Nix. (Den of Mercenaries Book 3) (19 page)

Aiming her gun lower, “The first one will go in your cock.”

“Fine,” he said, a bit too agreeably. “I’ll take you to her.”

Lawrence struggled to his feet, holding his hands out when she raised the gun a little higher, but he didn't try anything. Not yet. Instead, he pushed a rolling bookcase out of the way, revealing a door behind it.

He didn’t hesitate in entering, bright light spilling out, but Luna was a bit more hesitant as she followed, not sure what to expect.

But what she found …

Now the nausea returned, bile clawing its way up her throat.

She couldn’t help but notice the smell first—the sharp tang of blood mixed with the foul odor of someone soiling themselves—but once she found the source of it, she couldn’t believe her eyes.

There was a woman tied up with intricate ropes, binding her limbs to her body, hooks pierced so deeply into her skin that purpling bruises outlined them, and the rope twining between them all kept her suspended in the air.

Not a single inch of her was bare of bruises or cuts or dried blood.

And though it had been a year, and even as her hair had been crudely shaven, Luna could tell it was Cat hanging from the ceiling.

Shock had settled over her, but she was snapped back to the present as Lawrence laughed, the sound a bit manic.

“She was a masterpiece,” he said almost reverently, as though he expected her to take as much enjoyment in this as he did.

He was fucking sick.

Looking in his direction,
seeing
the satisfaction that oozed out of him, the first pinpricks of red spotted her vision.

Tossing the gun away, she didn’t watch it clatter to the floor, sliding across until it was nearly on the other side of the room, but Lawrence did. He was practically calculating the time it would take him to get it before she did.

She only watched him.

“Do you know why I like knives?” Luna asked, drawing in a deep breath as she pulled one of the blades gifted to her from Uilleam free, flipping it open with a quick twist of her fingers. “It’s harder to kill with them.”

* * *

K
it hated
the plan the moment he’d heard it.

He understood the need for it—men like Lawrence were easily panicked and should he have arrived with Luna, the man would have been less likely to go off with her alone.

Lawrence had to make sure that his future prey wouldn’t be escaping him as opposed to one that might have a significant other looking for them.

No, every part of Kit understood the reasoning—even knew that Luna could handle herself.

It was that fucking dress.

A dress that she didn’t need to be wearing unless it was in the privacy of his bedroom. Yet, there she went, hips swaying in that natural way of hers that had his cock hard and his need for her pounding away in his head.

But beyond his desire for her, he was more concerned with how well she would process the events of the night.

Aidra had already shaken her head at him earlier saying, “She’s distracted you,” before they had even left the penthouse. Kit would be the first to admit that he
was
distracted, but not enough that it compromised what he knew needed to be done.

But what a lovely distraction she was.

He didn’t think there was anyone that captivated him as much as Luna.

“I don’t see why you’re so worried,” Aidra said glancing at him. “If I recall, you sent me to take out a Columbian drug lord.
Alone
.”

“If
I
recall, you nearly died in the attempt, and I decided it was best to avoid unnecessary hindrances. This assignment, as personal as it is, is already enough of a challenge for even the most experienced.”

Aidra was silent a moment before she said, “She’ll never walk if you only let her crawl.”

Kit glanced at his watch again. “You’re missing the point.”

“And you’re making excuses,” Aidra returned.

“You don’t think I made a mistake in pushing you so far so soon?”

“If you hadn’t, would we be here? All I’m saying is give her a chance. Besides, you won’t always be there to save her. Learning to stand on your own is a part of one’s growth.”

Instead of responding, Kit glanced down at his watch. Fifteen minutes had already passed since she was escorted in. If she were to follow his instructions to the letter, she would be coming out within the next five.

But there was something that wasn’t settling well with him—and his instincts had never been wrong before.

Except, Aidra was right.

He couldn’t step in unless absolutely necessary—not if Luna expected to make it out alive. He could never guarantee, no matter how he wanted to, that he would be there to help her out of a bind.

But after these five minutes wound down, he was going in whether Aidra liked it or not. For this first assignment, he would make an exception.

Each one of those minutes passed with agonizing slowness, and by the time the fourth arrived without any sign of Luna, he set his untouched drink on the bar and started across the floor.

“You have two minutes, Nix,” Aidra called after him, the familiar warning ringing in his head.

It was a lesson he had drilled into many heads during his bout at the firm. The deviation of two minutes from the scheduled extraction time was the longest he would permit for others. And should they not make it out in time, then they were burned and left to get out on their own.

If he and Luna weren't back in the required time, Aidra was out the door—though after a distraction, Kit was sure.

For now …

Kit, very carefully, snuck up behind one of the guards that had trailed Luna and Lawrence to the empty hallway. When he was sure no one else was standing watch, he struck, snapping the man’s neck with one brutal twist of his hands.

With his phone, he opened a covert app on his home screen, sifting through other contacts before he got to the one he needed. In seconds, a red icon glowed on his screen before it grew smaller as it pinpointed Luna’s location.

The collar he had given her wasn’t just for him, but there was also a tracking chip embedded in the metal.

It didn’t take more than thirty seconds before he was in the private study, his gun now in hand as he followed the sniffles he heard coming from the other side of the room.

What he found as he stepped into the hidden room …

For years he had seen the worst life had to offer. The blood of children, lives lost in the quest for power and fame, but it was nothing compared to the sight of Luna on her knees, cradling the broken, bruised body of a woman he could only guess was the girl she often talked about.

There was blood everywhere, her skin and dress saturated in it. The metallic odor assaulted his nose even as he scanned her for the source of it all.

But besides a number of shallow cuts and newly forming bruises, there was nothing about her appearance that spoke of this much bloodshed.

At least until he got to the pathetic excuse of a man that was left of Lawrence Kendall. His eyes remained wide and unblinking, fixed on a distant spot on the wall—or had it been Luna that was his final sight?

She had made good use of the knives with the sheer number of stab wounds Kit could make out along the man's front. And one curious glance down at his open fly had him quickly looking away—she’d castrated him.

“Luna—”

She flinched, like her own name was hard to hear, but she didn’t release the hold she had on the girl, nor did she turn to look at him. “I should have cut her down sooner.”

Kit noticed then, the hooks in the girl’s back, and one glance up showed him exactly what Luna had meant.

But even at his vantage point, he could see that the girl was no longer breathing—a blessing, undoubtedly. She was sickly thin, with bruises, and her hair shorn. This girl had suffered, and at the hands of someone like Lawrence, it hadn’t ended anytime soon.

“Luna,” Kit called again, not bothering to look at his watch—it was well beyond time to go.

Never mind that the girl, though he knew she was close to her, wasn’t part of the job.

“Fifteen seconds,” she responded back, oddly.

“I don’t—”

“Now twelve,” she said, “before we’re meant to be at the door. I didn’t forget this was still an assignment.”

The way she said that, such hurt in her voice made him wish he could spare her this pain. More than anything, he wished he could take it from her.

After a shaky breath, she looked at him with watery eyes, “Do we have to leave her
here
?”

He knew what she wanted him to say, she didn’t bother trying to hide that. And the almost clinical side of him knew that leaving her there would be a better course of action, but the other side that was affected by her thought she had suffered enough for one day.

But it wasn’t what he felt for her personally that mattered. “We need to go.”

“We could take her with us, and I—”

“
Now
, Luna.”

She wanted to argue, protest further, but as she opened her mouth to do just that, shuffling back in the office had Kit palming his gun.

“Boss? Is everything—”

The second he cleared the entryway, Kit plugged two bullets into his chest, then one final one in his head.

They were out of time.

Starting across the floor, he grabbed Luna's arm, intending to drag her out if he had to, but she snatched her arm free, muttering words he couldn’t hear—though he was pretty sure he wouldn’t have liked what she said—then looked back to her friend.

She shook her head, whispering softly as she gingerly laid the girl back down, then moved to her feet. She barely spared Lawrence a glance as she went over to his body and jerked the knives she’d left embedded in him out.

Luna left the room without waiting for him.

Calavera
, he though staring after her.

Day of the dead.

Aidra was waiting by the door near the back exit, her gaze intense and scrutinizing as she took them in. Kit knew their time had been up, but Aidra had remained—it seemed everyone was breaking the rules.

On the drive back to the penthouse, Luna never spoke a word.

* * *

H
e was talking to Aidra
, but Luna wasn’t listening—nor did she particularly care.

She wasn’t sure at what point her sadness at Cat’s fate had shifted to anger, but once it hit her, she welcomed it—anything but the cloaking sadness that threatened to tear her up.

The second the doors opened and she could walk inside, Luna didn’t hesitate in stopping in the kitchen, bending down to the liquor cabinet and grabbing the first bottle she saw.

She didn’t bother looking at the label, nor did she particularly care what kind it was, she just wanted something she knew would take the pain away.

Luna wasn’t thinking about the fact that she and Kit were sharing a room, or that all of her things were tucked away inside of it. Instead, she headed for one of the spare rooms he’d told her about, closing and locking the door before she headed into the bathroom where she ran a bath.

Screwing the cap off the bottle, she tipped it to her lips, drinking down the burning liquid without hesitation. It seared her throat before settling into her stomach, but as the pleasant warmth began to spread, she didn’t think about that.

Slowly, she wasn’t thinking about anything at all.

Despite her earlier intentions as she sunk into the bath, she let the water burn away the rest of her feelings until she was in a pleasant state of warmness.

There was no pain and death.

There was no heartache and loss.

There was nothing—and she loved it.

Even the shallow cuts on her hands didn’t bother her—if anything, she was glad to see them.

They were a reminder that in the end, she’d had the last laugh with Lawrence—she was no longer the victim.

“Luna.”

She startled at the sound of Kit’s voice outside the bathroom door, water splashing onto the floor as she sat up. But he didn’t come in, nor did she see the handle move.

But that didn’t make a difference when she knew she had locked the other door.