The Assassin's Wife Page 9

  She whipped her head from side to side and strained up against him. She closed her eyes, squeezing them shut, refusing to look at the man that wreaked such wretched havoc on her body, while strumming her like a fine-tuned instrument. Because, while he burned her flesh, punishing her for some supposed insult, the fingers of his other hand continuously slid through the folds of her pussy, gliding relentlessly, coaxing, entreating and loving until she was mindless. Caught somewhere between two worlds. One was bleak and painful, terrible and unforgiving, while the other promised ecstasy. But it was a pleasure she didn’t trust.

  He drove her relentlessly toward the peak of an orgasm, darker and more painful than anything she’d ever experienced before. Tasha writhed and shouted against him. She bit the shoulder than hovered against her as he held her down, his hand clamped against her wrists, protecting her from hurting herself, but also restraining her. Making sure she never escaped him again. The symbolic cruelty was almost too much to bear. She wanted to hate him. But that was something she couldn’t seem to do. As much as she feared her husband, she had never hated David.

  She could feel herself nearing the explosive peak, despite the fiery resistance of her mind. Her eyes snapped open and she glared up at him with every ounce of rebellion she felt. His own eyes reflected a moment of shock. A moment of respect. For her. The dancer that had captured his notice and become his obsession. Then she saw the monster surface and knew a moment of abject fear as he reared back, releasing her hands.

  He reached for the candle.

  “David, nyet!” she screamed.

  He looked down at her, his gaze flat and controlled as he plunged his fingers deep into her tight pussy while tipping the candle over her, pouring hot wax over both her vagina and the back of his hand. She flung her head back and screamed as the searing pain hit her at the same time as an orgasm crashed through her. Her back arched so high that she nearly lifted off the bed. He dropped the candle, clamped a hand on her belly and forced her back down as she rode the devastating waves of her orgasm. She screamed until her throat burned and arched her head back, rocking her hips through the shattering aftershocks as David stroked his hard fingers through her wet folds and the slowly dripping wax, enjoying the beauty of her orgasm.

  She lay dazed, barely able to comprehend what he was doing when David removed his fingers from her pussy, opened his pants and pulled his cock out. Placing a knee on the edge of the bed he moved her legs, pushing them wider on either side of him. He dragged her ass up his leg and shoved his fingers deep into her pussy while his other hand squeezed his cock. He masturbated over top of her while thrusting two rough fingers deep into her. He splayed the fingers, opening her channel and rubbing his thumb roughly across her clit.

  Another orgasm began building deep within her. She whimpered, her body still hot and oversensitive from the last orgasm. She would have rolled away from him, but he blocked her. She cried out at the intensity as his insistent fingers plunged deep into her body and massaged her g-spot. She vibrated, helpless to control her reaction, lifting her hips in supplication as he fucked her with his fingers while hot wax cooled upon her body.

  He jacked off faster to the sight of her bound, helpless body writhing on his fingers. This orgasm hit her fast and hard. She screamed, thrusting her hips up and down across his knee while he grunted and came with her. His semen shot in warm jets across her pussy, her stomach, her breasts, leaving her nipples bathed in the hot fluid.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Now will you please uncuff me?” Natasha asked quietly, turning her head to speak to him, her breath skittering across his neck.

  David grunted and stirred slightly from where he had collapsed on the bed beside her. Tasha tried to wait a decent amount of time after their explosive climax before disturbing him, but her hands were going numb and she really was uncomfortable. She could feel an ache where the metal bit into her wrists when she’d struggled while he’d poured the wax over her.

  Rolling onto his side David pulled the key from his pocket and sat up to release her. She breathed in his masculine scent as he leaned over her. She tried not to enjoy the memories his smell invoked. After releasing her hands, he tossed the cuffs aside and sat back on the bed. He took her wrists in his big hands and gently soothed the raw marks where the skin had chafed.

  She wondered why he would treat her with any consideration at all given his low opinion of her, but kept her mouth closed. The last thing she needed was to give him a reason to treat her badly again.

  As he rubbed feeling back into her hands he stared down at her nude body, the flush of orgasm still bright across her chest, the drying wax and his semen sticky on her skin. She shivered at the memory of the wax hitting her skin. Now that it was cool, the combination of scorching heat combined with pleasure seemed somehow… erotic. It was strange. She had never been into such things before, always preferring soft touches and silken caresses. But something about the explosiveness of the fire and wax, combined with her knowledge of who David was, had created a new kind of heat between them. One that had amped up a sex drive she thought had died the day she ran away from him.

  She glanced up at him through her lashes. She could see possession and satisfaction written all over his face. He had always seemed so refined to her, but now she wondered if this dominant beast had always been there, just withheld from her, lest he frighten his young, innocent wife.

  David was thirty-seven, while she was only twenty-three. She imagined there was a lot he had held back from her during their short marriage, now that she thought about it. She was young, but she could already see how experience could mature a person. She was a world away from the youthful dancer he had plucked from the Bolshoi.

  “I need a shower,” she said hesitantly, wondering if he would allow her to take one.

  His fingers tightened around her wrists. His sharp eyes searched her face, then he nodded. “Run the water for a few minutes before you get in, it will heat sufficiently,” he said gruffly and then released her, allowing her to rise from the bed.

  Natasha got to her feet slowly, swaying slightly on unsteady legs before hovering for just a moment, glancing down at her exposed body before walking swiftly out of the bedroom toward a door that she thought must be the washroom. She shut herself inside and twisted the lock. With a snort, she acknowledged if David wanted in, that puny little lock would not keep him out. She would consider it a symbolic barrier, then, if it couldn’t be a physical hindrance.

  She looked in the long mirror over the marble countertop and winced at the image that looked back. With a small laugh, she acknowledged that she really did look like the slut David had accused her. Her long mahogany hair was tangled around her head and her eyes were ringed in smudged mascara and the berry eye shadow she frequently wore. Her naked body looked fuller to her, more flushed, with streaks of white where candle wax and semen marked her pale breasts and belly. She shivered and closed her eyes against the image of him tipping the candle and allowing the hot wax to scorch her tender flesh.

  She sighed and used to edge of her nail to peel and chip the wax away from her body. The sensation was not as painful as she would have thought. In fact… it evoked an almost sensual feeling. Like the hands of a lover, skimming and pinching her, just a little. She closed her eyes and replayed the image of David’s lust-filled face, dark and satisfied as he came all over her body. Tasha shivered as she peeled the last of the wax from her body and swept it into the garbage can beside the sink.

  She turned the shower spray on hot, the way she liked it, and got in to scrub away the feel of her husband on her body. She hated that she felt more alive now than she had in years, since… ever. Sex with him had been more intense, more powerful than ever before and he hadn’t even penetrated her. Her hands drifted down her body as she thought of his thick cock fucking her tight pussy. Shivers of anticipation rippled over her as she reached down and shoved two fingers up into her pussy. Head thrown back she played with herself while imagining Da
vid watching. Within minutes she was muffling another orgasm against her arm while she masturbated in the shower.

  “God, I must be sick!” she mumbled, quickly soaping up a sponge and gliding it over her body.

  How could she still be so horny? And for the man that had nearly killed her a few hours ago, kidnapped her, handcuffed her to a bed, burnt her with hot wax and accused her of cheating on him. He was an assassin, a merciless killer that had been hunting her for two years. Where was her self-respect?

  “In my torn panties,” she sighed feeling pathetic, answering her own question out loud.

  She took a moment for self-pity while rubbing her skin dry with one of the fluffy towels. She had finally decided that she had a future, between the travel agency and gym. She had a friend and was thinking about dating again. She was ready for a normal life, a life where her husband wasn’t waiting in the shadows ready to kill or claim her.

  Now David had her and was going to force her to resume her role as his wife. Only he intended to treat her like a whore instead of the cherished bride she once was. Frustrated, Tasha slapped the counter with her palm.

  “I hate him!” she snarled at her misty reflection, “he’s ruined everything!”

  Righteous anger soared through her. She was no weak-willed woman to meekly fall at the bastard’s feet and beg him for mercy. She had spent years running and surviving on her own. She hated that her freedom was being taken from her again.

  Tucking the towel around her breasts and tossing her wet hair back over her shoulders in a rope she stomped through the bathroom door and looked around the room. David sat in a chair, next to a round, wooden kitchen table. He was leaning forward, his muscular forearms flexed over his knees. Shadows encased him. There was a window behind him, over the kitchen sink, and she could see that the steady snow fall would effectively trap her on the mountain with him, which only served to increase her self-righteous anger.

  Tasha stormed over to him and stopped a foot away, her arms straight at her side and her fists clenched. She stared at him. His height was so much greater than hers that even sitting hunched over he was nearly eye level. At this moment Tasha even hated him for that. She hated everything about this sinister man. But she especially despised feeling small and helpless in his presence.

  “What do you want, Natasha?” he asked, his voice clipped and tired. She felt a tiny flicker of concern, probably remnants of her old feelings for him, before he squashed it by being a rat bastard, “A repeat performance?”

  Natasha drew back her elbow and threw her fist forward as hard as she could, making sure to tuck the pinky in, the way Jordan had shown her, so she wouldn’t break it. Even from a relaxed posture David blocked the punch by shifting sideways and grabbing her wrist as it passed his head. He twisted her arm, turning her around and gripping her neck, forced her to the floor using her arm as leverage. Tasha cried out in pain and surprise, falling to her knees in front of him, facing away. He pulled her back by the neck, dragging her into his body between his spread knees. He titled her head back until she was forced to look up at him.

  “You want to fight me, dancer?” he sneered, bending so he was speaking into her ear, pressing his nose against her damp hair. He squeezed her neck, giving her a taste of how easy it would be for him to crush her.

  She moaned at the flash of pain where his fingers landed on the bruises he’d inflicted earlier. She brought her free hand up and wrapped it around his fingers, but he was immovable. He wasn’t exactly hurting her, but the flow of power was there. He was showing her how very little all that time spent learning Jujitsu meant in the face of a man like him. A man that ate little girls like her and spit them back out without a moment’s thought. After a brief moment of struggle, she slumped back against him.

  “Good girl,” he breathed against the side of her head, the warmth from his breath whispering against the strands of her hair and sending a streak of lightening through her belly.

  “Fuck… you,” she gasped out.

  David gave her a little shake. “You are in no position to be fighting me, Natasha. You have no choices here, wife. It’s time for you to accept what must be and not challenge me. We will be in this place for some time. You need to settle.”

  He leaned back in his chair, but continued to hold her in front of him on the floor. Like a slave. He waited her out until gradually the tension drained from her. She let her head slump forward, the dark ropes of damp hair swinging out to cover her face from his view. Then she allowed herself to do something she vowed she wouldn’t. For the first time in years she let the tears fall. She’d lost her fight and now she was back in the arms of the monster.

  She didn’t fight David when he picked her up and carried her back to the bed, tucking her beneath the blankets before turning away and leaving her to cry out her fears alone in the darkness. As Tasha’s tears dried on her face and her eyelids began to close in exhaustion her spark began to return and inevitably her thoughts drifted toward escape. Next time she attacked him she would need to get her hands on a weapon first to even the playing field a little.

  Chapter Thirteen

  There was no denying it.

  His obsession for his wife had grown. He should have known that tracking her every movement over a two-year time span would fuck with his brain. He was already programmed from birth to become a hunting, killing machine. Following her across the globe, ferreting her out of each new hideout had been infuriating, yes, but if he were to admit the truth, it had also been a rush. The exhilaration of the hunt.

  He’d known all along it would have to end in her death. He’d been raised from birth with the certain knowledge that some things must simply be. The truth of his existence was one of those things that could not be discovered by an innocent. He was a ghost, working in the shadows. Yet… he could not… end her. It was the first, and only, thing in his life that he had been incapable of following through on. This knowledge did not bother him. Much. He no longer had superiors to answer to. Only himself. And he would somehow reconcile this lapse of judgment. Natasha must die. Yet, he could not kill her. He would have to live with the contradiction. And so would she. Though by the time he was done with her, she may well wish for the alternative.

  He had never seen Natasha cry before this night. She’d always been so happy and full of life. If something made her sad then he fixed it. The sight of her tears bothered him in a way he found disturbing. And David usually killed things he found disturbing. Damn woman was fucking with his head.

  He watched her sleep from the shadows next to the bed. Reaching over, he flicked the blanket away from her slumbering form, careless of waking her. She didn’t even remotely stir, perhaps too tired from their earlier activities. The towel she had gone to bed wearing had loosened from around her small, rounded breasts, slipping low over the creamy swell. Her hand was curled in a loose fist by her shoulder, as though she had been clutching the fabric of the towel tightly to her breast until sleep finally claimed her. Her other hand was pressed against her silken cheek. A habit she’d always had, he remembered. It made her innocence glow like a beacon.

  Anger simmered. A feeling he was not used to, except with his young wife. Somehow, she managed to melt the ice in his veins. Only her, only Natasha could bring out his baser instincts. Anger, jealousy, possessiveness. Emotions he despised.

  He flicked a long, dark lock of hair from her face so he could see her treacherous visage. She flinched in her sleep, eyelashes fluttering against porcelain skin, but still she did not wake. She was not innocent. If she were innocent she would not have been able to run and hide as effectively. Had someone hidden her from him? Taken her in and helped her escape her husband as he stalked the globe searching for her, leaving no stone unturned? With her rare beauty and grace, it was easy to imagine her appealing to a man’s primal protective instincts. What man wouldn’t claim such a woman? There could be no other explanation. It was not possible for a woman of Natasha’s inexperience to hide from a man used to h
unting and murdering people, often persons with mafia links and far more experienced than this small, helpless creature at evading capture. She must have had help disappearing.

  Fury ripped through David’s chest, igniting his mind with images of his wife repaying such generosity with the only form of currency she would have available. She had fled the hotel in Versailles with only the clothes on her back. How had she survived? Where had she gone? Who had she gone to?

  It was the last question that had him finally reaching for her, his mind filled with only the need to discover the answer. The need to punish and possess. The desire to wipe away the two empty years she had forced on them when she’d run away from him. It didn’t matter that if he’d found her hiding in the shadows that night he would have, in all likelihood, turned his gun on her, thus separating them forever. It didn’t matter that training from birth demanded cold logic in all instances. For once in his life, scalding fury spilled over. And he would have it no other way. He wanted his wife under his hands, to do with what he pleased.

  She came instantly awake as he descended, two years of fear and fight or flight instinct kicking in. Too late. As she tried to rear up in the bed, her beautiful blue eyes wide with panic, he wrapped one hand around her neck and slammed her back against the pillows, covering her small curves with his unyielding body. The towel fell away to leave her naked and vulnerable against his much larger, clothed frame.

  “David!” she whispered in confusion, struggling weakly against his tight hold, her lips moving frantically to shape his name.

  He clenched his fingers still further, allowing her to feel the tensile strength within. Fear flashed across her lovely face, twisting her lips. His cock hardened between her thighs and he had to stop himself from rocking against her. He should have resented the desperate need to fuck she brought forth in him. He’d been raised a machine. Yet, she was the single anomaly in his life. The one toy that he’d wanted bad enough to risk distraction. He should hate her for drawing these reactions from his body without permission. Except he knew from the moment he saw her that his dancer would always do this to him. She had only grown more beautiful over time, blossoming with curves and confidence. Where once she had been ethereal, almost untouchable, now she was irresistible.