Page 26 of Marked By the Devil

I’d been missing for almost three days now. Of course, they were looking for me.

Unless they figured I’d be… dead.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

I frowned at him. I wasn’t motivated to lie to him, but telling him that I had a nugget of suspicion that it would make sense if someone at the agency had told me to go to that stakeout so I could be shot instead of Smithson who was supposed to be there…

Yeah, that wasn’t happening.

He’d take that information and use it against me. And I had no proof to back up my speculation.

“You can’t keep me here,” I repeated, stubborn to stick with my request. “Release me. I won’t allow any charges against you for kidnapping.”

He scoffed. “Nah. I like my plan better.” He backed up. “You’re staying right here. With me.”

As he tossed the towel to the floor and reached for the strings to his gym shorts, my mouth fell open.

“What?”

“You heard me.”

I stood, rushing after him. “With you? You mean in here? In this room?”

He turned just in time for me to collide against his bare chest, his hands on the waistband of his shorts. “Here. In my room. With me.”

I backed up, shaking my head. “No. No, that’s not⁠—”

He dropped his shorts and I jerked my head up to look at the ceiling. Dammit. I wasn’t playing this game. I wasn’t doing this. I couldn’t let myself get any more distracted and confused and stuck in desire for a despicable man like him, a criminal who’d kidnapped me!

“What, you want to join me in here too?”

I flinched, lowering my gaze to him.

He smirked, holding his hand out to me.

A tall, toned, completely naked version of him.

Oh.

Fuck.

Me.

I choked on air and spun to avoid looking at… at… any of him.

He chuckled, the sound gritty and low as he strode into the bathroom.

The sound of the shower starting came next, and as I stood there, glaring at the opposite wall, Lurch came back. He held bags and didn’t even raise a brow at me as he set them near the open doorway to the walk-in closet. “For you, Miss Green.”

“That’s Agent Green,” I snapped.

“Very well,” he replied, monotone, as he turned and left.

Nothing was well about this. About the fact that a very naked Viktor Volkov was showering feet away from me. About the idea that he expected me to live in his room with him as a prisoner.

Assess, ascertain, act.

You will survive this.