Dark Deception Read online

  Her only choice now was the police. If the neighbors awoke from the sound of her screams and the struggle, they would probably call them. The police would question her presence in the house. They would undoubtedly find her knapsack filled with burglary tools. It would also place Paine in an awkward position. He wouldn’t want to tell the police too many details about himself and their prior relationship. He would be forced to say she was just a stranger. An opportunistic housebreaker. It meant possible prison time but at least she would be alive.

  Sucking in a fevered gasp for another scream, she never got the chance.

  His large hand covered her mouth. The side of his index finger pressed against her nose. Between that and the heavy weight of his arms crushing her ribs and stifling her lungs, her air supply was completely cut off. Mirage struggled for breath as she clawed at his hand.

  “Stop and I will let you breathe.”

  With no other choice, she wilted in his arms.

  Paine let her body slide to the floor at his feet. Standing over her, his bare chest was clearly outlined in the dim light. His denim-clad legs spread wide as he stared down at her. He looked like some kind of vengeful god.

  Mirage could tell he was assessing the situation. Assessing her. She felt rather than saw his gaze as it scanned her body from head to foot, not missing a single detail. The power of his intense scrutiny stopped at her chest. Looking down, she could see her thin, black t-shirt had become torn in the struggle. Glinting in the yellow glow of the street light from outside, was the Raj Pink diamond, peeking out between the curves of her breasts.

  It sealed her fate.

  The tension in the room was thick. Their blood was running high and hot with violence and lust.

  With a growl, he fell to his knees. The wide spread of his legs easily spanned her narrow hips. His hands fell to either side of her head, caging her in. Mirage expected to feel the cold grip of his strong hands around her throat, strangling the life out of her.

  She was shocked beyond reason when his mouth crashed down on her own.

  Taking possession.

  His tongue swept in to stop all protest. Shifting, he moved his hand to her breast, palming the soft flesh, digging the tips of his fingers in, marking her with the bruise of his touch. The violence of his kiss crushed her lips against her teeth. He tasted of whiskey and the metallic tang of blood. His hand moved lower, cupping between her legs.

  Mirage moaned as her hips shifted upwards.

  “Is this what you really came for, baby?” he breathed against her lips.

  The harsh sound of his voice brought Mirage back to reality, cutting through the haze of anger and lust.

  “No!” she yelled as she tried to push his dominating weight off her. “I hate you. I want you dead!”

  Leaning back on his thighs, his hand went to the zipper of his jeans. “Let’s see just how much you hate me.”

  Mirage twisted onto her front and, using her elbows for purchase, tried to shimmy out from between his legs.

  Paine grabbed her by the hips and pulled backwards.

  Forced onto her knees, the front of her body low to the ground, her ass brushed against him. She could feel the hard ridge of his cock press into her flesh. Panicked, Mirage started to claw at the carpet, desperately trying to get away. She couldn’t let him know, let him feel, how much he affected her. It was her body, not her mind and she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  Keeping a restraining hand on her middle, he forced the fingers of his right into the waistband of her black yoga pants. Wrenching her pants down, he exposed her pale skin as the thin fabric bunched around her lower thighs.

  “No!” she screamed.

  His only response was to press a hand between her shoulder blades, forcing her upper body into the carpet, her head to the side. She could hear the metallic trill of his zipper. A faint rustle of fabric.

  He leaned over her prone body. “It’s not like I haven’t fucked this sweet cunt before, Mira.”

  Mirage squeezed her eyes tight, ignoring his familiar use of the name Mira. His special nickname for her. No one else calls her that, just Paine. She tried to force the memory of that warm summer’s eve in a foreign land aside. Thinking she was going to die among the bullets and bombs that rained down on them, she had given in to Paine’s seduction. She hated to recall that memory as it had been the most passionate night of her life, far surpassing the ineffective lovemaking of Dev, the man she supposedly loved. The shadow of Paine had haunted her for their entire relationship. Dev never quite lived up to the memory of Paine. Another reason why she hated the man. Although she was with Paine before she dated Dev, her lasting memories of that night always made her feel as if she were cheating.

  She could feel his hot flesh touch her chilled skin and the touch of his cock as he let it fall against her ass, caressing her. He reached between her legs and stroked her already wet clit, forcing a response. Her back arched as she pushed her hips back, grinding into his hand.

  “You’re a bastard for this, you know that?”

  “You tried to put a bullet in me. I think it’s only fair I put my cock in you, especially since we both know you want it.”

  Two fingers pulsed as they circled her clit, her hips jerking in response. The scratchy seam of his jeans scraped against her outer thighs. She could smell the astringent, musky scent of his cologne with every inhale. Each sound seemed indistinct and far away through the thrumming in her ears. She felt the brush of his knuckles on the underside curve of her ass as he fisted his cock. The shaft pushed between her clenched thighs. The bulbous head forced its way to her entrance.

  Mirage tried to buck her hips. The movement earned her an open palm slap on her right buttock. She screeched in shocked pain as prickled heat radiated from where his hand had touched her, sending unwanted ripples of illicit sensation between her legs.

  “Stop or I will make it worse for you.”

  What could possibly be worse than this humiliation? Her own body was betraying her, thought Mirage, as the weight of his body covered her own, pinning her down. The confident way he handled her, the power in his tight grasp, even his anger, all started to affect her. Memories of his touch came flooding back.

  The head pushed in past the tightly clasped ring of muscle. Her body’s feeble, waning resistance to his assault useless.

  Shifting his hand to her other hip, Paine rolled his hips back before violently thrusting forward.

  The force of his cock pushing deep inside of her drove her body to the ground.

  He pulled back, forcing her back onto her knees.

  He thrust again.

  A moan escaped her lips. She hated the satisfying feeling of fullness as his cock drove inside her.

  His thick shaft pierced her in two. Her body burned as it struggled to accept each pulsing thrust.

  “No, stop!” she cried out, fighting her body’s response as her arms reached weakly back, trying to push him away.

  Still he shoved his cock into her body with powerful force.

  His large hand palmed her breast through her t-shirt. In disgust, Mirage wished he was touching her skin, wanted to once again feel the warmth of his hand, his mouth. She remembered how he liked to pinch her nipples till she cried out in pleasure tinged pain.

  The pressure of his rhythmic thrusts began to build. A spiraling warmth grew in the pit of her stomach. Her thighs clenched as she balled her hands into fists. Her primal self took over. The irrational side. The part of her that gloried in his violent mastery of her body, in his display of masculine power.

  The pressure continued to build with each thrust.

  Without thought, she reached between her legs and rubbed her clit. The tips of her fingers brushed the underside of his shaft as he pushed deep.

  She felt rather than heard the rumble of his groan.

  He thrust faster. Her whole frame rocked from the force of it.

  Mirage fell forward, her arms stretched out, her fingers splayed wide as her body
tensed for one supreme moment. Then her world splintered into a chaos of light, sound and color.

  She was only dimly aware of his continued thrusts into her now sensitive cunt before she heard his roar. Felt the warmth of his cum on her lower back. The heat of his body as he collapsed along her side.

  The night was once again still, but its peace was shattered.

  Chapter Three

  Paine focused on the tactile.

  The feel of her soft body along his own. The brush of one of her errant, silky black curls as it laid against his shoulder. The sound of her breathing. The harsh feel of the floor.

  Anything to focus him. Anything to quiet the primal rage still coursing through his veins.

  For months he had been searching for the person who had burned him. You didn’t live the type of life he did without making enemies. The thing was his enemies were usually the brute force type. The kind that came at you in dark alleys with knives.

  He was a criminal renaissance man. The type of man who could pull off any job, no matter the danger or risk. His specialty was art theft, but he would also be used as a ‘cleaner’ for The Syndicate. He was the man they sent in to clean up messes. Whether it was helping operatives escape from foreign prisons before they made any deals with the authorities which could compromise The Syndicate, getting rid of an inconvenient dead body, or convincing a loose tongued buyer that it was in his best interests to keep quiet about who his supplier was, Paine was the man they turned to.

  The job that burned him, the Raj Pink diamond wasn’t even in his wheelhouse. He was in the country on another job, a museum had hired him to steal back a Klimt. That was how fucked up and incestuous the art world could get. A museum hiring a known art thief to steal back a painting stolen from them. It happened all the time. The museum would arrange a big splashy press release congratulating the authorities for the recovery. The authorities, happy for the good publicity, wouldn’t give a damn they’d had nothing to do with it. The insurance company would get their money back and everyone walked away happy.

  He was in the country when the auction for the Raj Pink diamond was announced. The diamond had only been found a few years ago and no one expected the Saudi Arabian prince who owned it to let his precious stone go so quickly. There were rumors of insanely high gambling debts as the cause. Since the auction was supposed to be quick and quiet, The Syndicate needed to move fast. He was in the neighborhood as they say, so he got the call. When he showed up, someone had beaten him to it. Not too surprising, it wasn’t as if he was the only thief eying the stone. What was surprising was when he heard he was apparently the one hocking that same stone on the dark web. Someone had set him up. Everything spiraled downward quickly after that job.

  The setup was subtle. Clever. Slowly chipping away at his reputation till there was nothing left. The final blow was that fucking Vermeer. He had to admit it was a stroke of genius. Returning a fraud to the museum he had stolen the original from…brilliant. It was public so The Syndicate could not help but notice, even though it wasn’t a job he completed for them. It made a very influential buyer not only drop him but encourage others to do so. In his line of work, relationships took a long time to build and only seconds to destroy. It only took a whisper of the law on your back or the inference your stolen goods were not genuine. That was the final nail.

  No matter where he’d searched, no matter who he’d questioned with his special interrogation skills, no one knew anything.

  The answer was always the same…who the fuck would be stupid enough to cross him?

  He’d never had even a hint of suspicion it could be Mira. Mirage as she was referred to in their circles.

  Her skills as a thief were legendary. Jewels and sensitive data swiped from corporate computers were her specialty. Given her diminutive, feline physique, it made sense. Paintings, antique sculptures and gold bars, his specialty, were all heavy as hell and usually required a crew for the heist. He excelled not only in the theft but in keeping a wayward crew of criminals in line and under his thumb.

  Everyone knew Mirage preferred to work alone. She liked to be the one in complete control.

  Like her nickname, she could steal into a building and past some of the most sophisticated security, appearing as no more than a quick bend of light, a glimmering flash. Her presence an illusion until the stolen item was discovered gone. She was discrete about her exploits, so there were only rumors, but he was fairly certain that job in Antwerp was hers. Over one million in uncut diamonds vanished out of secure vault without so much as a wayward hair or fingerprint left behind. There was the heist from the Carlton Hotel in Paris. The day after the American Ambassador’s Annual Christmas ball, it was discovered the hotel’s safe had been emptied of all the guests’ valuables. Not so much as a ring reappeared on the black market. Clever girl had probably ripped every diamond and sapphire out of its setting and then patiently sold them, stone by stone.

  Mirage was nothing if not patient, a crucial personality trait in a well-planned revenge scheme.

  He respected her for her skills, and he wanted her for her beauty. Like the thief he was, Paine appreciated something precious and rare; Mirage was both.

  She was simply stunning. Her petite frame matched her gamine, almost other-worldly features. Skin so pale it was almost translucent. Dark, obsidian eyes which matched her silky, black hair. Her lips dominated her delicate face, almost appearing too large and always painted a crimson red. Many a night he had lain awake dreaming of that mouth, thinking of the stain of her lipstick on his shaft.

  He’d had a small taste, not enough…perhaps never enough…that one fateful night in Istanbul two years ago. The rebel faction of the military had staged a coup d’état. The Syndicate had pulled him from a job in Munich and chartered an emergency flight for him into Turkey.

  He was tasked with rescuing a valuable asset. Mirage.

  They had hired her to steal government documents during the upheaval which could be used to bribe and coerce future officials, on both sides of the coup. It didn’t matter to The Syndicate who won just as long as they had dirt on them. The situation in the country erupted in violence sooner than anyone had anticipated. She was holed up in a house near the front lines of the fighting.

  At that time, he had known her through reputation alone. As she preferred to work alone, they had never been on a crew or job together. Thieves of their distinction were a rare commodity. It was unusual to not have crossed paths earlier.

  He would never forget his first sight of her.

  Hiding under a table, she was curled up like a frightened kitten. She was dressed much as she was now. All in black. Sleek like a cat. Those beautiful red lips quivering. Her black eyes large and bright with fear. A few specks of blood dotted her cheek. Scanning the room, he saw a corpse lying amongst the rubble.

  “It wasn’t me.” The softly uttered yet defiant claim was the first she had spoken since he’d broken through the door. Her voice was smooth and low, dark honey.

  Ripping the tattered cloth from off the table above her, Paine knelt close to her side. Using an edge of the cloth, he wiped the blood from her pale cheek.

  “I wouldn’t give a damn if it was, Mira.”

  He could see her eyes assessing him. In this business, you cannot trust anyone but you need to learn who you can at least rely on. He could see she was trying to decide if he was savior or executioner.

  “That’s not my name,” she said finally. “Everyone calls me Mirage.”

  “I’m not everyone.” His lips quirked up in an arrogant smile. “And I’m here to help you. The Syndicate sent me. So you can put down that steak knife you’re clutching.”

  Lowering her eyes and turning her chin slightly away, she didn’t even question how he knew her concealed left hand was fisting a knife. He heard the soft thud on the floor as she dropped it. Whether it was because she believed he meant her no harm or that she knew a mere knife would do nothing to stop him from killing her, he couldn’t say.
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  Turning back to face him, she countered, “Who says I need help?”

  Paine knew in that moment she would be his. She immediately fascinated him. Small and vulnerable yet feisty with balls to the wall courage. He wanted to both protect her and push her limits. Not one to waste time, it wasn’t long before he lifted her slight frame into his arms, ignoring her initial struggles and protestations, and carried her to the first bedroom he could find. Tossing aside the rubble covered blanket, he pinned her body beneath his own. Never in his life had he wanted to feel the hot grip of a woman’s pussy around his cock as he did in that moment.

  And Mira did not disappoint.

  He felt like a phoenix, burnt to a cinder from her touch only to be reborn.

  The next morning, he had left to do some reconnaissance to figure out the best way to smuggle her out of the country since the military had confiscated the private plane and closed the airport. When he returned, she was gone. Vanished into thin air. As if the entire night had been nothing more than an illusion.

  He never did learn how she was able to save herself. The Syndicate would only inform him that both his and her jobs had been completed. Nothing more. For months, he wasn’t even sure if she lived. Then he learned she had hooked up with that lying sack of shit, Dev. A woman of her beauty, intelligence and skill…of her fire…with that asshole?

  Paine wasn’t the least bit sorry he’d put a bullet in the piece of shit’s head.

  Shaking off the past, he tilted his head to look at Mira. Her eyes were closed. Those beautiful, full lips of hers were swollen. The skin along her cheek stained a slight pink from where he had smeared her crimson lipstick with his kiss. A pale streak of light from the coming dawn peeked from between the curtains. The golden light fell on her back. It made her skin glow a rosy pink and showed the faint outline of his fingerprints on her hips from where he had gripped her.