They Endure: A Stone Hearts Novel, page 11
The comment was meant to be a dig at Lou. It made her grin. The tent was still mostly silent aside from the sound of clinking glasses, shuffling feet, and the near sounds of horses trotting about doing their warmups. Everyone was still staring, so Lou said, “it’s good for the lady balls. Perhaps you should give it a go instead of stuffing your tits with fake shit. I’ve found that men prefer it.”
Blondie, as well as a few of the other women who also had fake balloon tits, sucked in sharp offended breaths—but the men, including Lou’s fake husband, laughed.
“If you’ll excuse us,” Bash said to the sputtering blonde, and led them away. “You’re giving me a hard on, '' he whispered as Lou took a pull of her bourbon that really was the good stuff. She looked back over her shoulder at the bartender and gave him a thumbs up.
“Poopoo for you, Loulou isn’t feeling as generous as you,” Lou said with a dramatic pout.
Bash tipped his head back and roared with laughter. The sound and his big grin did things to Lou. Things that shouldn’t be doing and weren’t of a sexual nature. Including her not being able to help but smile. His laugh really was infectious.
Fuckity fuck.
“Marco and Victoria Davies?” a very familiar voice said. No fucking way. There was absolutely no fucking way.
Lou turned around, and low and behold, there was none other than Thato Carver looking as hot as ever. Kill her, just fucking kill her. What the hell was he doing here? Did Ren send him and not tell them? Why would he? This could compromise their entire mission. Thoughts of Thato crossing a line or betraying them weren’t anywhere in Lou’s mental ballpark. The head Carver was a right bastard when it came to his criminal enterprise dealings, but he was loyal to Ren. Especially to Vas, who Lou still thought the Carver would kidnap and marry himself if Ren bit the big one.
Bash didn’t miss a beat. Smiling, he offered his hand to Thato. “The very same, and you are?”
“Thato Carver. I’m from Luxton, the next city over. I’ve heard of your architectural work. I must say, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
What. The. Fuck. Did Bash know about this or was he just a really good fucking actor? Lou supposed he was either way—he couldn’t stand Thato, even more so considering Lou’d been riding him seven days to Sunday for the last few months.
Thato leaned in to kiss Lou’s cheek. “You are a fucking vision, please ride my fucking face later,” he said quietly for no one else to hear. He went to her other cheek, kissing there and whispering, “our foreign friends reached out to me and our mutual friend said to play along.”
Lou was damn impressed with herself for keeping her Victoria Davies face on at both the face riding comment, which she really wanted to take him up on, and the Russian reveal. Holy shit, the Russians they were hunting were actually here, and Ren and Thato knew who they were now. Was this just a really lucky coincidence or were their prey onto them? It’d been Luxton’s best kept secret that the Stone and Carver alliance was more than tenuous now—had the Russians someone found out?
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Carver.” Lou said, playing along, tucking herself back into Bash’s side. “We’ve heard of your work as well.” She rested her head on Bash’s shoulder and looked up at him like the doting wife she was playing. “Get any informative texts from butt buddy lately?” she said to him through her smile.
Bash shook his head. “Haven’t checked my phone, my attention has been completely on my gorgeous wife.”
It took everything in her not to roll her eyes. Bash was a damn good actor—his smile reached his eyes and was foolproof—but she knew him, knew his body, which was nothing but tensed up muscle. He was staking a claim on her in front of Thato. Which she had to let slide since she was his wife right now. She could tear him a new asshole for it later.
Thato put his hand in his pocket and sipped his drink, tequila from the looks of it, green eyes glimmering with amusement. He looked downright yummy in his all white suit and black loafers, but not as good as Bash, certainly not with his golden shoe a-game going on.
Good lord. Did she just give Sebastian Corinado a compliment? She needed to get it the fuck together and stop thinking with her pussy.
Not having bothered to tie his hair back today, the head Carver shook his long mane of dark curls away from his chiseled face. “I had a most unfortunate explosion at one of my properties,” he said to Bash. “I’d love to have a sit down and talk about a rebuild if you’ve room in your schedule. I know how sought after your work is.”
The explosion he was referring to was when the Russians employed by his new Russian buddies bombed his brunch place, The Rose, and made it look like Ren did it in order to start a war between the two crime families. And it nearly did, especially since Thato freed Vas’s dad from jail in retaliation. It ended up working out well though. Orlando Alexandrio had done fucked up shit to both his wife and daughter, but Lou would like to think that he got at least a little redemption when he took a bullet for Vas. He died for her.
Lou scanned around. People were back to chatting, but those closest were eavesdropping and those further kept glancing over curiously.
“I heard about that,” Bash said with a grin, rolling back on his heels. “Must have been devastating. I do happen to have some room. We’ll set up a meeting.”
Jesus fuck, now was not the time for jabs. The Rose going down was a very sore spot for Thato, but not for the egotistical reason that Ren and Bash thought. The little brunch place had been opened by Thato’s mother before she died. He had revealed this to Lou during one of their post-sex pillow talks—something she normally wouldn’t allow because it led to expectations but did sinceThato wasn’t looking for more than a dependable fuck with her—but he didn’t share how she died.
What was up with her and her people and their loss of parents? Lou didn’t know if it was comical or horrifying at this point. She only fucking prayed the reoccurring theme wouldn’t trickle down to her niece.
Thato didn’t falter in his facade, nor could you see any sort of reaction in him other than his own grin growing into something mischievous. “Just as devastating as a lover being scorned, some would say, don’t you think, Marco?”
What was this, a goddamn preening show? Lou glanced around. Thankfully no one had heard their volley of masked, passive aggressive insults.
“Carver!” someone barked in what Lou knew to be a distinct Russian accent.
Again, no way. No motherfucking way. It couldn’t be. Not on the first shot and within the first ten minutes of being there. Yes, Thato had been invited by their Russian friends, but she didn’t expect them to come into contact this soon. What did the Russians want with Thato? How did they reach out to him? One thing was for certain, Lou wouldn’t be able to scratch her itches with him anymore if they’d taken an interest in him—likely they’d be watching him. Lou was crying on the inside. Maybe if she and Thato were discreet?
She saw Bash shoot Thato a suspicious look before she turned around to see a hulk of a man fast approaching like a bull barreling through a china shop. The enemy gunning for her family was wide as he was tall, looking like one of the pro wrestlers she liked to watch on Monday nights with a beer, and handsome. Lou had been expecting him to be older like his former employee, Aleksandr Sokolov, and damn fugly—but he was younger, somewhere in his thirties and had a good face. His dark hair was buzzed, looking very military, and he had bright blue eyes that looked more silver in the light. His all-white attire consisted of slacks, a tight-fitting cashmere sweater, and the dreaded white loafers.
But then there was the woman he toted along on his arm.
She was gorgeous and so Lou’s type. Red haired—the natural kind—curvy—again the natural kind—and would be on the shorter side without her heels, which were to-die-for silver Via Spiga’s Lou recognized from their most recent spring collection. Her skin was like glowing alabaster, her breasts full and round. And to top it all off and Lou’s favorite feature, she had bright hazel eyes. The woman looked to be only a few years younger than Lou. She wore a simple satin white dress that had Lou wondering if she’d gone commando too. Definitely no bra since it was completely backless and she could see the clear outline of hardened nipples through the haltered front. The silky garment was short—so short that one wrong move or strong breeze and she’d be flashing her shit—but it was still classy as fuck. Especially with her subtle makeup that she didn’t need since she was an absolute bombshell and how her long curls were left loose and wild. If they weren’t on a job and their necks weren’t on the line, Lou would have liked to bend her over and make her see god.
“Mr. Zaitzev,” Thato greeted with a sly smile, acting completely like himself rather than respectful and uptight like most men probably did when this man addressed them. If Lou had a dick, it would be hard. Thato was the kind of man that was always himself and didn’t bend that to anyone else’s status or will. The head Carver was known not to give a fuck who you were or what you did as well as being a big fish unaffected by people that others may consider the bigger fish. To Thato, he was the biggest fish of them all no matter what. Since Mr. Zaitzev had obviously heard of Thato, given that he had reached out to him and invited him, he must know this about his personality as well.
The Russian wanting to go after Lou’s family grunted at the lack of respect, obviously letting it slide because he thought Thato a moron who thought himself too big. Oh how mistaken he’d been. Thato Carver was a damn shark. “Who are your friends?” Zaitzev asked, sounding annoyed.
Thato knocked back the rest of his drink like the lush he’d been known to be. “Mikhail Zaitzev, Marco Davies. Marco Davies, Mikhail Zaitzev.” Lou knew he left her and the redhead dime piece out as a cultural placation to the Russian, but it still burned her ass.
Bash and Zaitzev shook his hands. “You’re the architect everyone here is buzzing about,” the big Russian said tonelessly in greeting. Though his eyes were light, they were a very, very dark place. One that had Lou itching to finger her knife. She’d seen pure evil before, had survived it—this man was no different.
“Guilty,” Bash said with a shrug, and rubbed the hand he had at Lou’s side up and down her arm. “This is my wife, Victoria,” he said, smiling down at her with a wink—the wink letting her know that he knew how burned her ass was at the lack of acknowledgement. Points to him for that, but with a deduction for the smugness about it. “I apologize, I don’t know who you are—we moved here not too long ago.”
Zaitzev did not deign to respond to Bash’s last comment. Instead he looked Lou up and down with a critical eye. But not in a sexual way, it was more like he was appraising a piece of art and deciding if it was worthy or not. Well newsflash, Louise Geralt was all that and a goddamn bag of chips.
Lifting her chin, Lou brazenly did what was most likely a no-no and offered the asshole her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Mr. Zaitzev.” After he eyed her with disapproval but shook her hand, Lou addressed his woman. “And this must be your gorgeous wife.” She placed her hand on the woman’s arm and leaned in to kiss both of her cheeks, letting her lips linger a bit longer than custom but not long enough for the men to notice. “I’m Victoria, it’s very nice to meet you,” she said, letting a sparkle come into her eyes and batting her lashes at the snack. Yeah, she was on the job, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t appreciate a beautiful woman—maybe even indulge in her if it didn’t end in her getting caught and likely beheaded by the monster towering over them.
“Mistress,” Zaitzev corrected with a curl of his lip at Lou.
His alleged mistress ignored the correction, leaning in to do the double kiss thing in return with a grand smile that showed perfect white teeth. “I’m Tatiana Levin, it’s very nice to meet you as well,” she said in a more delicate Russian accent than her asswad of a boyfriend. “I love your shoes,” she gushed.
Oh, Lou really liked this drink of water. She moved back to Bash’s side. His arm automatically curling around her, she smiled. “I was going to say the same about yours.”
They smiled at each other.
“Carver,” Zaitzev said again, sharper this time. “I have people I want you to meet. Come.” And with that, Mikhail Zaitzev turned on his heel and headed out of the bar tent, his grip on his pretty little mistress looking to be bruising.
Thato rolled his eyes and put his empty glass on a passing waiter's tray. “Apparently duty calls.” He shook Bash’s hand again—had to keep up appearances. “I’ll give your office a call this week, it was most illuminating to put a face to the work,” Thato said with a wink. He reached for Lou next, once again kissing her on the cheek. When he pulled back, he said loud enough for the both of them to hear, “looks like playtime is over for the foreseeable future, lover. Might want to give Pretty Boy a ride, I know I would,” he said with an appreciative look at Bash, then was strolling away to go find the Russian.
Dear god, Thato just hit on Bash. Lou looked up at her pretend husband and nearly burst into hysterical laughter. There was a mix of horror and anger on Pretty Boy’s face—but was that also a touch of puffing up she saw? Bash wasn’t bisexual or anywhere remotely bicurious, but that didn’t mean another man telling him they wanted to fuck him would make him uncomfortable like most hetero men. The anger and horror was strictly at the fact that it was Thato Carver saying it.
But then Bash looked down at Lou and was grinning like a cat, his strange green eyes sparkling. “Your now ex lover just said we should have sex. Want to go find some privacy and fuck like wild animals? Go back to the car? Sneak onto one of these yuppies boats and get our juices all over their fancy shit?”
Lou’s reaction to his suggestion was half lust and wanting to do just that, and half irritation at him thinking he could just put himself back onto her roster. Besides—Thato could be open to sneaking around. It’d make their already pantie-soaking sex even hotter. “The answer is fuck no. And we’re on a job,” she chided after looking around for eavesdroppers. “We need to mingle like you know who said.” You know who being Ren and not good old Voldy-pants.
“Step one of the mission is complete, we’ve got a name. In fact, you know who,” he said with a chuckle, “likely knows already.”
“We still need to mingle!”
He tapped his finger on her nose. “The purpose of mingling was to get a name.”
Lou was going to stab him. “We need to get into the inner circle! And the match hasn’t even started yet! It’ll be suspicious!” she whisper-hissed.
“Not today we don’t. One step at a time, gorgeous. Can’t move too fast and come off as suspicious in that way either. I am impressed with your work ethic though. It’s outrageously sexy.” Bash sighed. “But I suppose you’re right about leaving before the match has even begun. So how about we appease your dire need to mingle for an hour, then get to the sweaty gorilla sex?”
Lou tossed back the rest of her bourbon and ditched it on another passing tray. “Two.”
“Darling,” Bash all but purred as he took her hand and started leading her toward the field. “If I didn’t know better, I would say that you’re avoiding leaving early because you want to get it on with me and know that you won’t be able to tell yourself no no matter how much you tell your kitty cat to behave.”
He was one-hundred percent correct. Lou wanted to jump his bones the moment she came out of her apartment and saw him. But she couldn’t. It would be giving in on her part and giving him the wrong idea on his. So yes, she was stalling, at least until she got her body under control. Her mind too. Fucking tits.
“You’re delusional,” Lou finally said.
She was saved from whatever his response was going to be by a flock of people descending on them.
“You’re Marco Davies!” one said to her husband, ignoring Lou completely.
“The architect!”
“We love your work!”
“We would love for you to design our house!”
Good fucking god.
Bash must have sensed the internal statement because he looked down at her extremely amused. “You did say you wanted to mingle, wife.” He put on his megawatt smile that made Lou wish she was wearing underwear to stifle the flood going on between her legs, and turned it on his little fan club. “This is my wife, Victoria,” he said, not commenting on their statements and squeezing Lou’s hand.
Lou did say that, and now she was wanting to go back in time and shove the words back into her big fucking mouth. Wishing she could stab Bash and herself with her shoe, she settled in at his side as the people started introducing themselves, the match that Lou would much rather be watching beginning behind them.
Mingling here we fucking come.
9
They ended up staying for the whole match.
And fucking mingled the entire time.
When Lou got home she was going to close all of the curtains, turn out all of the lights, and sit in complete silence, stillness and darkness. Maybe the rest of the night. Unheard of for her—she normally loved to talk and never got drained from socializing. But with the Remmington high class dipshits? For so long? She was developing an eye twitch. She should have never opened her fat mouth about it and let the rabel be suspicious.
Something else was twitching too as she and Bash said their goodbyes to their ‘new friends’ and started making their way to his Aston Martin—they opted to pick up the keys from the valet and get the car themselves. Which was fine with Lou, she needed the walk to prepare herself for the short yet too long car ride back to Luxton.
Because Sebastian Corinado had tortured her the rest of the afternoon with innocent touches in just the right places. By the tenth squeeze of his fingers at her hips, brush of his hands over her bare legs, and kiss over her very sensitive neck and behind her ear, Lou was ready to jump out of her skin.
And the shithead knew it.
To make things worse, whenever they caught a break between the hordes of people that wanted to talk to them—some of them having a connection with their new Russian friend, Mr. Zaitzev—the bastard whispered filthy things in her ear. Him squeezing her ass through her dress when everyone was busy cheering about a goal was the final straw. Lou took that distracting goal to grab his cock and squeeze threateningly, making him hiss but then give her a sultry smile that made her entire body pulse with heat.
