Hitman's Captive: A Bad Boy Romance Read Free Page A

noticed just
how close we were in this tight space, and the way her sweet scent curled
around us had me reacting in all sorts of inappropriate ways. The insane urge
to press her against the wall of the elevator and take her mouth in mine surged
up within me, and it was all I could do to push away thoughts of tasting her
full red lips and feeling her go breathless at my touch.
    It was completely fucked
up, and I didn’t understand any of it. Self-sabotage of the highest form. I
shouldn’t have even taken her with me, let alone allowed her to distract my
usual laser-sharp focus.
    Stress. People react in
unexpected ways to intense stress. That’s why you’re fucking up.
    Except that my whole life
had been intense stress - and I was used to the stress from hits. Though
kidnapping a witness…that was something else entirely.
    The elevator dinged and
the sliding doors combined with the sudden noise of people and activity brought
me back to reality. The woman beside me didn’t seem to have noticed my
distraction - or if she had, she’d kept quiet about it. I squeezed her waist
slightly and started forward out of the elevator, using action to refocus
myself again.
    This was the real test,
and my body was immediately on full alert. I kept myself relaxed and casual,
sweeping my eyes around the place almost absently while noting the different
clusters of people. The lobby area wasn’t too busy, and everyone was - as
always - distracted with their own business, but I knew this part was the big
risk.
    I could feel the tension
and anxiety radiating off the captive woman beside me, and it was obvious she
wanted nothing more than to scream and yell and make a scene. Her eyes stayed
on the floor, but they darted around as she wracked her mind for some
advantage. My pulse sped up and I nudged her again with the gun, leaning in to
growl against her ear.
    “Don’t even think about
it, baby.”
    The tension in her body
increased, but after a moment she gave a jerky nod and we continued moving. The
pace was maddeningly slow and sedate, and I could tell she was feeling that far
more than me - I was used to it by now. Acting calm and casual despite intense
inner tension was part of the job.
    Pressed up close to her,
I felt it when she started to tremble, and that earlier disquiet stabbed
through me again. I resisted the urge to reassure her - tell her that
everything was going to be okay.
    God knew, everything was not fucking okay.
    As we approached the exit
without incident, my mind started turning to the next part - where the hell I
was going to take us. I’d had a plan in mind, but I needed to re-evaluate fast.
I was no longer safe - whatever had just happened, there was going to be far
more than the relatively incompetent police force after me.
    And the Russian bratva would have a much better idea of how to find out who had done this.
    Not to mention, I
couldn’t go back to my apartment with her anyway. In fact, I didn’t have
anywhere that was equipped to hold a hostage. I wasn’t in the damn kidnapping
business.
    Fuck.
    I needed somewhere safe
to regroup and work out what the hell was going on with Viktor’s murder. Then
I’d try and clear everything up.
    And if not…you’d been
planning on leaving NYC anyway.
    We moved up to the wide,
elegant doors of the hotel and I nodded at the doorman with a smile as he
opened them for us - making my life a lot easier as I continued holding onto
her while we stepped out onto the sidewalk.
    By the time we’d made it
a few paces down the road, several taxis had already passed and my chest
started to ease as I worked out what I needed to do. When we were a little way
away from the hotel, I flagged a taxi, ignoring the furtive glances the woman
kept giving me.
    I was just glad I’d
convinced her well enough to be quiet and acquiescing. She got into the taxi at
my gesture and I pressed close to her again as I directed the driver to Central
Park, near the Metropolitan Museum, trying to ignore