had a chance to react. Unlike the day in the alley when he'd grabbed the blade with his hand, this time he took hold of her wrist, twisting just enough for her fingers to open.

Miranda gasped, but he granted no reprieve, backing her against the wall and pinning her there with his body. "It's not smart to play with fire,
bella."

"Don't touch me!" she shouted, pushing against the hard heat of his chest.

He caught her wrists and held them in one hand, raised them to the wall above her head. "Thatta girl," he encouraged, his smile grim, his eyes bleak. "Now let him hear you scream."

Miranda blinked at him. "W-what?"

His breathing was ragged now, strained. "Petros thinks I'm giving you the ride of your life right now," he explained. "Best not to disappoint him."

The heat from Sandro's body warmed her flesh, but the cold filth of his words sank through to her bones. "You're disgusting," she whispered, wondering how she could have been so completely wrong about this man.

"Be that as it may, if Petros thinks I'm going easy on you back here, he'll get suspicious. Best to make him think that I'm forcing you, that you despise me."

"I do despise you."

Something hot and dangerous flashed in the midnight of his eyes. "Then let it rip, sweetheart. Now is not the time for holding back."

"Stop it!" she cried out, thrashing against him. She went to raise her knee toward his groin, but he held her too close. All she could do was stomp down on his bare feet.

He showed no reaction, no signs of pain. He was all robot again. "Good, good," he encouraged. "Now scream for me."

The memory hit Miranda without warning, had her cursing herself a fool all over again.

When I make a woman scream, it doesn't
have a damn thing to do with a knife.

"I'll never scream for you," she vowed.

"Then scream for yourself,
bella.
Scream for the freedom you so desperately crave."

She lost it then, the restraint that had held her together like glue. She struggled against the hand manacling her wrists, broke his grip and landed her palms against his chest. "You bastard," she cried, pushing against him with her shoulder. "You bastard!"

"Perfect," he said, neither fighting nor resisting. He just stood there, accepting one blow after another. "Don't stop now."

The tears started then, turning quickly into sobs. She gulped in huge breaths of air, but her body continued to starve. She kept at him anyway, pummeling him with fists and fury and shoving at him with her palms, battering him with all the useless intensity of the waves they'd seen crashing against the ancient cliffs, until finally he gathered her against the warm flesh of his chest and simply held her.

Which only broke her heart further.

"I'll never forgive you for this," she whispered, trying valiantly not to sound as shattered as she felt.

"I know," he whispered with an aching tenderness that sounded so real she almost thought she could reach out and touch it. "But I'm not in this for your forgiveness," he added, running his hands in a soothing gesture along her back. "Besides, just a few more days and you'll never see me again."

The fact should have brought her comfort.

It didn't.

She'd made a terrible mistake, one whose consequences she'd only begun to face. To survive, she had to be strong, cut off all feeling as completely and ruthlessly as Sandro did. There was no point in struggling against him now. Her time would come later, at a moment of her choosing.

She would never let him turn her over to the general.

"Better?" he asked against her hair.

She lifted her chin, didn't bother wiping the tears from her eyes. "It takes more than a few lies to break me."

He smiled then, a smile that looked as real and warm as the tenderness she'd heard in his voice. Whoever this man really was, he was as talented at lying as he was at everything else.

"Hey, Petros," he called over her shoulder, then continued in what sounded like a Slavic language.

Her heart start to race all over again. Panic and dread crowded out the moment of insanity. "What?" she demanded. Dear God, he couldn't really be turning her over to that vile little man. "What are you saying?"

A sliver of panic cut through the question.

"Hang on," he whispered, then waited. But above the fading patter of rain, no sound came from the other side of the house.

Chapter 10

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"
G
et your things," Sandro instructed, pulling away but keeping one of her hands in his.

Miranda grabbed her purse and the bag with her clothes, but when she looked to where her knife had landed, she found only a threadbare rug mangled on the dirty hardwood floor.

"You won't be needing that," Sandro said. He pulled on an olive T-shirt, then traded the hand that held hers and stuck his other arm through the sleeve.

"Petros?" he called again.

Again, no answer came.

"Is he gone?" she asked.

"Doubtful."

"Then what?"

"Come on," he said, leading her into the darkened hall. She didn't want to follow, but he left her no choice.

The storm had just about passed, leaving a dark stillness in its wake. They passed the bathroom, where bubble bath, shampoo and stupid dreams remained, as well as the goofy floppy hat he'd bought for her.

The pang of loss only strengthened her resolve.

The kitchen was as empty as the bottle of wine on the table. In the main room, they found Petros on the sofa. His breathing was deep and regular, a faint rumble from his throat.

Sandro stared at the inert form, his hands balled into fists. "Touch her again, you son of a bitch, and you're a dead man."

The vicious words went through Miranda like lightning. Her heart staggered and stalled. There was a ferocity to Sandro that had not been there before, a raw possessiveness that both frightened and … fascinated. She'd never been around that kind of intensity before, like iron heated to the point it glowed like red-hot coals.

Petros was oblivious. Out cold, he didn't move a muscle.

Questions jammed through Miranda, but before she could squeeze the words past her impossibly tight throat, Sandro tugged her toward the back door. And as much as she knew better than trusting the man who had kidnapped her, she wanted to risk remaining near the sleeping Petros even less.

Five minutes later they were in the old car, tearing into the night. The substandard roads were slick, the air surprisingly balmy.

"Why did you do that?" she asked. She told herself not to be afraid, that he wouldn't hurt her, but the chill seeped into her blood and snaked around her bones. "Why did you just leave him there like that?"

Sandro kept his hands curled around the wheel, his eyes on the road. "Maybe he was right, after all," he muttered. "Maybe I want you, the glory, all for myself."

* * *

Sandro found no glory in what had just gone down. Destroying was part of what undercover special operatives did. Misleading. Calculating. And until tonight, he'd always reveled in the masquerade, savored the collection of falsehood upon falsehood, all building to the apprehension of dangerous criminals who threatened freedom everywhere.