Risk the Night by Anne Stuart Page B

would.
    “Are there jobs you would refuse to take?”
    “Why would I?”   He was
toying with her, more interested in her answers than his own variety of lies.
    “Because the … the victim … the target … what do you call them?”   She was beginning to sound
rattled.   He took another drag on
the cigarette he didn’t want and smiled.
    “Take your pick,”   he
said.   “Victim sounds good.”
    He could pick up on her annoyance now.   She suspected he was playing with her.   Good.   He liked an intelligent adversary, and she was most
definitely that.
    “Did you kill Congressman Walters?”
    “No comment.”
    “Did you kill the King of Waziristan?”
    “No comment.”
    “Did you kill Jimmy Hoffa?”   she demanded, frustrated.
    “No comment.”
    “Would you kill a good man?   If the price was right?”
    “How am I to know whether a man is good or not?   One man’s savior is another man’s
terrorist.   It’s not my place to
judge.”
    “Just to carry out the sentence.”
    “Yes.”
    “Would you kill a woman?”
    He took another drag on the heavy Turkish tobacco.   When in France he smoked Gitanes if necessary, unfiltered.   “What makes you think women are any less innocent than
men?   I can assure you, certain
women are far more dangerous than their male counterparts.”
    “I take it that means yes.”
    “Take it any way you wish.”   Taggart was going to be annoyed with him.   He was supposed to give this inquisitive female enough to
feed her paranoid fantasies with no real information.   Instead he was stonewalling her, for the simple reason that
he wanted to annoy her.   To get a
reaction from her.   For God’s sake,
he wanted to move her.   What the
hell was wrong with him today?
    He heard her intake of breath.   “Have you ever killed a woman?”
    He didn’t hesitate.   “Yes.”
    “A child?”
    “No.”
    Silence as she digested that information.   He should have lied to her – he didn’t want her making
the mistake of thinking he was human.   “Are you here in Paris for a particular job?”
    “I’m on vacation,”   he
said.   “I’m here for the wine and
the food and the pussy and nothing else.”
    He felt her instinctive reaction, and he wanted to laugh.   A crude word was such a minor thing
compared to the world he was opening up for her.  
    It went with his accent – rough German that was then distorted
by the microphone.   He could croon
to her in a few hours and she’d have no idea who she was talking to.   The idea was tempting.  
    He wondered what she looked like, he thought as he fielded her questions.   Was she tall and leggy, unnaturally
thin and nervous like so many career women?   Was she slightly plump, with glasses and sensible shoes?   He liked that idea.   He was tired of wafer-thin models.
    He found he was getting turned on, which was odd.   Not his style.   He liked the idea of fucking her.   Of going out and finding her after this
was done, seducing her, seeing how far he could push her.   He could seduce just about anyone, and
this woman, whose name was most definitely NOT Elizabeth Shannon, would be
child’s play.
    Blonde or brunette?   Tall
or short?   He fantasized as he spun
her stories, some blatant lies, some horrifyingly true, and she was naked with
her sweet, questioning mouth on his cock.   He didn’t usually like women to be frightened of him, not in bed.   He liked an even match, a woman who
gave as good as she got, one who had the illusion that she was in control.   They never were.   He made it a rule never to walk into a
situation where he didn’t command complete control.
    It would be easy enough with this one.   She was young, thinking she was experienced.   Those were the easiest to get to.
    He shook his head, amused at himself.   He wasn’t taking care of that little problem this
afternoon.   This was business, this
was for Taggart.  
    “Tell me,”   he said,
pitching his voice low.