In For the Kill (McClouds & Friends #11)(138)

“No, I am coming with you, with the chiavetta.” He held up a router. “We will get coverage on the way with this.”

Sam’s blood roared in his ears. “You aren’t going anywhere,” he said. “You’re staying right here, where it’s safe. You are a kid.”

“Kid?” Misha’s voice dripped with irony. “Me? Safe? Where?”

Sam hissed through his teeth. “Okay, so you’re not a normal kid, that I’ll concede. But you’re still fourteen, and I’m responsible for you.”

“I’ve been responsible for myself since before my mother died.”

“I don’t give a f*ck who you think is responsible for you. I let you out of that room, so I’m responsible now. And I say you stay here.”

Misha’s fingers clicked. The screen went dark. He snapped the laptop closed. “Okay,” he said. “Take the laptop. Guess my father’s password. Figure out how to use the program. Find the code for the RF frequency of Sveti’s tag, all by yourself.”

Sam’s jaw dropped. “You manipulative little shithead.”

Misha crossed his arms over his thin chest. His eyes blazed defiantly from his pallid face. “I have been called worse.”

“I’m sure you deserved it. Do you want to help Sveti or not?”

“Of course I want to help Sveti,” Misha said haughtily. “Sasha would want that. But if you want my data, you cannot leave me here.”

Sam pulled out the Glock and pointed it at Misha’s thigh. “Not happening, kid. Sorry.”

Misha stared at the gun, then at Sam’s face.

“I won’t kill you,” Sam said. “But I will turn your quadricep into red paste. And trust me. It will never be the same again, no matter what they do to it. You have ten seconds to pull that icon up again.”

Misha gazed at him for a long moment, his face expressionless. “Do you remember the man who was with me when you and Sveti came to the house a few days ago?” he asked.

Sam did not lower the gun. “Yeah,” he growled. “Why do you ask?”

“That was Andrei,” Misha said. “He was the closest thing I had to a friend. Of course, he would have put a gun in my mouth if my father had told him to. But I do not blame him for that.”

“That’s big of you,” Sam said grimly. “What about him?”

“My father was angry when he found you had been here. Andrei was just a warm body, not very smart. No one told him anything. But I knew. Papa had Andrei beaten to death in front of me. To punish me.”

“Jesus,” Sam muttered. “And you’re telling me this exactly why?”

A smile flashed over Misha’s face. He opened a drawer in the desk, pulled out a dagger with a jeweled handle, and laid it down. Then he took out a Walther PPK and a full magazine. He slid it into the gun, locking it in place. As if he didn’t give a f*ck whether Sam shot him or not.

“Put that down,” Sam scolded. “You’re fourteen, for Christ’s sake.”

“I would like to reach fifteen,” Misha said. “I grew up around men who would shoot me in the leg if it was convenient for them. I know these men. You are not one of them. You cannot shoot my leg, Sam Petrie. Do not tell me that you can. It makes you look stupid. We are wasting time, and Sveti is in danger. This argument is finished.”

Sam lowered the Glock. Christ, his groin hurt. His jeans were blood soaked to the knee, starting to dry stiff. “Fuck,” he muttered.

“It is not a bad thing,” Misha said, by way of consolation. “I did not mean it as an insult.”

“That makes me feel so much better,” he growled.





CHAPTER 28

The heavy drone in her head hummed beneath the images of blood and bones. Not until the drone lowered in pitch and she began to bump and lurch did she pull it together consciously. She was in the trunk of a car, and they’d turned off the highway, onto a smaller road, with stomach-churning twists and dips. She was folded up, arms still bound. Her shoulders hyperextended. Her hands were almost numb.

Liv’s ring. She struggled to get the little blade snapped out, but no matter how she twisted and strained, she could not get her forefinger positioned so that she could get the blade near the plastic ratchet tie.

She snapped the blade back into position as the car slowed and finally rolled to a jolting stop. Car doors popped open. She heard the rumble of masculine voices. They were arguing. What a surprise.

The lock mechanism rattled. The trunk popped open.

Hazlett and Renato gazed down. The look on their faces reminded her of the hot glow that had always been in Yuri’s eyes after beating her. To think she’d scolded Sam for playing dominating power games in bed. With what breath she had left, between one screaming orgasm and the next. But she’d scolded Sam out of sheer habit. To keep him at a distance. To keep her feelings for him in a little locked box that she could open or close at will. Embarrassed by her desire for him, ashamed of his power over her body. Now she could see Sam’s passionate generosity so clearly. It shone in her memory like a star, compared to the less-than-human emptiness that squirmed in these two men’s eyes.

She closed her eyes against it. She had no one to blame but herself. She’d f*cked up colossally. She’d failed everyone: Mama, Papa. Her Seattle family. They were flying blind into a death trap, just because they loved her. The little girl in the cave, flowers twining around her rib cage, abandoned and unavenged. The entire goddamned city of Rome, for f*ck’s sake. She’d failed them all.