Total pages in book: 39
Estimated words: 36597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 183(@200wpm)___ 146(@250wpm)___ 122(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 36597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 183(@200wpm)___ 146(@250wpm)___ 122(@300wpm)
“Nyet. He stayed in Belarus where he’s most comfortable.” Venus was obviously confident her information was correct. She spoke immediately and concisely. “I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t sure.”
Millie looked at Shadow again. “You speak Russian.” It wasn’t a question. When he nodded, she shrugged. “Perhaps you will be more useful than you look.”
“Yeah,” Shadow said with a grin. “The big dumb brute has more than two brain cells to rub together.”
Millie tsked. “So touchy. Don’t you have friends who aren’t pussies, Venus?”
Venus just shrugged. “He has his uses. Brawn is a wonderful thing to have sometimes.”
“If we leave in an hour, I assume you already have travel planned?”
“We do. Jet’s waitin’ on the tarmac,” Shadow said. “Venus said we’d need you, but if you ain’t goin’…”
Millie gave him an impatient look before turning to speak to Venus. “If we’re going to Belarus, I have something I need to retrieve. Give me location, and I meet you in thirty minutes.”
Venus shook her head. “Nyet, little sister. You come with us now, or not at all.” Venus’s face was hard. When she spoke of her younger sister, it had always been with a soft smile that Shadow had a hard time reconciling with the hard woman he knew Venus to be. “This comes directly from my boss. No one must know we left country, and I will not take chance on you contacting your lover in palace. Tipping him off. We need you to get Katya, but I don’t trust you.”
“Ouch,” Millie said with a mock wince. “You sure know how to hit girl where it hurts.”
“Considering you nearly got us killed last time, you’ll understand why I won’t take chances.”
“Fuck you, Ulyana! You have no idea what really happened! You don’t want my help? Fine! See how far you get without me. Blyad! I don’t even know why you came for me in first place! But I promise, you’ll get little Katya killed without me.”
Venus raised an eyebrow. “What do you know that I don’t?”
“What?” Millie gave her a wide-eyed look of complete innocence. “Did you think Victor wouldn’t keep tabs on little Katya? You leave with her, she dies.”
“You’re gonna have to explain this one,” Shadow said, losing patience with the whole affair. “But we ain’t got time to wait.” Instead of arguing with the two women, he grabbed both of them by the arm and urged them in the direction of the exit. They needed to get out of here and on the road. They had a small window to slip out of U.S. air space without being noticed. And he had the feeling they needed not to be noticed.
“What the fuck?” Millie spat at him, struggling. Shadow knew if she wanted to get free, it would be an easy thing for her, but he was betting she’d rather go with them than risk being left behind.
“We’re on a bit of a tight schedule, ma’am,” he said as he kept moving them until they reached his and Venus’s bikes.
“Pink, Ulyana? Really? You must have a pussy for a president if he lets you keep that at his clubhouse.”
Without warning, Venus struck out, slapping Millie full on the face. Instead of retaliating, Millie just looked at Venus like a naughty child who’d overplayed her hand, in complete and utter shock.
“We don’t have time for this, rebenok. We need to get to plane and get airborne. Now.”
Shadow raised an eyebrow but said nothing. He didn’t have a helmet on his bike, but he figured Millie wouldn’t wear one anyway. On the way here, he’d thought Millie would ride with Venus. Appeared that wouldn’t be the case.
“Come on, wildcat,” he murmured to her. “Climb on behind me.”
* * *
Lyudmila climbed on the back of the big Harley behind Shadow. If she’d ever met a larger man she couldn’t remember when. He wore dark jeans and a dark T-shirt, his muscles stretching the material almost to bursting. Kinda reminded her of the Hulk. And, God, a man with that much muscle turned her the fuck on!
The name Shadow suited him in more ways than one. His skin was black as night, his eyes just as dark. Even with his size, Millie had nearly missed him at first. Her sister was flamboyant, sticking out like a target in that ridiculous pink getup she had going on, but it effectively kept the attention on her, rather than her companion. Shadow took advantage of that diversion. She admired and respected his abilities. The fact that he understood Russian was a surprise as well. Apparently he had brains as well as brawn.
Then there was her sister. Ulyana. Venus she went by now. Her club name. As if she could outrun the past by drowning herself in pink and changing her name to the goddess of fucking love. They were killers. Both of them. She wasn’t certain Ulyana actually tried to hide what she was, but she certainly downplayed it. Millie, on the other hand, embraced it. She’d been trained to kill from the time she started school. What she never expected was to be on the back of a man’s bike flying down the road to a plane headed back to Belarus. The only thing there besides her niece was death. Death and sorrow.