Xtraordinary (14 page)

A whirlwind of images tumbled through Chelsea's mind. Red silk scarves. Hot, dripping wax from an ivory candle. The sharp blade of a knife. The sparkling crystal of a toy meant for exquisite torment. The polished box full of clothespins…

Her knees weakened at the memory of his hands in her hair, his cock in her mouth, her ass. With another man, these acts would have been debasing, humiliating.

With Ricardo, they were something else entirely. Submitting to him made her…stronger. It quieted her mind and expanded her awareness, satisfied her hungers and quelled her restlessness.

Without really meaning to, she stepped into his arms, closing the distance between them. For a moment he froze, his arms suspended stiffly around her. But it was too hard to resist; she had been through too much. She pressed her face against his chest and bowed her head, feeling her eyelashes flutter shut against the fine fabric. And then he was holding her, encircling her with his arms, pressing his chin to the top of her head and murmuring in Spanish, endearments that she only caught a few words of.
Mi corazon…mi alma…niñita linda
.

The stirring inside her turned to a raging current of need. Her pussy lips swelled and her nipples hardened, and her fingertips twitched with the need to touch, feel, explore. She longed for him to yank her head back with his hands in her long hair, to rip the clothes from her, to drag her anywhere in the suite that he wished to go.

Fear had made her need greater. It would not be enough merely to make love. There would not be enough release in simply reaching orgasm. Chelsea needed to feel more, to feel everything…every bit of sensation her body was capable of, from pleasure to pain. She needed to disappear into the physical contact, to lose herself in giving herself away.

She tipped up her mouth and brushed her lips against his, quickly, softly, tracing with her tongue. Needing the taste of him, needing to meld him with her.

Her head was yanked back, hard, and then he pulled her hair so hard she was forced to stand on her tiptoes.

Desire rocketed through her. Her hips bucked ineffectively in the air. “Please,” she muttered.

“You don't touch me without being told,” he said ominously. “Have you forgotten?”

“I…no.” She mewled with need and frustration, but his grip only tightened, pulling the hair from her scalp.

“If you cannot trust me, I will walk out of here today. Mr. Smith will come for you and he will personally escort you where you will be safe. I will transfer enough money into your account that you can build any collection you want. And I will leave your life forever.”

Chelsea gasped. She couldn't believe he would do what he threatened, that he would cut himself off from her forever. Except that she knew he was serious.

“But you do trust me, Chelsea,” he continued. With his free hand he traced a fingertip very slowly and lightly from her forehead, down the bridge of her nose, over the cupid's bow of her mouth…down her chin, along her neck, her collarbones…and then slipping inside her shirt, and very lightly circling her nipple. Chelsea bucked and struggled, but he only lightened his touch further, until it was as if a downy feather had been electrified with a thousand volts.

Then he pinched, hard, and a moan escaped her lips.

He withdrew his hand and relaxed his grip on her hair so that she slumped against him. He slid his hands down her back and cupped her ass, grinding her against him so that she could feel every inch of his rock hard erection.

“
This
is your trust in me.
This
is your faith. This is your knowledge that I will never hurt you, that I will always protect you.” One of his hands slid into the cleft of her ass, reaching to thumb her pussy through the quickly drenching fabric of her pants. “When you submit to me you make us both stronger. I can't be my best without you, Chelsea. I—I never knew who I was meant to be until God gave me you. To use. To make you mine.”

To love
, Chelsea finished the sentence in her mind. Because as the memories of being in his arms morphed into the need to be there once more, Chelsea realized that in the complex tangle of her submission was her own identity. If Ricardo needed her to fulfill his own promise as a Dominant, she needed him even more to be her safe place to let go. To rest from a world that had demanded her to be strong since childhood. He offered, with his control and his fiercely executed play, a safe haven for a woman who had never been allowed to be a girl, a chance to let go when she'd never stopped looking over her shoulder.

She could love him. If she didn't put a stop to this soon, she
would
love him. And that was a danger even greater than those that waited outside the walls of this hidden suite. Because there was always a faint chance that she could escape the bullets or the blade of the
bratva
…but she would not survive falling in love, only to lose again.

She had lost her beloved father to an accident when she was six.

She lost her mother to drugs in the years that followed.

She lost her innocence to the monster who invaded their lives.

Now she had her gallery and she had Rufus and Donny and she had the series of anonymous men who stayed long enough in her bed to distract her for a few hours. For years that had been enough…until she met Ricardo.

Gently, Ricardo held her apart from him and caressed her cheek with his fingertips. But she didn't want caresses. She didn't want gentle. She needed his hard hand on her flesh, striking her, choking her, forcing her. She needed her choices taken from her until her own will was just an extension of his.

She needed, more than ever in her life, to submit.

Recognition dawned in Ricardo's eyes. He knew her. He saw her…all the way to her soul. He needed it too.

“
Mi querida
,” he whispered. “We do not need to decide today what we will do tomorrow. But tonight you are mine. You will stay here and I will protect you.”

It wasn't a question. Chelsea nodded numbly.

“Now I must go, for a few hours. Do not ask me what I will do. It's what needs to be done, no more and no less.”

Chelsea shivered, wondering what those ominous words meant for those who had taken his friend's life. And while she had decried violence, while she abhorred bloodshed, she found that she wanted vengeance for the gentle man who had brought her the spiced cookies and flavorful coffee of Russia, who had taken her into his home, who had called her daughter.

She wanted his killers brought to justice. And if it had to be dark justice meted from the shadows by a man who answered to no authority but his own conscience…then so it would be.

He brushed his lips against her mouth, an echo of the kiss she had stolen and been punished for. “I will be back by tonight. Mr. Smith is here, but you will not see him unless you need something. If he needs to talk to you, he will use the name Ignacio. Can you remember that?”

“Ignacio,” Chelsea whispered.

“Do not answer the door for anyone else. Do not answer the phone. No matter what happens, do not leave this room. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Chelsea said.

She wanted another kiss, another reassurance, another hour to convince herself that she was doing the right thing.

But Ricardo released her. He walked to the door, and after giving her one tormented glance, he was gone.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Vlad Aksyonov drove to the abandoned school with some trepidation. Maybe he should have brought someone with him. After all, the old man was dead, and he'd taken evidence to prove the job was done. But killing Boris Solonik had been less than ideal, and everyone in the
bratva
knew it. And Vlad desperately wanted to take the focus off his failures and prove to Sergey and the others that he had the matter under control.

The rapidly changing landscape of cocaine trafficking was not his fault. How could it be? He was not a part of decisions made at higher levels, a fact that filled him with bitterness whenever he thought about it.

The Chechen threat was not his fault either. They were ruthless animals, answering to no one, unimpeded by honor or fear.

The more he thought about it—and in the secret recesses of his heart, Vlad occasionally considered himself a bit of a philosopher—it seemed that the very nature of existence had changed, at least here in Los Angeles. With so many factions vying for dominance—not just the Russians and Chechens, but the South Americans, the Chinese, the gangs of all stripes spilling blood in the streets—a man had to divide his loyalty into only two parts: his brotherhood, and his own interests. The latter was best kept a secret.

Vlad had killed the old man to prove to Sergey that he could be trusted. Now, he was expected to deliver de Santos, at least to hear what the
bratva
could offer him. To persuade him to shift his loyalties. But then what? Would Vlad dutifully bring Ricardo into the fold, only to be forced to live under his shadow? Would he be prolonging his own time in this limbo of powerlessness, answering not only to Sergey but to the others, those with more seniority than he, those deadly or lucky enough to bask in the approval of the
avtoritet
?

Vlad ground his teeth in frustration and pushed the pedal down, dodging in and out of traffic. Such recklessness courted trouble, and he could not afford to be pulled over on such an important errand. But maybe it was time for him to be a bit reckless. To make his own decisions. To live or die by his own sword.

It had been Sergey's idea to threaten the woman. But it hadn't worked. Now, Vlad was calling his own shots. Killing the old man was only the start. Luckily, not twenty minutes after he put a bullet in the old man's head, he'd received a call from de Santos himself. What further proof did Vlad need that he was doing the right thing?

Vlad had been calm but ferocious, as he saw it, promising to kill everyone de Santos cared about until he agreed to cooperate. A meeting had been set up for an abandoned school Vlad knew about, on the crumbling edges of Palmdale, far from the bustle of downtown Los Angeles. Naturally, Vlad did not expect de Santos to appear unarmed. He wasn't stupid, even if he was arrogant and overdressed. Vlad might not be as sophisticated, but he had come up through the ranks, stealing his first gun at the age of eleven and making his first kill at seventeen. He would wait and see how the meeting went. If de Santos was repentant, maybe Vlad would bring him in, leading him like the trophy he was. If not—well, it would be easy enough to claim that he'd had no choice.

De Santos threatened me
, he would say.
He fired first
.

The brotherhood would take note. His status would grow.

And if de Santos failed to show? It was only a matter of time before Vlad found the girl. She couldn't hide from him forever. Meanwhile, Vlad would take the old woman from that miserable little shop. When he called de Santos, he would hear the old woman's screams.

He arrived at the school and parked his car behind a boarded-up gymnasium. He'd used the site before, an advantage de Santos didn't have. He knew the best places to hide.

That gave him an unfair advantage, perhaps. But Vlad had long ago given up believing that anything in life was fair.

#

A knock at the door caused Chelsea to practically leap off the sofa, where she had been trying—and failing—to read the fashion magazine she'd found on the coffee table.

She threw the magazine down and padded to the door, moving as quietly as she could. Her bare feet on the impossibly plush carpet made no sound. She put her face to the peephole, wondering if she would be shot through the door.

The man standing on the other side was distinguished looking, with short silver-laced hair and wearing an understated suit and tie.

It was Mr. Smith, the driver who had taken her home after the first night she spent with Ricardo.

Chelsea was under no illusion that Smith was his real name. But she did trust that he worked for Ricardo. And Ricardo had told her that she could open the door to him alone.

She kept the chain on the door, knowing the few ounces of metal would mean nothing to someone like Smith.

“Hello, Ms. Ryder,” the man said calmly, as though they had run into each other at the post office. “It is I, Ignacio. How nice to see you again.”

“Oh, hello.” She managed a small smile for him. “Imagine running into you here.”

As ridiculous as it was to make small talk under the circumstances, it made Chelsea feel just a little bit better. A little more normal.

“I understand you are feeling, perhaps, very anxious,” Mr. Smith said. “I only wanted to let you know that I am close by and perhaps reassure you that you are safe.”

“I…thank you.”

“In the meantime, I took the liberty of picking up a few things for you downstairs. In case a fresh change of clothing might make you more comfortable.”

She glanced down and saw that he was holding a silvery bag emblazoned with the name of an expensive boutique in the hotel lobby. No doubt Ricardo had let Smith know that Chelsea hadn't been home for two nights…and he could see for himself that she hadn't exactly left home in her best clothes.

She accepted the bag gratefully, squeezing it through the gap in the door. “Thank you, truly.”

“Are you hungry?”

Food was the last thing on her mind, but Chelsea supposed that she ought to eat. “I don't suppose you've got a pizza up your sleeve.”

The smile he gave her was fleeting, but genuine. “Sadly I do not. But you'll find basic provisions in the kitchenette. And if you need anything else—”

“I'm sure I'll be fine.”

He nodded briskly. “Well then, Ms. Ryder, I'll return to my post. Always a pleasure.”

As Chelsea shut the door, she wasn't sure if he was joking.

#

Ricardo watched the Russian walk around to the steps leading up to the second-floor balcony of the old gymnasium and nodded to himself. It was the same location he would have chosen himself if he were in the other man's shoes. From a narrow space between an HVAC unit and the stairwell, one could remain hidden and still see almost the entire campus.