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  Wherever I ended up after the summer, the things he'd taught me were going to stick with me forever.

  Maxim

  I followed Elizabeth to a gym on the outskirts of Hammersmith and I took my time before going in.

  This was where she'd learned her craft. Where she'd come all those times I couldn't follow, when I'd wondered what she did when she wasn't at home or school, or working.

  I hadn't expected it to be in a neighborhood like this. I'd pictured a bright, airy space, maybe on the river, down by Battersea, just across the bridge, or somewhere else other than here.

  The place was away from the main road, which hummed with traffic speeding out of town. She turned onto the kind of back streets that girls like her were told not to walk down alone and I quickened my pace to close the distance between us.

  I wanted to be within reach if she came across any trouble. Around here, that could be anything from the group of young guys across the street, spreading out wide across the pavement, stalking down the street in classic pack formation, to the spaced out guy on the corner, rubbing his hands against his threadbare jeans and talking to the pixie on his shoulder.

  Elizabeth came here all the time, but that didn't mean today wouldn't be the day something went down that was too big for her to handle on her own. I wasn't going to let that happen.

  I could tell from the sign over the doorway that it was the kind of place with a reputation rather than subscription plans.

  Elizabeth

  I was going a couple of practice rounds with Jamil, one of Mitch's kids who was starting up with the under eighteens, when the guy from across the street walked right in like he owned the place.

  Because boxing went on weight rather than much else, usually, I was a good fit for the kids to practice with. And that's all I'd wanted. A fair fight. Where we both got something out of it.

  But suddenly I was all too aware that I had an audience. My skin prickled pleasantly under the guy's gaze and I refused to let myself look at him.

  Focusing my concentration, I got in another jab to my opponent. Jamil shifted and I knocked his gloves down and moved to smack him around the face. I did it every time he got distracted by the fact that it was a girl he was trying to hit.

  Jamil was still forgetting about his guard when his jab connected, and all it took was a dancing side step to get in the space he made. I was fast enough. I wasn't going to be the only one. And I wanted to show him that far more than I wanted to let my body sabotage what I was doing because the mysterious, hot guy who may or may not have been some kind of sniper, had just walked in.

  Jamil was supposed to be building up to proper fight rules, but it wasn't going to happen if he couldn't stop taking it personally every time he took a punch.

  I forced my focus in on the fight, until out of the ring, the impossibly hot guy was nothing more than a shadow talking to Mitch. That was pretty impressive mind control on my part, because he was built like a Greek god and instinctively I wanted to give him all the attention he deserved.

  My state of zen focus only worked until Mitch shouted out for Jamil to take a break.

  I turned on my heel. "Come on Mitch, we were just getting warmed up."

  I was all set for more of a protest, but my face slackened when I saw who was climbing into the ring with me, strapping on pads.

  "This guy wants to see what we do here. Doesn't reckon a girl can fight. You want to prove him wrong, pet?"

  "Don't fucking 'pet' me Mitch." I punched my gloves together, meeting the man's blue, blue eyes as I retook my stance, trying to ignore the tingle of my clit and the way my nipples tightened beneath my sports bra.

  "That's my girl. You want to watch out, mister. She doesn't pull her punches."

  The man's lips barely twitched, but the glint in his eyes told me he was smiling. "I wouldn't want her to."

  The way he looked at me made my whole body flush. Fuck. I was so screwed. Had he followed me here? What did he want?

  I had to keep my gloves high as he brought the pads towards me in an attacking swipe and I ducked under his arm. He pushed the pad against my glove as my fist swung, and I felt the force of the connection ripple all the way through my arm, solid and true.

  His eyes were locked with mine, but there was nothing threatening about them. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was as entranced with me as I was with him.

  I edged forwards, moving into the space my jabs provided, steering him around, and he let me, the flat of the pad taking the brunt of each strike. He swiped again, and I ducked, perfectly choreographed like a dance only both of us knew.

  "Follow me here, did you?"

  One of his eyebrows raised, and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. I wanted to bite his lip and smack his smile off and the impulse was making me clumsy. "Have we met?"

  "You were outside my building the other day. Don't play dumb with me."

  The man frowned, but there was a whole load of held back amusement in his face. It was irritatingly attractive.

  "Really? I don't think so. I'm just checking out a boxing gym. Like Mitch told you. "

  I narrowed my eyes, and I took another swing. My right hook knocked his pad back a satisfying distance.

  "Oh-ho. You've got a whole lot of power in that little frame of yours. Been coming here long, have you?"

  But I knew he'd let me. He was a solid wall when he didn't want to be moved. I'd have been impressed, but mostly I was turned on to a debilitating degree.

  "A while now. It's funny, you look exactly like this guy who's been hanging around outside my house."

  "That is funny. Must be a real handsome fella to get you this worked up." He pushed back against my gloves with the pads, knocking my hands out of alignment with a solid downward slap, just the way I'd done with Jamil. Only, he leaned in, let his voice drop. “I hope you don't mind me saying, you seem a little bit obsessed."

  I growled, swinging in again. It was way too late to stop him pressing my buttons.

  "You're the one following me."

  "Am I indeed?"

  I knew Mitch purposefully hadn't given the guy gloves. With pads he didn't have much he could really hit with, but all the same, I saw Mitch waiting, tense at the edge of the ring. I glanced to him and back to the man my body was tingling all over for.

  I went at him with a series of jabs and crosses, and he walked back, letting me land every single one.

  "What do you want?"

  "I want to talk to you about Pierce Sutherland, Elizabeth."

  I was out of breath, panting hard and he was cool as a cucumber. But he knew my name. Knew Pierce too. Of course he did. Why else would he be doing this?

  "Which newspaper are you with?"

  He leaned in and I felt his breath graze over my ear, evaporating the sweat from my shoulder and the back of my neck. And God, I wanted him to lower his mouth and kiss my skin, trail his hot mouth all over me and ravage my lips like I knew he would if he let that that cool calmness slip.

  "We both know I'm not a journalist."

  "Do we? Then what the hell are you?"

  "A full blooded male, last time I checked." I wasn't going to disagree with that when I could feel the evidence pressing into me when I had him up against the ropes. "Who the hell are you, is the more usual question."

  I stepped back, threw an arcing hook that I knew was wild before I let it go, chin tilted up as I bounced back on my toes, out of his reach. He was being cocky and I was being cocky too.

  "And what's the answer?"

  "Toropov. Maxim Toropov."

  Before I realized what he was doing, he'd yanked off the velcro straps that secured the circular pads to his hand and delved into his pocket. He held a card aloft between his fingers and the glint in his eyes as he tucked it into the top of my sports bra was devastating.

  My nipples all but throbbed at the lack of touch, pebbled and aching beneath the thin layer of structural lycra pressing my breasts flat to my chest.

  I
was breathless and it had nothing at all to do with our sparring session.

  The back of his hand skimmed my ribcage on the way down, and I virtually whimpered at his touch. It flared across my skin like his body held the key to everything I was made to be, leaving me breathless and shaky. But it was the opposite of bad.

  I was entirely screwed.

  One skim of his knuckles had me craving him. I knew that I wanted him in ways I hadn't let myself want anyone for all of my teenage years. But I wasn't a girl any longer. I was a woman now, and he was the man I wanted to show me exactly what that meant.

  "Watch for me. I'll find you, Sugar."

  I glanced down at the creamy white cardstock and up again, just in time to see him climb over the ropes. He shoved both the pads at Mitch and his long legged swagger took him towards the door before either of us managed the brain power to get out another word.

  "The hell was that about?" Mitch finally managed.

  I shook my head and swallowed hard, to get my voice to work, but it still came out croaky. "I have no idea."

  "What was that about him showing up at your house? Has he been bothering you, luv?"

  "Nothing Mitch, don't worry. He's definitely not been bothering me nearly enough."

  My trainer blew out a breath over his teeth, shaking his greying head. "I'm too old for this. Boys are simpler."

  I laughed. "I'll be out of your hair before you know it. Don't worry, old man."

  CHAPTER 6

  Maxim

  I'd been involved in field combat as well as fighting in the ring for the better part of twenty years, but Elizabeth had read me like a book in there. Any opening I left and she was on it. Any inclination to favor one side, and she was hounding me down, putting herself too close for me to use it.

  My treacherous head took that further than the ring. I wanted her naked, reacting to my every move as I took her through her paces in the bedroom, tangling with her in the sheets. I wanted to fight her and I wanted to fuck her and I didn't rightly know which one I wanted to do more.

  I had to walk out when I did. Any longer in there, up close like that, and I'd have barely been able to walk because I'd be too bloody hard. My cock seemed to think it could strain through my pants to get to her. And I wasn't entirely in disagreement, because she turned me into the damn Incredible Hulk, suddenly huge and hard enough to rip through my clothes.

  There would be time for that, once I had her trust. Once I had that, I was going to have everything else too. She needed to be mine, and I needed to make her want that too. No way was I letting her go when the chemistry between us was hot enough to set the air on fire.

  In the ring with her, up close, everything I thought I knew from watching her seemed to amplify. I'd been wrong before, about how good she looked. She was better up close than I could have imagined. Exquisite, exceptional. Light on her feet and wiry and strong, and ruthless and calculated.

  It took me less than thirty seconds in that ring with her to fall in love completely. From that point on, the female population of the planet had ceased to exist apart from her. I was never going to look at another woman again as long as I lived. Not one of them had what she did.

  And she had to know it.

  Her eyes danced, brows bobbing teasingly above them as she encouraged me to go in for a hit.

  I could see her leaving the opening and at first I thought it was her defences letting her down, but time after time, she smacked my pads away and sailed right through with a solid jab of her own, backed up with a swinging uppercut.

  It took everything I had in me not to lean into my physicality and push her harder. I could overpower her so easily and the thought made my heart thunder against my ribs and my steely erection throb. I wanted her up against the ropes to see what she did when she was cornered. I already knew she'd come out fists whirling. Her jabs were efficient and targeted, she wasted no energy. Everything was precise. I wanted to break down her control and see what she did when she gave into instinct.

  My fighting wasn't doing it, but I could make her come apart in other ways. And God, I planned to. Just as soon as this was done with.

  I'd set the groundwork. All I could do now was hope that she agreed to work with me when I needed her to. More than that, I hoped she didn't put up a fight when I showed her she was meant to be mine.

  In the morning, I watched her come out of the house a little bit before the time she usually did. I liked to watch her leave - watch her run down the front steps with half a slice of toast in her mouth, or flicking through her revision cards for her exams. I liked to know what she might be up to while she was away from the house, away from me. Today, she was unflappable and calm. Early, for her exam.

  I knew the schedule, all the timings. After this week, she'd be done with school, and out into the world like the woman that she was. It mattered that she'd seen that last step of childhood out. She was older in experience than any of her peers, but all the same I was glad that her school didn't insist on uniforms.

  It would have made me feel too much the old man, and I wasn't really that.

  It would have been one level of torture too far to see her in a little pleated skirt, and neat blouse. I didn't want her as a schoolgirl. The image didn't suit her. She was arch and lithe and cunning, clever and resilient and strong and she was everything I never thought I'd find. The woman of my dreams.

  And she was damn well haunting them.

  I watched her turn down the street, and walk right up to the main door of the building I was in. I had to press myself as close to the glass as I could get so I could see her disappear inside.

  Usually I'm unshakable, but she had my heart pounding hard. It took all I had not to race out into the corridor and down the stairs to meet her. I had it drilled into me not to break cover. When I did it, I had to do it right. Protocol was the only thing that kept me where I was. She'd seen me at the gym, but she didn't know for sure that I was here, and it needed to stay that way for both of our protection.

  Only a handful of minutes passed before she was back out on the pavement again, heading off on her usual route without even turning back to look.

  When I went downstairs, there was an envelope in the pigeon hole for the mail with no name on the outside of it, and no stamp.

  Inside was the folded sugar bag I'd aimed at, and the bullet, along with a small scrawled note that I opened with a grin I couldn't disguise.

  I think this belongs to you. What do you need me to do?

  This wasn't the approach I was supposed to be making and it had, arguably, been a dangerous gamble. But there was something going on with Elizabeth Harrington that wasn't fully clear, and somehow I knew she wasn't going to call the police.

  My shot had done what I'd intended it to do - broken Pierce's attention long enough to diffuse the situation. The small single pane at the top corner of the window wasn't enough to set his fears spiralling. For all the work he'd done in digging out the names he claimed to have, he didn't seem to be all that aware of what became of journalists who threatened to expose the way Russia worked.

  Fine by me. The less security he had the better. Right now I could pick him off whenever I wanted, and the more he did to Elizabeth, the less I cared about the list I was supposed to be finding. I'd take out everyone connected with his damn book and burn the printers to the ground if that was what it took to keep my word, and keep Elizabeth safe.

  I liked that she knew I was watching. I loved that she wasn't spooked. I got all kinds of thrills knowing she was facing up to me, pushing back. God, I'd love to get her in the ring again and really put her through her paces. This was a woman who didn't scare.

  I knew exactly what I was going to ask her to do. And exactly how to do it. But first, I wanted her. All of her that she was willing to give.

  CHAPTER 7

  Maxim

  I couldn't get her out of my head. Either one of them. My cock refused to settle every time she drifted into view and sleep was a thing of the past. Eve
ry time I closed my eyes, I saw her, all the glimpses of her naked body I'd ever had forming into a fragmented, perfect whole, to taunt me.

  I wanted her more than ever and she was torturing me, playing these games, flirting with me in the ring, and with that bullet, letting me think I could have her.

  She was perfect. Sexual and wild, strong, but distractingly delicate, like a butterfly wing or a spider web. I wanted her in the worst possible ways, but I knew if I came at it wrong, I'd crush her.

  And I never wanted to do that.

  She was the only woman who'd made me pause for longer than a second. When I closed my eyes it was her body I saw, her face looking up at me as I plunged into her, and in her eyes I saw a future I never thought would be mine spiralling out in front of me.

  A future with kids of our own, and her standing strong by my side. A future where I wasn't trying to hide the side of me that lived for what I did, wasn't hiding all the ugly things and spinning plates in the air to protect the fiction of something cleaner, better, more morally good.

  I ended up in the shower, running cold water over myself until I was shivering and the goosebumps on my skin could have been used for sandpaper. All that and I was only just back in control of myself.

  The slightest thought of her had me hard again. By the morning my balls were aching with a sickening throb that worsened with every drum of my pulse, but I refused to do anything about it. Jacking off wasn't going to bring the kind of relief I wanted. After weeks of watching, not being able to touch, I needed her for real. The next hand closing around my cock wasn't going to be mine. One way or the other, I had to have her in the flesh. There was no other way around it.

  I knew from her schedule that I had carefully put together - kidding myself it was necessary information to target Sutherland effectively - that her very last exam finished this afternoon.