UndercoverSurrender (2 page)

“He didn’t!” Bobby cried dejectedly from the floor.

“No, but Vik here knew he was being set up. So I’m not sure
it proves anything.”

Vik glared at the man.

“How about another test, though, Vik? You put Bobby there
out of his misery and you can have his spot on my boat.”

At the suggestion, Bobby began to struggle to try to get to
his feet. The thugs moved forward, but at a sharp shake of Gunderson’s head,
they halted. This was apparently going to be one on one.

“What do you say?” Gunderson prompted.

“You want me to kill your own man?”

“Look, boss—” Bobby croaked, leaning heavily against the
wall, clutching his bleeding arm.

“Funny thing about Bobby is, he was so all fired up about
proving you couldn’t be trusted, he forgot I don’t trust nobody.” Gunderson
stared pointedly at Bobby. “Yeah, that’s right, you stupid fuck. You think I
wouldn’t notice you taking a little extra off the top now and then?”

Bobby’s face lost even the little bit of pasty color it had.
“I was going to pay it off. I swear. Every bit!”

“You’re a dead man.” Gunderson’s voice was flat at the
pronouncement. He turned to Vik. “You do it and you got a spot on my boat. You
don’t and my boys out there’ll take care of both of you.”

“They could try,” Vik said calmly.

“I’m starting to feel you might be a little queasy about wet
work, Vik. Am I right?”

Maggie had no idea how this was all going to shake out or
how she had somehow ended up in the middle of their little drama. Jakarta was
filled with criminal activity, but her golden rule was to stay out of it and
she said with more confidence than she felt, “Look, everybody out. Now.”

The fact that they all ignored her was maybe a good thing in
retrospect, she immediately realized. She was wise to just try to fade into the
background.

Bobby, who had more at stake in the matter, apparently did
not feel the same. He lunged at Vik, a knife in the hand that wasn’t bleeding.
What good that would do him, when the two other thugs were standing by to
finish him off anyway if Vik was not so inclined, was not clear. But Bobby
never struck her as much of a clear thinker at the best of times and now he was
bleeding like a stuck pig. Maybe he was just pissed.

Vik deftly blocked the blade and shoved the other man away,
so hard he staggered again, but quickly recovered. Vik’s own knife was now
prominently held aloft as he watched Bobby circle again.

Stuck pigs were dangerous after all.

When Bobby lunged again, Vik jumped back a little. But the
third time, Bobby sealed his own fate. He had gotten too close. Without
hesitation, or further debate, Vik seated his knife in the other man’s chest.

Maggie couldn’t suppress her gasp.

Vik pushed the body away from him and wiped his knife on his
jeans, staring at Gunderson.

With a nod to his two cohorts, Gunderson instructed them to
carry the fresh corpse out, presumably to dump in the nearby sea.

“Happy now?” Vik said.

Gunderson shrugged. “I got to make sure a man can handle
himself with a blade. That he’s not afraid to use it.”

“You must lose a lot of crewmen with that kind of test. You
might want to pit your job prospects against somebody outside your own team.”

“Bobby was a thief. And worse. He got what he deserved.”
Gunderson turned to Maggie. “Thanks, babe. Bobby pay you already?”

She startled at the sudden attention and nodded vigorously.

He turned back to Vik. “You can have the girl if you want.
Can’t rape a whore if she’s been paid anyway.”

“You could’ve fooled me. But no thanks. I’m not in the mood
after all this childish bullshit.”

Maggie neglected to point out that a knife fight to the
death wasn’t what one normally thought of as childish.

“Okay. Up to you. See you first thing tomorrow at the docks.
We’ll take off then.”

Vik nodded, glancing at her, and then back at Gunderson.
“Look, you got a second? I got a few questions.”

Gunderson was looking at Maggie with a slight smile and
opening his pants. His attention was something she sure as hell didn’t want,
from everything she had heard and from what she had just witnessed here, but
she had it now.

“Not now, man. I feel like hanging out here for a while. She
was paid for, after all.”

Maggie’s stomach inexplicably dropped. She took a deep
breath, not sure why she felt so squeamish all of the sudden. Maybe it was
Bobby’s blood still on the carpet.

She could do this. She really could. It was what she did.

She glanced around desperately for the whiskey bottle,
realizing with despair that she had left it downstairs, and felt those intense
green eyes on her.

Not knowing why, she locked eyes with the one man in the
room who she knew for sure was a killer, that she had seen kill, even though
she knew the other one had a list of victims a mile long if the gossip was
true. She glanced at this Vik’s green eyes. How had she ever described them as
cold? They were warm, soft and warm and surrounded by long, black lashes.

Suddenly, Philly seemed so far away as she stood in her
little Jakarta hovel, looking for comfort from this Greek god of a fellow who
could wipe another man’s blood off his knife like most people would grab a
paper towel in the john. Incredibly, she almost felt as if she was going to
cry.

And Christ, she probably hadn’t cried since that first trick
more than a decade ago.

“Actually,” Vik said, “I changed my mind.” Not taking his
eyes from hers, he walked right up to her, in the process forcing Gunderson to
back away a little. “If you don’t mind, I will take the girl.”

Gunderson gave a jovial laugh and she saw with relief that
he was zipping his pants back up. “Well, you really should. You earned her.
We’ll be out at sea for a while and she’s what passes for pretty around here.”

Instead of leaving, though, the big blond man sauntered over
to the only armchair in the room, a worn overstuffed number Maggie often slept
in since she equated the double bed with more taxing endeavors. He sat down.

“Don’t mind me, you two. I like to watch. I can tell a lot
about a guy from how he uses his blade. But even more from how he uses his
cock.”

Vik’s lips thinned at the comment and his eyes darkened. In
that moment, Maggie saw that Bobby may not have been too far off the mark about
this stranger and if pushed too far, Gunderson might see that as well. Not
stopping to analyze why, she put her hands around Vik’s neck and brought his
head down to hers, standing on her tippytoes to bring her lips to his firm,
warm ones.

Tense for a moment, he then relaxed into the kiss, his fingers
sifting through her hair. Funny, a long, long time ago, her lover had done just
that and it had felt so…so shivery. So like it felt right now as this strange,
beautiful man did it, gently, his fingers running through the long strands of
her hair as she kissed him. She felt his lips move along her cheek, her neck,
her throat as his hands strayed down to her hips.

With his mouth against her ear, he whispered, “You don’t
have to do this with him watching.”

She pulled back and repaid the favor, tasting the clean,
warm skin of his throat, his jaw, his ear. “But you do,” she whispered, biting
his earlobe gently, and feeling his hands clutch on her hips, knowing he
understood what she was saying. This was a test of another kind and he’d be
wise to just pass it. “It’s okay,” she murmured. “I see only you.”

Against her stomach, she felt his hardening cock twitch and
she thrust her tongue in his mouth, sucking on his for a moment.

She led him to the bed, pulling her clothes off as she did
so until she was naked. When she put her hands to the waistband of his jeans to
do the same for him, though, he stopped her, simply unzipping his jeans instead
and pushing her to lie on the bed. He lay down on top of her, balancing his
palms on either side of her head, almost as if he was trying to shield her from
the other man’s gaze. It was ridiculous—she’d had more men and more
permutations thereof than she would ever care to remember—but she found it more
endearing than she would have thought. As he settled between her thighs, she
opened them with more than her usual professional enthusiasm.

And then came the kissing.

Kissing wasn’t something Maggie particularly liked to do.
Never had. Except with her long-ago lover of course. It was the rare client who
cared anyway. But she fell naturally into kissing this man. His mouth was soft,
but firm, and his tongue insinuated rather than invaded. They kissed for so
long that Gunderson grunted from the sidelines, “Jesus, you going to fuck her
or not?”

She didn’t know if Vik heard the sarcastic comment. She only
knew she barely had. And she certainly didn’t care to get on with it, as she
usually did, time being money and all. Because as intoxicating as this man’s
kisses were, his gentle fondling was even more extraordinary. With hands big enough
to close over breasts she’d long ago given up lamenting were too small, he felt
her up—not in the crude way usually associated with that expression. No, he
really
felt
her, kneading softly with one palm until his fingers moved
in ever closer concentric circles to her nipple. The groan she let out into his
lips was as genuine as she had emitted in a decade.

“That feels so good,” she murmured, because it was true and
not because she was trying to turn him on. He was turned on already anyway. She
could feel the hard, heavy weight of his penis against her bare thigh.

Suddenly, she did want to feel him in her. She fumbled for
one of the handy condoms she had in any number of places around her bed and
then slipped her hand down to pet him, registering how big he was as he took
the condom from her and slipped it on. A hefty size down there was something
she normally did not welcome, since a lack of enthusiasm on her part and a big
penis on the man’s usually meant pain for her or at least discomfort. But as she
slid her hand along his solid length after he had donned the condom and he
paused in his kisses to catch his breath sharply, she knew she was enthused
sufficiently. There would be no pain with this man. Eager for it suddenly, she
brought her hands around to the back of his jeans, slipping them down his bare
ass to give him more freedom of movement. When he thrust into her, she was the
one who gasped this time.

“Yeah.” Even Gunderson’s hoarse encouragement couldn’t spoil
the simple, pleasurable feeling of Vik inside her.

He slid out slowly and then smoothly back in and she wrapped
her legs around his narrow waist, planting her hands on his shoulders still
covered by the cloth of his tee shirt. Another sharp thrust had her arching
into him and opening eyes she hadn’t even realized had shut. When she did, he
was looking down at her. “Do you like that?” he murmured, so softly she was
sure their audience did not hear it.

“Yes.”

He plunged into her again. “Okay.”

He was quicker about it than she would have liked, but he
stunned her at the end. She honestly had not thought she could orgasm anymore.

She wasn’t sure how she felt about that as he pulled out of
her, getting up to dispose of the condom.

“Nice,” Gunderson said, standing up as well. “Might have
liked a little better view of the girl during it all, but nice. See you
tomorrow, Vik.” He gingerly closed the door behind him with a festive little
wave.

“There goes one sick bastard,” Vik commented, zipping his
jeans as she sat up in bed.

Maggie took a deep breath. “I guess I should thank you.
Bobby would have let you do anything to me, no matter what he’d told me. Kill
me even.”

“Yeah. I’m sure he would have.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“I didn’t want to. I don’t have anything against you.”
Incongruously, he smiled.

“And Bobby?”

The smile dimmed. “Look, I’m sorry if he was your boyfriend
or something, for real. But he was a bad guy. Believe me.”

“Stealing isn’t exactly out the ordinary around here.”

“Not that. He had a thing for kids. Anyway, the world is a
lot better off without him.”

“He wasn’t my boyfriend.”

“Good.”

“I don’t have boyfriends. I’m a whore.”

She collapsed again on to the lumpy mattress behind her as
he went over to the sink. After some clattering and the sound of the tap, he
sat beside her and held a glass of cold water to her lips. “Drink.”

She did. Cool, clear water. It was the one advantage this
dump had.

She drank it down and then he set the glass on the floor
beside the bed. He was holding her hand too, she realized, his long fingers
over hers, his thumb lightly stroking her palm.

“Who are you?” she asked softly.

The corner of his mouth went up. “Nobody you have to worry
about.”

She nodded.

“It was a stupid test,” he added ambiguously. “A cop is just
a man. He’d fuck you if he wanted to.”

“Even with that asshole watching?”

He shrugged. “I have to go.”

“Don’t.” It was out of her mouth before she realized it.

“You want me to stay, Maggie?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “If you won’t hurt me.”

He stood up and pulled off his tee shirt and then his jeans.
Naked, he climbed into bed beside her and pulled her on top of him. “I won’t
hurt you. I promise.”

But he had lied. He did hurt her. He reminded her of how it
felt to make love. And then he left.

Just like they all did.

Vik—short for Vikram—Pillay made his way to the docks. He
shouldn’t have done that. He should have just walked away and let Gunderson
have the girl. It wasn’t as if it was something she hadn’t done a thousand
times with a thousand different guys. But she had looked at him in that moment
with such despair in those tired, beautiful blue eyes—a despair he had
undoubtedly compounded by knifing a man right in front of her—that he resolved
not to leave her to that sick brute. Not in that moment. He had wanted to save
her from that at least—even though they had both just ended up putting on a
show for the bastard anyway.