Page 26 of Ballistic

“I want to see it.”

I slid the card from my pocket and handed it off to her, studying the tight crease of her forehead as her gaze flicked over it.

“Black gloves on his hands?”

“Yeah, what’s up with that?”

“His wife was murdered in front of him years ago, and his hands were dipped in acid to ensure he’d never know what it felt like to touch a woman again.” She ran her hand through her hair and let out an exasperated breath. “Does he know where I am now?”

“No, I’ve not yet contacted him. Is he a danger to you?”

Sneering, she tossed the card onto the bed and slipped over the edge of the opposite side. She padded toward the window, where she peered down, as though searching. “What man isn’t?” she asked, glancing back at me. “What did he offer to pay?”

“For what?”

“For me. How much?”

Shaking my head, I shrugged. Aside from his offer to finance her extraction, he hadn’t offered any sort of reward on top of it. “Nothing.”

Rolling her eyes, she peered out the window again and crossed her arms. “Nothing. Right.”

“I told you before, Nicoleta. You’re not a prisoner here. I’m not out to sell you. I just want to make sure you’re safe.”

“So, I could just walk out that door, and you’d let me?”

Huffing a sigh, I nodded. “If that’s what you wanted. There’d be no guarantee Tesarik won’t find you again. Which is why I need to figure something out for you.”

“Why?”

I tugged a Zippo from my pocket and tapped a pack of smokes onto the heel of my hand, sliding a cigarette from inside. “I plan to kill him,” I said, and inhaled a long drag. “Wasn’t there the night I came for you.” My voice croaked with the held smoke. “Otherwise, he’d already be dead.”

Her head craned back in my direction, eyes studying me from where she stood. “He hurt someone you care about. That’s why you carry shadows behind your eyes.”

Thoughts of Livvie left me frowning, and I dropped my gaze from hers, taking another hit of my smoke. “He did.”

“He hurt someone I care about, too. Which is why I can’t go back to Dmitry.” She jutted her chin toward me. “Can I have one of those?”

Popping another from the pack, I held it out to her, and she rounded the bed and nabbed the proffered cigarette. Once she’d pressed it between her lips, I flicked the Zippo and lit it for her. “Why can’t you go back?”

Eyes on me, she turned her head just enough to blow the smoke off. “Can I trust you, Dax?”

Something about the girl seemed off, sending up alarms through my system. “Of course.”

She lowered her gaze, brow twitching as if my response troubled her, or something, and she curled her bottom lip into her mouth. “It was no accident that Tesarik found me when he did.”

“Come again.”

“I wanted in. And if you’re a woman, there’s only one way into their club. It’s like you said, they don’t take in outsiders.”

My mind rewound itself to months back, when I’d first seen her hanging from a chain in some dingy ass building, while Tesarik assessed her. I tried to remember one moment I might’ve mistaken that for something involuntary. No way. No way would a girl sign up for that shit willingly. Knowing what he did to them, how some of them were never heard from again.

“You’re …. You’re trying to tell me … you volunteered yourself as a fucking slave? A torture toy for a bunch of sick fucks? For what? What could possibly be that important?”

“Not what. Who.” Curls of smoke trailed after her as she padded across the room once again. She stopped beside the window, resting the side of her head against it. “A little over two years ago, I stumbled upon a link to a website buried somewhere in the bowels of the dark net. I downloaded a video there.” Her brows came together, cheeks caving as she drew in another inhale. “The girl in the video was systematically tortured and raped by two men in pig masks. In my sixteen years, I had seen some fucked up things, but this was, by far, the worst. And at the end of the video, they tied her to an anchor and threw her into the Detroit River to drown.” Not bothering to look at me, she kept her eyes directed out the window.

The story wasn’t too far off from what’d happened to Livvie. Had almost a ritual feel to hers, too. Black rage curled through my veins, an old familiar sensation I’d spent practiced hours tamping down.

“This girl … you know her?”