Conflicted (Undercover #2) Read online

  by Helena Newbury

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  © Copyright Helena Newbury 2015

  The right of Helena Newbury to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988

  This book is entirely a work of fiction. All characters, companies, organizations, products and events in this book, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any real persons, living or dead, events, companies, organizations or products is purely coincidental.

  This book contains adult scenes and is intended for readers 18+. The serial contains a scene that may be triggering for rape survivors.

  Cover by Aubrey Rose

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to:

  Aubrey for the cover

  My awesome street team!

  Liz, my editor.

  And to all my readers :)

  I closed the door, shutting out Luka and his world of violence and money and isolating myself in the silence of the wet room. I locked the door. Then I leaned my back against it.

  You won’t need anything to wear, he’d said.

  This was it. He wanted to have sex. Luka Malakov wanted to have sex with me.

  The fact that it had been in the cards all along didn’t make it any less of a bombshell. He was everything I stood opposed to. He was the literal enemy, the sort of man I’d sworn to protect the US from. And I was going to give myself to him?

  Give yourself to him? A mocking little voice spoke up inside me. As if it’s the supreme sacrifice?

  I felt the heat roll down my body, making my breasts tingle and my belly throb, finishing in a hot ache between my thighs.

  If I slept with him because it was my job, because I had to...did that make it okay? Or did that just make me a whore?

  All this on top of the fact that even simply having sex—normal sex, with a normal guy—would have been a major event in its own right. It was six months since I’d dated, and that had only lasted a couple of dates. It was just over a year since I’d had sex.

  And this wouldn’t just be sex. I remembered Roberta’s warning: God knows what he’ll want in the bedroom.

  What would it be like? To be with a man as big and powerful as him? To lie under him, while he…

  I squeezed my thighs together.

  This is nuts. I should call the whole thing off. I should tell Adam I needed to bail and fly home to the US and even quit the CIA if I had to. I can’t have sex with a guy like him!

  ...however much I want to.

  I reddened guiltily.

  Except that, because it’s my job, I don’t have to feel guilty.

  Guilt-free sex with a truly evil man I knew I shouldn’t get involved with but couldn’t resist. Perfect. Except for the part where, if he suspected for an instant that I was CIA, he’d break my neck.

  I closed my eyes and leaned back against the door. What would Nancy do? Probably somersault backwards through the air, firing a gun in each hand. Not all that helpful.

  A shower. I’d take a shower and hope that cleared my head. Except that meant taking off my clothes, and there was nowhere to put them in the wet room where they wouldn’t get soaked. I could dump them outside the door like Luka had said to, but if he really did take them to be cleaned, I’d be trapped there...naked. Taking a shower was making a decision.

  I took a deep breath and stopped thinking. Instead, I felt. I remembered the feel of his hands all over me, at the party in New York and his foot between my thighs at lunch. But that wasn’t what decided me. It was when I remembered the warmth of his chest against my back in the car and the tenderness of his gaze, those few times he’d let his defenses slip. There was more to him than the raw evil I’d been told about. And yet, worryingly, I was aware that the evil—and the fuck you attitude, the not caring what anyone thought—turned me on as much as the tenderness. I wanted his cold strength as well as his hidden, blazing center.

  I unzipped my dress, still damp from the toilet water, and peeled it off. I stripped off my bra, panties and heels and then stood there, naked, biting my lip, the bundle of clothes in my arms.

  All at once, I unlocked the door and pulled it open, half expecting Luka to be standing right there. But there was no one in sight. I laid the bundle down outside the door together with my purse and closed and relocked the door, then stepped quickly towards the shower before I could change my mind.

  The slate tiles were warm underfoot—the place must have underfloor heating. There didn’t seem to be any controls for the shower but, as I stepped under it, the spray came on, strong and just the right side of scalding. The shower head was as big as a car’s wheel with about a million holes for the water. Standing under it was like being immersed rather than showered and the sensation left me gasping. But I could feel the jets pounding the heat into my body like hammers, forcing back the Moscow chill. And that took me back to a different sort of cold.

  What exactly had happened in Luka’s car? I hadn’t had a full-on flashback like that in a long time and the intensity of it scared me. And yet, at the same time, it had felt as if something important had changed inside me. I was still frozen inside but I’d definitely felt things crack and move before they’d hardened again.

  On the few occasions when the memories had hit me at full strength like that, I’d just had to endure it, the pain turning back in on itself again and again, like a beam of light in a hall of mirrors. But with Luka there, I’d actually been able to vent some of it. A little of the pain had escaped and it had felt...incredible.

  Had he healed me, in some way? That made no sense. He killed people and sold things that killed people. What did he know about healing?

  He’d called me Little Mouse. That wasn’t how I’d expected him to react, faced with a woman ugly-crying in his car. I would have expected him to kick me out and pick up a couple of Russian escorts, instead.

  When the water had sluiced the dried tears from my face and the toilet water from my skin, I rummaged around on the shelves by the shower, looking for shampoo. Translating the Russian wasn’t a problem. Reading the labels in the moodily-lit bathroom was. Who does he think he is: Batman?

  The bottles all looked like men’s products—black, silver, and blue bottles. They had a quality feel but they didn’t look trendy. That didn’t surprise me. I couldn’t imagine Luka reading up on which hair products would make his hair softer and more manageable. I was surprised he didn’t wash it in coal tar and engine grease.

  Right at the back of the shelf, I found a half-empty bottle with a definite feminine feel. Something Elena or one of the others had left there. I washed my hair like I’ve never washed it before, until all traces of the fight in the club bathroom were gone. I gently felt my face. My cheek still throbbed a little where the woman had slapped it, but there didn’t seem to be a bruise. My forehead was tender but hadn’t swollen up and my lip had stopped bleeding. I’d been lucky.

  I found a bottle of what I hoped was shower gel. As soon as I opened it, I recognized the scent from being around Luka—it was the one he used, citrusy and with a hint of cold, stormy skies. I soaped myself down until I felt completely clean, suds trickling down over my breasts and stomach. I don’t know how much time passed but, by the time I finished, the attack felt as if it had happened to someone else.

  I shut off the water and then took a look at myself in the mirror. Without make-up remover, I’d had to just scrub at my
ruined make-up as best I could. It was pretty much all gone, which looked a hell of a lot better than a clown face. But now I was completely bare.

  What I needed was my purse, so I could at least apply a little lipstick. It had been a long time since I dated, but I hadn’t completely lost touch with my feminine instincts. I looked around for a towel...and then realized there weren’t any.

  I poked my head out of the door. My clothes, as Luka had promised, had gone. So had my purse. I was now stranded, naked, and dripping wet. I swallowed. “Um. Hello?”

  Nothing. But, if I strained my ears, I could hear something coming from the open-plan living area. A crackling sound. The penthouse seemed to be mainly in darkness, with only the occasional spotlight and the moonlight coming in through the windows to light my way.

  I took a deep breath...and stepped out, naked, to find him.

  The penthouse had cream carpets, the pile so deep that my feet almost disappeared. I squelched across them, wincing. First I’d probably ruined his car’s upholstery, now his penthouse. But he had stranded me without a towel...possibly deliberately. A deep, hot throb went through me.

  As I rounded the corner, I saw him. He was standing by an enormous fireplace in which a fire was blazing, the logs stacked as high as my hip. The scale of it would have dwarfed any other man, but not Luka. He was still in his black shirt and black jeans and yet, despite the fine clothes, he looked...rugged. The fire was lighting up his high cheekbones and solid jaw in reds and oranges and I couldn’t remember ever seeing anything more beautiful. He was like a statue to male power, cast in granite.

  And then he turned and saw me and I saw his eyes gleam in the darkness. I felt his gaze rake down my naked, dripping body and I swear half the water just evaporated right there, my whole body going warm under his eyes. I felt my core dissolve into liquid heat.

  He beckoned with his finger.

  I stepped towards him and, as I passed a framed photo on the wall, I saw my reflection in the glass. My pale skin was gleaming wetly, still beaded with moisture. My hair was a twisted, wet rope down my back. My nipples had already hardened from the sudden transition from hot shower to cold air. But I was just...me. Why does he want me?! This should be Svetlana or Natalia or...hell, Nancy, stalking around in their high heels with their perfect make-up. Why me?

  I started walking towards him and, with every step, I could feel that charge in the air between us, tingling and sparkling against every inch of exposed skin. I wasn’t sure how much he could see but I knew I was still mostly veiled in shadow. Every step brought me closer to the firelight and put more of me on display. I started to breathe faster.

  When I was still ten feet away, I could feel the heat of the fire. I looked down and saw that the warm light was hitting my calves, now, allowing him to see them. Another step, and it was over my knees. Another, and it was all the way up my thighs. The room was so quiet that I could hear my own ragged breathing.

  His eyes ran down and then up my body and he gave that smile, the one that seemed to mean he approved, and the heat started to build faster and faster, as if a switch had been thrown. How could just a smile, just the knowledge that he wanted me, do that to me? God, I was completely at his mercy.

  This time, he didn’t beckon me. He said, “Come here,” and I could hear the thick layer of lust under his words.

  My legs seemed to move of their own accord. I closed the remaining distance between us, the last shadows retreating up my thighs, stomach, and breasts until they disappeared completely and my whole body was wrapped in flickering orange light. It made the soft curls of brown hair between my thighs gleam. As I neared him, I stepped right in front of the fireplace and the heat was like a furnace.

  I stopped. There were no more than a few feet between us, now, but he didn’t reach for me or tell me to come closer. I felt the fire beginning to dry the water from my body, the heat of it almost too much to bear on the side of me that was closest. And Luka was just as close—how is he not hot? But he just stood there as if made of rock and I didn’t doubt that he could stand there all night if he wanted to.

  His own comfort didn’t seem to bother him at all. He was only interested in one thing, at that moment, and that was me. His gaze traced every line of my body: my cheekbone, the curve of my lip, the shape of my neck. It went lower and I felt it like a touch on my breasts, the nipples puckering even more as his eyes swept over them. Down over my stomach, down between my thighs—

  I swallowed. The heat inside me coiled and tightened.

  His gaze moved down my legs, all the way to my toes, and I shifted my weight from foot to foot. It felt as if he was consuming me, savoring each piece.

  His eyes rose to mine and locked there and he made the tiniest circling motion with one finger. I realized he wanted me to turn and dry myself. And, at the same time, show off my entire body to him.

  I lifted my arms out to the sides and began to turn. The blazing hot skin on one side of me went blessedly cool as it rotated away from the fire. Then my back and ass were facing the fireplace, the violent heat of it vaporizing every drop of moisture. I kept turning, because I knew that if I stopped, I might not have the courage to start again.

  I turned until my ass was towards Luka and my other side was towards the fire. I felt his eyes sweeping over my back and down the curve of my spine, following it down between the cheeks of my ass, and I tensed.

  Then I was rotating again, my front towards the fire, and the heat was so intense that I had to close my eyes. I felt the fire blasting my eyelids, my cheeks, my breasts. The heat soaked into me and I swear I felt my breasts swell as they warmed. My nipples had been hard because of the chill; now, they stayed hard thanks to the heat inside me. I felt my sex absorbing the heat, too, swelling, aching, the heat inside and out melting me, my arousal turning to slick moisture.

  I faced him again and opened my eyes. He was staring right at me and he was breathing hard, that massive chest moving in ragged heaves, as if he was having to hold himself back.

  I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. Say something, Arianna, say something or it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen right now, say something SAY SOMETHING—“I—”

  Too late.

  All in one movement, he stepped forward, put his hand under my chin, and tilted my face up. His lips were on me instantly, crushing against mine, the kiss open-mouthed and hungry, and it was less than a second before my own lips flowered open and let him in. His chest pushed up against my naked breasts, the soft cloth of his shirt rasping against my nipples, and I groaned into his mouth.

  Then one of his huge hands landed hard on my ass, pulling me powerfully up, and I yelped as my feet left the ground. I grabbed for his neck instinctively and my legs went either side of his. My naked sex bumped against his jeans and I went weak, squirming and then clinging to him, my legs wrapping around him to hold me up. His tongue was exploring my mouth while the hand under my ass squeezed and fondled each cheek in turn, every press of his fingers making me gasp. His other hand played up and down my spine, each sweep of it drawing the fire inside higher and higher—

  Suddenly he spun around and pushed me away from him, almost throwing me down. I staggered and almost fell. He turned his back on me, staring at the fire. He was between me and it, now, silhouetted against the flames. “Luka?” I asked, worried. “What—”

  “You shouldn’t be with me,” he said. “You’re a good person.”

  I’d like to say that I pretended to be naive. That I played the part of the American tourist who didn’t know what he did for a living. “You are too, I’m sure,” I said.

  But the truth is, I said it because I wanted it so badly to be true. I wanted it all to be a huge mistake, and for him to turn out to be the good guy after all.

  He shook his head, his back still turned. “No,” he said. “No, I’m not.”

  I had my way out. I could just ask for my clothes and leave and never see him again. Tell Adam I’d done my best and go home to
a hero’s welcome for having tried.

  But I didn’t want to go. I wanted to be with him so badly it hurt. I stepped forward and put my hand on his arm.

  His hand came down on my hand, trapping it there. He slowly turned to face me and I almost gasped when I saw the pain in his eyes, the debate that was raging there. “Don’t start what you can’t finish,” he told me.

  I swallowed. And nodded.

  His eyes were stroking over me, hotter even than the fire had been. “I don’t know what you’re used to,” he said. “But you won’t be used to me.”

  Something deep inside me, something I hadn’t even known existed until the party in New York, twisted and throbbed, releasing a dark, dark heat. He’s not going to be like one of your boyfriends, Roberta had warned me.

  I didn’t want him to be. I felt a rush of shame as I admitted it, but...part of me wanted to welcome that darkness into me.

  I nodded. And instantly, I saw the change in his eyes as he slipped over the edge and out of control. I felt as if I’d just cut the rope tethering a balloon to the ground and now it was surging skyward, dragging me with it. He grabbed my hand in a death-grip—

  OhGodwhathaveIdone?

  —and pulled me towards the bedroom.

  I had to run to keep up. If I’d stumbled, I honestly believe he would have dragged me along the carpet.

  We burst through a door into his bedroom. A huge room, with a bed that looked bigger than king size, covered in a dark red satiny comforter that gleamed in the low lighting. Luka heaved on my hand and I squealed as my feet left the floor and I flew headfirst through the air —

  I landed on my back on the bed, the air knocked out of me. I lay there gasping, looking up at him, trying to come to terms with the reality that he just threw me onto his bed.

  He was undressing. He didn’t rush, despite the headlong dash through the apartment. It was as if he wanted to savor this part. His fingers worked the buttons of his shirt, his bare chest gradually appearing. I lay there panting, staring up at him. He was a huge man anyway but, looking up at him like that, he looked like a giant.