The Villain Duet by Bella J.

Chapter 11

Charlotte

Icould hear it, the rich, stately sound of a cello playing far away in the distance. It reached for me, wanting to envelop my soul and create a hunger in me to play, touch the strings and allow its music to carry me away.

It reminded me of her—of how she’d play for me every night before bedtime. It was the most beautiful music I had ever heard, not because of the instrument, but because of her—how her love for playing echoed in every sound.

My mother had been my tutor from the day my arms were long enough to hug the cello. The first lesson she taught me was that the cello could not be mastered, it could only be danced with while its music effortlessly guided you to where it wanted to go. Not to where you wanted to take it.

I opened my eyes and stared at an unfamiliar dressing table of bold mahogany wood. My fingers were stiff, my joints flaming hot like a coal had been lit inside them. I eased my hand into a fist and gently opened it again, slowly warming the muscles so the pain would subside. Rheumatoid arthritis—the irony in a cellist player’s life.

I pushed myself up, my head pounding and mouth dry. My insides turned, and nausea curdled in my stomach as bits and pieces of my memory trickled back, until it all gushed toward a reality I’d much rather have forgotten.

Elijah.

Josh.

Blood.

Needle.

I grabbed my arm, remembering the way it burned, how Elijah held me against him so I couldn’t move.

“Jesus.” I breathed and placed a palm on my forehead and glanced down, the unfamiliar navy-blue sheets jumping out at me.

Where am I?

I launched out of bed, the white nightgown fanning around my legs. This wasn’t the bedroom Elijah had me in the first time I woke up trapped in this goddamn nightmare. The walls consisted of mahogany wood panels, two single plush chairs placed on either side of the bed. The carpet beneath my feet was soft, warm, and under-bed lighting illuminating the floor area.

“You’re awake.”

His voice forced a cold chill down my neck, and I turned to see him standing by the door, leaning against the frame, the epitome of sophistication and poise. One would never think he was a cruel kidnapper who suffocated his victims and shot men without blinking.

“You drugged me.”

He shrugged, nonchalant, as if drugging and abducting women was part of his fucking daily routine.

I glanced around. “Where are we?”

He straightened the sleeves of his black dress shirt and strolled into the bedroom, his increasing proximity forcing me to step back, watching him like he could turn into a poisonous viper at any moment.

“Italy.”

I balked. “Italy? You’re kidding, right?” Jesus, the last time I remembered, we were in New York, and now he was saying we were in Italy?

He nodded. “Well, we’re somewhere off the coast of Rome, to be exact.” He spread his arms out wide. “A very good friend of mine was kind enough to let us borrow his yacht.”

“A yacht?” I breathed. “Rome?”

He arched a brow. “Would you like a moment to process that?” Sarcasm dripped from his words, and I wanted to smack that amused grin off his face.

“Care to tell me why we’re in Italy, and on a yacht?”

“So,” he feigned a look of thought, clearly enjoying the theatrics, “imagine you’re trying to get away from some really bad men, and the—”

“Oh, you mean men like you?”

“Hush, woman. Has your father never taught you not to interrupt a man when he’s speaking?” He held up his hand. “Oh, that’s right. You never had a father.”

It stung more than I’d care to admit, the way he used the truth to take a stab at me, and also to remind me just how much he fucking knew about me and my life.

“Now, as I was saying—if you wanted to get away from some bad people, where do you think is the safest place for you to hide? Someplace they couldn’t easily find you?”

It clicked, sliding in like a puzzle piece. “The ocean.”

“The ocean,” he reiterated. “Hence why we’re currently on my friend’s very expensive, and if you ask me, far too extravagant yacht.”

What I wouldn’t do to find answers without engaging in more conversation with him. It seemed he loved treating me like a child, talking to me with sarcasm, patronizing me. But right now, my mind was spinning in a thousand different directions, and I had to somehow figure out what the hell was going on before my thoughts would drive me mad.

“So, I’m assuming we’re hiding from someone.” My voice was soft, my head still pounding along with the racing beats of my heart. “And that this has something to do with someone shooting at you back in New York. And you shooting Josh.”

“Wow,” he smirked, “that is one loaded assumption.”

“What the hell is going on, Elijah?”

“Firstly,” he held up a finger, his shirt pulled taut across his broad shoulders, “that someone wasn’t shooting at me. That someone was shooting at you.”

Ice exploded in my spine.

“Secondly, I shot and killed Josh because the man was a fucking snitch. He sold me out, and that’s how they found you.”

“Who are they?”

“The Bernardi family.”

“You say that like the name is supposed to mean something to me.”

He slipped his hands in his pants pockets and stilled on the other side of the bed, his gaze as intense as ever. “Does the name Gianni Guerra sound familiar to you?”

“No.”

He shrugged. “That’s understandable, the fact that you don’t know of him.”

“How so?”

His eyes met mine. “He’s your grandfather, from your father’s side.”

My skin went cold. “Excuse me?”

“Your grandfather.” A grin tugged at his lips as if my shock amused him. As if dropping a bomb like this on me gave him sort of fucking kick, mindfucking me. “Gianni Guerra is your grandfather.”

My legs felt weak, and I needed to sit down, but I wanted to look the devil in the eye, to not show him how he had just pulled the rug from right under me. “How do you know?”

He scratched his temple and shot me a cocky grin. “Really? You’re going to ask me how I know who your grandfather is? Your father? Charlotte,” he took a step closer, “I know what you had for dinner last Tuesday. I know what flavor cupcake you bought yourself on your birthday last year.”

I frowned.

“Red velvet,” he stated to prove his point, then twirled his fingers, “but with the meringue topping, not the cream cheese. You’re not a big fan of cream—”

“This is all a game to you, isn’t it? A sick, twisted hunt where you can play God and fuck with people’s lives.”

His expression hardened, and his jaw clenched. “I can assure you this is no fucking game.”

“Then tell me what is going on.” My skull prickled with a curiosity that had a thousand questions bombard my thoughts, but at the same time, my instincts sounded with alarm. “How do you know my grandfather,” I breathed out, a sharp pang slicing through my chest, “my father?”

There were so many nights I lay awake wondering where my father was, who my father was. My mom never spoke about him, never made any reference of him. He might as well have been a phantom, a ghost, someone who didn’t exist. I used to watch other dads with their kids—dropping them off at school, playing with them in the park, laughing and smiling. And one day after school, I asked my mom about him, and why he wasn’t with us. I never made that mistake again. The hurt, the pain, the complete heartbreak I saw in her eyes was too much for a little girl to take. She never answered me that day. She simply hugged me and said good night. But I heard her cry that night, and I hated that I was the cause of her tears.

I never asked again after that.

For the longest time, Elijah just stood there, easing his fingers along the silk sheets on the bed, looking down as if he too tried to sort through his thoughts. Maybe trying to choose his words wisely.

“Elijah, what—”

“Do you know what I am?”

“A psychopath?”

His gaze shot up to mine. “You want answers, then I strongly advise you not to fuck with me right now, Charlotte.”

I bit my lip, feeling like a goddamn schoolgirl who just got scolded, my cheeks burning and my chest tight.

Cognac irises kept me captive as he approached me with slow, calculated steps. There was something unsettling in the way he looked at me, something sinister and dark—his expression guarded.

I crossed my arms, rubbing a shoulder with my palm. Maybe it was a way to protect myself from what was to come. As if I knew that whatever he was about to tell me would rock the very foundation of the life I’d lived until now.

One more step, and he stilled in front of me. His scent enveloped me while his lustrous amber eyes dared me to ask the question he was burning to answer.

“Do you know. What. I. Am?”

I licked my lips, my mouth suddenly dry. “No,” I whispered, hating that I sounded so scared. Vulnerable. Weak. But I bet he fucking loved it.

“I’m a master.” He inched forward, and I moved back, hating that his heavy presence penetrated my space, taking control.

Dominating.

My back hit the wall, and I shut my eyes—trapped between the devil and the gates of hell. Air swooshed from my lungs as he placed his hands above my shoulders at either side of my head, cocooning me in, leaving me trapped with him entirely in control of whatever move I made.

He leaned closer, his scent wrapped around me, the coarse hair of his stubble beard grazing against my jaw, sending a wave of shivers down my back. The sensation drowned out the threat and replaced it with an impulse to want to be closer, my skin ignited with a toxic fusion of fear and seduction. I had no idea how this was possible, how a man could instill terror and ignite a sensual attraction at the same damn time.

I sucked in a breath and closed my eyes when I felt his lips brush against the side of my ear, my body lit with a dangerous desire to submit.

“Master of what?” I whispered, and I heard him take a breath.

“Killing people. They call me…The Musician.”

Fear slammed into my chest, breaking shards of ice in my veins, my lips parting as I whimpered. Every muscle in my body went rigid, and I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe, and I couldn’t think.

“Judging by how you just paled, I’m guessing you’ve heard of me.”

The Musician. The man I’d heard Chase and the other guys whisper about. The man who carved out a treble clef on the chests of his victims. The man everyone knew about, yet no one had ever seen. A ghost. A phantom.

Not anymore. Not to me.

“Tell me, my little cellist,” he dragged a finger down the side of my face, “are you afraid of me?”

I swallowed before choking out a shaky, “No.”

“Liar.” He gripped my jaw and forced me to look the other way, pressing his nose against the skin below my ear as he inhaled. “I can smell your fear, how it radiates off your flesh. It’s fear that feeds men like me. Do you know the kind of high it gives you, the rush of power seeing a grown man piss himself while looking you in the eye?”

“You’re a sick son of a bitch.”

“You say that like I have the ability to give a fuck.” His grip tightened on my jaw, my body growing weaker beneath his cruel touch. “I kill people for money. I live off the death of others, eat food and drink whiskey bought from blood money. And yet you think to insult me will make me give a damn.”

I bit the inside of my cheek, desperately trying to hold on to whatever strength I had left. “Did you kill my father? My grandfather? Is that what this is all about? And now you want to kill me too?”

“Again,” he lifted a finger, “if I wanted to kill you, you’d be dead.”

“Did you kill them?”

“I did not.”

I swallowed, my throat dry and mouth feeling like I had eaten sand. “Then what does all of this have to do with them? With me?”

“Shhh,” he cooed. “We’ll get to that part soon enough.”

“What do you want from me?”

He jerked my face, forcing me to look him in the eye. “See, the answer to that would have been simple, had you asked me three years ago. But now,” his tongue darted from his mouth, licking his lips, coating them with a shimmer of wetness, “now it doesn’t seem so simple anymore.”

The sting of unshed tears threatened to break down my resolve, and I tried my hardest to bite it back. “I guess this is the part where I ask you what changed.”

“That’s another tricky question to answer.”

I didn’t even realize he had dropped his other arm to my side until he gripped the silk of my nightgown between his fingers, touching my waist through the smooth fabric.

I desperately tried to ignore how his touch burned like a simmering coal that had the potential to ignite a fire that would destroy everything in its path.

“So, what…I’m a job?”

“Indeed, you are. A unique and extremely complicated one.”

“What does that even mean?”

His fingertips touched my naked flesh as he held the fabric hostage, and it was impossible to ignore the tainted desire that infected me. This must have been that twisted part in me, that part he woke when he cupped my breast, making me aware of the dark warning of something perilous flickering inside me like a stalking threat.

“It means”—his hand slid down the side of my leg, only to return up across the inside of my thigh—“that you are a job that has the potential to ruin me.” With leisurely circles, I felt him move his fingers up…up…until a single digit brushed against my sex. The involuntary moan that slipped from my lips left a bitter taste on my tongue. I was supposed to hate his touch, to fight and scream and beg him to stop. To feel violated and repulsed by him. Yet my body felt bewitched by the dark seduction that emanated from him, wrapping its tendrils of twisted temptation around my body. I was desperate to keep my expression cold and hard, unaffected by his sick, twisted fucking game. But the longer his touch lingered, the weaker I became, and I couldn’t stop my eyes closing as that flicker turned into a flame, his finger continuing its delicate caress against my panties, my body building with a strong rebellion to betray me.

He brushed his lips up the side of my face, my skin now hyperaware of every touch, every breath, every sound. “I have killed enough people to earn me an eternity in hell. And even though I can kill just about anyone I fucking want without the slightest of hesitation, you, my dear cellist, are the one person in this entire goddamn world I can’t kill.”

I sucked in a breath, not knowing whether it was relief or disbelief that caused me to shudder. “Why?” I swallowed thickly and licked my lips. “Why can’t you kill me?”

“Because you’re special, Charlotte Leigh Moore.” My name rolled off his tongue like a prayer and a curse combined, as if I were his saving grace and the sin that would cause his descent from the heavens. It was equal parts terrifying and enticing, causing every muscle to tremble while my thighs clenched.

His finger prodded at the hem of my panties, my body humming with anticipation, yet my mind was screaming, yelling at me to stop him. To fight. To not let him tip my body over the edge, because if he did, I’d never be able to come back from it. But I was caught in his web of seduction, my fight tangling me tighter until there was no way out, and I could only watch as my demise approached.

I squeezed myself against the wall. “What makes me so damn special?” My voice echoed the staccato of broken resolve that possessed me while his touch burned.

“You were just a means to pay a debt owed.” His lips grazed all along my jaw. “You were a promise, nothing more. But after all this time, watching you, studying you, infiltrating your life—your music…Jesus, your music,” he breathed out, the hot air that left his lungs easing along my flesh, igniting a flame in my core, “it became my drug, my escape from this wretched fucking world. And then I found myself being around you, close to you not because I had to,” he looked at me, a maze of secrets and confessions, “but because I wanted to. Because I was drawn to you and this emotion your music stirred inside me.” His voice trailed off, and I found myself swept away by his every word—entranced, captivated by everything he had just said, and I allowed myself to forget the events that brought us to this moment. The fear, the panic, the lies, it evaporated, replaced by this burning need to know more. To know everything about this man and whatever the hell this was that pulsed and beat between us.

“So, you see? You became something more than just a debt, or a job,” he continued as his fingers lingered against the side of my face.

“What? What have I become?” There was no rhyme or reason for me wanting an answer, for even pursuing this conversation. But there was a burning need to know what it was that earned me the attention of a man like Elijah. A man who bathed in darkness and basked in sin. A man who did whatever he wanted, took whatever he wanted.

His gaze dropped to my lips the moment he managed to get past the barrier of the thin piece of fabric between my legs, slipping a finger through my heat. I craned my neck, leaning against the wall as evil desire gripped me, twisted me, and tied me up in the barbed wire of his vicious and ruthless seduction.

“You, my dear little cellist, became an addiction I willingly surrendered and drowned in night after night. And now,” he slipped a finger inside me, and I gasped, my body climbing from the unwelcome intrusion. “Now you’re an obsession.”