Yield (3 page)

She looked like some innocent hidden away from the world for most of her life. Unsullied. The report said she was twenty-six. She probably knew every sex position in the book.

Who gave rat’s ass? Just
looking
that innocent grabbed my attention.

Man, I was in trouble.

The vehicle hit a bigger bump and veered off course. I tugged it back into line and cleared away all the visions clouding my mind, or tried to.

My cock ached with the possibilities. I didn’t feel right about kidnapping her, or killing her, just to tidy up my world...and how messed up were my morals that I’d even considered that? Pieter would be surprised to hear me question my moral code but it was true. There was a line I never wanted to cross and I’d found it the day we’d thought about killing Jazmine. Today had only reinforced that line.

Yeah, deep down I was a little angel with a halo made of stolen gold...and I had so many dirty things I wanted to do to pretty little Wren...over and over and fucking over.

Wren

In my hotel room, I packed my handbag under Hugh’s vigilant eyes. The Beretta, with an extra magazine, made the bag weigh a ton already. My wallet was in there too, as well as everything else a woman needed on a dirty evening assignation, like red lipstick and pepper spray.

Hugh put a small packet in my hand. His facial expression was as disgusted as that of an opera singer asked to do rap. We’d argued for hours. Apparently, what I was about to do was the equivalent of throwing myself off a cliff. There was no one whose opinion I valued more. Hugh had been a cross between my bodyguard and babysitter for years. When he’d finally agreed to help me, I’d been torn between wanting to give him a big hug and smacking him.

I turned the packet over. A condom?

“When did you become my mother, Hugh? My creepy mother, come to think of it?”

He raised a brow. “I’m being practical.”

Agreeing, taking it, seemed to say, first of all, that I was indeed having sex with this Richard in exchange for information. Ugh. What had I been thinking? Second, that I should not expect him to provide the condom...or condoms. Wasn’t that traditional male territory?

“No.” I placed the packet on the glass-topped sideboard. With my forefinger, I pushed it away a few inches.

His brow stayed up.

“No thank you, Mother, I have other plans.” I did too. Let’s see what mister tough and arrogant Richard did when faced with insubordination. Wrong word...not insubordination, no. A redefinition of his clause. I didn’t really expect to need a gun. My guards had been left intact, just gagged and bound.

The man could have hurt us both. Hugh wasn’t a superhero – just a super-good friend slash bodyguard slash security organizer.

I reached for the last item on the sideboard – a knife – and slid it from the leather sheath, then turned it over. The blade danced with light.

Knives with their long, sharp steel, and their potential for penetrating the human body, were endowed with an unearthly promise that never failed to send cold shivering through me, down my spine, between my legs, to my sex.

The things a knife might do.

“I don’t think you need this either.”

What? I frowned. Sometimes, Hugh had a thing about letting me near knives, as if he sensed when they affected me badly. As I mostly did, I gave in. Gently, Hugh took the knife and sheathed it.

Snatching up my bag, I marched to the door, and threw a few last words over my shoulder, “You are odd. Guns get a big tick of approval but knives make you jittery?”

“I don’t get jittery. Today is a day when you make me think you’ll be careless. Your pistol has a safety catch.”

“Hah.” I pulled open the door. After Hugh followed me out, the luxury hinges huffed closed slowly.

With the Beretta, I could hit a bull’s eye at twenty yards with ninety-three percent accuracy. A knife required close-up encounters. It required me being near enough that an assailant could wrench it from my hand if I made a mistake. No matter how much training I had in self-defense, a man was more dangerous up close. Hugh’s logic argued the opposite, that I might hurt this Richard by accident. Maybe it was best I not be tempted.

“I’ll be in the bar for a while, talking to a possible informant. If you need me, do not hesitate to press the emergency button in your handbag. We can track you to a degree with the location service, but here, in Papua New Guinea, it’s not going to be as reliable. We may lose you. Be careful.”

“Sure. I will be. You remember, no surveillance of us meeting at his car.”

“I agreed to that, and if this goes wrong and all he wants to do is to ransom you, you’ll lose millions.”

I nodded. Nothing more to say, really. We’d gone over this ground many times. This was not in Hugh’s handbook on keeping me safe.

I needed to know what had happened to Dad. Even if he was...had been, an utter bastard of a parent on most days of my life. Love didn’t obey logic.

I heaved in a breath.

There was one other couple in the corridor, also heading for the lift.

My black high heels made no noise in the carpet. Such a quiet place. Behind all those doors, people were probably fucking their little hearts out while tied to the beds, being spanked, cropped, snorting cocaine. Even if I didn’t partake, I knew of fetishes, kinks, and addictions. It had hardly been a secret after dear brother showed me a video of father whipping one of his mistresses. I’d been ten. Such a sweet brother, and I’d loved him too, despite his flaws.

If I died tomorrow, I’d be the end of the family line.

The family line being extinguished bothered me little. Our...my Gavoche family was about as close to Heaven as the murderous medieval Borgias. It was sadness that flattened me. My mouth turned down as I contemplated the past.

Children, a baby or two, might be nice, one day. At twenty-six, I could finally declare myself responsible enough to be a mother. No one else was left. Father could no longer deny me.

Babies... Huh. I clamped down on bad memories but a tear or two threatened to spill. Funny, how a still birth bit so deep, even though it was a person who had never quite been born. I sniffed then swallowed past the tightness in my throat. The pluses to being the last one left standing. Fuck, there had to be some, right? As well as the excess of money?

The handbag slapped against my side, no doubt making the crushed red silk of the dress even more crushed.

A few yards down the street from the hotel’s circular drive, barely within the pool of light from a streetlight, Richard waited. Arms folded, he leaned on the hood of a black corvette – an old, remodeled one from the looks of it.

I glanced about, betting this spot was outside the hotel’s video surveillance range. Far enough to be safe for me to walk, but also discreet.

“Enter.” He waved at the Corvette.

Once I was sitting in the car, he leaned over and drew down the safety belt at the same time as I put my hand to it. His larger hand engulfed mine, pulling down the belt to click it in place while I stared at the stubble on the side of his face, stricken with both fear and arousal. This close, smelling him was a given. Whatever pheromones had kicked in, they were doing unwelcome things to me.

If he leaned his elbow on my lap, I’d possibly self-combust.

“I can do this myself.”

“Just making sure.” He resumed his seat. “Wouldn’t want you getting hurt.”

No smile, just that assessing appreciation that strayed downward to my breasts, for a second, before he met my gaze again.

Smug bastard. I blinked and pretended to straighten my skirt. Scary bastard.

Smart rejoinders could wait. Right now, this second, I was still humming with the effect of his proximity. Breathing steadily needed my concentration to the nth degree.

I simply hated men who could do this. It reeked of me losing control, them gaining it. Father had been good at that – control, and most men who attempted to make me do what they wanted only triggered a rise of temper. Sometimes when it was the stupid thing to do.

I had to say something or seem an idiot. But what?

He started the engine, clicked on his own belt, and pulled away into traffic.

Saved.

“We’re going to a friend’s house. Not mine. Not far from here.”

After driving in what seemed circles, no doubt to check for my men tailing us, he stopped at the side of the road with a small bridge just ahead.

“Is there anything in your handbag that’s important to you?”

Suspicious, I gripped it tighter, on my lap. “Why?”

“It’s going into that river.”

Fuck him. “Why?”

“You know why.”

He put out a hand, imperious, expectant – and having it there in front of me, waiting, annoyed me no end. My gun – I’d lose that.

“The deal’s off if you don’t give me it.”

Could I claim my phone as precious? No, he wasn’t that stupid. “My wallet has all my credit cards, my driver’s license.”

“I’ll keep those for you.” His hand stayed out.

“And pills. There’s a packet of them in there I need. I don’t have another prescription.”

“They’re prescription? Not crack, uppers, downers? I’m not saving your fancy little rich girl designer drugs.”

Shit. This man... I had thought him hot, now I knew better. Just another asshole.

“I don’t do drugs. I have a sleep disorder. I sleepwalk.”

“Sounds like fun. I’ll find the pills.”

My temper simmered down from molten to bubbling.

“You’d better be trustworthy.” Because if he wasn’t, I’d drive his bloody Corvette keys through his eyes before I’d give in to any demands.

“I am.”

“You really expect me to –”

“I do. Trust me or it’s off.”

And so, after another twenty or thirty seconds of stonewalling him, and fuming, I relinquished the bag. Then I watched him find my wallet and pills, take out the cards, and declare me a bad girl for having a gun. Asshole. He drove closer to the bridge and exited the car to hurl the bag into the water.

The splash died away, leaving only the throb of the engine then the slam of the door as he reentered.

Gone. On my own. It had been nice knowing I had a gun if I needed it.

Glass might be a recruiter for one of those slave houses. I could end up locked away forever as some man’s sex slave. I risked a sideways look and his set expression gave me no reassurance. I could be dead tomorrow too. Shut up doubts.

“Damn you,” I whispered, staring out the window at the stonework of the bridge. “Damn you to hell.”

“I’m already going there. Save your breath.”

Hugh needed to invest in a GPS tracker I could insert up a body cavity. And wouldn’t that be fun on a date night. Making light of this wasn’t going to fix anything but it made me feel better.

“Now we can have our night in privacy. I’m allergic to people barging in with guns.”

“Really? I’m not so gauche as to let Hugh do that.” I slumped back into the upholstery. My orneriness surged to the fore. Fuck him ten times over. “Besides, I have an emergency beacon elsewhere on me.”

“Oh?” I couldn’t see much of his face as he drove, but amusement showed in his tone. “Then I will have fun searching for it, with you naked.”

I glared. If looks could kill, he’d just been stapled to the seat with a hundred knives. Sharp fuckers. I could see the blood soaking that fancy dark shirt. The handles wedged deep, right up to his chest. Well...almost see them. Let’s see him call that fun too.

I kept my eyes open as he maneuvered through the streets, fairly certain I could find where he was taking us on a map. Until he pulled over and made me sit still for a blindfold to be tied on. Deal or no deal. I had to say yes. This was getting more and more like a bloody game show.

At one point, I sneaked up a hand to raise the edge. He stopped me with one uh-uh and threatened to tie my hands. Now that rang alarm bells.

So I was good, outwardly, while inwardly adding some knives to the collection in his chest.

The echoes and creak of a metal door winding up said he’d driven into an underground car park. Somewhere secure then. A compound for foreigners probably. They were a common way to be safe here, what with the high crime rate against foreigners.

When he led me up and around some flights of stairs and through a door, then lifted off my blindfold, I found myself in an immaculately decorated apartment.

“What a pity,” I sighed out.

That drew a sharp look.

I studied him as he ambled from the short entranceway into a living room to toss the blindfold onto a giant glass and metal chessboard. Ferns and small palms added greenery, their fronds hanging from small pots. An ocean theme encompassed a sand and blue color scheme, paintings, and furniture like a driftwood-inspired coffee table. There was even a small rowboat upended and fastened upright to one wall.

“A pity? Why?”

I shrugged.

To the left was a small but modern kitchen that ran along the wall. Beyond him was an opened wall looking out onto the night sky. Folded back shuttered doors were concertinaed at either end.

“Call me Glass. It’s friendlier than Richard.”

“If you want.” Was this another fake name? Glass, it sounded like a nickname.

He propped his hand on the wall beside the boat.

For a moment I admired the way his arm muscles bulged and flexed under the sleeve of his dark gray shirt. Glass had that physical solidness of a man who could effortlessly fill a room with his presence. Had it in spades. Curiosity kept me looking far too long.

I tore myself away and answered his first question just to see his reaction.

“I was hoping to see a few knives in you when you removed the blindfold. My imagination amused me on the way here.”

“Bloodthirsty.”

“Yes. That’s me.”

He studied me. “Snap. Me too. We’ll make a great couple.”

“I’m paying you a lot of money. Don’t trivialize this.”

He snorted. “I’m not toning down my jokes for you. Be happy I’m not trivializing your quest to find your father’s killer.”

Stalemate.

Slowly, he approached, his tread measured, his gaze as nonchalantly menacing as a leopard that’s found a fear-paralyzed bunny in its territory.