Page 29 of Ricochet

“Fucking let me go!” She writhed beneath me, her knee pounding into my side.

Holding both wrists captive with my right hand, I pushed her assaulting thigh flat, climbed onto the bed, and straddled her body, crazed with the desire to knock her out. Beneath me, she bucked and arched with more strength than I’d given her credit for, until I pressed into her, my forehead pushing against hers, and at last, she stilled.

With heaving breaths, I stared into her eyes, teeth grinding, breaths mingling. It was in that moment I became aware of the way her breast had popped from her dress in the struggle and pressed against my chest. The salty taste of blood coated my tongue as it trickled into my mouth. Lifting my head away from hers, I lowered my gaze to the perfectly rounded globe, set pert with her arms stretched above her head. I licked my lips and swallowed hard, taunted by her bare skin so close to my mouth.

She made a pathetic attempt to nudge me. “Don’t you fucking dare,” she growled, and I came to my senses.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. You don’t do anything for me.” I slipped her dress back over her breast and, still pinning her wrists, pushed off of her. “You want to live? Do exactly as I tell you. No fucking around.”

Eyes wide, she trembled, nostrils flaring with rapid breaths, as if she expected me to inflict pain. The sight of her fear cast a ripple of adrenaline through my body, warming my muscles.

I tipped my head, leaned over her, inwardly laughing at the twitch of her eye. “Are you afraid of me, Aubree?”

Her answering snarl kicked my lips into a grin. The woman put on a good front, I’d give her that.

“You should be.” Tugging her arm toward the headboard, I froze. One long scar stretched vertically down her forearm, the edges irregular, crooked. Across her wrist was a tattoo that, by the words, suggested the death of someone close to her. I hadn’t noticed it the night before, when I’d tied her the first time. Didn’t take a genius to recognize a suicide attempt.

My gaze shot to hers, and she narrowed her eyes, chin inclined in defiance like she had no intentions of explaining.

What did I care if she’d tried to kill herself? Except, the longer I stared, the more she seemed to get increasingly uncomfortable with the display, turning her head away from me.

“What’s this?”

Her head snapped back in my direction. “What? Not as perfect when you peel the layers back?”

Evidently, she had something deeper going on, but I had neither the ambition, nor the interest, to give a shit. Aubree served a single purpose—revenge. So what that some fragment in her past didn’t match the perfection of her present life?

“Everyone has scars. What makes yours special?”

“I never said they were special. In fact, they’re my daily reminder that nothing is as special as people choose to believe.”

All the alarms inside my head screamed at once—abort fucking mission. I didn’t need Aubree Culling snaking her way beneath my skin, the way she had with the question about her husband hiring me to kill her, and then the scar, but something darker, deeper whispered below the noise in my head.

I quickly tied her hands to the bed, ignoring that nagging thought, but still, it persisted. Perhaps I’d missed something. All those hours logged, watching the Cullings, studying them day in and day out for over a year.

Maybe Aubree Culling wasn’t who I’d thought she was.

Get the fuck out.

I hauled ass out of that room. Wouldn’t let her shit infect me. She was the smiling face behind The Culling propaganda. The gentrification of inner city trash, and the driving force behind the brutal deaths of my wife and son.

A faithful, loving Stepford wife who served her husband’s every morally corrupt whim. Scarred or not, she remained the enemy, for the same reason every soldier under Hitler’s rule deserved to go down with the bastard dictator—they believed in the lies.

Alec and I had plotted for too long, to let some manipulative piece of work destroy it with her fake tears and pleas for sympathy. I’d lost the ability to sympathize long ago.

Still seething, I made my way to the kitchen and braced my hands on the countertop. Reel it in. A part of me’d never subscribed to the part of the plan that included kidnapping her. I had a feeling that spending too much time with Aubree was a bad idea. Didn’t help that she was a natural beauty, with her long chestnut hair, honey-toned skin, golden eyes, and that dimple in her cheek that gave her a sort of playful, youthful appearance—something the cameras and news reports hadn’t fully captured.

Throwing back the cupboard door, I nabbed the bottle of tequila, popped the cap, and tipped it back. After taking a long swill, I slammed the bottle onto the countertop and shook off the burn in my throat. From beside the sink, I grabbed a rag, flipped on the faucet, and soaked the corner of it before holding it to my nose, daubing away the drying blood where she’d gotten in a good punch.

“You play a nice game of bullshit, Mrs. Culling, but you’re not going to bullshit me.” Pinching the rag to my nose, I squeezed the remaining blood and, sniffing, I swiped up the bottle and tossed back another swig. I set the bottle down, glanced over in the direction of the staircase. S’pose I should feed her something. Much as I’d have liked to starve her, Alec would probably go apeshit.

It’d been a long time since I’d cooked a meal for a woman, though, and I had no idea what the hell they ate.

In a palette of color, I arranged cut strawberries, eggs, salsa, avocado, toast and sausage on a plate. All things Alec claimed he’d observed watching her eat. Back upstairs, I reentered her room, grabbing the chair propped against the wall on my way, and took a seat beside her.

The tracking of her eyeball from the corner of her eye had me inwardly chuckling. Only the liquor kept me cordial. With the fork, I stabbed a strawberry and placed it to her lips.

She snapped her head away from me. “I’m not hungry.”