HARD WIRED Page 8

  If I’m so angry, he accused himself wryly, then why won’t this damned hard-on go away?

  _____________

  Night had blanketed the marina as Xander approached the boat, but to his surprise, the lower deck seemed unmanned as he neared.

  Is my information wrong? Has Cerci moved on already?

  It seemed unlikely that Marius was misinformed but Khan Cerci was not exactly known to be a picture of stability. For all anyone knew, the drug lord had hopped on his private plane and headed out of Paris minutes earlier.

  Xander hoped not as he stealthily boarded the boat, his eyes darting around for signs of life.

  Xander wasn’t sure where to search first, thinking that Khan may be in his stateroom, holed up for the evening. Or possibly entertaining in there? There didn’t seem to be any action on this deck. He made his way up the narrow stairwell and heard sounds coming from above.

  A scuffle was occurring, something he could hear before he saw, but as he poked his head over the railing, peering onto the upper deck, his blood ran cold.

  Khan Cerci stood over a collapsed woman, unbuckling his belt as another man stood by, a cruel smirk on his face.

  Xander felt a stab of fury as he realized what the insane gangster was intending to do to the defenseless woman, but he forced himself not to act. Not yet.

  He was unarmed, and as he stood, trembling with rage, his one ‘weapon’ became more and more difficult to focus. He needed to concentrate on projecting into Khan’s mind.

  Some people deserved to be killed, that was a simple fact.

  People like my abusive parents, he thought, the memory of his adoptive parents fueling his anger. But no one deserves to be sexually assaulted.

  Xander closed his eyes and forced himself to overtake Khan’s mind. It turned out to be a Herculean effort, but Xander knew he was short on time.

  Khan’s pants were unzipped.

  Xander fell against the railing as his own essence became Khan’s, forcing the villain’s energy out into nothingness as Xander “became” him.

  Through wild eyes, Khan’s hand stopped fumbling at his waistline. He froze and looked at his counterpart who eyed him in confusion.

  “What’s wrong, boss?” Jacques asked.

  Xander reached into Khan’s beltline and withdrew a pistol, immediately shooting a single bullet between Jacques’ shocked eyes. Hearing no report, Xander looked down at Khan’s hand and realized the pistol had a silencer on it. Interesting, he thought. I wonder who he planned to kill later tonight.

  Jacques was dead before he hit the floor.

  It was then that Xander realized it was Ashtyn Deveaux laying unconscious on the deck.

  Myriad emotions flowed through him, but he knew he didn’t have much time before his own form died without a breath of life.

  Really I should let her die here, he thought. But he knew he would never allow any woman to face a death in this fashion.

  The only thing he could do was kill Khan and deal with Ashtyn Deveaux himself – the proper way.

  Without another thought, he raised the gun again, this time to Khan’s skull and fired once.

  Xander gasped, back in his own body and he sprung toward the fallen girl as Khan crumbled to the floor, an expression of shock on his face.

  Xander had no idea where the guards were but he knew time was not on their side. He had no idea how many other men were on the boat but there was no feasible way to take them all out, even with Khan’s berretta.

  Idly, he contemplated killing Ashtyn there and saving himself the trouble of hauling her out, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He grudgingly had to admit to himself that he respected her cunning and intelligence. She certainly didn’t deserve to die like this.

  This was not the place to end his contract, not when he had just saved her from such a brutal assault.

  It wasn’t right.

  There’ll be time for that later, he assured himself, despite the doubt crawling through him.

  Scooping her up in his arms, he huddled her naked chest to his and turned to flee the yacht, but as he moved, the blonde stirred in his arms.

  “Wh-what’s happening?” she moaned.

  “Shh” he ordered, as her teal eyes fluttered open.

  Shock registered on her face and she began to squirm against him.

  “Stop moving! I’m saving your damned life,” he snapped. “But no guarantee its going to stay that way,” he muttered under his breath.

  Ashtyn paused and gaped at him as if trying to determine if he was serious or not. Her gaze rested on the fallen men as he jumped down the stairwell.

  “Oh my God,” she whispered, her arms encircling his neck as he ran. “You killed them... thank you,” she paused, and then “No, wait!”

  “Shut up!” he snarled again. “Don’t make me tell you again or I’m leaving you in the water to drown.”

  “No, please,” she begged as his feet touched the dock and he hurried through the darkness toward safety. “We have to go back!”

  Xander snorted.

  “That’s not likely,” he replied. “We have to find a safe place to go before Khan’s goons find us and come after us.”

  “No!” Ashtyn wailed. “You don’t understand!”

  She began to flail in his muscular arms and Xander was left with no choice but to drop her.

  She fell unceremoniously onto the dock, her eyes filling with tears as she gazed up at him.

  He glared at her furiously.

  “Are you fucking crazy? We – “ The expression on her face took him aback, causing him to stop speaking mid-sentence.

  Xander could not imagine that such a cold, calculating bitch would ever be capable of shedding these kind of tears, yet her luminous teal eyes were soaked and her chin quivered as she tried defiantly to contain herself. He felt like he could literally see her heart breaking.

  What the fuck? Is she playing me? He wondered, glancing around to ensure they weren’t being watched.

  “My sister is on the boat! I have to go back for her!”

  Xander gaped at her dubiously.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” he snapped. “If we go back there, we’re both dead.”

  “I have to,” she whispered, stumbling to her feet slowly.

  He saw the red bruises around her throat from where Khan had grabbed her, and he gritted his teeth.

  I don’t regret killing that son of a bitch for one minute, he thought.

  “Don’t be crazy,” he retorted. “Even if what you’re saying is true, and let’s face it, I don’t believe a thing coming out of your mouth, there is no way to get to her now. We have to get out of here.”

  “I can’t!” she cried and the anguish in her voice sent shivers through him. “If we leave, they’ll kill her.”

  “If we don’t, they will kill us,” he replied. “And dead, we’ll be of no use to anyone at all.”

  They stared at each other for a long moment.

  “Let’s go somewhere and regroup,” he finally said gruffly. “We are both in a weakened state and we can’t take on anyone like this.”

  She eyed him warily.

  “You’re going to kill me,” she said flatly. “Aren’t you?”

  “I don’t work for Khan,” he told her, hedging. “Obviously.”

  “Who do you work for?”

  He chuckled dryly.

  “That is one long fucking story,” he answered, but suddenly he wanted to know more about his employers and why they were so eager to have Ashtyn killed.

  “I’m leaving,” Xander told her, spinning to leave her behind. “We’ve already been sitting ducks too long.”

  He strode away from her with long legs, his pulse racing as his thoughts grew confused.

  You can’t leave her there, he thought, slowing his gait. They’re going to kill her. Plus, you have orders to kill her, his mind rioted. This situation was so fucked up.

  “Wait!”

  Unexpected relief flooded through him
as he stopped and turned to face Ashtyn who hurried after him.

  “What? You changed your mind?” he asked arrogantly. Her eyes narrowed, the moment of weakness he had seen fading fast.

  “I’m doing you a favor,” she retorted.

  Xander arched an eyebrow.

  “You are?” he chuckled. “How’s that?”

  “I have a safehouse outside the city.”

  It was not the answer he was expecting.

  This girl continues to perplex, he thought. Obviously she felt unsafe around Khan even before he tried to rape her. He wondered about their situation, but there was no time for further discussion.

  Ashtyn brushed past him toward the road and he was the one left chasing after her.

  She hailed a taxi as he approached and they both slid inside.

  His cell began to ring in his pocket as they drove and Xander cringed, realizing he had not touched base with the Smiths in over twenty-four hours.

  “Are you going to get that?” she snapped, her nerves obviously on edge.

  He started to shake his head but he changed his mind.

  They would only keep calling and the last thing he needed was a surprise visit from one of them.

  “Yeah?”

  There a chuckle on the other end of the phone.

  “Oh good,” Sam breathed. “You’re alive. Cathy was convinced you were dead.”

  He arched an eyebrow but turned his head away from Ashtyn who was pretending not to listen.

  “Of course I’m not,” Xander replied.

  “We traced you to the hospital,” Sam explained and Xander gritted his teeth.

  “It was a minor setback,” he replied calmly. “Is that all?”

  “Have you found her?”

  Slowly, he turned his head to look at the sensational but scared woman peering out the window into the night.

  It is my job, he reminded himself. She is just a job.

  “Xander?”

  “I’m here.”

  “Well? Have you found her?”

  He inhaled quietly.

  “No.”

  There was a long pause on the other end of the phone.

  “Well the clock is ticking, Van Hoyt. And I should mention one last thing…”

  “What?” he sighed, gritting his teeth.

  “We have Sarah in our custody.”

  Ice ran through his veins.

  “We had a deal,” he growled.

  “We still do,” Sam assured him. “But think of this as a little incentive. I would hate to think you’re wasting our time or that we called on the wrong man for the job. Talk to you soon!”

  Sam disconnected the call leaving Xander to stare blankly at the phone in his hand.

  “Your boss?” Ashtyn asked sarcastically, her face unusually pale in the moonlight.

  Xander didn’t answer as he studied her profile.

  They have Sarah, he thought, swallowing. I have no choice; I have to kill Ashtyn.

  But as he continued to stare at Ashtyn, the memory of her laying broken on the deck of Khan’s yacht vivid in his mind, the image of her tear-filled eyes pleading with him from the dock, he didn’t know if he could bring himself to do it. He felt the heat of her body pressed up against him on the train, the sweetness of her lips, the gush of her orgasm against his fingers. Xander knew that fulfilling this contract was going to be impossible.

  I have to choose between my sister, who is a killer, and a woman who tried to kill me.

  For the first time in his life, Xander found himself conflicted.

  Until that moment, life had always been so black and white.

  But he would be lying if he said he was still going to honor his contract to kill Ashtyn.

  That was why he had lied to Sam, saying that he had not yet found her.

  But it wasn’t only because of Ashtyn’s vulnerable beauty and deviant connection to him; now, the Smiths had reneged on their end of the deal, and no one double crossed Xander Van Hoyt.

  He needed to find a way to protect both of the women, and do it before the Smiths learned that he had Ashtyn Deveaux within his reach.

  Dammit, I hope Ashtyn doesn’t try to kill me again, he sighed to himself, settling back against the leather.

  He had more than enough to worry about without sleeping with one eye open.

  Chapter Eleven

  Creteil, France

  The one thing the safehouse did possess was a bed, and while it was not high quality, nor did it have pillows, it served its purpose.

  The taxi had dropped them off two blocks away and Ashtyn had almost sprinted back, not caring if Jean was on her trail.

  A part of her wanted to run as far away from him as she could, but she could not help but realize that he had saved her life and her dignity on Khan’s yacht, and then saved her again by keeping her from going back to find Viola.

  There was no reason for the man to keep her alive, especially when she had tried to end his life earlier. But she read something in his eyes which told her that he was not going to harm her.

  And you could use an ally, no matter how little you trust him, she thought, her strides quickening.

  The exhaustion, both mental and physical, was more than she could bear and all she wanted was to go to sleep, curled against Xander’s broad, protective chest. Wait just a second, Ash! Where the hell did that thought come from? She chided herself.

  She burst through the front door, falling onto the bed, her mind whirling with the beginnings of a plan.

  Her turquoise eyes closed but she could not relax.

  She kept envisioning her sister, trapped on the yacht, waiting for death.

  No one saw me board the boat, she thought. Did anyone see me while I was unconscious? Do Khan’s men think I had something to do with his death? How did Xander manage to disarm and kill them both? And what was he doing there?

  She had no way of knowing, but it gave her a glimmer of hope that he had saved her. Perhaps she had figured him all wrong in the first place and he was not after her. But then, how did he keep turning up wherever she was? Although he wasn’t the one that had tried to harm her.

  Guilt filled her as she thought about injecting him with the syringe full of heroin. If she had been wrong about him, and it wasn’t Khan that had sent him, then what had she done? Guilt continued to flood through her. He could have killed me already, but instead he saved me. Twice.

  And he certainly can’t trust me after what I did to him, and yet here he is… She felt warm as she thought of the way he had carried her off the boat after killing Kahn and Jacques.

  She forced herself to think about her sister, the most pressing issue.

  If no one else had witnessed her on board and both Khan and Jacques were dead, there would be no reason to kill Viola. They wouldn’t suspect she had anything to do with it…would they?

  It was all too confusing, too much to handle and Ashtyn threw her eyes open, suddenly realizing that Jean had not followed her inside the house.

  Apprehensively, she sat up, peering at the open door, heart hammering.

  Shit, did I underestimate him? Is he about to burst in here and kill me after all?

  His shadow appeared and when he showed himself in the doorway, Ashtyn gasped aloud.

  Blood was dripping from his hand as he sucked on the gash in his forearm to stop the bleeding.

  “What the hell happened?” she demanded, flying toward him. “I just left you alone for two minutes!”

  He shook his head as he continued to apply pressure to the deep laceration.

  “Did someone follow us? How did that happen?” she insisted, her voice raising an octave.

  He wrenched his shirt over his head and sighed.

  “I did it to myself,” he confessed and she gaped at him.

  “Why?” she demanded, snatching his wrist into hers and peering at the damage done to his arm. She kicked the door shut behind him and latched it, still clinging to his blood-soaked hand.

  “I had a GPS ch
ip imbedded in it,” he replied. “I had to remove it before coming in to your safehouse.”

  “You removed it out there?” she cried, shaking her head as she led him toward the miniscule bathroom at the back of the shack. “How the hell did you do that? You should have gone to a hospital.”

  There was only a powder room, no place to shower or bathe but it was all they needed for the time.

  Ashtyn ripped open cupboards, pulling out odds and ends left behind by the previous tenants. She sighed in relief when she located some alcohol and bandages.

  “I used a sharp piece of metal that I tore off an old bike frame,” Jean he replied. “Not the most sterile instrument, but it did the job. And now the chip is on its way to wherever barge the garbage truck I dropped it in takes it.”

  Ashtyn didn’t reply, even though hundreds of questions were flying through her mind.

  Carefully, she dabbed the alcohol onto his cut, cleaning away the blood as delicately as she could.

  Her guest registered no emotion on his face, but Ashtyn thought she recognized a flash of pain in his eyes as the sting of the alcohol hit him.

  A wry smile formed on her lips, despite the direness of their situation.

  Did that hurt? She thought, but she said nothing as she wrapped his hand, the bleeding at least slowing for the time.

  “Are you laughing at me?” he asked, cupping her chin with his thumb and forefinger. The motion sent a shiver down her spine as their eyes locked.

  His eyes were a sea green, almost hypnotic, as she gazed into them, lost in the ethereal coloring.

  She shook her head slowly.

  “No,” she mumbled, wanting to look away, but she could not pull her eyes away from him.

  He’s going to kiss me, she realized and it seemed like such an daring move for him to make, but she didn’t stop it from happening.

  It was a welcome distraction from everything else which was happening around them in that minute and she could not deny that she had thought about their episode on the train dozens of times, in spite of her intentions at the time.

  But when his lips met hers this time, something was different.

  Gone was the almost violent undertone he had possessed on the train.