Collateral (Collateral Damage 1)

But it’s not that that’s off. There’s a smell that doesn’t belong here.

A look around tells me I’m alone. But the bedroom door, it’s open. I know I’d closed it when I’d left.

I walk toward it. I don’t make a sound.

No one should be up here. The soldier wouldn’t have let anyone up.

I push the door wider and step inside. The smell, it’s stronger in here and it’s making me nauseous.

The room is too dark for me to see and I’m about to flip the light switch when a figure moves. Standing with his back to the windows, the light creates a sort of halo around him and he has the advantage. I can’t see his face, but he can see mine in that same light.

I swallow, try to speak. “You’re not supposed to be here,” I finally manage, sensing something dangerous. And I remember for all the friends my father has bought, the number of his enemies is double that.

“No, I’m not,” the man says, his voice a deep, sure timbre that ices my spine.

He takes a step forward and I take one back, my hand closing over the doorknob behind me.

Danger.

It ripples off him.

“What’s that smell?” I ask before I can stop myself.

“Morgue,” he answers, his voice low and hard.

He walks toward me, no hesitance in his step, and before I can move, he’s standing just a few inches from me.

The smell clings to him and it’s making me sick. When I cringe back, he leans toward me and I open my mouth to scream just as something clicks.

For a moment, I think it’s a gun.

But then the room is bathed in soft, golden light. He’d just reached to switch on the lamp on the table beside me.

I exhale but my relief is short-lived.

The man is taller than my father. He’s more than a foot taller than me and I’m wearing four-inch heels.

His disheveled hair is dark, eyes hazel and I think he’s drunk. He must be. Only a drunk man would enter Gabriel Marchese’s daughter’s bedroom.

Or one with a death wish.

“Who are you?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer me but studies my face instead. His eyes narrow as he takes me in, his gaze lowering to the swell of my breasts lifted and pushed together by this ridiculous gown. It, like the roses, is pink. A soft, champagne pink. A color I don’t detest.

“I came with a gift,” he says.

He tucks his hand into his pocket and for a moment, I wonder if he’s going to pull out a knife or a gun. If he’s going to kill me after all. Because I know this man is not my father’s friend. Not even a business associate. And for the first time in my life, I think about the protection I’ve always lived under. The protection that often felt more stifling than anything else.

“It’s your birthday, isn’t it?” he asks, cocking his head to the side, setting one hand on the door above my head. He’s leaning so close that I can feel the heat coming off his body.

I swallow.

“How did you get up here?” There are guards everywhere.

He lets what he’s holding dangle and my gaze shifts to it, to the pendant hanging off a gold chain. It’s too dark to make out the details.

“You shouldn’t be up here. The party—”

“I’m not here for the party. I’m here for you, Gabriela.”

My blood runs cold at his words.

My father, as much as I hate to admit it, scares me. But this man is terrifying.

His lips curve into something wicked. A grin. A sneer. I wonder if he can feel my fear. Maybe smell it coming off me. Men like this can, can’t they?

“Turn around.”

“Why?” I ask weakly.

“So I can give you your birthday present.”

“I don’t want—”

“I said turn around.”

I should scream. Alert a guard. There are plenty of them. But I just keep staring up into his hazel eyes and I think how strangely beautiful he is, even for as fucked up as he looks. As drunk as he obviously is. As crazed.

“Please just go,” I manage.

“Turn. Around.”

It’s an order.

I swallow. Turn.

He moves his hand from above me once my back is to him, so when he lifts the chain over my head and brings it down to set the pendant against the swell of my breasts, I smell that smell again. On the sleeves of his suit. On the skin of his hands.

I look down at the pendant, but he pulls it higher so I can’t see it. Instead, I notice the ring on his finger, a heavy, dark ring.

But then those fingers touch my skin and it’s like touching a live wire. I gasp, listen to the hammering of my heart, wonder if he hears it. If he feels that shock of electricity.

I don’t move as he pulls the chain tight, the pendant at my throat. He tugs and a new panic takes hold. I think he’s going to strangle me with it.