What Men Want - Chapter 37

Crap!

She’s gotten herself captured again. Figures. No wonder Ryo constantly told her to stay at home, to stay back. She always got in trouble, even when she didn’t want to. Even when she thought she was doing a good deed...Like helping a kidnapped woman.

Turned out that Hitotsugi Amaya hadn’t been kidnapped. She’d faked it. And Kaori had fallen for it.

And straight into a trap.

Crap!

She’d driven to the Lumber Terminal, searched for the warehouse #38, and found it almost at the very end of the terminal, in the deserted part. She drove past it and turned, pretending to be lost. She drove past it again and parked behind the closest warehouse, only to circle back on foot.

Calling for Amaya softly, the woman in question dashed from around the corner. Suddenly, Kaori felt herself being grabbed from behind as someone pressed a wet cloth to her mouth. She’d recoiled at the foul taste and smell, worried more about Amaya than herself.

Her sight blurring, she watched Amaya leisurely stroll toward her, a satisfied smile on her face, before darkness took over.

And now here she was, tightly tied to a slab of concrete like a human sacrifice in nothing but two scraps of barely-there underwear, staring at the ceiling, a strip of silver tape over her mouth.

Figures that she’d be kidnapped the day after the best night of her life, the day she felt sexy and loved...and she’d put on a pair of her sexiest underwear in anticipation of Ryo coming home. And figures that the day she was wearing a pair of her sexiest underwear, her kidnappers would strip her.

It was just her luck.

Coupled with the fact her mouth was taped over, preventing her from being able to scream, curse their ancestors, or blab her mouth to annoy them until Ryo came to get her, Kaori wasn’t a very happy camper.

As far as kidnapping experiences went, this one was among the worst ones.

Well, at least she wasn’t held at gunpoint or threatened with death. But she guessed that was to come as soon as Amaya made her entrance. She might’ve gotten knocked out earlier, but there had been no mistaking the promise and glee in the woman’s eyes.

"Trust, it’s been a good nap.”

Kaori turned her head toward the voice. And there she was. Hitotsugi Amaya, dressed in a tight white dress that covered her from neck to calf, clung to all the curves in between.

Her white stiletto heels clicked as she neared. “I’m sure you needed it. You didn’t get much sleep last night.”

And there was the drawback of having her mouth taped shut. She couldn’t tell the bitch to go straight to hell.

“Yes,” Amaya mused, “I heard you two last night, rutting and groaning like animals.” She chuckled. “I stood right outside his bedroom door, listening, and he didn’t even know I was there. Saeba Ryo, the formidable sweeper, the great City Hunter in front of whom criminals tremble and cry in fear, reduced to a writhing, horny mess.” She inspected her perfectly manicured nails. “If I knew how easy it was, I would’ve killed him when he was between my thighs.”

Kaori growled behind the tape.

Amaya looked down at her with a contemptuous smile. “You didn’t know, did you? He didn’t tell you he had had me.” She ran a fingertip down Kaori’s cheek. “I left him begging for more because it wasn’t yet time, but I must say I enjoyed it. He’s so virile...”

Kaori stared up at her. Either the woman was completely nuts, unable to tell the difference between reality and fantasy, or she was trying to rile her up. Which she was succeeding; pity Kaori couldn’t do anything about it.

“It would’ve been so easy, really,” Amaya continued. “I even dreamed of how I’d do it.” She giggled. It sounded a little maniacal. “Right under your roof, as well. Oh...He looked so funny staring at my gun as I told him to die, so amusing as he lay on the floor with a bullet hole in his chest.”

Kaori felt blood freeze in her veins. What Amaya was describing...It was the dream she glimpsed in CinemaScope the night she ran to Mick. But how could it be? She only heard male thoughts...Was it possible that Amaya’s dream had been so intense and her innermost thoughts so filled with rage and hatred that Kaori had tapped into them while she was vulnerable under the assault of Ryo’s erotic dream?

Oblivious to Kaori’s mental acrobatics, Amaya waxed on. “He’ll get a bullet hole in his chest just like my Takeru.”

Kaori rolled her eyes. As if Ryo would’ve taken the risk of shooting the Yakuza boss in the chest. He’d aimed at the bastard’s head.

“But first, he’ll suffer,” Amaya vowed. “Like I’ve suffered when Takeru was taken from me.” She glared down at her, her gaze running over Kaori’s tied form. “I don’t know what he sees in you. You don’t know how a woman is supposed to comport herself and act, how a woman should treat her man, and you take no pride in your appearance.” She scoffed.

“A woman should dress like a woman, not like a teenage boy, and the hair.” She grabbed a fistful of Kaori’s hair and viciously pulled.

Kaori refused to give her the satisfaction of crying out.

“What does he see in you?” Amaya hissed with another pull at her hair. “What do you have that I don’t?”

Her sanity, for one.

Amaya slapped her. “He obviously has no taste.” She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter anyway, he’ll watch you die, and then I’ll kill him myself. But first, you will be the one to suffer. You see, no one threatens me.” A sadistic grin distorted her face. “After my men are finished with you, you’ll be begging for death. I think you’ll do just fine, they have as much taste as Saeba.” She pinched one of Kaori’s nipples and twisted viciously, making her scream behind the tape.

The bitch wanted her gang raped. Kaori screamed again and strained against the bonds.

Sorry, I’m late, honey.

The familiar, warm, and soothing cadence of his voice in her head was like a balm to Kaori’s soul.

Traffic was a bitch.

A tear trickled from the corner of her eyes. He was keeping his words light for her benefit, keeping her calm, keeping her grounded, letting her know he was there, that everything would be fine. Was it any wonder she loved this man?

Blink, if you can hear me.

Kaori blinked furiously.

“Tears, really?” Amaya intruded. “How wonderful.”

Nice getup. Remind me to gouge out Mick’s eyes later.

If she wasn’t tied up and gagged, she’d giggle. He was incorrigible. And he was making it so much easier to ignore the psychotic woman holding her captive.

Sit tight, I’ll get you out of here in a sec. Think of me.

And then nothing. As if she’d been imagining his tender words. No more distractions.

Amaya walked out of her field of vision, and Kaori lifted her head to keep her in sight. She might not be able to do much, but it was still better to know where possible danger came from.

Amaya walked to the tripod holding a camera and switched it on. “Now...” She smiled. “Let’s make this interesting, shall we? After all, it’s Saeba’s send-off gift.” She tapped her index finger against her lips. “I wonder what he’ll make of it. Will he pleasure himself as he watches you with all my men? Will he get jealous?”

Kaori wanted to puke.

Amaya clapped her dainty hands together. “Oh, how I wish to be a fly on his wall when he sees it.” Her expression turned dreamy. “Maybe we’ll recreate some of it together before I kill him.”

Kaori gagged as another’s thoughts slid into her mind like an oily ooze. Dark and twisted images of her naked, spread open, bloodied and torn, eyes bulging as fingers squeezed around her throat.

“Just in time, anata,” Amaya cooed as a man joined her, his gaze on Kaori, eyes glistening with hunger.

“Don’t look at her like that!” Amaya snapped. “She’s not for you! Call the men!”

“Good luck with that.”

Kaori’s heart somersaulted in her chest as Ryo melted out of the shadows on the right of her sacrificial pedestal. Left hand in his pocket, the right one hung by his side, holding his trusty Python. He looked relaxed, without a care in the world. One had to really know him to see the tension in his shoulders, the slight tick in his jaw, the carefully banked rage in his eyes.

For the first time in a week, Kaori was happy he could blanket his thoughts so well. She preferred not to see what was on his mind at such a moment.

“Saeba...” Amaya flashed him a brilliant smile and cocked a hip. “Where are my men?”

“On the way to police headquarters.” A corner of his lips curled. "Some are a little worse for wear than others.”

“You’re too early.” She shrugged. “Luckily, I’m adaptable. You’ll still watch her die.”

One glance at the man standing beside her, and he suddenly pulled a wakizashi out of the black sheath, strapped to his waist.

Kaori stared wide-eyed as he swung it, almost in slow motion, toward her neck.

A shot rang out of the shadows, and the short sword went flying.

Amaya screeched and threw herself at Ryo, fingers curled into talons.

He swatted her to the side like a fly, where Umibozu caught her, thrashing and screeching. But her thwarted attack had been enough of a diversion for the creepy man with the sword to cut Kaori’s bonds and drag her off the concrete slab.

She could barely stand, least of all walk, with pain shooting up and down her legs after being tied up for so long, he half-carried, half-dragged her a few steps away from the slab. Her left arm was curved awkwardly across her body and to the side of her neck as he used the cut rope dangling from her wrist as a garrote to both restrain her and use her as a shield.

“Kill her!” Amaya screamed, struggling against Umibozu’s bruising grip. “Make him watch her die!”

Gritting her teeth against the pain shooting through her limbs, feeling the rope bite into her neck, Kaori twisted her lower body to the side and clamped her right hand between her captor’s legs, tightening her grip as he gulped.

Ryo couldn’t shoot him as the bastard was using her as a human shield; Mick probably didn’t have a clear shot with the man cowering against one of the wide steel pillars holding the roof of the warehouse; and Umibozu had his hands full of screeching, hissing crazy woman.

It was up to her to try to get free, or at least dislodge him enough for Ryo to take him out, and she’d be damned if she went down without a fight, so she dug her nails into the soft tissue between the sadistic bastard’s legs and pulled. Hard.

He shrieked and shoved her away. As she went flying, she heard the distinctive, thunderous sound of the Python. As she landed, she felt a sharp pain in her head and heard a strange, cracking sound...