Bad Blood Read online

  “Don’t you think I know what you did to those girls?” I rose half off him, my fist poised to strike. “You sick son of a bitch.”

  “X!”

  I blinked hard as Mercy’s voice broke through the haze and I focused on her underneath me. Fuck, fuck, fuck!

  She kicked, knocking my knee out from underneath my body and I lost my grip. I fell as she rolled clear, landing on my stomach. A split second later her knee came down hard into the small of my back, pressing painfully against my spine.

  “Fuck!” I exclaimed, smashing my palms against the ground.

  “That was new,” Mercy mused above me.

  She let the pressure from her knee relax and I twisted my body away from her. I almost did it again. Motherfucking… I roared in anger, sitting and drawing my knees against my chest.

  I needed to be in control. I needed to be in control. I needed...

  “X, don’t be so hard on yourself.”

  “I was hallucinating,” I snapped. “I could've killed you.” Something told me it was a very real memory, but I didn’t recall ever seeing the man’s face before.

  “Yeah, but this time you came back on your own.”

  “It still doesn’t make it okay. What if I didn’t?”

  She shrugged, pissing me off even more. “Why plan for a scenario that’s not going to happen?”

  I grunted in annoyance. “You can’t know that.”

  “I believe in you, isn’t that enough?”

  I grimaced, running my hand over my face. Too much too soon. I should’ve waited before resuming Mercy’s training. I shouldn’t be training her at all.

  “What did you see?” she asked and my skin began to crawl.

  I closed my eyes and I saw what I’d forgotten. I killed that man because I was commanded to, but why? I saw it dissolve in my mind like a cross-fade in a movie. A fucking sick, twisted feature film that I had no control over. I saw women. Women in cages.

  “Royal Blood traffics women,” I said out of the blue.

  Mercy hissed, hugging her arms around her stomach.

  How did I know that? Why couldn't I remember? Why was it so important that they would take it from my mind?

  “Did you know?” she asked. “Before all of this?”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “What have they made me do that I don’t remember?” I asked. “Did they program me to forget that, too?”

  Mercy sank onto the grass next to me and cupped my face in her tiny hands, my eyes searching her blue like she had all the answers. She opened her mouth, but no words passed her lips. She didn’t know what to do either.

  Lifting my hands, I wound my fingers around her wrists, pulling her away.

  “How’s my technique?” she asked, referring to her hand-to-hand skills.

  “Fine,” I replied. “If we had more time…” I trailed off.

  “We do what we can,” Mercy said and my skin bristled.

  We’d never have enough time. I could spend my entire life training her and it would never be enough. I didn’t want to let her go out there, but that part was inevitable. I’d made a promise.

  “X?”

  I squinted in the sunshine, glancing across the field toward the moor.

  “No more killing for hire,” I said. “Not until this thing is over.”

  I heard Mercy move in the grass next to me, but I didn’t look back at her.

  “I’ll only do what is necessary.”

  “But Vaughn’s price was necessary. Wasn’t it?”

  I curled my fingers into tight fists. “I could’ve talked him out of it. I should’ve tried harder. I didn’t—”

  Mercy’s hands found mine and began prying at my fingers. “You didn’t know, X. You didn’t know that you’d react this way.”

  “I should’ve.”

  “It’s done. We’ll deal with it.”

  She threaded her fingers through mine and we sat palm-to-palm, something unspoken passing between us.

  I had to get a fucking grip on reality is what I needed to do. My conditioning might be unraveling, I might be remembering things, I might be beginning to care, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t compartmentalize anymore. If I could do that, then I could handle anything.

  I glanced at Mercy and she was so beautiful in the sunlight I felt like melting against her. I wasn’t cold anymore. I felt remorse and I fucking hated it.

  Most of all, I hated the fact that I didn’t know what was going to happen when we left here.

  Mercy had been learning at an exponential rate. Faster than I’d seen anyone before her and the single mindedness she had when it came to learning the art of assassination had me worried.

  All this time I’d been focusing on my ability to handle my changing mind, but nobody had been paying attention to her. What would happen to Mercy once we left this place and how much would she change because of her quest for revenge?

  I mightn’t have a soul left to lose, but Mercy still had hers. How much of it would she have to let go?

  There wasn’t much I could do but trust her and for a man who never trusted anyone?

  Good fucking luck.

  Eleven

  Mercy

  It had been three days since X had returned.

  Three days and no word from this mysterious Vaughn guy. I wondered how much longer we had to wait before we could move forward. My trigger finger was getting itchy.

  X hadn’t had any more episodes, but he’d been treading lightly, refusing to continue anything physical outside of sex. Not that I was complaining about the latter, but I really wanted to master fighting with my fists. A gun would only get me so far and if I was disarmed, I wanted to know how to incapacitate quickly and effectively.

  We moved onto knives and X instructed me on sharpening, throwing, stabbing, marking out the places on the body that would bleed life away the quickest…and the slowest. His fingers had dug into my ribs, along my stomach, against my breasts, around my neck… One guess how that session ended. Me impaled on X’s cock, riding him to a glorious orgasm.

  X was extremely intelligent and well thought, but he was also a very physical creature. When he couldn’t tolerate his mind, he took me with his body. He was intense in all senses of the word.

  I was lying on the sofa, stretched out after a hard and extremely satisfying day. X sat on the floor, his long legs out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. That was the other thing about us. We could sit in companionable silence, no matter how screwed up things became. I didn’t know when the dynamic had shifted between us, but I was glad it did.

  Most of all, I wondered if that dynamic could move even further. I wondered if one day, X’s screwed up emotions could allow him to love again. My heart flared at the thought and I squeezed my thighs together, squirming at the hint of a life that could be.

  Being in love with Xavier Blood. I was pretty sure I was already there, but I longed for him to return the feeling.

  I watched X as he used the tip of his switchblade security blanket to pick at the dirt underneath his fingernails.

  “I can see you staring at me, Mercy,” he said dryly, not even bothering to glance at me.

  “So?” I retorted. “Maybe I’m enjoying the view.”

  “Do you think I was born yesterday?” he asked. “What is it?”

  Well, I had to come out with it now. Truthfully, I was kind of crapping myself.

  “What do you think love is?” I held my breath.

  X flicked the switchblade closed and narrowed his eyes before glancing away. So, that was a bust.

  “Forget I said anything,” I said with a roll of my eyes and went to stand.

  X reached up and grasped my thigh and I fell back onto the sofa. He actually wanted to talk. About feelings. Another first.

  “I know what it’s supposed to be,” he said thinly. “But I don’t know what it’s meant to be like for me.”

  He went to let go of my thighs and I slid my hand over his forearm.

  “I think
in numbers and scenarios, Mercy,” he said, bowing his head.

  “I get it,” I whispered, slightly, okay scratch that, mortally disappointed. “You’re incapable.”

  X drew in a deep breath, his shoulders rising and falling. “I don’t know.”

  I let him pull away, and I was expecting him to leave like he always did when things got a little hard on the hearts and flowers front, but he knelt and scooted back onto the sofa beside me.

  He stared at me intently for a moment, his green eyes looking more like flaming orange in the firelight. He looked confused, like he was trying to solve some unknown puzzle and my breathing hitched. He was really something to look at. Every time he was still and lost in thought, I imagined I could see all the things he thought he was trying to hide. Maybe he wasn’t like that before, but it was what he was like now.

  “You said once that I could be tender.” He stumbled over the last word like it was a horrible taste in his mouth.

  “You are,” I said. “Would you like a list?”

  His eyes narrowed, but his lips quirked slightly. “I think I’ll be fine without it.”

  Slowly, his hand rose and his fingertips brushed against my collarbone, teasing and exploring. And he said he couldn’t do tender?

  His hands were cold, making my skin prickle as he traced the curve of my neck. His gaze followed his progress, but mine was firmly on his face, desperately trying to read his emotions, but as always he was impassive, totally in control.

  His palm flattened against my neck and his thumb stroked the length of my jaw before fluttering across my lips.

  A shrill ringing filled the still air and my heart somersaulted in my chest. X jerked away, blinking hard and leaving me hanging, as he fished around in his pocket.

  “What the fuck is that?” I asked, sitting up straight. He had a mobile phone? With coverage? Since fucking when?

  “It’s a burner phone,” he retorted, rising to his feet.

  “Is it Vaughn?”

  He raised his eyebrows like the answer was already obvious and strode across the room. Raising the phone to his ear as he opened the front door, I heard him answer with a brisk 'what' before he shut me out.

  I fucking hated when he did that. Things were about to move forward, his equilibrium was about to change and then something came along to thwart it yet again.

  Sometimes I felt like I could take X on, other times he made me feel like a defenseless little girl. A little girl hoping the broken boy of her dreams would wake up and fall in love with her.

  What I did know was that he had to start showing me a little bloody respect. How much further did I have to go before I proved that I was more than capable of completing my revenge kill? I wanted to know the details. I wanted to be involved. I didn’t want him to move all the pieces into place for me.

  A little voice began nagging me in the back of my mind.

  He won’t see you as his equal until you paint the walls with Sykes’ brains.

  Twelve

  X

  “What?” I snapped into the phone, one hand on my cock trying to arrange myself.

  Fuck, Mercy had me fucking hard again.

  “Interrupt something did I?” Vaughn asked. I could hear his laughter down the phone and if we didn’t need him so much, I’d do the bastard in myself.

  “Have you made the necessary arrangements?” I asked thinly, keeping my annoyance in check.

  “Yes. We need to meet to discuss the terms.”

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow evening. The Black Horse Inn at eleven.”

  I stared across the dark field, a multitude of stars dusted across the clear night sky. If it was any other time, I might’ve sat here and thought it was beautiful, wondering if somewhere out there there was a version of me that didn’t have to kill to get by in the world.

  “I’ll be there,” I replied, casting my gaze to the ground.

  “Oh, and bring Mercy or the deal is off.”

  My blood began to quicken. “Why?”

  I only got silence in return. Glancing at the phone, I saw the call had disconnected and if I didn’t need the fucking thing, I would’ve hurled it across the field.

  Posh bastard.

  Mercy had looked smug when I’d told her I was taking her to Exeter with me.

  Smug and proud. I wasn’t sure what kind of emotion that stirred up inside me, but it wasn’t good. I’d realized that in a way I’d been trying to shield her from all of this. Her part in Sykes’ downfall was imminent and unquestionable, but I still wanted to save as much of her soul as I could.

  It was plain that she thought I didn’t think her capable. She never said, but I felt it in the way she looked at me.

  She couldn’t be more wrong and I couldn’t be more fucked up.

  We were driving across the moor in the darkness, thick cloud cover obscuring the universe above. The completeness of the night around us made the road ahead look like a tunnel that never ended. A journey without a light to guide us.

  Motherfucking metaphors.

  Mercy sighed at irregular intervals, her fingers worrying the zipper on her leather jacket. She’d never discussed her failed attempt on Sykes, but I assumed this was making her nervous. She was falling further down the rabbit hole, tumbling out of control.

  She sighed again and I reached across and rested my palm on her thigh.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Why does he want to meet me?” she asked, squirming in the passenger seat.

  “Because he’s a nosey bastard,” I replied, my right hand tightening around the steering wheel.

  “Oh.”

  I stole a glance at her in the darkness. “He doesn’t want to hurt you, Mercy. He’ll try and play you with words, but it’s not in his interests to harm you.”

  “So, he’s another manipulative asshole?”

  I chose to ignore her barb. “Show him your strength. For you, I’m assuming that will be easy.”

  “Oh, so now I can dial up the bitch?”

  I heard the smirk in her voice and the ghost of my own smile tugged at my lips. “Not to the point of offense.”

  I stole another glance and she looked troubled, her forehead furrowed.

  “I think he’s interested in you because of what he went through,” I said. “Nothing more.”

  She glanced at me. “Because of Lorelei?”

  I snorted, pulling my hand away from her thigh. A wall of emotions began to brick themselves in my mind and I sucked in a deep breath. Was I afraid of the same thing happening to Mercy? The mere fact that I was beginning to fear was unsettling all on its own.

  She didn’t press it, casting her gaze back to the road ahead.

  Eventually I’d have to face this thing between us and categorize it, but I was far from ready to even understand it.

  When we finally arrived in the city and stashed the car, we walked through the quiet streets, making for the pub. We kept our heads down and walked fast, our hands wedged together. This wasn’t Royal Blood or Necromancer territory, so the likelihood of being spotted was low, but it was still a threat nonetheless. They would be hunting and that would include hiring outside men. Bounties, hits, nowhere was totally free of prying eyes. Nowhere except the solitude of the cottage.

  That was the one calm place in the shitstorm that was our lives.

  Vaughn was waiting for us when we stepped through the front door of the pub.

  Doing a quick scan of the premises, I noticed that it was mostly empty, save for staff behind the bar and a few punters who looked like they were paid well to look inconspicuous. As I suspected, Vaughn had planned this little meeting right down to the last detail. We were visitors in his territory and there was no other way he could declare it so plainly.

  Mercy was slightly behind me and I reached back to grasp her hand, but she was already searching for my touch. As her palm connected with mine and our fingers curled together, I gave her a small squeeze.

  Vaughn sat in the back c
orner, and as we approached, he rose from the table and smiled, his gaze running the length of Mercy and back up again, making me prickle with anger.

  “X, glad you could make it,” he said. I snorted, but his attention was firmly on Mercy. “And you must be the woman everyone has been talking about.”

  She cocked her head to the side.

  “Mercy Reid,” Vaughn said with a smirk.

  “And you must be Vaughn,” she replied sweetly.

  He smiled, a wicked gleam in his eye, and bade us to sit.

  “Drink?” Vaughn asked, gesturing to a man by the bar. A moment later, three pints of beer appeared on the table before us. “I hope X has been treating you well, Mercy,” he went on. “He has a penchant for violence.”

  I tensed, grinding my teeth.

  “I can hold my own,” Mercy retorted. “I don’t need your concern. What I need is your information.”

  Vaughn’s eyes widened slightly and he began to laugh. “Fair call.”

  I straightened up, my cock twitching. Fuck. And she was worried about this meeting?

  “You’ll be interested to know that Weiss is alive.”

  That one was directed at me to test my reaction, but I already assumed as much. Royal Blood wasn’t my concern. They were a fight that was queued up for another day.

  Mercy tensed beside me and I clamped my hand on her thigh.

  “We’re here about the hit on Sykes. Nothing more. What are the arrangements?”

  Vaughn's lips curled into his trademark smirk and he said, “All business? No pleasure?”

  He was trying to bait me in front of Mercy, but it wasn’t going to work. I narrowed my eyes and he leaned back in his chair, getting the message.

  “I have a man who will meet you just south of Portsmouth to take you across the English Channel.”

  “France?” Mercy asked, her eyes wide. “Sykes is in France?”

  Vaughn eyed her, but whatever he thought of Mercy’s eagerness he kept to himself. “He will be.”

  “Keep talking,” I drawled.

  “A fishing trawler will be waiting offshore to collect you.” Vaughn reached into his pocket and produced a small envelope, which he handed to me. “Inside you’ll find coordinates for your rendezvous point. Once you’re on the trawler in open water, my man will give you the location of your drop off point and the location of the cache.”