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Tabitha

Why did he have to ask all the embarrassing questions that made her insides curl up and shrivel? How did he read her more thoroughly than anyone she’d ever met? What was it about him that made her obsessed with his every breath?

These were questions that plagued her as she forced herself to stay away from Rory freaking McCabe for an entire week. Just to prove she could, because her body was not stronger than her mind. Its… yearnings were not factoring into her decisions, no way, no fucking how.

“It really is very unfair,” she said aloud, enjoying the clomp of her boots thudding on concrete as she paced. She ran her fingers up and down between her breasts. “This is determined it wants to get close to him. I mean, those few hours on the couch with him were pleasant, but completely unorthodox.”

“Mmmph.”

“Nobody said you could talk,” she snapped, kicking her captive in the back of his knee, buckling his leg. For good measure, she booted the other knee so he dropped in his bonds, the coarse rope around his wrists biting into flesh when his weight pulled him down. “Bad men who sneak into little girls’ beds at night don’t get speaking privileges.”

Making pathetic noises behind his gag—a gym sock she’d soaked liberally in chili sauce and duct taped in his mouth—the middle-aged delivery driver, father of two, and all around very bad man was strung up before her like a naked pi?ata.

“My father was like you.” Reaching for the sheath at the small of her back, Tabitha slid her hunting knife free. “He didn’t sneak; he didn’t have to. Master of his own house, yadda blah. He summoned.” Walking around him, she flicked the blade with deft movements of her wrist, opening his skin one miniscule cut at a time. “Are you beginning to understand why I don’t like you, Mr. Luca?”

His plaintive moan told her he did indeed understand.

“What is it about pedophiles and kids? Is it because they’re smaller, easily overpowered? The sounds they make when you fuck them, prey animals succumbing to a predator?” Her mouth twisted as she remembered the noises she’d made the first time, and how her father reveled in them. “Does the act of breaking trust get your little dick all hard, or is it the fact you’re taking something innocent and marking it for life with your toxicity?”

He shook his head frantically, sweat splattering off the end of his nose.

Standing in front of him, Tabitha studied the worm wiggling on her hook. He’d been on her list for a while; she’d taken it as a sign when he finally took the bait she’d used to confirm his true identity. “Should I tell you what I did to dear old dad? Maybe I shouldn’t—wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise.”

His eyes, brown with a sheen of panic, widened.

Pressing the tip of the blade to the center of his hairline, she cut a thin line down his forehead, his nose, skipping the tape over his mouth, and continued along his throat. “Ah, what the hell. I rarely repeat the same party trick twice. He was a bad man; much worse than you. Hurt everyone he came in contact with—men, women, and teeny, tiny tots. Bad man, bad man, bad man,” she sang under her breath.

She watched blood bead along the cut she made down Luca’s abdomen, the scarlet drops pleasing her beyond measure. Blood was her kind of currency, a universal payment balancing out sins and tragedies. “He used pain and fear as weapons. Raped women and little girls. Turned children into monsters. I cut off his cock and shoved it down his throat, letting him choke on it while his blood turned into a lake.”

Good times, she thought with a smirk. Dominic’ scream as her blade cut through the root of his pride and joy became the benchmark for every kill that came after—and she hadn’t managed to top it yet.

“Men who do despicable things to little girls and boys don’t deserve a penis. Honestly, I don’t understand why the world thinks the males of the species should be in charge.” A twitch of her wrist was all it took to slice the skin on his flaccid appendage, eliciting a pained cry from her victim. “It’s such a delicate organ, really, nothing special. I’ve castrated dozens of assholes like you, Mr. Luca. Made them beg for forgiveness, to atone for their sins. Heard them whimper like babies and scream for mercy. Scream, scream, scream,” she murmured salaciously. “What will you do, hmm? Whine, whimper, scream, beg?”

He shook his head frantically, sweat pouring off him. A litany of Mmmphs vibrated in his throat.

“You’re right, of course. That’s a difficult question to answer when you don’t know what I’m going to do to you. So…” She smacked the flat of the blade against his dick as she mulled over the possibilities. “What should I do with you? I haven’t skinned anyone alive for a while; that might be fun. No?” she asked when he gave her a pitiful look. “Huh, well, I guess that makes all the difference.”

Tabitha pursed her lips, pacing around him again as she mentally calculated the time. She’d arranged to meet Luca here, in his own specially modified storage unit, when he greedily chomped on her fake eleven-year-old girl profile she used on specific websites. The unit was soundproofed, there were high quality locks on the door, and the asshole’s lair was kitted out with not only a bed, but a lot of gadgets, hooks, and tie rings.

Her stomach knotted. How many times had she been trussed up in cuffs and chains, a rope around her neck in predicament bondage, so her father could train her how to take a fucking from a target before she killed them.

Everything was always about learning how to get her victims to let their guard down long enough to slip a knife between ribs. Dominic had taught the males—Jasper, Troy, Ashford, Darius, Wesley, and the rest—how to hunt their prey instead of pretending to be bait to snare it.

Oh, she knew why her training program was so different to her brothers’. It wasn’t because she was stronger, faster, smarter, or more vicious. No, her whole life came down to what was between her legs, what her father could take from her.

She spent days circling the rabbit hole, tumbling into the depths, because of what he’d done to her. Once, there was a time when she’d been on the sane side of civilization. The memories were vague, almost too far in the past to remember clearly, but they were there.

Buried under a lifetime of pain and craziness.

However, she had more important things to worry about, and her time was sneaking away as night crawled toward day.

Smacking his dick again with the knife, she let a smile curve her lips, dead and menacing. “I wonder if your victims want to watch you die. If I hadn’t been the one to kill my father, I’d totally have wanted to witness the moment when his life ended. Unfortunately for the ones you made suffer for your pleasure, the only comfort they get from this is knowing you’re dead.”

More muffled speech, a heartfelt plea.

“Mmmph, mmmph, mmmph,” Tabitha mocked. “You know, there’s one method of punishment I’ve always dreamed about trying. More as an experiment than anything else, but I do wonder what happens to flesh when it’s injected with hydrochloric acid.” She scored a line down his limp cock, the deepest one yet. “Lucky for you, I’m ill-equipped for that little trip down science lane, and our time together is running short.”

When Luca went limp with relief, she smashed the hilt of the knife into his jaw. “Ah-ah-ah, don’t get all excited on me now. Just because I don’t have all my toys at hand doesn’t mean I don’t get to play.”

In actuality, all she needed was her bare hands. Pain or death, she was capable of causing it with just the most basic of weapons. She did love working with her knife, though. Of all her toys, her blade was her favorite, an extension of her body.

Silent, deadly, swift.

Humming under her breath, Tabitha studied the flabby man hanging by his wrists as though he was a carcass ready for butchering. She was skilled enough to do just that; she’d learned the anatomy and physiology of the human body when she was thirteen, could dismember one in under thirty minutes less than a year later.

She broke her personal record at fifteen.

“Would you like to say your last words now, before we begin?” Without waiting for an mmmph in response, Tabitha reached out and ripped the tape off his mouth, slightly unimpressed with the results of the chili gym sock. “Screaming, pleading, begging, and making a complete fool of yourself do not count as final words, by the way. I hear any of that, I cut your tongue out.”

He actually choked on whatever he’d been about to do. Probably not screaming, she mused; it was his storage unit, after all, soundproofed to his specifications. Begging or pleading was her guess, and both bored her.

The subtle buzz of her phone ringing broke her focus. Scowling at the interruption, she tugged it from her pocket far enough to see her brother’s name on the screen, then all the way out. “Excuse me a moment.”

Quiet sobs broke out behind her as she turned her back to Luca, curling her lip in disgust as she answered the call. “I’m busy, Ashford.”

“What the fuck have you done now?” he demanded, obviously not listening to her. “Christ, I’m beginning to think I should have a leash wrapped around your neck.”

“Try it,” Tabitha suggested hotly. “I’m your equal, brother. I suggest you don’t forget that.”

“Equal, my ass.” Frustration stained his voice. “I just flagged a contract with your name on it. Care to tell me how that happened?”

She flipped the knife, hilt to blade and back again, over and over as her temper began to rise. Ignoring the bite of metal against her flesh, she tried really hard not to let his holier than thou attitude get under her skin. “I take on a lot of contracts, Ash, same as you. Which one has your man-panties in a bunch?”

“The one with your fucking name as the hit!”

Huh, now that was interesting. She hadn’t been notified of any new contracts; she kept track of things like that. Humming under her breath, she switched the call to speakerphone, then pulled up the secure app and scoured through it for her name.

Oh, and there it was, loud and proud. Active for just over an hour, but no takers yet. Good, that meant the more experienced among her brethren were shy about taking her on. For most, it was a certain death sentence. One miss, one glancing shot instead of a direct hit… she would rain death and destruction on them like those fist-sized hailstones that plagued Texas a while back.

Being crazy had its benefits.

“Now I’m offended,” she scoffed, reading the price tag on her head in disbelief. “No one’s going to come after me for a paltry fifty thousand. Five hundred thousand might hook some of the bigger fish, but with my rep, they really ought to think about the upper ranges. Four to five million would probably land them a sharpshooter who can drop me from a mile away.”

“Can you not be suicidally stupid for one fucking moment?” Ashford demanded harshly. The rapid click of keyboard keys underscored his frustration. “I wish you’d think things through before you leap into shit, Tabitha. Darius may find it funny to keep saving your ass, but I’m getting tired of it.”

She blinked. Since when did her brothers save her ass? At no point had she ever asked them for help, nor could she remember them doing so of their own volition. Whatever shit she got herself into, she pulled herself out of it with teeth, nails, and sheer fucking grit.

No pun intended.

Temper stirring, Tabitha clenched her jaw, tightening her fingers around the knife still in her hand. She was sick of being the youngest, so goddamn tired of being labelled the little sister as though her skills were inconsequential. “Oh please, don’t trouble yourself on my account. In fact, I’ll make this easy for you.”

She hung up on him before he replied, too angry to listen to his nasty digs at her character. After all, she was what she was; nothing was going to change that now. Her die were cast, and she’d forever be this.

“Please…”

Scowling at the phone when it rang again, Tabitha switched the focus of her ire onto her captive instead. “I apologize, that was incredibly rude of me. Answering personal calls during our meeting.” She turned off the phone and returned it to her pocket. “Now, where were we? Oh, yes, that’s right. Last words for the bad man.”

“I don’t know who you think I am, but you have the wrong guy.”

Her eyebrows shot up. It wasn’t the first time she’d been given that excuse, but as always, it did buy him a few more minutes as she checked her mental records. “Arnaldo Luca, fifty-six. Six-one, two-sixty. Brown on brown—well, you’ve acquired a few silver hairs, I guess. Tattoo of the American flag over your heart—very patriotic of you—and another with the names Lucy, Abigail, and Chloe on your upper right arm.”

Her eyebrow lifted as she stared pointedly at said tattoo. “I don’t make mistakes. I don’t get the wrong guy. Bet you thought the cops would find you first, right? Or maybe you’ve been fucking little girls for so long without getting caught, you believed you were home free. Either way, you’re cooked.”

Hmmm, now that had potential. Did she still have that butane torch in her bag? As he squirmed, she gave him a reprimanding slice down the inside of his thigh.

The first of her warning alarms signaled from her wrist, telling her time was passing by quickly. She always set three alarms—ninety minutes, sixty, and thirty; she usually had the kill over and done with by the first alarm, cleanup complete by the second, and was gone from the scene by the third.

Silencing the irritating beep, Tabitha assessed the situation. She was distracted, which meant there was potential to become sloppy if she wasn’t careful. A creative kill often pulled her into a mental space where she lost track of time—hence the alarms—and she didn’t have any leeway for that now.

She’d be damned if she was going to be caught because Grit consumed her thoughts and her fucking brother was under her skin. Men would not be her downfall, not now.

Quick and simple, then.

Humming under her breath, she didn’t grace her victim with any more words. With the ease of practice, she mercilessly castrated him without further ado, her knife splitting open skin effortlessly.

As screams rained down on her, she realized they weren’t bringing the normal rush of endorphins to the surface; they were just annoying. Disgusted with her state of mind, she dropped the two useless lumps of flesh to the floor, ignoring the copious amount of blood forming a pool beneath the thrashing man, then decided to go the whole hog.

When his cock joined his balls, she stepped back, idly flicking the knife so blood splattered on the walls. There was no need to do anything else but wait for the catastrophic damage to run its course.

The screams died down to pitiful moans as shock kicked in. Luca hung limply, his face turning ashen.

Rather than watching him die, Tabitha began the tidying stage of a kill; cleaning her knife meticulously, using wipes from her bag to remove any trace of blood from the weapon and her hands, checking for any blood that might have found its way on to her.

Black clothing was always a good choice for a bloody murder.

She never touched anything she didn’t need to at a scene. No fingerprints, no trace of her left behind. Finding a metal trashcan in the corner of the room, she kicked it away from the wall and burned the wipes until nothing remained but ash.

When the cops found the body, they’d add it to her tally—this one bore all her trademarks. It didn’t bother her, yet there wasn’t any sense of pride either. Besides, once they dug through all the evidence and souvenirs of Luca’s crimes, they’d understand the why of the matter.

Satisfied her work was done, she grabbed her bag, flipped the hood of her sweatshirt up over her head, and gave Luca one last glance.

Graying skin, limp body, dead eyes.

One more pervert off the streets.

As she left the unit, her thoughts turned to Grit and what he was doing now. The urge to see him was overpowering, but her stomach churned at the idea he might have alternative plans. She missed the sound of his voice, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled. His scent, his touch, his quiet calmness.

For the first time in her life, she found herself actively missing someone.

The sensation didn’t fit comfortably, she thought, keeping her head down and slinging her bag over her shoulder. She watched her boots pound the pavement without really concentrating on where she was going. The eternally switched-on part of her brain guided her on autopilot where she needed to be.

Grit was forbidden, she reminded herself. For several valid reasons, the least of which was men were cruel, vicious beasts capable of doing horrible things when they lost control. Hell, half of them didn’t even need to lose control—they just enjoyed causing pain.

Nice on the surface wasn’t a guarantee of nice underneath.

The only way to protect herself was to remember not to trust anyone.

No matter how much she wanted someone to trust.

*

Grit

“What the hell do you mean, you haven’t seen her?”

Kneading the bridge of his nose, Grit gave his cooling pizza a longing stare. He’d had a bitch of a day, and Jasper verbally stripping his ass raw wasn’t adding sunshine and glitter to the shit.

“My job is to guard Elias, not babysit Tabitha. I haven’t seen her in a damn week, Jasper; you didn’t tell me to keep tabs on the girl.” Like he could, he thought with a silent scoff. Keeping tabs on her required a fucking GPS chip under her skin.

Pacing the living room, still in his jacket, he found himself growing concerned by Jasper’s tone. The man was the epitome of cool, calm, and collected. Tabitha’s sudden departure shouldn’t alarm him; disappearing and reappearing was her specialty, after all.

“Her contact in Ireland got tired of waiting for her to come through on the contract for Elias,” Jasper said without preamble. “They posted a lousy fifty-K hit out on her—not enough for the sharks to start circling yet, but it might entice some lower-level plankton into aiming for the higher rungs on the ladder.”

Grit clenched his jaw. “Taking her out would get someone a whole lot of adulation from their peers. Fifty thousand is pittance to what they could demand after eliminating a Fairfax.”

“They wouldn’t have time to enjoy it. Darius treats Tabitha like glass; if someone breaks her, he’ll have no issue doing the same to them.”

The thought of Tabitha’s crazy light being extinguished kindled a furious fire in the pit of his belly. It was none of his damn business—she was on her own path, one that came with risks of the deadly kind—but God, he fucking hated it.

“If she turns up, sit on her,” Jasper ordered. “Ashford is tracing whoever placed the hit. Anarchy dabbles on the dark web, but he lives in there. Whether she likes it or not, Tabitha is getting locked down until we get to the root of this.”

“It can’t be the first hit put on her. She can handle herself.”

“She can, one-on-one. Hell, six-on-one. But a dozen, twenty? Even she has limits, Grit. She can’t fight bullets or spot a sniper from a mile away—Thane could make the shot,” Jasper pointed out before Grit dismissed the notion. “He has made that shot; both Atticus and I would be dead now if he hadn’t.”

“Is there a waiting list for this contract?”

“Knowing Tabitha’s rep, probably. When it’s a non-exclusive hit, it’s first-come, first-served.”

“They declared open season on her.”

“Pretty much.”

“Fuck. Does she know?”

“Apparently Ashford got a bug up his ass about it, called her, and reamed her out. She hung up on him and switched off her phone. Now we can’t reach her at all.”

Was she on a job? Had she headed back to Ireland to clean up this mess? Grit doubted she’d gone into hiding, it simply wasn’t her style. Chances were she was on the move, but where the hell was she going?

“She shows up here, I’ll pin her down. Am I shipping her back to Phoenix?”

Jasper sighed. “Atticus has a holding cell ready for her. All that crazy needs secure containment, especially if we’re holding her against her will. Lock her down, and we’ll send a team to pick her up.”

“All right, I’ll keep you updated.”

“Grit… Atticus told me about the incident last week. Finding Tabitha in your bed.” Jasper cleared his throat. “I’m not going to go all big brother on you; hurting her isn’t what concerns me. I’m more worried about her harming you. You know how we were raised. Maybe you’ve guessed some of what was done to her, from a young fucking age. She’s damaged in ways I can’t explain.”

Grit paused mid-stride, scowling at the phone. He didn’t need to be told she was damaged; it was obvious after spending two minutes with her. Just as it was clear that she was still a human being, a woman, with all the same needs as anyone who hadn’t been groomed and raped by their father. “I appreciate the warning, J. Have you ever considered the craziness might be a defense mechanism?”

“That level of insanity goes too deep to be an act, Grit. I know what you’re thinking, and I’m sure your Dom instincts are urging you to intervene. God knows I love her, more than I believed possible when it comes to my own blood, but Tabitha isn’t one who can be tamed.”

Taming sounded so suppressive, like pumping her full of pills and expecting her to revert back into a sheep to follow the rest of the flock. It wasn’t what he wanted for her; she was too bright, too colorful, in a world where gray and black dominated the unique.

Instead of arguing, Grit bit his tongue. He wondered how much time any of her brothers had actually spent with their baby sister, whether they’d looked deeper than the initial layer of her inner self. “I get it.”

“Good. With any luck, this assignment will be over in a few days and you can haul ass back home.”

When the call ended, Grit tossed his phone onto the couch in disgust, then stripped off his jacket. Tossing it on the hook beside the door, he blew out a breath and tried to think if he’d brought anything suitable for securing a strong, slightly insane, ludicrously skilled wildcat to his bed for an undetermined amount of time.

The answer was, of course, no.

Padded cuffs were probably best; less risk of injury to those delicate wrists. Chains with U-bolt attachments so she couldn’t chew her way free, or undo the couplings. Because he just knew, given the chance, Tabitha would gnaw her way through straps or rope like an oversized hamster.

Then she’d murder him in his sleep, no doubt.

Damn it, he was going to have to find a store and be prepared in case she decided to come back here. If she did, pinning her down and getting restraints on her was going to hurt.

Something else he needed to take into consideration was how the situation might trigger her. It was unlikely Jasper knew much about what Dominic did to her, his methods and tortures. It was more than possible she’d rather kill Grit than feel that vulnerable ever again.

Fuck. This assignment was never-ending, and kept throwing him curveballs.

Pizza and beer would wait, he decided, retrieving his phone by leaning over the back of the couch. Once he got settled on the couch, any inclination to go out again would fizzle and die like a wet sparkler.

As he reached for his jacket, he hesitated. Suspicion crept into his bones; his room had been unoccupied all day, and he was aware how sneaky Tabitha was when slipping into hotel rooms without detection.

What were the odds she’d performed her breaking and entering act while he’d been out?

Zero, he concluded, after a thorough search of the bedroom, bathroom, and every nook, cranny, and storage space he could find.

Wherever Tabitha was, it wasn’t here.

Locking the door securely behind him, he walked down the hall to tap on Elias’s door. When it cracked open, he blinked once in surprise as Callie peeked through the gap.

Laughter lit her eyes, mischief all over her pretty face. She was in full Little mode. “Hi, Rory!”

He wondered how fired he’d be if he strangled one of her Daddies. Evander was likely the culprit; he seemed to enjoy annoying Grit by calling him by his real name, and now Callie was playing the same game. “Hey, Callie. Is Elias there?”

Mischief morphed into pure devilment. “Maybe…”

“Could you get him for me?”

Giggling, she yelled, “Daaaddeeee!”

Christ, she had a pair of lungs on her. The girl could sit on top of a cop car and act as the siren in an emergency.

“Little one, what have I told you about answering the door?” Elias’s accent was thick with stern British disapproval. “Evander’s in his office; go find him and tell him you’re getting twenty for disobeying an order, yet again.”

“Daddy’s cranky after a nap,” she muttered, then broke out in giggles again.

The door swung wide open this time, and Grit struggled not to break out in laughter himself. He lasted all of ten seconds before a chuckle rumbled in his chest.

“Everything okay, Grit?”

The chuckle escalated quickly when Elias’s brows drew together in a frown. The stick figures scrawled over his face in black and red ink looked pretty damn permanent. “Uh, yeah. Just wanted to let you know I’m heading out for an hour.”

Wariness flashed in Eli’s eyes. “Has something happened?”

“Nothing that involves you. Still, I’m here to make sure it stays that way.” Grit smirked, lifting his hand to gesture a circle around Eli’s face. “It seems I’m too late; there’s a traitor in your midst.”

“What?” Perturbed, he took a step back, turning to glance at the hallway mirror. With a truly amusing double take, he faced the mirror fully. “That little… Callie!”

“I’ll, uh, leave you to it. Don’t forget to lock the door,” Grit suggested, letting his laugh erupt in full force as he walked away, hearing Eli bellow his wife’s name again as the door slammed shut.

That right there was reason numero uno why he steered clear of getting involved with Littles. They were adorable, sure, and some of them—Sierra, for example—were shy and unassuming. Others—like Atticus’s Alicia, and Callie—possessed those traits and about a thousand more which were full of sass, brattitude, and troublemaking.

Only a brat could get away with doodling on her Daddy’s face with… hell, had it been permanent ink? Felt tip?

Someone was going to get a lot more than twenty swats for that stunt.

Tabitha wasn’t a Little. He’d confidently bet a month’s paycheck on it. Her sense of independence was too finely honed, her instincts too keen to balance killing with regressing.

Grit pondered on that as he summoned the elevator. Jasper and Tabitha’s sister—half-sister—was a victim of Dominic’s too. Caera displayed a lot of Little tendencies, many of which hadn’t come to light until she met Saul and felt safe enough to expose herself so fully.

Stepping into the car when the doors opened, he frowned. Tabitha’s career was an unorthodox one. She was in a position not many women found themselves in, being able to protect herself to unbelievable standards, disabling men three times her size with ease.

But did she ever feel safe?

Did she have somewhere that gave her a sense of belonging, comfort, peace?

It was none of his business, he reminded himself. Pulling out his phone, he Googled kink stores in the local area, attempting to distract his thoughts from uneasy notions. He was tasked with capturing her, locking her down until he could get her ass into a seat on a plane and back to Arizona.

By the time he reached the hotel lobby, he’d located a store a few blocks away, and he was still thinking about Tabitha.

*

An hour later, Grit returned to his room with a brown paper bag full of every possible thing he might need to keep Tabitha from running, arguing, or beating him to death with a lamp.

His wallet was several hundred dollars lighter, and his head was still full of her.

Because she seemed to like surprising him in the bedroom, he kicked off his boots and headed there first to drop off the bag. Shrugging off his jacket, he walked back into the living area, hung up the jacket, and gratefully dropped into the corner seat of the couch.

It was bad when he wished he had her phone number, he realized. She probably wouldn’t pick up if he called, but maybe it would alleviate this sense of helplessness. Right now, he didn’t know if she was dead or alive, if she was hurt or scared, and that… aggravated him on a primal level.

“Not my problem unless she comes here,” he muttered to himself, reaching for the TV remote and switching on the screen. Scrolling through the channels, he chose some cop show to keep his mind occupied, and dragged the pizza box onto his lap. “Can’t track her, can’t contact her, so it’s out of my hands.”

Gunfire blasted through the TV speakers as he bit into a vaguely warm slice. Even on the verge of cold, it was still the best damn pie he’d ever had. The first bite reminded him he’d had to skip lunch after the fucking disaster on site earlier that afternoon; the one where a roofer lost his footing and plummeted off one of the cabin roofs.

The guy was lucky he’d only broken his arm and gotten a concussion. The idiot had landed on a pile of discarded tarps, striking the back of his head on the thinnest part of the heap and the ground underneath, but his body had made contact with the bulk of the pile.

Three feet on either side of his landing site were several crates of slate tiles to the left, and an unforgiving stack of support beams to the right.

Grit had spent most of his afternoon helping with first aid, then paperwork.

He was so fucking glad it was the weekend.

Two beers, an entire pizza, and three episodes of The Rookie later, Grit was yawning every couple of minutes and ready to call it a night. He’d spent more time lifting and carrying shit the last few weeks than he spent in the gym, and he swore he walked a dozen miles a day checking out the construction crew under the pretense of helping.

Just because the threat had switched over to Tabitha didn’t mean the Irish prick behind this mess wasn’t waiting for the right fish to snap up another shot at Elias. The whole debacle started with the Brit; one way or another, it would undoubtedly end with him too.

Stifling another yawn, Grit stood and tidied the table ready for housekeeping the next morning, flipping off the TV with the remote. The damn room was beginning to feel like home, which he hated; he wanted to go home to his own place, with familiar carpet beneath his feet, his carefully chosen furniture around him, and his big-ass TV screen exactly where he’d left it.

Debating on taking a quick shower before he went to bed, he walked into the bathroom and switched on the light, his dick halfway in hand as he stopped in front of the toilet.

The dark shadow to his left made him pause and turn his head slowly.

“Goddamn it.”

Tabitha sat in the bath. Fully dressed, no water in the tub. Her expression was strangely subdued, the light in her eyes absent. They flicked to him, dull and empty. “I knocked.”

“Mmm-hmm. Why are you in the bathtub with all your clothes on, little tiger?” Abandoning his ablution mission, he crossed the short distance to her, going down on one knee.

“I don’t know.” Her teeth worried her lower lip. “What are you doing to me?”

“Not touching,” he pointed out, lifting his hands.

“I was fine before you. I loved my job, I could do it over and over again without losing sleep. You came along and now I can’t sleep. Everything tastes wrong. One week away from you and I feel like my world is tilting.” She twisted her wrist, holding her palm out flat until it angled toward the wall. “I don’t like it.”

Grit sighed. This was a twist he hadn’t expected. Obsessive stalking was one thing; an emotional attachment from a woman who vehemently claimed she felt no emotion? Something messy was brewing, and he was smack in the middle of it.

The misery on her face tripped his Dom switch. Caring was ingrained in him, and seeing her this way, so unlike her usual manic self, was disconcerting.

Cautiously, he reached out and brushed the back of his fingers down her jawline. When she didn’t break them off and stuff them up his nose, he cradled her cheek in his palm, unnerved by her capitulation as she let him take the weight of her head.

“When did you last sleep, Tabitha?”

She blinked. “I can’t remember.”

“Hmm. Eat?”

Her slim shoulders rose and fell in a shrug.

Grit rubbed his other hand over his face. There probably wouldn’t be a better opportunity to tie her up and send her back to her brother than now, but it wasn’t the right thing to do.

She was exhausted, disassociated, lost.

A growl rumbled in his chest. Standing, he held out his hand. “Stand up, little tiger.” When she barely registered the command, he deepened his voice. “Tabitha. Take my hand and stand up.”

Her fingers slipped into his, cold and stiff. Muttering to himself, he pulled her to her feet, then hooked his arm around her waist and hoisted her out of the tub. Releasing her before she reacted, he turned to jam the plug into the hole and set the water running.

“I need to get something from the living room,” he told her. “Get undressed, little tiger, and use a towel to cover up.”

The chances she’d do as he told her were slim to none. He doubted she’d even heard his voice in whatever hole she was stuck in. Still, he left her alone while he hurried back into the main space and used the in-house phone to call room service.

Upon his return to the bathroom, he found Tabitha exactly as he’d left her, shrouded in the growing cloud of steam from the water. What the hell was powerful enough to trigger her like this?

Women liked gloopy crap in their baths, right? Not that he was sure she was a girlie girl type of woman, but even a killer lunatic might appreciate that little luxury.

Grit rifled through the complimentary bottles stuffed into a long rack above the tub, finding shower gel, shampoo, conditioner, even shaving gel. Plucking one of the larger bottles from its spot, he popped the cap and took a sniff.

Apple and cinnamon.

Christ, she was going to smell like apple pie; his favorite dessert.

Pouring a hefty dollop of bubble bath into the water, he set the bottle back, and with his heart in his throat, faced Tabitha with wariness. It didn’t matter that she knew him, had shared an intimate moment or two with him; what she knew, what she remembered, didn’t come into play here.

“Tabitha, you can either undress yourself or I’ll do it for you. Are you listening to me?” He set his hands lightly on her shoulders, feeling the lack of tension. She was in limp mode, barely functioning. “Hoodie first, okay?”

“Don’t be nice to me.” Her arms lifted.

“I’m always nice to people who look like their world just collapsed and burst into flames.” Shaking his head, he grasped the hem of her hoodie, drawing it up and off. While her arms were still high, he slipped off the tank top she wore beneath. “What happened, sweetheart?”

“I kill people for a living.”

“Yeah, I know.” Grit flicked open the front clasp of her bra, frowning as she kept her arms raised straight. Snagging her wrists, he lowered them before sliding the bra off. “Been doing it for a long time, Tabitha. Sounds like you’re damn good at it.”

“I guess.” She closed her eyes. “Someone wants to kill me.”

So, she was aware of the hit. She didn’t appear surprised or upset by the threat—she was a woman with her finger on the pulse of that kind of thing, because it was her kind of business.

“I can’t imagine it’s the first time.” Stepping back, he switched the water off. “There’s always someone with a grudge, right, or who wants to knock the top dog off the pedestal.”

Her faint laugh was bitter. “Top dog. Ashford doesn’t think so.”

“Ashford?”

“Brother,” she mumbled. “Asshole.”

“Asshole brother, got it. He doesn’t think you’re top dog?” Grit lowered to one knee, easing her pants down cautiously. She seemed oblivious to the fact he was systematically stripping her down to the skin.

“I’m a child to them.” Her bottom lip quivered before she bit it.

Now they were getting to the root of the matter, he thought, steadfastly ignoring the long, slim thighs in front of his face, and the pretty blue panties covering a place he really shouldn’t be even thinking about.

He unlaced the heavy boots on her feet, picking each foot up and wiggling the shitkickers off, followed by each pant leg. The panties joined the pile of discarded clothing, and he still had all of his teeth.

“Little tiger, from what I know, you were never given the chance to be a child. I doubt your brothers see you as anything but a strong, capable, woman dominating a typically male-specific field.” Rising, he made a concerted effort not to look anywhere south of her chin. “What did the asshole say to make you upset?”

Evidently, it was the wrong question to ask; she fell silent again, worrying her lip until blood began to show.

Grit blew out a breath, lifting his hand to set his fingers beneath her chin and using his thumb to pop her lip free before she mangled it. “Why did you come here, Tabitha?”

“I… I needed you.”

The simple answer contracted his chest. Coming from an independent woman who needed no one, it was one hell of a declaration.

“Still need me?”

A flush of color highlighted her pale cheeks for a few seconds. Asking an emotionally-allergic woman to express her feelings, her desires, was akin to pulling her toenails out if her tightly pressed lips were anything to go by, yet she gave him a pitifully small nod.

“Then you’ve got me, little tiger.” He looped his arm around her waist, scowling when he felt the raised bumps of flesh against his forearm and realized they were goddamn scars. Instead of spinning her around to investigate them, he dipped his hand in the water to test the heat—soothingly hot—then guided her in.

“Why—oh.” Tabitha’s moan of relief told him she’d reached breaking point. She slid down into the water, those beautiful blue eyes fluttering closed as she sank to her chin in the bubbles.

Grateful for them and their ability to conceal everything Jasper would kill him for looking at, Grit rolled a towel and slipped it under her neck for support. Christ, she didn’t look well, the shadowing beneath her eyes more pronounced with those pale lashes overlapping them.

“If you want to sleep, Tabitha, you can. I won’t let you go under.” He wasn’t leaving her side until she was out of the water.

“My clothes are gonna get wet,” she mumbled, her brow furrowing. There was a tired whine in her voice. Her legs kicked restlessly beneath the surface, shifting the bubbles.

“I’ve got your clothes.”

“No. Then I’d be naked.” Her lips were barely moving, but the muscles around her mouth and eyes were becoming tense.

“Buck naked, Tabby Cat,” he agreed quietly, then tsked when she began to struggle. “Enough of that. Enough,” he repeated in a stronger tone. “Relax and enjoy your bath. Don’t argue with me.”

Her mouth trembled shut.

“Good girl. You came here for a reason. I’m going to give you what you need. Now, close your eyes, take a deep breath, and finally let that manic brain of yours have some peace.”

The pulse in her throat rabbited wildly. “I don’t like being touched.”

“Then you’re going to hate me in about fifteen minutes. You know what I am,” he told her gently, “and still you came to me. Time to stop being on alert for a while and let someone take care of you.”

Tabitha opened her mouth; Grit just arched an eyebrow.

Swallowing hard, she bobbed her head. Uncertainly flashed in her eyes before she squeezed them shut. Her body damn near vibrated in the tub, her unease palpable, but she showed him a remarkable amount of trust nonetheless.

It pleased him immensely.

Standing, he grabbed the wash cloth and shower gel from the rack, settling onto the edge of the tub and dunking the cloth in the water. He felt Tabitha’s anxiety surge, making a low noise of reassurance in his throat.

Whatever her asshole brother said to her, it had knocked her confidence or her self-esteem, whichever part of her fueled the sassy, fearless persona she wore so seamlessly.

Starting with her hand—after a brief but intense battle—Grit began to tend to her the way he would any wounded sub. Lathering her up with fragrant gel, massaging her palm and fingers, working along her forearm and up her biceps.

Slow, unthreatening movements of his fingers designed to make the wildcat purr. Spreading his magic over every inch of her aside from her breasts and pussy.

Saving those two areas for last, he took his time stroking the cloth over her skin, noting each and every freckle, scar, and… tattoo? Well, that was a surprise. High on the inside of her left bicep were the words, No Surrender, in what he assumed was her handwriting.

Loki would have a fit if he saw it. Avalon’s tattoo artist and piercer was fanatically particular about his artwork, and Grit suspected Tabitha’s amateur work might give the guy a heart attack.

The tattoo itself said a lot about her. Inflicting pain on herself wasn’t an issue, and she wore a visible reminder not to bow down to anyone. Was it a mantra she followed? Something to do with her father or just life in general?

Tabitha’s head thunked lightly on the back of the tub, her neck arching over the towel. Her pulse wasn’t quite as erratic, her muscles were looser and not trembling as hard as they were. She was learning his touch didn’t cause her pain.

Satisfied she was comfortable, Grit spread the cloth over his palm and fingers, covering her breast. A handful of perfect flesh, full and firm. Beneath the dying bubbles, her stomach muscles went rigid, her hands curling into fists.

“Easy, little tiger,” he crooned, keeping his hand still. “Not gonna hurt you.”

Her lip curled. “Don’t touch.”

“Do you trust me, Tabitha?”

“Don’t trust anyone.”

Understandable, he supposed, but fucking frustrating. Beneath the cloth, he felt her nipple budding into his palm. “Need you to give me an inch. Just an inch. Can you do that?”

Revulsion marred the peace on her face, straining her features. It was a big ask, a test he wasn’t sure she was ready for, so it was a delightful shock when she acquiesced with a whimper.

Quickly, lightly, he washed one breast, then the other while she bared her teeth and kept her eyes squeezed tightly shut. “All right, that’s good. Done now, little tiger—you can stop snarling at me for the time being.”

Breathing ragged, she repeated, “Don’t like being touched.”

“And yet you’re handling this well. Lean forward.”

If anything, she pressed back further against the tub. “No.”

“Please,” he added in a firm tone, pushing her limits to see which inflections appealed to her more.

Tabitha clamped her hands on the edge of the bath and hunkered down.

“How old are you, Tabitha?”

She blinked. “Um… twenty-seven? Twenty-eight, maybe?”

“You don’t know?”

“Birthdays aren’t something we celebrate.”

No, the mad scientist and her husband probably hated celebrating the birth of their many test subjects, Grit thought bitterly. Why would they when most of the children under their care were disposed of via unspeakable methods? Rita likely marked the birth dates in whatever records she kept for her research.

“When was the last time you kissed someone?”

Her mouth twisted in disgust. “Kissing is a means to an end.”

“How about sex? For… work or for pleasure?”

Bitter laughter filled the room. Icy blue eyes opened and met his. “Dominic taught me how to use sex as a weapon; it isn’t one I use.” A muscle under her eye twitched. “I disarm my prey before…”

Grit’s cock shriveled slightly at the implication. The little tiger apparently spent a lot of time amputating vital parts of the male anatomy in order to protect herself. Although amputating didn’t feel like the right word when her victims presumably didn’t survive their encounter with her.

“How long?” he repeated, keeping his tone casual.

“I think I was seventeen?” Her brow furrowed. “There was the Russian… oh, and that French diplomat who had the preteen kink.” Some of her usual madness shimmered in her eyes for a brief second, reflected in her smile. “That one caught me off-guard, got me tied to his bed and…” She trailed off, shuddering as the memory resurfaced. “They sent him back to France in a couple hundred pieces.”

“That’s my girl.” He brushed the back of his fingers over her cheek, catching the tear he doubted she knew was there. “So you’ve never had a positive, painless sexual experience.”

“Sex is pain. I hate it.”

“It doesn’t have to be.” Deciding to avoid a fight, Grit changed his plans slightly. His thoughts drifted as he began washing her hair. “Your father was a child predator, you get that, right?”

“It’s one of the reasons I cut off his dick and made him choke on it.”

“Hmm. So you understand that everything he did to you, everything he made you do, warped your view of sex? Guys like him get off on pain because it gives them pleasure, Tabitha. We both know that fear has a scent and causing pain can be almost euphoric in the right context; they feed off that, use it to pump their egos and feel like their tiny dicks are worth something.” He dumped a puddle of shampoo on her head, started kneading it through her silky hair. “Men like me, we might enjoy catching a whiff of fear in our subs, tasting that euphoria when we add pain into the mix, but the biggest turn on for us is nurturing trust and giving back pleasure in exchange.”

Tabitha hummed softly under her breath as his fingertips found a sensitive spot at the base of her skull. “I’ll never be that vulnerable to a man again.”

Barely suppressing a snort of amusement, Grit refrained from pointing out she was as vulnerable as she was ever going to be right now. While she wasn’t defenseless—she’d never be that, seeing as she was a walking, talking weapon—she was exposed in more ways than simply being naked in the bath.

“Don’t you want to know what it feels like to be cut free, Tabitha? To trust someone so implicitly that you place yourself in their hands without question, let them guide you through fear to where you don’t have to think for a while?”

“No.”

Stubborn little Tabby Cat. Shaking his head, he rinsed the shampoo from her pale locks thoroughly, considering his response. She was effective at shutting down a conversation with that unarguable bluntness, so he took his time formulating a response.

Reaching for a towel, he pulled the plug and stood, lifting her from the receding water and covering her with the fluffy material. “Can you orgasm, little tiger?”

She jerked her chin up in challenge. “Don’t want to. It sounds…”

“Painful,” he supplied, snatching up another towel to wrap around her head. “I can’t tell you that they are or they aren’t. Some women orgasm so sweetly, they say it’s like riding a wave. Others come hard enough their pussies could crack walnuts while they scream the house down. An orgasm is different for everyone, every time. You don’t have to be afraid of it, Tabitha.”

If she’d been a dog, her hackles would be six inches tall and bristling. “I’m not afraid of anything.”

Laughing—not unkindly—Grit rubbed the towel over her hair before bundling up the white-gold locks. “I can name two straight off the bat; sex and intimacy.”

“I… That’s not…” A furious flush blossomed in her cheeks as she stuttered. “They don’t count. I-I…”

“You said you’re not afraid of anything. Sex and intimacy do count as something, whether you agree or not.” He tapped a fingertip on the cute tip of her nose. “The fact you’re speechless right now proves I’m right.”

“Only because you addled my brain with hot water and bubbles,” she muttered.

“Yeah, I’m sure that’s it,” he commented dryly, holding out his hand. “Why don’t I addle it some more by feeding you?”

“I-I’m not hungry.”

“For someone who cuts the tongues out of liars, you’re skirting a fine line.” Capturing her wrist, he tugged gently until she padded forward on bare feet. Small, delicate feet finely bisected by pale, silvery scars. “Come on, before you fall asleep where you stand.”

“I’m not t—”

He made a warning sound in his throat, giving her a quick squeeze of approval when she recognized it for what it was: do not lie to me.

Leading her out into the living room, he was pleased to see room service had obeyed his orders down to the letter—the food was waiting on the coffee table rather than the dining table in the next section over, covered with a warming platter; there was a fluffy white robe draped artfully over the back of the couch, and they’d come in and gone out without Tabitha being aware of anyone else in the room.

Grit stopped by the couch, his hands going for the fold of the towel where he’d knotted it closed. With a couple of deft movements, it dropped into his hands, leaving Tabitha naked and uneasy.

“Breathe, little tiger, I’m not going to ravish you.” His gaze roamed over her, a smile quirking his lips. “Even though you are possibly the most exquisite thing I’ve ever laid eyes on. No touching,” he said when her arms crossed over her breasts, “but you need to drop those hands back to your sides, Tabitha. There is no hiding from me.”

Her arms lowered, as did her eyes. Shivering, she muttered something under her breath, over and over again. Thinking she was cursing him out, Grit tackled the not unattractive task of drying her off, making sure his hands didn’t come into contact with her skin without the fabric between them.

“…a child anymore, she’s safe. I’m not a child anymore, she’s safe.”

Jesus, Connie would have an absolute field day with Tabitha if she ever got her hands on her. The Mistress wouldn’t put up with any shit from her, regardless of what Tabitha did for a living, and would dig into the mindfuck Dominic and his fucking wife had planted in their project’s head.

When his touch skimmed over areas that triggered her, she scrunched her face up, her hands fisting by her sides. Her training obviously included forcing a willingness to obey over self-preservation.

Perhaps in her mind, they were one and the same.

“Safe, safe, safe,” she whispered, her breathing disintegrating into whimpers.

“Yes, you are.” Grit tended to her patiently, his heart breaking for both parts of her—the child who’d been raised without love, beaten and raped into becoming the woman who was mired in so much pain and fear that even her craziness couldn’t bury it. “Relax your hands, Tabitha. I’m not going to hurt you.”

There was a hair-raising moment when he dried between her legs, as clinically as he could manage, where he thought she might give ripping his throat out a damn good shot.

Her threatening snarl was borderline whine.

“Nearly done,” he said casually, moving around her to do her back. “Hold still.”

The scars… fuck, the scars. So old they were little more than silver lines running over her skin like the ones on her feet, yet they spread out like some demented spider’s web across all of her. Thick lines, thin ones, some that weren’t made by a whip or a cane but by God only knew what. The ones he’d felt earlier were from wounds he didn’t want to imagine, yet the proof she’d survived them were in front of him.

Evander and Elias’s Callie wore similar marks. She’d been belted and caned by her father, abused by a pseudo-Dom, but this… this wasn’t the result of a regimented beating or a punishment.

This was caused by inflicting pain for pain’s sake.

Her skin twitched and flinched beneath the soft stroke of the material, her back so tense he thought her spine would snap if he made one wrong move.

Did Jasper have any idea what had been done to her? He sure as hell didn’t have this tapestry of scars on his body, or the mental wounds in his head. Not to Tabitha’s degree, anyway.

Furiously impotent to do anything to fix it, Grit finished up and bundled her into the robe, tying the belt securely around her waist as she stood and shuddered. “Good girl, thank you for trusting me. Sit down, little tiger, and get stuck into your food.”

As shell-shocked as she’d been when he found her sitting in the tub, Tabitha shuffled around the couch and plunked herself down, staring vacantly at the blank screen on the wall.

Fuck, he’d broken her again.