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.#p#分页标题#e#
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.#p#分页标题#e#
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.