Page 98 of Of Desire And Deception

I smirked. “I thought you’d never ask.”

Surveying the tools on the table, I selected an ice pick, tossing it in the air as I strode over to the nearly naked men. Cosimo had left their underwear on. The man on the end sneered at me, his bald head shining in the light. The tattoos on his bare body gave away his past with the Bratva.

“Bitch,” he spat as I got closer.

“I prefer diavola,” I answered, slamming the ice pick into his thigh. The muscle gave way, and the pointed edge lodged deep. The man screamed. “You’d do well to remember that. Now, tell me, what was your connection to Bogdan?”

I was gambling on the possibility that their involvement in illegal activities would connect them to the Russians. When he refused to answer, I gripped the handle of the icepick and braced my boot against his thigh, pulling until it dislodged. Blood trickled from the puncture wound. Stabbing it into his side was enough to get him talking.

“He was a messenger,” the man rasped. “Brought us messages from his boss.”

“Who is his boss?” I pried, twisting the pick. The man screamed but didn’t speak. That was no fun. I looked at Cosimo and froze. His eyes looked black in the dim lighting, but fire burned within their depth. He was hungry, biting his lip as I walked toward him, swaying my hips. “Are we done with them if they don’t talk?”

He cleared his throat. “Yeah. You want to do it? I can.”

“I’m all in, psycho.” I selected a knife with a long, thin blade from the table and circled the man, standing behind him and keeping eye contact with my husband. Cosimo’s lips parted, as I wrenched the man’s neck to the side and drew the blade across his jugular, arterial spray painting the tarp-covered floor. The rush of crimson slowed, then turned to a steady stream. My first victim was dead.

I didn’t feel remorse. No, I felt high, laughing wildly as I danced in the deceased man’s blood and dragged my knife down the next man’s chest. He looked at me like I was insane. I probably was.

“I know you,” he panted. Cosimo had worked him over, leaving his face a mottled mess of bruising and slicing into his lips like some horror house character. “Agent.”

“Not anymore,” I purred. “Justice isn’t nearly as fun as vengeance.”

He glared at me through swollen, black eyes. “They’ll know it was you.”

Something about him sparked a memory, and I tried to place him. My eyes widened. “You were in my apartment?”

“What the fuck?” Cosimo rumbled, stepping forward.

I held up a hand. “He took me home from Deception.”

“So he’s FBI,” he concluded.

“Yes.” I pressed the tip of the blade against his stomach, slowly slicing through the layers of flesh and muscle. He tightened his abs, but it was futile.

“Madden will fucking kill you!” he cried. “Sadistic bitch!”

I stilled. “Madden?”

The man’s mouth dropped. He’d made a fatal mistake, and he knew it. My lips curved into a triumphant smile. This is what we’d been waiting for. A breakthrough. “Tell me more.”

His lips flattened in refusal, and I twisted the blade, making him scream. “He helps orchestrate the shipments. Turns the government’s eye in a different direction.”

“But he has a mole in the River Raiders.” It didn’t make sense.

Blood bubbled from the man’s mouth as he laughed. “He helped found the fucking Raiders. The mole is a cover. He’ll feed just enough information to the Bureau to keep the heat off. They’ll never fucking know.”

The man coughed, and I stepped back to avoid the blood, watching his eyes turn glassy. My mind raced, assembling the information I’d gained with everything I already knew. It had been Madden who arranged my first meeting with Cosimo, supposedly based on a tip he’d received. I couldn’t trust anything my boss had told me. “Fuck.”

“We got what we needed,” Cosimo reassured me.

He slit the throats of the other men, and the room fell silent, save our breaths. He reached for my black, long-sleeved tee, pulling it over my head before unfastening my jeans and yanking them down my legs along with my panties. His lips pressed to my center as he crouched to untie my boots, leaving me in just my bra. I unclipped it and let it fall to the floor, then worked my fingers under Cosimo’s shirt.

Impatient, he removed his clothes and shoes, then pulled me along to a bathroom, shoving me into the shower and kissing me as he turned the water on.

“Shit!” I squealed as the freezing spray hit us, hardening my nipple instantly. Cosimo took advantage of it, pinching them and lowering his head, biting and sucking the peaks until I squirmed. “Stop, please.”

“You’re so fucking hot when you stab people,” he murmured against my stomach, kneeling on the shower floor. He looked up with those deep chocolate eyes, lifting one of my knees over his shoulder and burying his face between my legs.

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