Page 28 of Assassin's Mark
Chapter Fourteen
The bed was empty when I woke the next morning. The sheet next to me was cold—Levi had been up for a while already. Last night’s climax could be felt in the unfamiliar soreness of my body, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t remember going to sleep. Maybe I hadn’t; maybe I’d simply passed out after that mind-blowing peak, and that had been that.
Loss dragged at meas I slid from the bed. Would I ever get to experience the afterglow part of sex with Levi? Find out if he was the cuddling type or the roll-over-and-snore type? I’d probably never know if all the sex was like the last two times.
And really, did I want to know any more about him than I already did? That would just be one more memory to haunt me after all this was over, and there were alreadymore than enough.
I trudged into the bathroom and showered. Turning my face up to the water helped blast away the cobwebs of sleep, but it couldn’t erase the questions, couldn’t quiet my overactive mind. I could add armor, though—clothes, makeup. Anything to patch up the holes last night had torn in my defenses. Levi wasn’t a good guy any more than my father was, and I was asking to be screwedover if I didn’t remember that. What was between Levi and me wasn’t love or even affection, just sex.
Damn good sex, but still…
When I left the bedroom, Levi was standing at the stove, his back to me. The smell of bacon and pancakes filled the air. So did curses. Despite the growling of my traitorous stomach, I approached the source of both with caution, but the closer I went, the more I struggledto hold back a laugh.
“Did we finally find something you aren’t perfect at?”
Levi swung around, a plastic spatula gripped in his fist like a sword. The kitchen certainly looked as if he’d gone to battle. Flour and pancake batter coated the counter, bacon grease splattered the backsplash, and both were smeared over Levi’s T-shirt in liberal amounts.
Laughter bubbled out before I could stop it.“Need help, or have you vanquished your foe?”
Levi growled. “Don’t push your luck, little bird.”
Maybe a push or two was exactly what this demigod of the criminal underworld needed, just to help him remember he was part human. I smiled my sweetest smile.
Levi narrowed his eyes at me, but I didn’t miss how they dropped to trace my body as I moved the rest of the way into the kitchen. I ignoredthe flame that look sparked in my belly and waved a hand at the mess. “So…what’s the occasion?”
Levi turned back to the stove to flip pancakes. “We’re celebrating.”
If he was this grim when he celebrated, I’d hate to see him at a funeral. “Celebrating what?”
Starting at one end of the skillet, he began turning the bacon. “Your father’s campaign fund made a generous donation last night.”
Iblinked, the spark of happiness inside me flickering out. What had I expected? Surely not some gushing praise for screwing like bunnies after he almost killed me. Because that would be stupid. And dangerous, especially if I ignored the “he almost killed me” part. Last night had been about releasing tension and sating needs that had no other outlet at the moment. Nothing else.Remember that, Abby.No matter what happens, for God’s sake, remember that.
This wasn’t a romance and Levi wasn’t a hero. Of course he was happy about some massively reckless step forward in his plan to take my father down.
Did I really want to know details?
“To whom?”
Levi finished with the bacon and turned to prop a hip against the counter, grinning at me. “So proper. ‘To whom?’”
I shrugged a shoulder. Beingproper was a survival skill in my world.
“To the bank account of a well-known mob boss.”
I winced.
“How much?”
Levi turned back to the food. “Enough that he won’t feel like celebrating with pancakes.”
The amount really didn’t matter in the long run—my dad came from wealth, and he was good at building his own. Whatever Levi had taken wouldn’t hurt him. It was the blow to Derrick Roslyn’s reputationat the start of his campaign that would hurt. But for Levi to reach his objective, someone had to know about the contribution.
“He won’t let information like that leak; you know that, right?”
Levi transferred pancakes to a plate, his lips still curved into a smile. He was enjoying this, obviously. The win, not the cooking. Too bad the course he’d set us on made my stomach hurt. “Oh, it’ll leak.Don’t you worry.”
All I could do was worry, not that the men around me, caught up in their power games, gave a thought to that or the ulcer I was likely developing, as long as they got what they wanted.
