Ultimate Weapon (McClouds & Friends #6)(11)

It was her voice that was the problem. He remembered Tamara’s husky alto voice all too well. It made him shiver with raw hunger.

This woman’s wailing squawks of feigned appreciation were high-pitched, strident, stupid. They ruined the effect.

It was disappointing. Boring and exhausting, too, but there was no question of stopping, not with three of his men standing over the bed watching him, as was his custom. He could no longer conclude a sexual act without an audience.

Fortunately, Georg had no lack of willing spectators.

He tried to close his ears, picturing Kurt Novak’s pale, crazed eyes watching him as he possessed Tamara. Sweat broke out on his forehead. The most erotically intense moments he had ever experienced.

The thought detonated something inside him. He jerked, convulsed, came.

He collapsed for a few panting seconds upon the woman’s damp body. He could hear the heavy breathing of the men watching. Her perfume was unpleasantly strong in his nostrils.

He clambered off her body, fastened his pants, buckled his belt. The woman propped herself up on her elbows. He did not look at her, but he saw out of the corner of his eye her miffed expression. Arrogant bitch. Expecting to be praised and petted for doing her job.

One of his men cleared his throat. “Uh, boss?”

“What?” He sat down at the desk and powered up the computer, already putting the experience out of his mind.

“Can we…?”

Georg glanced back at the three men who’d stood slavering over the bed, and then at the growing outrage on the masklike Tamara face superimposed upon the redheaded woman reclining on the bed.

He shrugged. “If you like. I don’t want this one again.”

She folded herself up defensively. “That wasn’t in the contract! There’s nothing about taking on four men in my contract!”

“So you’ll be paid quadruple,” he said indifferently. “In cash. And I can refrain from mentioning this bonus to the agency.”

Her red lips pursed and her eyes narrowed, calculating.

Georg turned back to the computer, bored with it, and pulled up the file of digital photos he had collected of Tamara. He clicked through them with dreamy concentration, studying her from every angle. The whimpers, grunts, and muffled laughter that began to emanate from the direction of the bed faded away, and he was alone on the earth with her. No one else existed. Perfect beauty. Beauty, strength, perfect symmetry. The only fit mate for him. She just didn’t know it yet. She had no idea of the vast empire he would offer her, the power, the wealth, the luxury.

A voice intruded on his reverie. He turned and found one of his men, Ferenc, holding a waxed cardboard box in his arms. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that the woman was now on her knees, rocking vigorously as she serviced two men at once, one with her mouth, the other with her backside. The man holding the box did not appear to notice the pornographic tableau behind him.

That alone was remarkable enough to snap him to full attention.

The man’s eyes were frozen wide, his skin greenish gray. There was a greasy sheen of sweat on his forehead.

“What is it?” Georg demanded. “What’s in the box?”

“Jakab,” Ferenc said hoarsely. “Or…some of him.”

Georg pushed aside the packing material. A blood-drenched, severed head and hands were wedged inside. Jakab’s eyes stared up at him, wide and startled. He looked perplexed at his fate.

It would seem that Novak had discovered Tamara was alive.

Georg grabbed the blood-stiffened hair and lifted out the dead man’s head. Ferenc jerked his gaze away, throat working. Soft, Georg thought scornfully. Useless. He dropped the head into the box, and pulled out his phone, waving the man away. “Dispose of it.”

The man scurried out, stumbling in his haste. The panting and gurgling from the bed was beginning to annoy him. “Shut the f*ck up,” he snarled at the writhing knot of limbs. “I’m working.”

The heads of his men swiveled. They gave him assorted nervous glances. The head of the woman could not easily turn since she had a penis in her mouth, but her eyes rolled toward him. Her face, distorted by the act of fellatio, no longer looked even remotely like Tamara’s.

He turned away, letting it fly out of his mind while he concentrated on this puzzle. The operatives at Prime Security Solutions would never let slip any details about their search for Tamara Steele. The reputation of their organization depended upon it.

Which meant that there was a traitor in Georg’s own midst, in contact with Daddy Novak. He stepped out onto the balcony, pulling up the number for Hegel, the PSS agent on the case, as he ran through the roster of his staff, one by one, trying to imagine which one deserved a slow dismemberment.

The man picked up on the first ring. “Yes?”

“There’s been a new development,” Georg said. “I have discovered that she is in danger. I need her brought to me immediately.”

The man hemmed. “Ah, I will get in touch with the operative—”

“Immediately.” Georg dropped the phone into his pocket and looked up at the moon. It hung full and bloated on the horizon.

So he was no longer Novak’s chosen surrogate son. He did not really mind, he realized. He had developed his own power base by now. He preferred the role of avenging conquerer anyway. It suited his personality better.