Bone Deep (16 page)

“Do not ask us for what we cannot give you. We will not betray our plans,” Bone said fiercely.

Adam raised a hand. “We are here to help you. And before you argue, our goals are the same—eliminate The Collective.”

“I have no doubt that you have your own revenge to take on Joseph, but if you understand nothing else, try to understand this,” Bone demanded. “If we do not take him, we
will
break. He is ours and nothing you can do or say will allow us to give him to you. If we aren’t allowed to destroy the entirety of The Collective our pain and suffering will be for naught.”

“Let us help,” Dmitry pleaded.

Bone stared at him, her gaze locked and potent. “Is that not what you’ve been doing, Russian? For every time you’ve looked at me and seen something other than death, you have helped. For every time you’ve smiled at me, you have brought me from the edge of cliff so high had I jumped I would be lost. You. Have. Helped.”

“Adam Collins, you have pulled me from my darkness, stilled the violent waters of my mind and given me a reason to live after our vengeance is complete. What is that if not help?” Arrow asked.

“Rand Beckett, you offered me your heart when I didn’t have one of my own. You took it from your chest and placed it in mine and I will hold it safe knowing you will be here for me once I have done my duty. What is that if not help?” Bullet told her man.

Outside the storm raged. But inside, his heart clamored with a pain that would only dissipate with time. His mind jumbled with thoughts about a killer. And there, in his soul, was need for Bone.

“There is nothing more to say, Dmitry,” Rand concluded. “Sometimes words are no longer necessary.”

Rand walked to Bullet, wrapped her in his arms and carried her out of the room. Adam crossed to Arrow, grabbed her hand and led her up the stairs.

That left Dmitry and Bone, two enemies on the precipice of becoming lovers.

“You are still holding something back but now isn’t the time to discuss it. When you’re ready you’ll come to me. You need rest now,” Dmitry told her.

She nodded and turned, making her way to the threshold before she turned back toward him. “Do not seek to see things inside me that are not there.”

“I have only scratched your surface. I cannot be worried about the things that aren’t there when the things that are present are so fucking amazing. But I will give you this and hopefully it will ease your mind—when I take you, I will be taking all of you—the good and the bad. Goodnight,
moye
.”

He turned back to the window, watching the storm. His feeling of loss was a ragged wound in his soul. He would use the time until light broke open the sky to mourn Ninka.

Tomorrow, he would start the fight with Bone again.

“I will leave soon,” Bone told Bullet as they walked out to the range.

Dmitry had been wrong about the weather. The storm passed so quickly it hadn’t done much damage. The ground was wet and there were limbs and leaves everywhere but the sky no longer wept and the sun was making a valiant attempt to show its face this morning.

Rand Beckett had decided to settle on this land he’d originally purchased for the wife and daughter Joseph took from him. The house was being renovated, or rather completed and filled with furniture. The grounds that sprawled around the house had begun to take the shape of a training venue.

The range he’d set up specifically for Bullet. But there were now training facilities and a path had been cleared that skirted the beach before delving into the woods surrounding the house. Bone wished she had time to run, but it just wasn’t to be.

Bullet nodded, accepting her sister’s words and not venturing an opinion.

“How is your rage, Bone?” Bullet asked.

“It is there,” she answered simply.

“Should you call Blade to go with you to Russia?”

Bone snorted. “And take her away from her search for the boy? No. Besides, am I a child to need a keeper now? Not even Joseph sent me out with a handler, Bullet. I believe I was the only one out of all of us who did not require a sitter.”

“I am simply checking. The next moves are crucial. You would question me if the tables were reversed.”

Bone ignored the censure in her sister’s tone. “Have you managed to find out anything on Nodachi?”

Bullet shook her head and stopped as they came to the range. Beyond the targets, in a small field cleared and then filled with flowers that shouldn’t bloom at this time of year, were the babies. Ten children rescued from the clutches of Joseph Bombardier.

Each life was a win for First Team. Not that any of this was a game, but with as many as they’d been forced to watch die, each of the children standing in that field coated with reds, blues, purples, and yellows was affirmation. That they lived lent credence to the fact that everything First Team had endured was worth it.

“They do not sleep well and most cry out from their dreams when they do,” Bullet told her.

“I would expect nothing less. Most of them were slated for termination. I can only imagine how they were used as bait for the others.”

“They have asked to see you,” Bullet said with a smile.

Always she smiled now. Bone rubbed her chest at the queer ache that took root. Bullet had changed—become
more
and it was good to witness.

Bone walked to the clearing and stopped in front of the old woman she’d only ever known as Juana.

“
No he olvidado, anciana
,” Bone said harshly.

The woman smiled, her heavily lined face softening. “
Tengo la esperanza de que un día se quiere, rompehuesos.”

Bone passed her then and stepped into summer flowers covering an autumn field. When the children saw her, they stopped their exercises and bowed their heads. She took her time making her rounds, touched each one on the head, praising them for their strength, their courage in surviving hell. They shook, clearly in the grips of fear. Bone was a killer after all, but they persevered.

She walked to stand in front of them and said, “Do you remember the dance I showed you?”

Each of the girls nodded, eyes bright though their faces remained blank.

Bone looked at them, forcing them by will alone to meet her gaze. Once they did, she allowed her lips to curve. “Then we shall dance,” she murmured.

Dancing could take one of two paths—killing or training. Tai Chi had never been for her. There was not enough force to the movements. When Bone danced she preferred to mark the steps with death, but for the babies she learned to control that lust for endings so she could show them how to calm their raging hearts.

Bullet sat at the edge of the clearing, her gaze on the babies, a smile hovering on her lips.

Bone began her movements as the sun crawled from behind a cloud. She shifted her feet apart, squatting before she rose slowly and lifted her hands in the air. She became each movement slowly, intuitively, realizing the babies needed this more than she and fully willing to give them what she could.

She moved with methodical precision, until her muscles screamed in protest for more and then she turned and bowed to the babies. They giggled, and it was a sound Bone had never heard before. Children did not giggle in Arequipa.

She glanced at Bullet as the need to fight raged through her blood. Bullet nodded and sent the babies to the house with Juana.

“Your arm is still mending. I will take it easy on you, sister,” Bone taunted.

“Fuck you, Bone Breaker,” Bullet responded with a grin.

They bowed to one another and the fight was on. Bone feinted, Bullet countered. It didn’t take long for it to begin to spiral. Her sisters, more than any other opponents, knew what Bone needed and sought to provide it. Her fighting skills were only as good as she continuously honed them to be. She’d always been quicker than the others, but when her opponents were as versed in dealing death the dance was infinitely more difficult. That was part of the allure of fighting them—it wasn’t easy.

The air shifted at her back and she turned, sweeping behind her and taking Bullet off her feet as she met the parry and thrust of Arrow’s sidekick. Besides Bone, Arrow was the martial artist. She blended every movement seamlessly, letting it flow from her core to her fist—truly channeling her power.

The need clawed under her skin—it was always this way. When she’d fought Master, she frequently lost control and the punishments had been harsh. Beatings, whippings, burns with a brand. She learned eventually to control the rage but it had been a close thing.

Rarely since she’d taken his head had she known that kind of overwhelming lust for death and the fight itself. Usually, it was after a period of time away from her sisters. Remove her from her anchor and the lust took over, weighting her down even as it propelled her to seek out the one thing that shut it up.

When she would return from particularly harsh assignments her sisters gave her what she needed—no holds barred fighting. Today was no different. She relished every punch she took because it allowed her the clarity to return it ten-fold.

She took a blow to the chest, knew it would bruise and watched as a mean smile broke over Arrow’s face.

“You have gotten slow, sister,” Arrow said as she began to circle them.

Bullet attacked Bone from behind, punching her in the shoulder. When in doubt go for the joints. Bone winced and Bullet turned that single second of inattention against her, spinning and backfisting her in the cheek. Pain exploded in her face as her arm went numb. Bone dropped to a knee, twisting her torso and punching up with her right hand, catching Bullet square in the gut. Her sister dropped like a rock, breath squeaking in through her mouth as she tried to catch it.

Bone stood and raised her hand to Arrow. Arrow automatically grabbed it.

“You should never trust a killer,” she whispered.

Arrow smiled and cocked her head, tugging slightly on her arm but Bone was too fast. She pulled Arrow into her body, spinning her around and catching her around the throat. She wove one of her legs between Arrow’s, hooking one of them and effectively trapping the taller woman. Then she took her sister to the ground and choked her until the other woman tapped but the lust didn’t abate.

Bullet punched her in the head, kicked her viciously in the side first and finally her elbow. That elbow deadened, and Bone released Arrow who rose to her hands and knees, struggling to draw in breath.

“Stop!”

It was a harsh command from three different men.

Bone could not stop, the taste was in her mouth, the desire to maim in her blood, and she turned on Bullet, striking blow after blow, tearing into the other woman with unmatched fierceness.

Bullet finally took a knee, lifted her face, blue eyes nearly black as she waited for Bone to finish her. That was when Bone realized she had lost control. Everything stopped—Bullet, Arrow, Bone’s heart. She fell to her knees and bowed her head.

“Sisters, forgive me,” she whispered.

“There is nothing to forgive, Bone Breaker. You are who you are and as your sisters it is our right to take your hate and pain from you,” Bullet returned as soon as the last word left Bone’s mouth.

Her sob caught her unaware, the hot track of a single tear the only indication that the pressure had made her crack.

“It has been too long,” she screamed at the sky. “I have killed for too long.”

“You can be more than a killer,” the man who now held her dreams called out.

She looked around—everyone was gone, except for Dmitry. She had not heard them leave. She was distracted and it left her vulnerable.

Bone shook her head. “It is all that I know. If you take that from me I will be…nothing.”

She watched fury take him, pulling his muscles tight and locking his jaw. She was empty inside and instinctually knew only Dmitry could fill that void with something other than pain and death. He held out his hand.

She watched him as a cat—wary, silent. Then she reached for him, stood as her fingers grazed his. He tangled their fingers together bringing their palms flush. His eyes reflected the capacity for a love that knew no bounds, but she was scared to reach for it.

“There is something else you can be, Bone Breaker ,” he told her, his voice infinitely deep and soothing.

She stared at him but said nothing, her throat raw with unshed screams, her breath stuck in her chest.

He shook his head at her unspoken denial and then pulled her closer to his body. “You can be mine.”

His words crushed her. The one thing she wanted more than her next breath and he was offering it to her. It was impossible.

Then he turned and she followed him to the house, up the stairs of the west wing and to his room.

She did not question her actions. All she knew was that Dmitry lessened her need to kill. When she looked into his eyes, felt his heat, she was something more than a killer.

She gazed at him, drawing in his pine and juniper scent, letting it soothe the gnawing inside her. Then he began his seduction, undressing her slowly, meticulously, softly. He stroked every inch of the skin he unveiled, kissed each hollow that had never known the touch of another. He sipped from her skin and when he stepped away and toed off his boots, removed his shirt, and took off his pants she watched, her body coiling tighter with each flex and play of his muscles.

Her mouth watered and as the sweat of her endeavors cooled on her skin a new heat replaced the fires of rage, this one hotter, brighter than her lust for death.

“You will change me,” she said into his silence.

He stood there, arms at his sides, face devoid of emotion but his eyes said everything his lips did not. Want…it was there in his gaze, in the tightness of his muscles and the clench of his fists.

“I have no need to try and change what I don’t understand. Because my heart tells me you are mine, I need only accept that I cannot change who you are and what you have done. Besides, nothing that comes before right now matters to me. I will have you and maybe, Bone Breaker, maybe we will both be changed in the process.”

He picked her up and placed her gently on the bed, settling between her spread legs and meshing their bodies together. His cock was a brand between them and her body wept to feel him deep inside her. It was so foreign, that need, but it was as it should be.