by Lea Griffith No Mercy Book 3 |
and | by Lea Griffith No Mercy Book 2.5 |
by Lea Griffith
No Mercy Book Three
Bone and blood. Two sides of one coin. Retribution draws them together, but before all is said and done, they will learn love can either break you or make you stronger.
Her tears will never reach Heaven.
She was formed of the earth and time has hardened her into stone. To her marrow Bone is the coldest of killers. She is the only one of First Team who lusts for death. Yet even a killer’s heart can bleed.
He has never wept for his greatest loss.
Dmitry Asinimov knows well what it is to lose the ones you love. Nothing is thicker than blood, nothing. He has hidden his pain but never has he stopped searching for vengeance. Now he’s close to answers, but first he must break the woman whose eyes whisper of pain and whose strength is unlike anything he’s ever known.
Genre: Romantic Suspense
Content/Theme(s): Assassins, Contemporary
Release Date: March 5, 2015
Publisher: Hartwood Publishing
Free download, Excerpt, Interlude & More
Bone Deep Purchase links: Amazon ARe Smashwords Kobo B&NBone Deep Excerpt:
She took away knowledge from every contract because what did not kill you made you stronger. Sacha Asinimov taught her more than any other.
And so the truth mocked her. Dmitry always had a reason to pursue her. He was a man honed in the fires of revenge. Most of his family had been wiped off the planet by Joseph Bombardier. And while she wasn’t the only one of Joseph’s killers to play a hand in their demise—after all, Bullet had taken his brother Alexander—Bone had taken someone who obviously meant more to Dmitry than anyone else.
And Dmitry would not care that someone had not been a good man.
The urge to flee rose, taking her breath even as her muscles loosened with the flood of adrenaline. Fight or flight? She measured her options. He was close enough that the heat from his big body burned through the material of her Gortex unitard. His breath carried the hint of mint and vodka and her mouth watered. Russia had the best vodka. She could only imagine the taste when flavored with Dmitry.
His scent teased her nostrils. The smell of snow-kissed pine and juniper—fresh, seductive—sank into her pores, making her core clench.
Out of every person she’d ever met, this one man called to her on a level she was neither comfortable with nor complacent about. He made her want to move.
Into him.
Away from him.
Both.
The one thing she could never do was hold him against her. He would sink too deep then and would destroy her when he found out the truth of who she was.
So she would run again.
Another caress along the curl he held and then, “I can feel you getting ready to move. Your muscles have gone lax and your breathing has slowed. It is a singular oddity among you and your sisters—instead of your muscles bunching and drawing in to prepare, you go still and soft. It is quite unexpected. Tell me, Bone, will you fight with me or flee?”
She snorted. “I will not fight you. Do you think I have allowed you to live each time we’ve met only to take you now?”
His breath brushed her cheek again as his big body meshed against her back. She wanted to curve into him, let his strength surround her and carry her through her trials. The heat, the strength, the need. It was all there between them.
“So you will flee, da?”
She said nothing, just continued to take measured breaths, her body hounded by the one thing it could never have. She hated the weakness, indeed, tasted the need to harm rise in her heart and eclipse her mind with its red haze.
Hurt others before they hurt you and you will survive. Joseph’s words tortured her now. He had trained her personally until she had become too strong for him to spar. She’d been a foot and half shorter and a good one hundred fifty pounds lighter than Joseph, yet she’d been stronger. He’d recognized it by her eighth birthday and stopped training her, turning her over instead to another, more brutal taskmaster.
She shook the memories off.
“Who is next on your list, Bone?” he asked against her neck.
“Step away from me, Asinimov,” she demanded in a low, cajoling tone.
“Who is next?”
“You are a dog with a—” She caught her words and sighed.
He laughed and it moved through her body in a slow, warm tide. Surely it was the most stunning feeling she’d ever had.
“A bone? Yes, well, I do have one in my hands now, correct?”
His tone was teasing. The situation was anything but.
She turned then, took two steps back and lifted her face. He was stunning. The carved features of his face, thrown in relief by the night lights of St. Petersburg, made her heart beat harder. His gaze narrowed, expression going bleak.
For the laugh he’d just blessed her with, there was no happiness on his face. He was completely shut down.
“Come with me to Virginia, kostolomochka moja.” It seemed a plea wrapped in a command. My little Bone Breaker he called her. The name made her want to smile.
She knew every way to kill it seemed, but this man made her want to live and it hurt.
“No.” She shook her head. “Not yet. Death calls and it is time to mete out punishments. You know this, Dmitry, and yet you refuse to stop this insane crusade of yours. Leave me to this and we, all of us, will be better off. If you persist, we will dance and I will win. I have no choice,” she whispered.
“There are always choices. Do not hide behind your fear to make the right one,” he warned. “Your sisters sent me. They are worried you are losing sight of the goal.”
Anger exploded in her mind. He did this to her—made her feel so much she couldn’t comprehend the depth and scope of her rage. “Then perhaps they should come tell me themselves? I have been known to kill messengers.”
“Do not make me hurt you, Bone,” he implored, his deep voice smoke over sandpaper. That he mimicked her words from moments ago gave her pause.
Hurt, hurt, hurt…she was comfortable with that.
She cocked her head and stared at him. “Pain is nothing but a reminder that I was created for death. It is my alpha and omega—my beginning and my end. My heart craves it, my soul requires it. If you thought the prospect of pain would draw me in line, Dmitry Asinimov, you were wrong.”
She struck before she could question the need not to. One, two, three, she hit him with her closed fist, first to the side of the head, the next two to the gut. She sidestepped and went low, aiming a kick at his hip. He stumbled, clearly unprepared for her attack but gained his balance within seconds.
He spun to meet her next blow, blocking the swing of her arm. The force she’d swung with combined with his re-direction turned her. This gave him her back for mere seconds and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his chest and squeezing. She didn’t draw in a breath, rather she pushed out, because if he squeezed as she breathed out he had the upper hand. Bone aimed a kick backward at his knee as she swung her head back. She connected with his knee and his nose. Not hard enough to maim but she’d hurt him. He grunted and released her, shoving her away.
She glanced up as he shuffled and then once again he was coming, tackling her to the ground but bearing the brunt of the fall.
The man would undo her. Her rage rushed back in. How dare he try to protect her. This was war.
She was on her back and he lay within her guard. Their bodies were flush as their gazes met, his blue-black in the night and pleading. Bone ignored the unspoken request. She would neither break nor give in.
His full weight pressed on her. He was six-feet four inches, two-hundred fifty pounds of heavily muscled male and she was barely one-twenty soaking wet. She relaxed, going limp and he took advantage, pressing his chin into the hollow between her neck and shoulder and grinding down. The pain was immediate but not such that she couldn’t function.
Instead she welcomed it—let it flow through her so it became strength. She twisted her hips and brought her feet up to push against his. With a swift shift of her shoulders, she countered his attempt to subdue her and once again shoved up on his hips with her feet. He flew over her head and she was on him, taking his back as he rolled and wrapping her arm around his neck, leveraging the hold with her other arm.
He fell back and she was pinned beneath him but she folded her legs around his waist, squeezing to cut off his ability to draw in air as she did her best to choke him out. He tapped her arm desperately, a classic sign he was giving up, but she wouldn’t relent…couldn’t relent. This wasn’t a sparring session.
He went limp moments later and she released the hold before shoving him off. He fell to his side and Bone rubbed her chest at the pain there.
She glanced up at the sky again. Flakes of snow fell like a sanction from the blackness above her and she knew a hurt she couldn’t counter. “I am not your Bone Breaker, Dmitry,” she whispered.
She had no time for this. There was another move to put into play and until she had Vadim Yesipov’s head in her hands, this part of her journey wouldn’t end.
She hadn’t held Ninka’s hands in the darkness like Bullet, so she would go after her betrayer with the fury of a million demons. She would rip and rend the one who sold her into Joseph Bombardier’s hands—the one who still catered to the devil who created them all. She feared it would all be over too soon.
Bone checked Dmitry’s pulse, found it steady and strong and then whispered the words she’d spoken to him two weeks ago.
“Do not follow me, Dmitry Asinimov,” she said at his ear. “Do not make me kill you.”
That would destroy her as nothing else could.
He groaned and Bone stood, grabbed up her backpack, secured it over her shoulders, and backed away.
Dmitry woke swiftly, coming to his feet in a smooth motion that spoke of the fighter he was. Had she time, were she a different person, she would have taken a few seconds to admire the shift and play of his body, the effortlessness he displayed.
But she was Bone. There was to be nothing more.
“Bone!”
She heard him yell but she was already flying, leaping off the building as fear locked her throat. The waters of the Griboyedov Canal flowed below. The air stroked her like a lover, but the distance to the water taunted her. She pushed through the terror, swallowed it like the bitterest pill, and met the water in a clean slice. She pushed deep, into the darkness of the frigid river that wound like a snake through St. Petersburg.
And she swam until she was far enough away he couldn’t reach her.
~~~~~~
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by Lea Griffith
No Mercy Book 2.5
For fans of the No Mercy series a very special peek into the lives of the first three killers—Bullet, Arrow, and Bone.
Brass (Bullet and Rand) The sniper and the man who sneaked his way into her heart? It’s a constant struggle to overcome the past and their own brokenness. They always fight the fight and in their pain is born a beautiful love.
Flight (Arrow and Adam) Arrow’s struggle is a bit different, fraught with insecurities and a love unlike anything she’s ever imagined. Adam will hold her hand the entire way but no journey of the heart is ever easy.
To the Bone (Bone and Dmitry) Bone–the only one of the killers who truly lusts for death. Her weakness has become a certain Russian, but even in her turmoil, she is fully committed to eliminating all threats. It’s up to Dmitry to pick a side.
Genre: Romantic Suspense
Content/Theme(s): Contemporary, Anthology
Release Date: February 10, 2015
Publisher: Hartwood Publishing
Interlude free download from: ARe KoboOther titles by Lea Griffith:
the Soul |
the Heart |
& Yours |
of Roses |
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Night |
Moonlit Night |
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Be on the lookout for Lea Griffith's future release(s): The Way of the Warrior coming May 2015, Kiss of a Blade coming Spring 2015, Nameless coming June 2015, Never Enough coming August 2015, All the King’s Men coming Fall 2015, They All Fall Down coming mid-Fall 2015, and See How She Runs coming late Fall 2015
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