Chapter One
Present
“Please, mercy!” The suit fell to his knees, but Vadim pressed the gun at the side of his head and pulled the trigger.
“What’d do you that for?” growled out McDaniel to the left of him, one meaty arm over the throat of a frightened young man, cheap suit stained with blood.
Vadim’s recent kill didn’t know it when he died, but death by Vadim’s hands was preferable to someone else’s. McDaniel’s men liked to enjoy the spoils of war, didn’t like clean kills, and would rather use up a victim, until they begged to die. Vadim might be one skilled motherfucker, may be able to take on McDaniel and six of his men, but he wasn’t excessively cruel.
It didn’t matter. Today marked the end of the Valentin family, and whatever friends they’d made, had fled or formed new alliances with whomever held the most power. One man couldn’t make a difference. Vadim didn’t consider Charles Valentin a friend, although he’d worked for the bastard before. No, Vadim’s interest lay elsewhere, on one person.
One man in a suit scuttled behind the sofa on all fours. A Valentin man. Vadim aimed his gun, interrupted by a woman’s scream. He knew that voice, remembered the sound of her laughter, how soft her curls felt when he twirled one finger to a loose strand to give it a tug. Even five years after he’d danced with Eve Valentin on her sister’s wedding, he could still recall how sweet she tasted on his lips.
Eve might be too good for a monster like him, but better him than men like McDaniel. Vadim only agreed to be on the Petrovichs’ payroll for one reason. The Valentins never stood a chance. Gustav had meticulously planned his vengeance for years, found men willing to slaughter an entire mafia family.
Vadim knew he wouldn’t have made a difference. He owed the Valentin family nothing. Charles Valentin used his services but was always wary of him, as was right. Charles was a decent boss, not the best, but decent. He didn’t dabble in human trafficking at the very least, unlike the Petrovichs.
Vadim shot the coward before the poor bastard could make it out the door. No chance for escape anyway. One of McDaniel’s men would have found the grunt and would have made him scream plenty first, before wasting him. Vadim knew men like McDaniel, but for now, their interests were aligned, or so McDaniel thought anyway.
Vadim walked past more bodies, ignoring the screams mingling with the sound of gunfire and up the flight the stairs. Family portraits decorated the wall, the smiles preserved. His gaze lingered on the last one, on his woman, although she didn’t know it then.
Vadim couldn’t stop the slaughter of her family, and he was no angel of mercy. Another ear-splitting scream made him hasten his footsteps. Rage thickened in his vision as he arrived at the hallway. Two fuckers held Eve down while a third stood over her, dick in his hand.
Hints of flesh peeked from her torn nightgown. Tears streaked down her bruised face, but the fire he remembered still lingered in her remarkable blue eyes. That fire could soon be extinguished if sweet, innocent Eve fell to the wrong hands. Gustav Petrovich had been known to make slaves of his enemies, to reduce what was once a proud human being to blank-eyed merchandise.
Not right. Only Vadim possessed the right to own every inch of Eve Valentin. Any other man who dared lay their hands on her, automatically appeared on his fast-growing kill list.
He didn’t remember moving. Vadim shoved the closest bastard off her, slamming his skull at the nearest so hard that bone creaked. The other man groaned, but Vadim pried the fucker’s lips open and shoved the barrel down his throat until he stopped moving. Given a choice, Vadim would snuff the life out of these ignorant fools who thought to claim what rightfully belonged to him. Patience, he told himself.
Vadim would never forget the faces of these cowards, these walking dead men. Once the smoke cleared, he’d hunt each of them down, saving McDaniel and Gustav for last.
“Remember, the bitch’s mine,” he hissed in the guy’s ear. The man choked on the metal.
“Vadim, Mitchell didn’t mean anything. Sorry. We forgot,” Mitchell’s partner in crime said, raising his hands in mock defeat, dick swinging from his open zipper.
This one, Vadim decided, he’d make an exception for. When Vadim pulled out the barrel from Mitchell’s throat, his companion relaxed, and he still wore that stupid expression on his face even when a crimson stain appeared between his legs. He screamed. The second man backed off, fear on his face. Ignoring him, although he made certain not to turn his back on any of these scum, Vadim yanked Eve’s arm.
She widened her eyes, screaming when he yanked her to her feet. Vadim needed her silent, at least for the moment. He grabbed his handkerchief from his jeans pocket, gagging her. She glared at him, tears in her blue eyes. Good. Without warning, he tossed her over his shoulder, ignoring her fists beating at her back.
“If any of you touched what was promised to me,” he warned. Mitchell shook his head, face pale. The other man still stared at the ruin that had been his friend’s dick.
“No, the bitch’s yours.”
“McDaniel will hear of this,” hissed the third on the floor, clutching his privates.
“Not if you’re dead. Get him to a doctor,” he told the friend, before making his way down the stairs.
“Anything happen I ought to know about?” asked McDaniel at the foot of the stairs. The leader of their cutthroat crew already had a young man on his knees, sucking his dick, a gun pointed to his skull.
Vadim didn’t have time to play who was the bigger badass bastard. Instead, he patted the sweet curve of Eve’s ass, gripping her leg when she tried to kick at him.
“I got what I wanted. One of your boys tried to poach my prey, so I shot him in the dick.”
McDaniel considered him for a few good moments. Vadim held the other killer’s gaze. If eyes were truly the windows to the soul, then all he saw in McDaniel’s was murky darkness, a mirror reflection to his own. McDaniel started to laugh.
“I’m guessing you ain’t going to share your bitch. None of my men ever fucked a mafia princess.”
His turn to laugh. “This bitch’s no princess, merely my property.”
Eve started to shake on his shoulder, but he showed no sign of weakness, keeping his face emotionless.
“I have no quarrel with you. They call you a beast, but unlike my men, all I see is emptiness. I can’t tell if violence excites you or this is just a job to you.” McDaniel shrugged. “To each his own, I guess.”
“You still need me around?” he asked.
Vadim had no answer for McDaniel, because McDaniel hit a sore spot without realizing it. An empty vessel, perfect for corruption. His father had said that to him once, deeming him the perfect canvas. Maybe Maksim Solonik trained him too well.
“Nah. Clean-up can be done by Petrovich’s grunts. What are you doing to do with the bitch after you’re done with her?”
“Eve Valentin will cease to exist. Tell Petrovich that. Any one searching for her body will find nothing.” A partial truth, but good enough for McDaniel it seemed, because the other man nodded, turning to his own conquest.
Vadim left the Valentin house, sweeping past the dead guards at the entrance. The street emptied when their crew made their appearance, but Gustav had the nearest police districts under his pocket. No help from the local authorities would turn up. Perfect.
He opened the passenger door of his truck. His gift certainly made matters a lot more difficult. Once he laid her down on the leather seats, Eve tried to kick at him again. When that didn’t work, she clawed at his face. He gripped her wrists, using his body to pin her down.
“Behave,” he gritted the words out. They weren’t in the clear yet. One or two of McDaniel’s men probably still lingered in one of the corners of the street, keeping watch. Doubtless, they’d report any thing they saw to their boss. Eve spat out the piece of cloth in her mouth. He closed his hand over her lips, wincing at the feel of teeth on his fingers.
“I’m sorry,” he said in advance, then found the pulse point in her neck and pressed down.
Her blue eyes filled with terror, but he didn’t stop, not until she lay unconscious on the back seat. Eve didn’t know yet that there was nowhere in the world she was safe. Not for a fallen mafia princess. If Vadim hadn’t insisted she be the payment for the job, she’d be someone else’s new property to break and wreck apart.
Vadim couldn’t have that, because five years ago, he’d made his decision. Eve Valentin would be his, in every sense of the word. Soon.
****
Rough men with vicious looks in their eyes and hands that cut like knives held her down. No matter how hard Eve fought, they’d only beat her harder.
“Scream for me, bitch,” said the black-eyed man unzipping his jeans.
The fight went out of her for a second. What reason did Eve have to live? Her sister was dead, and so were her mother, her father, and the rest of the Valentin family. All she’d ever known, eradicated in a couple of hours. She’d never fit in with her perfect family, but they were her flesh and blood.
Now, they were all gone.
No reason to resist these men, these monsters who got their rocks off seeing her bleed, save one. Vengeance for the one man who Eve thought had been her friend, a killer whose hands had been stained with blood a long time ago, but had been kind enough to ask an awkward, shy, and chubby girl to dance at her sister’s wedding.
Eve jolted awake, with soft and unfamiliar sheets tangled around her naked body. Only a nightmare, except when she looked down, she saw evidence of the truth. Bruises colored her sides, her thighs, but they appeared to be tended to. She pressed a finger over one, sniffing, surprised to smell some kind of ointment.
Even the shallow cuts one killer had made with his knife across her stomach, had been taken care of. Eve fingered the gauze. No. What was she doing? She had no time for this, to wonder which good Samaritan had taken care of her.
The last she remembered, she fought Vadim tooth and nail. Her mother had warned her, lectured her all those years ago after seeing her and Vadim dance at Clarissa’s wedding. Men like Vadim lied all the time, and trust didn’t apply to them.
Contract killers didn’t understand the concept of loyalty, had no morals, and would agree to any job if the numbers were right. Payment. Eve recalled Vadim telling one of his comrades that. Vadim had shot one of the men about to rape her in the groin for forgetting that little detail. She swallowed, recalling how her body froze completely in place. She’d known what Vadim was, heard the stories of him, but seeing how easily he resorted to violence up and close and personal, was an entirely different matter.
Eve needed a plan, but first, she needed to know where she was.
She didn’t dare move, or make any noises but studied her surroundings. A plain looking bedroom, the furniture minimalist. The door remained open, revealing a hallway, a flight of stairs. She held her breath. Freedom or a trap?
Wind ruffled her hair, and she found its source. The bedroom also led to an open balcony. Eve’s heart started on an erratic rhythm. Standing there, with his back turned to Eve, was her captor.