Page 6 of Kept in the Dark (Hitmen of Ulysses #2)

“Your hand is torn up, but your face is good. I mean… it hasn’t been hit,” she corrects needlessly. “Obviously, you were the one landing the hits.”

“Perhaps the fight was a bit one-sided,” I allow, thinking of how Felix’s witness was tied to a chair for most of it.

Her lips twitch. “I’m not surprised. It’s probably hard to find another person big enough for you to pick on someone your own size.”

“Da ,” I agree.

Most people are afraid, intimidated or in awe of my height and frame. She pokes fun at it. And this is why I like large women .

“ Da ,” she repeats, tasting the word in a way that drags my eyes back to her mouth with a fresh hunger. “I like the accent. I’m guessing Russian, given the rest of the guest list.”

“ Da, ” I say again, reveling in the little shiver that crawls across her skin.

“All the way from Russia. What are you doing in New Jersey? Other than admiring the view with a stranger.”

As she speaks, I watch her lips, admiring their fullness. I do not realize at first that she has teased me until they tip up at the corners in an expectant smile. “It is not my usual way,” I reply. “You must be an exception.”

“Nice. Now call her an exceptional woman,” James offers.

“Shh, let him work,” Wesley chides.

Fuck. I had forgotten about my gallery of nuts. Their commentary snaps me out of the spell created by the moonlight and an unexpected encounter with temptation.

Right. My cover. The job. Viktor Volkevich.

This woman is not for me—our flirtations are not a private, shared moment. I should ensure the bratok has left and return to the house. I still have photographs to take.

But then she says, “An exception. I like that. Does that make me special, or lucky?” and I know I will not be leaving her side anytime soon.

“That depends on your perspective. Do you normally consider yourself special or lucky to be followed into a dark garden by a stranger?”

Her laugh is breathless; her stare is a challenge. “ That depends on the stranger’s intentions. I’ll admit I have my doubts about yours.”

“You are questioning my intentions?”

“Well, you did follow a stranger into a dark garden,” she says in a delightfully throaty, teasing way. “But I suppose they could be good. Pure, even.”

I let her see as my eyes forge a slow path up and down her body, feeling my own tighten in response. “They are not. ”

“D, are you flirting or threatening her?”

“I think this is him flirting,” Wesley chimes in, his voice thick with restrained laughter. “I suddenly understand the self-imposed celibacy.”

“Yeah, this is hard to listen to,” James agrees, his amusement also plain. “Stick to killing people, big guy.”

I nearly growl in frustration—they are breaking my concentration—but a startled laugh slips from her lips and her eyes widen, as if she cannot quite believe I am coming on with her, or perhaps that I am being so obvious about my desire. But her disbelief is not a joke, like theirs.

A noise catches my attention. My training kicks in, and I tense and shift away from her to turn in my seat towards the potential threat, only to realize it is a couple, drunkenly stumbling towards the maze. Drunk in a maze? What a terrible idea. I hate mazes.

“Right. Anyway…” The soft dejection in her voice makes me frown as I spin to face her again.

Her eyes are averted now as she reaches for the shoes on the ground by her feet.

She stands, depriving me of her honeyed stare, moving quickly into the grass and putting distance between us.

“I’m going to head back in. It was… I was going to say that it’s nice to meet you, but I’m not sure there’s anything nice about you, is there? ”

“No,” I agree, standing. “All the same, I will walk you.”

Her brows shoot up as she swallows the rest of her sentence, her jaw falling slightly open as she tilts her head up. “Really?”

“How else am I to prove my intentions to you?”

Her eyes dart across my face, searching it.

Her pupils are quite large, but not with fear.

With curiosity. With desire. I realize she is interested.

She was trying to leave for some reason other than indifference.

I see the hesitancy, just as clearly as I see the want and something deeper and guarded.

After a moment, she makes a pleased little hmm noise, and her lips twitch slightly. “I suppose it’s only fair to give you a second chance, but I warn you—it’s probably a lost cause. You make a pretty strong first impression.”

“You strike me as a woman who likes things strong.”

“Jesus,” she murmurs with another small laugh that zings right through me. “Now that was a line.”

“Perhaps.”

“Well… you’re not wrong,” she muses. I see her visually measuring the width of the bicep closest to her, so I flex for effect, and because it pleases me to watch her eyes widen slightly.

“God, I wish I had popcorn.”

“The wild assassin is a dangerous animal, and its courting practices are as extraordinary to witness as they are befuddling,” Wesley adds in a strange voice, as if he is narrating an animal documentary.

I place a hand on her lower back, and she stiffens against it briefly, then relaxes. Satisfaction thrums in my veins.

Only my feet make noise against the stones as we walk back towards the gardens; she sticks to the grass. More couples have wandered onto the terrace for some respite and fresh air, and I am almost disappointed that we are no longer alone.

She pauses, pushing back against my hand, and I look down at her curiously. Is she having second thoughts?

Sensing my question, she lifts her arm, and the shoes sway back and forth as they dangle from her finger by the strap. “I’m not sure if it’s better to wear these or not. I took them off because my feet hurt, but the grass ends here, and those rocks look pointy.”

“D, get down on your knee and help her with her shoe. She’ll eat it up.”

“What?” Wesley asks.

“Just trust me; get down and put on her shoe for her. All those little buckles and shit? When they’ve got those long nails, it’s hard for them. Show her chivalry ain’t dead; it’s just… rough around the edges.”

Oh, now James wants to help?

I consider the idea for a second, then realize I like this advice. It will allow me to touch her somewhere more intimate—an ankle, the arch of her foot, a calf. I want that very much. Both my hands flex, full of sudden anxious energy to have her weight and warmth against my palms once more.

“You should wear them. Here, allow me.”

I hold out my hand expectantly, and with a curious cock of her head, she hands over the shoes. In a fluid motion, I drop to one knee, lean down, and gently grip her lower leg. She has good, strong muscles in her calves, and I cannot help but run my thumb across the smoothness of her skin.

She lets out a soft noise of surprise. “Oh!”

Looking slightly bewildered, and glancing around to see if anyone is watching, she allows me to guide her leg up and place it gently on my knee. The motion parts her skirt at the deep slit on the side, and I get more than a flash of golden skin. The head of my cock pulses.

“I’m not very good on heels because I don’t usually wear them,” she explains distractedly as her hypnotized stare tracks my movements.

Frowning at the broken skin on her smallest toe, I wrap the straps around her foot, then ankle, tying a bow when I run out of ribbon length.

I am careful not to tie it too tightly. Her attempt to balance and not lean too hard on me fails as she switches to the other foot and must now stand only on her toes.

Her hands press into my shoulders, and it fills me with enormous gratification as she gives me more and more of her weight, trusting me to support her.

This side is the one with the slit, and I push the dress over her thigh to reveal the entire length of her leg. The silky material cascades, swishing into place and remaining there.

“Give her a compliment, but don’t be creepy. Something not about her body.”

Perhaps James does know what he is doing .

“I like this dress,” I murmur, as I slide my hand from ankle to knee, then back down her calf to rest around her heel.

“I’m… coming around to it.” Goosebumps rise on her flesh from my touch. I exhale noisily, wishing to run my tongue along their texture.

I take as much care with this shoe, wrapping and then tying neatly, wanting to draw out the anticipation for as long as possible. When finished, I stand, brushing off the knee that was in the grass, and replace my hand on her lower back. “Ready?”

“Definitely,” she croaks, then clears her throat of the desire making it raw. “Th-thanks for doing that. No one’s ever… that was… um, thanks.”

There is a loud hollering in my left ear. “See? She can’t even think straight. I fuckin’ told you so!”

“That was smoothly done, Dimitri. I’m impressed.”

“Is she hot? Can you see her, Wes? She sounds hot—”

There is no real cause for it, but anger rises swiftly in my throat, and I tap the comms in each ear in turn, severing the connections. I will open the lines again with just a touch if anything comes up, but some things are best done alone, without a devil whispering in each ear.

I do not want James and Wesley to listen to us anymore, to know more about her, or to be there as she gives in to me.

That passion is for me . Her hunger is mine.

She stirs something deep and primal that has been lying dormant in my chest—jealousy, possessiveness, the urge to take and hide her away, because no one fucking looks at what is mine.

Perhaps James had a point. There is such a thing as after hours . This job will be over soon enough—perhaps I can convince her to give me her phone number.

“Shall we?”