ALTERED BY LEAD: UNDERCOVER SINNERS BOOK 2 Read online

  And yet ... I find myself looking forward to the idea of it.

  "My father tried to kill me today," Natalia says, probably not realizing that an entire day has passed since. Time runs in strange ways when you're in a crisis. "He'd have let his men rape me until I was broken, and then he'd finish me off with a bullet to the head. That, or he'd cage me for the rest of my life, make me into a plaything for his favorite soldiers." She steps forward and puts her palms on the table. "All I want is a chance. If I can't cut it, kill me."

  "Jesus, Natalia," I start, but Janet seems pleased. She's watching the girl with a sharp expression, like she's remembering herself when she first started with Blackbirch.

  "You're the daughter of one of our marks. Our client isn’t going to be pleased with that."

  "Natalia wasn't part of the deal," Hawke insists, stepping forward. I've never seen him stand up to the higher-ups quite like this before, and my brow goes up. He literally just said he wanted to get rid of Natalia, so why the change of heart?

  I suspect almost losing her lit some sort of fire under his ass.

  "The deal was," he continues, glancing briefly over at her. “To kill Konstantin Petrov, and disassemble the Petrov Crime Syndicate. By taking Natalia and using her against them, I'd say we're doing exactly what the client asked for."

  He pauses, a rivulet of blood sliding down the side of his face. Natalia steps forward, almost like she's not thinking, and swipes it away with her thumb

  Janet notices their interaction and raises a dark brow.

  She has to have seen what I just saw, this tentative sort of ... like, affection or something? Jealousy roars through me, and I run my tongue over my lower lip. Janet notices that, too, and the edge of her mouth quirks up in a sardonic sort of smile.

  "You know what? It's your team, and your funeral." Janet taps something out on her iPad, and then flips it around to hand it over to Natalia. Their eyes meet again, but this time there's a bit of a challenge in them. "Contract. Bound in blood, but we're more sophisticated than that. Sign the screen with your finger, and if you fuck up or deflect, then we'll worry about the blood part." Janet smiles as Natalia reaches out to take the tablet. She doesn't even read it before she signs it with her finger and tosses it back.

  Ballsy.

  I have to admit: I'm thoroughly impressed.

  The door opens behind us, and it's Mace, frowning, gruff as usual. But the way he looks at me, I feel all the blood drain from my face.

  This is about Colt, isn't it?

  He better not fucking be dead.

  Because if he is ... then this thing I'm feeling toward Natalia won't go any further.

  And I think I want it to?

  I seriously must've taken a blow to the head.

  A major fucking blow.

  * * *

  For two weeks, Colt Ryan lay still and quiet, in a medically induced coma. Last week, they finally woke his ass up.

  “You have no idea how happy I am to see that ugly, lopsided grin of yours,” I tell my best friend, trying not to get too sappy. He doesn’t like that, heavy emotions and all that shit. Colt’s happier keeping things shallow, easy. It’s kind of his thing. I used to be like that, too, but all of that pretend is starting to fade at the edges.

  I’m tired of it.

  I’m interested in something … more.

  “Oh, go fuck yourself,” Colt says, slurping down the last of his ice cream and setting the cup aside. You’d think he’d be relieved to have a moment to chill here in the hospital, time to eat, think, read, binge watch some shit.

  But he hates it.

  I smile, glancing over my shoulder as a knock sounds at the door. Natalia lets herself in without waiting for a response, a cautious smile on her red-painted lips. I haven’t seen her since she signed the contract with Janet; Hawke found her a safe place to lie low. It was just better that we weren’t coming and going, just in case one of Konstantin’s men managed to track any of our movements.

  If she’s here, I’m guessing Hawke’s getting ready to move her to the safe house.

  “Hey, babe,” Colt says, that ugly grin of his ratcheting up a notch. “Come on in.”

  She steps into the room, and the smell of her flowery perfume makes my throat clench tight. Fucking hell, Natalia. Why do girls always smell so good? I’m so used to being around the guys all the time that I forget that.

  “Colt,” she says, the word a bit breathless, a bit husky. I wonder if she realizes how she’s talking to him? Like he matters. My jaw clenches slightly, but I refuse to be jealous over my best friend. If Natalia decided she wanted to settle down and have babies with him or something, I guess I’d be happy about that.

  Although I am starting to wonder if I might be happier if she decided she wanted to settle down and have babies with me.

  Not that I’m sure a girl like her will ever settle down. She’s a fucking firecracker, even in loose cargo pants and a tank top. I wonder where she got the lipstick from, considering she came to the church with nothing and left with even less.

  “Come sit on my lap,” Colt offers, sitting up and patting the bed next to him. Deja vu hits me hard, and I suddenly find myself remembering Natalia riding me while I laid in bed, injured, while Colt did her from behind.

  We could recreate that, right here and now …

  “You’ve been in a coma for weeks,” she says, crossing her arms under her full breasts and drawing my attention to them. She glances my way, and I raise a pierced brow.

  “I’ll give you a moment alone,” I say, slipping out the door. I don’t go far though. Actually, I don’t even close the door fully behind me, leaning against the wall beside it, so I can listen.

  “Exactly. I’ve been in a coma for weeks,” Colt pleads shamelessly. “And the nurses here are frigid as fuck. I missed you.”

  “You missed my pussy,” Natalia says, but not like she’s overly upset about it. There’s a long pause where neither of them speaks. A muscle in my jaw ticks, and I can’t help it; I have to look and see what they’re doing.

  When I peek around the corner, I find the two of them making out like a pair of teenagers. Two emotions war inside of me: jealousy and desperation. I want to storm in there and kiss the long, pale curve of Natalia’s neck, see her arch her back and press her breasts into Colt’s face.

  Instead, I move away and head down the hall toward the locker room. This entire building belongs to the company. There are studio apartments, a gym, a hospital, even a fully-stocked grocery store. It’s like a city in and of itself.

  I plan on heading to the gym to work out some of my frustrations when I spot the cart of clean laundry near the door. There are white lab coats, scrubs, nurse uniforms. The Company is a little old fashioned, a bit sexist, so the female nurses still wear those awful white dresses.

  An idea forms in my mind on the fly, and I lick my lips.

  This is stupid, West, leave them the hell alone.

  And yet, I can’t help myself. I snatch a white coat and throw it over my shoulders, grabbing a nursing uniform on my way out.

  Ducking down the hall, I slip back into Colt’s room, only to find Natalia straddling his lap. He gives me a what the hell, bro sort of a look, but Natalia doesn’t seem entirely displeased, especially not when she spots the uniform in my hand.

  “What do you have there?” she asks coyly, and I’m relieved to see that our confrontation with Konstantin wasn’t enough to shake her. I’m pretty sure Natalia feels like she has a lot to learn. Maybe she does, but I don’t think she’s as weak or incapable as she sees herself.

  “I figure Hawke’s going to move you to the safe house soon, so we won’t be seeing you for a few weeks …” I toss the uniform her way and she grabs it mid-air, holding it out in front of her for inspection.

  “Oh, man, where did you get this?” Colt asks, his irritation at my interruption fading in an instant. “There’s nothing better than a nurse fantasy.”

  “You like nurses, huh?” Natalia
asks, sliding off of Colt’s hospital bed. “This is a little dowdy, though, even if it’s still sexist.” Her nose wrinkles up, and I flash a grin of my own, snatching the garment from her hands and using the knife in my boot to cut the skirt short scandalously short.

  “Better?” I ask as Colt watches us with bright green eyes, the slight sheen of sweat on his forehead the only sign that he’s still hurting.

  “Much better,” Natalia says, looking up at me with those doe eyes of hers. Damn it. I swipe a hand over my face as she takes a step closer to me. I’m still a depraved asshole, but the way she looks at me, I wonder if she might see something else. “I didn’t just miss Colt.” The words come out in a whisper just before she swallows hard and seems to realize how vulnerable she’s being. Her face flashes with haughty arrogance as she steps back from me, reaching down to pull her tank top over her head.

  “Holy fuck,” Colt whispers, making the sign of the cross over his chest. “Satan take me now.”

  Natalia laughs, the sound a seductive purr that turns my dick to stone. She kicks off her boots, and drops her pants and underwear without even a lick of self-conscious hesitation.

  I glance toward the door, fully aware that if Hawke finds us in here, we’re going to get our asses handed to us.

  It’s hard for me to give a crap, watching Natalia pull that white dress over her head. It’s a bit too small for her breasts, the full mounds straining against the buttons. As she wiggles into it, one of them pops off and goes rolling across the floor.

  “Please get over here before I have to get out of this bed to grab you,” Colt purrs as Natalia turns toward him. She glances briefly my way.

  “What do you think, doctor?” she asks, playing the part of naughty nurse far too well. I’m about to cream my damn pants. “Should we give him a full body examination?”

  “So long as it’s quick,” I say with a sharp smile. “We don’t want to keep poor Colt up for too long. The poor thing still needs his rest. But if he can’t keep up with you, Nurse, I’m able-bodied and willing.”

  “Oh, get fucked,” Colt growls, grabbing Natalia’s wrist when she gets too close to the bed. She throws his blankets off, revealing the hideous hospital gown he’s wearing underneath. “Sorry about the threads, but I wasn’t given many choices. It was either green polka dots or Mickey Mouse.”

  Natalia smiles seductively as she pushes up the gown, revealing the hard length of Colt’s cock, straining toward her in desperation.

  It’s impossible to miss the bandages on his body, the tubes in his arm. I swallow hard, but push aside the fear. He’s alive, he’s here, and we have a red-blooded woman who’s more than willing to satisfy us both.

  “I don’t mind the clothes,” she purrs, leaning forward to kiss the side of Colt’s neck. “Easy access.”

  Colt puts his hands on her hips, pushing her torn, white nursing uniform up and over the generous curve of her ass.

  “Easy access is right,” he says as I approach the bed, wondering how strong this damn thing is, and if it can hold my weight, too. I want a repeat of that moment in the church, me and Colt and Natalia.

  I liked that.

  Natalia kisses his throat, sucking and leaving lipstick-red hickeys in her wake.

  “I’m checking his pulse, doctor,” she whispers, glancing back at me from behind a sea of chestnut brown hair. “What should I do next?”

  My breath leaves in a rush, and I reach down to rub my cock through my pants.

  “Maybe you should check his temperature?” I ask, cocking a brow. “If you put his cock inside of you, that should give you a good read on his heat.”

  “You think so?” Natalia teases, lifting her ass up and pushing her wet lips—not the ones on her face—against Colt’s shaft. She rubs back and forth as his head falls back into the pillows, lips parted in a low, desperate groan.

  I step forward and grab her hips, slowing her movements.

  “I’m the doctor; you should damn well do what I say,” I growl out, struggling to control myself. I want nothing more than to climb on this bed and double team this girl with my friend. At the same time, I feel like I need to savor the moment. Could be awhile before we get another chance to be together.

  But at least she’s on the team.

  She’s on the team, and that gives me time to sort through whatever weird feelings I’m having.

  “Right here.” I push her hips down, the tip of Colt’s cock teasing her soaking wet opening. The muscles in my arms tense, and I push down hard, spearing Natalia on my best friend’s dick. They both moan in unison, their mouths finding one another, smearing Colt’s face with red.

  The bright red color is an awful reminder of the blood that covered his body after the Hummer rolled.

  I unbutton my pants and shove them down my hips, climbing onto the bed and wrapping Natalia’s hair around my fist, yanking her head to the side. My own lips find her neck, tasting the rapid throbbing of her pulse. She groans, her hips moving up and down on Colt’s shaft, her nails digging into the fabric of his hospital gown.

  My own hands slide up her sides, taking in her curves with greedy, desperate need. When I cup her breasts, she tosses her hair back in a sweet-smelling wave.

  “Doctor, I don’t think I’m reading his temperature right,” she whispers, voice rough with her own need. “Do you think you could help me?”

  “Do you think you can handle it?” I growl out, stroking my hand down my cock. “I’d have to put my dick in the same hole for it to work.”

  “We wouldn’t want anything to happen to Colt because we didn’t take good care of him,” she pants, looking back at me with big, brown eyes.

  That’s what really does me in, not the nursing uniform, or the perfume, but those eyes. Those goddamn eyes.

  I spit on my hand, stroking the moisture across my cock, and then using the bit of pre-cum at the tip for some extra lubricant. When I push the tip of my dick against her opening, she whimpers and wiggles back against me for more. It’s a tight fit, so I go slow, keeping one of my hands on Natalia’s hips to keep her still while I try to fit myself in beside Colt.

  It’s such a tight fucking fit, but it feels so damn good. Based on the way she’s moaning and writhing, on the way Colt’s eyes are shut tight, I’m guessing they share the same sentiment.

  With a grunt, I push myself in the rest of the way, the three of us locked together in a dirty dance. It’s up to me to determine the pace, the rhythm. It’s slow-going, but the pleasure is exquisite, spiraling through me like a storm.

  I’m not going to last long.

  “I’m gonna come,” Colt moans, reaching up to tear the rest of the buttons on Natalia’s borrowed dress. He palms her heavy breasts, rubbing his thumbs over her nipples. She whimpers and pushes back against me as I reach around for her clit, finding the small, pink nub swollen and stiff. Using Natalia’s own juices as lube, I rub her in lazy circles, my hips bucking against her ass.

  As he promised, Colt doesn’t last, cursing and thrusting upward, the motion of his shaft rubbing against mine. It feels better than I’d care to admit—than I’ll ever admit to him—especially when he shoots hot liquid inside of her, lending extra lube for the violent slip and slide of our bodies.

  Natalia throws her head back, lips opening to scream as her body tightens around mine like a perverted hug. My hand clamps across her lips as she pulses on me, and I finish myself with a few last wild thrusts.

  “Get the fuck off of me,” Colt moans as soon as I’ve finished. I slide off the bed and help Natalia off, her body sliding against mine as I set her carefully on the floor. For just a brief moment there, she looks into my eyes, and something shifts inside of me. Not sure what it is, but Colt doesn’t offer me a chance to examine it. “That was hot as hell—even with this douche’s dick pressed up against mine.”

  “Get fucked, Colt,” I say, stepping away from Natalia, and fixing my pants. I toss the coat into the corner, and watch hungrily as she changes back into her
own clothes.

  Just in time, too, because Hawke comes storming into the room, gray eyes dark. The way his nostrils flare, I’m damn near positive he knows what was going on in here. At least, for once, he decides not to say anything.

  “Natalia, you’re leaving tonight; Janet would like to have a brief word with you.”

  She nods, without a snarky comeback for once, and slips out of the room, leaving the ruined nursing uniform behind her.

  Chapter 3

  Natalia

  The safe house that Hawke takes us to is in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere. For three weeks, I’ve been waiting on pins and needles for Colt and West to arrive. This place is lifeless, and the two of them are a party in and of themselves. I need that; I crave it.

  But I’m not going to let them know just how much.

  "This place is a major dump," Colt murmurs as Weston wheels him toward our new place. Colt is freaked all the way out by the wheelchair, and keeps insisting he's fine to walk. But his best friend is having none of it, clamping a huge hand over his shoulder and shoving him back into the seat. "I mean, where the fuck even is this place?"

  He's got a point there.

  We've been stationed in a new city, a new state. Apparently this is Trail, Oregon, but who the hell ever heard of that? It's a long-ass way from New York City, that's for sure.

  What, exactly, we're doing here, I'm not sure.

  For a few weeks, I stayed at a hotel, and then in the middle of the night, Hawke appeared in my room and forced me into an unmarked car, drove me to the company-owned hospital, and then loaded me onto a plane. For the past month, all I've done is train with him, or shoot with Mace. Arsen is still nowhere to be seen, and we're just now getting these two back.