Part Three: The Legend of Leon Kennedy
A dangerous game.
A delicious regret.
A final farewell to stop a madman.
Monte Carlo- 2011
The heavy ping of a slot machine accompanied the cards that he tossed down on the table. Around him, the high rollers that had just lost a fortune let out groans of distress. One of them, a heavy set man with a mustache worthy of Sam Elliot, lamented, "...pretty American fool!"
His Italian accent was rich and rolling. His cigar plumbed smoke into the already stifling thick air. The angry German baron known as Von Muller cursed in a string of gutteral filth that might have stung the ears of a lesser man. The rest of the men glared uselessly as he rose, the pretty waitress beside him offering him a victory shot of Patron.
He took it, winking at the sour expressions of those who hunched in defeat. "Gentleman...a pleasure."
As he wandered away from the table, the voice in his ear teased, "...you could have lost, you know. You just needed Von Muller to be aware of you."
"...I know,"Leon turned through the enormous lobby of massive casino, headed for the elevator and the room he had on the top floor, "But losing is boring. This way, he already thinks I'm a douchebag. It'll get him bent on revenge. He'll invite me to the VIP suite without having to grease any palms or rub any elbows."
Hunnigan came back to him, amused, "I hate how good you are at...everything."
Leon laughed, the elevator doors whooshed shut to show him his reflection in the gold mirrored surface, "I'll take that as a compliment. Get some coffee, kid, it's gonna be a long night."
"...as long as it ends with information on the missing Mrs. Muller...I think we're gonna consider it a win. Be good until I get back."
"I'm always good...at everything."
His quip made Hunnigan chuckled before she went radio silent.
His reflection was handsome - but that was a given. It was James Bond meets James Dean - chic and stylish, rebellious and badass. He'd through on a bulletproof vest beneath the expensive Prada shirt in screaming vermilion. The black tie and silk vest over it said he was too busy looking good to worry about looking for answers.
The truth was he'd been digging for information on Anita Muller for weeks now. The speculation said she'd married the Baron von Muller and given birth to a son. The early talk was that the son hadn't been his. The timing, the tone of the messages they'd uncovered, the whisper of information from the right people said that shortly before he'd gone off deep end in the early nineties, Albert Wesker had engaged in a flirtation with a completely unattainable attache to Germany. She'd left the country and married a Baron, but she'd been brewing a bastard in her belly before the wedding.
That bastard was heir to very specific blood type. Reports said the Baron had divorced Anita shortly after her duplicitous nature had been relieved. She'd fled somewhere inland and possibly left the country, but the good Baron was still paying alimony. So they needed the address, and they needed it before certain other players in the game lucked into the same intel. Wesker's bastard might have what they needed to draw antibodies for a variant of the T-Virus they'd found creeping up in Edonia and the ESR. Someone was playing god again - warping the already perverse work of a madman and making it unstoppable.
Diplomatic immunity protected Von Muller from being picked up and interrogated, so it was better to play the spy game and win the answers over a rousing game of poker. He'd lose the hand this time to be sure it earned the other man's trust. If he won too much, they'd turn against him and Leon would be black balled before he'd even begun. He just wanted to get in, the rest would fall into place naturally.
After about ten minutes in his suite, the knock on his door was the invite he was waiting for.
He followed a pretty blonde down a private elevator to a room turned into a ridiculous blend of money and prestige. The walls were woven with gold, the floor marked into veins of silver, and the room decorated with antiques worth hundreds of thousand of dollars. It was ostentatious old money at it's finest. He was sitting at a table with some of the most powerful, wealthiest men in the world.
All of them had names that dated back to the dawn of time. They were lineage children, drawing from a line that could be traced to kings and sultans. Leon was a former cop with a legacy of walking the thin blue line. He wasn't entirely sure where his life had turned to put him sharing scotch with kings.
He'd just won a hand, and lost a hand, and was working on throwing a third when the doors opened and a voice called, lilting, "Gentleman! I have brought us the entertainment!"
The heads turned, his included, and his smile stayed locked in place but it wanted to wilt.
Ada.
Ada in a gown that was red and sexy, oriental piping in black and beautiful white cranes stenciled up the blood red silk. The tops of her thigh highs winked as she walked, the slit so high it hit the edge of her hip and suggested garters in ebony and smoky stalkings. The ice pick heels put her inches taller than the man who escorted her. She dangled on his arm, smiling beguilingly.
Beside him, the sultan of somewhere nudged Leon's elbow and leered, "She is exotic, yes? Like a beautiful butterfly."
She was. She was a red butterfly, a thing that had spent a lifetime flapping her wings to change the winds that circled around him. She'd nestled once, at the edge of his ear, whispering as she waited to fly away again. He'd touched her, stroking a finger down the delicate silk of her wings, watching her preen and swirl in a beautiful and enchanting dance. He knew, as he'd always known, if he caught her...if he closed his hand around her...he'd crush her and she would never fly again.
Part of him wanted to catch her just to see what it felt like to finally hold onto to her.
Instead, Leon turned back to the game and invited, "Shall we?"
They played, the drinks flowed, the games were won and lost. Ada circled the table with another beautiful woman, this one blonde and full of touches and kisses for the those who tossed money around without concern. She placed her ample breasts on his shoulder to coo in his ear, she licked it and made the men at the table laugh. The blonde put herself in his lap to rub her toned butt against his groin.
Amused, he heard one of the men call, "He is prettier than the rest of us, yes? Perhaps we should make him less so."
Great.
Great.
All he needed was angry men with too much money and power hating him for being good looking. A little concerned, Leon told the blonde, "Do us both a favor honey, go find a man with more than looks. After tonight, that's all I'll have left."
The laughter tinkled around the table. The blonde pouted but made her way to the lap of a fat sultan who'd won the last three rounds.
And then something happened Leon hadn't expected - Von Muller leaned over and whispered into his ear, "I have brought my beautiful butterfly for you...perhaps we should adjourn...and you will show me how pretty you are beneath your wings as well."
Damn.
That explained the divorce. Von Muller was gay. Likely Anita Muller had known it when they'd wed, but apparently when it was socially acceptable for him to drop the act, he'd kicked the wife and the kid to the curb. The best way to get him to talk wasn't losing money to him, it was letting him think he had a shot of getting laid.
Amused again, Leon shrugged, "Your game, Baron. Where should we play?"
Ten minutes later, Leon was sitting in a chair in a beautiful penthouse with the warm breeze tickling his face. The Baron, thank god, seemed content to sit in a chair and watch as Ada danced for him. It was always curious how many powerful people had a secret streak of wanting those around them to dance like puppets on strings.
Ada shed her dress to be in a beautiful corset in black and red and a matching garter belt. In the blood red heels, she straddled Leon, ripping open his jacket to pretend to play with his nipples. Her nails clicked at the Kevlar beneath the shirt and she put her lips to his ear, whispering, "...fool. If he has you strip, he'll know what you are."
Leon started to speak and she hissed, "...when will you learn? Say nothing, you fool."
She rose and before he could blink, she backhanded him. The hit made his ear ring. He grunted and let her jerks his arm behind him to bind him to the chair. The flair of amusement was on her face before she turned it off and remarked, "...he is a bad boy, Baron. How shall I punish him?"
Von Muller shifted in his seat, eyes flashing happily. "Make him less pretty."
Ada's eyes flashed as she turned back to Leon. Her voice was laced with heavy humor as she cooed, "...less pretty...such a waste."
She slapped him again, open handed, and it stung. Leon laughed, tone rich with sarcasm, "...that it? You can hit harder than that, honey. Come on, play rough and show me whatcha got."
Ada grabbed a handful of his hair, jerked his head back, and bit into his neck like a fucking vampire. It hurt. There was no pleasure in it. It made him grunt and curse loudly. Von Muller cooed and preened, Ada left a hickey on him like a teenager under the bleachers, and she hissed in his ear, "...the lining of my bra is removable. Use your teeth..."
Without a word, he buried his face in her cleavage. Admittedly, it was a nice mix of business and pleasure. He licked unnecessarily, made her laugh and smack the back of his head, and his teeth gripped the blow-dart she'd bound to her corset.
He tugged it free, she tilted her head to the side, and he spit it across the room. It was teamwork in a way that was quite well done. Von Muller made a garbled gasp, and he fell to the floor with his dick in his hand.
Ada, still on his lap, mused to Leon, "...excellent aim...and yet I would imagine you still manage to miss the toilet."
"...no comment."
She rose, pressed a delicate kiss to the hickey she'd left and made him smile, and left him bound to the chair.
Surprised, he watched her loop her dress back on and turn toward the man asleep on the floor. "Really?"
Ada said nothing, shifting to take a small disk from the inner breast pocket of the fat man's suit. She hurried to the laptop on his desk and put the disk in. In the chair, Leon sighed, "...come on. Be fair here. Let me loose."
"Shut up." Ada tapped keys, scanning data. She shook her head, "...damnit. Damnit. I have to get it back."
"What? Get what?"
Ada shook her head again, "I won't share. I can't. I'm..." She heard the voices outside the door. "...damnit. They'll be here in a moment..."
She glanced at the man on the ground, "This doesn't end well."
She ran for the balcony, throwing open the doors. He watched her pull something else out of that corset and realized it was a tightly wound repel line. Amused, he wondered, "You ever just walk out the front door?"
"...only when I'm with you." She hooked one end of the bra underwire on the gargoyle beside her and the door was suddenly being pounded on. German voices called through to check on the Baron.
She hesitated before she leaped over the balcony to plummet safely down. If she left him, he'd be killed or taken into their custody. She looked back at him. He shook his head and urged, "...don't be stupid here, Ada. Let me go."
The door wiggled on the hinges.
The repel line wouldn't hold them both.
With a touch of sympathy, she told him, "...blame me. They won't hurt you since you're bound to the chair and look beat up. Blame me...I'll make it up to you...I promise."
"ADA!"
She went over, the door burst open, and men rushed in.
He found himself dozing off on the car ride back to the plane that would take him home.
Bitch - she'd taken the intel, bit him, hit him, bound him, and left him. He was going to repay the favor if he saw her again. She was such a selfish woman. They might have killed him.
They hadn't and Von Muller had been pathetically grateful for his discretion regarding their playtime, so he'd happily divulged the address for his ex-wife but it could have easily gone the other way. What had been on that damn disk? What was she hiding?
He knew she had some agenda that was probably going to fuck his world up. He knew that. He knew she was shadowing him, probably right now, to both protect and usurp his power plays before he made them. He hated her. He was going to enjoy besting her by beating her to Anita Muller.
The driver of the limo he was in edged to the side of the road. Curious, Leon called, "What's the problem?"
The driver alighted from the car and Leon listened to the crunch of gravel as he rounded toward the back. Gun in hand, Leon turned to sight down his arm as the door was opened. He fired, the gun was knocked free toward the ceiling of the vehicle and the shot went wild, and he struggled with his attacker in the dark. After a handful of moments with him trying to kill them, they finally used the confines of the limo to pin him to the seat and straddle him.
The second he stopped fighting, he smelled her.
Annoyed, he snapped, "Bitch! I should k-"
Her mouth settled, tongue sweeping. The limo driver cap was swept off her head by his hands. He tunneled his fingers and tugged her down, feasting on her mouth.
With a gasp, they parted, and she told him, "...I had to. They would have killed us both. I knew you'd be safe. I knew they wouldn't kill you. It was the only way I could protect you."
His hands jerked on her hair. Ada gasped, his fingers on his belly and headed toward his zipper, "...does it help to hurt me? Does it change anything?"
He jerked again. She moaned. His teeth flashed in a sneer, "...stop fucking with me, Ada. Goddamnit...what do you want here!?"
His zipper was loud. She licked his mouth, "...to fuck with you. Shut up, Leon...just-"
His hands gripped the dress she wore. He jerked it up, ripping the fabric with a cry of cloth. He fisted the front of her panties and jerked. The all but fell apart in his hand. She pulled him from his pants and he grunted, "...I hate you."
"...a short fall from love to hate..." Her mouth sucked at his and she purred, "...I like the hate better."
Her body lifted and took. She sunk down and he fisted her hair to arch her back and grip her hip. He fucked her so hard it echoed in the car. She mewed, surrendering even as she stole something from him. This is what it meant to be hers, he thought wildly, seeing himself fuck her while she keened like he'd floated above them to the roof of the vehicle to watch.
He was a guy who fucked a woman who'd just left him for dead.
Ridiculous.
Stupid.
He'd always been stupid for her.
What did he think? That she would choose his safety over her own? Did he think she'd risk herself for him? She'd never make that mistake. She'd never let him close enough for that to happen. She preferred love over hate. She was never going to be his.
She was a butterfly - all she did was fly away.
It was the first time since he'd met her that he knew what that meant. Butterflies weren't meant to be held. They weren't meant to be something you tried to pet or keep. He was chasing her like a boy with a net, hoping against hope, to posses her. She wasn't something you hung on a peg on a wall to look at forever.
She was better off beautiful and free.
His hands stopped grabbing and groping. His fingers stopped bruising her beautiful flesh. He softened, slinging her body forward to hold her. She went, collapsing around him. They mated, merging in the quiet car now in a way that made her heart race.
What was this?
What had changed?
His hands cupped her face, he drew her down, and the kiss was smooth and supple. Ada felt herself melt a little, clinging in that way she hated, and Leon stopped moving to hold her. She froze, amorous body panting but still with him inside of her.
Ada felt her heart shiver as he simply held her there against him. She put her mouth delicately against the hickey she'd left and kissed. His cupping hands turned her face to kiss her.
Smooth.
Somehow smooth and soft in the throws of a filthy fuck in the back of a car. It should have been tawdry, with his dick poked out of his pants her and her panties ripped. It should have been alot of things.
What it was was dangerous.
Into the quiet, he murmured, "...you feel the need to fuck me for an apology, Ada?"
Ada said nothing, hating the heaviness in her chest. She didn't kiss him back, but she didn't pull away when he kissed her again either. Her panting was loud somehow.
He spoke again, tender in a way that made her panic inside, "...why are you here, Ada? Why not just take what you wanted and never look back?"
She back from him. Her hands caught his wrists. She pinned them above his head on the seat and smacked them into the leather. "...stop it."
She hated the softness on him as he looked at her. Ada shook her head, "...you idiot. Why couldn't you just stop?"
Leon flicked his eyes around her face, "...stop what?"
Ada looked at him in such a way that he felt a lance of something in his chest he didn't like as she confessed, "...stop mattering. You weren't supposed to matter. It was a game, Leon...it ways always a game...you made it something else..."
Her hips rolled. His eyes hooded. She rolled them again and watched the pleasure shoot across his face and told him, "I've been keeping you here to give my men time to work."
He jerked like she'd slapped him. Her body worked his, up and down, watching each other in the dark while the need built. It cut both ways, punishing her for the pain she'd cause him. It was the only way. This was getting out of control. She cared about him. She'd nearly lost her end game keeping him alive and protecting him. She needed him out of her so she could finish what she'd started. Someday, he might understand the whys of what she did.
For now, she just needed him on his guard and away from her, so she could finish it. So, she took his body, and fucked them both. He could have thrown her off, but he just let her take him.
Her voice was breathless as she confessed, his cock conquering her even as her body did the same. It was, and would be, always a double edged sword for them both. "...I put a bug on your phone the last time I saw you. I've been tracking all your calls and listening to every word. The second you contacted Hunnigan back there, I sent a team after Anita Muller. I'm not going to hand her over. I'm not going to give her to you to question...I'm having her executed on the spot."
The flash of anger hit the pleasure on his face. She rode faster, her skin flushing, his eyes dilating as he fought between rage and release. She nodded, gasping a little, voice high, "...yeah...I know you need him alive but I can't let the kid live either. When I find him, he's dead too. I'm done playing with you here. I can't let Wesker's kid live. If you get in my way..." She lost her voice as her body hit the edge of a climax. She keened, pinning his hands and watching his face as she came all over his lap.
Her mouth lowered. It rubbed at his. He groaned, and the anger on his face was scathing, it was almost as hot as his body inside of her. She finished, heart hammering, "...I can't let you stop me...stop fighting against me, Leon...and just...surrender...don't make me kill you..."
She surged up and came down. He made a sound like a moan and a curse. His hands came up and grabbed her face. He growled, "...could you?"
Ada gasped, body rolling, the ugly truth of it making the sex, somehow, hotter. "...yes...I won't let anything stop me. I can't...it's too late for that."
His angry bark of laughter made her jerk and gasp, "...liar...always the bitch, Ada."
And then he showed her how it felt when love turned to hate and hit the end of a possessive greed that was deep and wide and merciless. It drowned them both, making their eager cries echo each other. She made him take her, made it clear she'd already owned him, and let him try to kill her right there with that need.
He rolled her to her back in the seat and finished, punishing them both with the ferocity of his fucking. When he came in her, she whimpered, shaking beneath him.
The hate on him hurt her somehow, even as she reveled in the truth of it. There - no love, no lies, just truth. And maybe the first real time he'd ever seen her. She wanted, in that moment, to tell him her name. She wanted to say it, out loud, and let him hear it.
But she was Ada Wong.
She was the bitch in red.
And he would never see her any other way.
Ada claimed his mouth and he jerked out of her, shoving her across the seat as cursed. She hit the wall of the limo and gasped, "...I know it hurts. I know it does. I want you...I've always wanted you...but you're just a pawn in a bigger game. Work with me, or I will take you down beside the rest of them."
He jerked up his zipper and kicked the seat across from him. His rage boiled, sharp and fast, thick and real. "...you fucking bitch...what is this?! You keep me alive, you fuck me, you kiss me and curse me and leave me for dead...what is this!?"
Ada slid toward the door of the limo, "...I thought you knew what this was...it's how I control you. Just enough to keep you running back for more. Kill me and end it. Go ahead. Put a bullet through my head and finish me off."
He panted, staring at the ceiling, jaw clenched and pain tangible. Ada nodded, climbing from the car, "I know, baby, it hurts to lose. Tell me again how you love me. Say it- look at me and say it. You were always a fool, Leon. Love...it's not something you can feel for someone that doesn't exist. Ask yourself if you ever really believed it when you said it."
When the moonlight struck her, he demanded, "...tell me you never felt anything. Go ahead, pretend it was just a game for you. Say it and mean it. I saw your face. I saw it...when I was inside you. Maybe you lie to the world, Ada, but you can't lie to me. Not about that. Not anymore. I'll ask you one more time...what was this?"
She studied him, heart thudding. Her smile was sad when she answered, "...it was goodbye."
She paused, shaking a little, and finally added, "I think we both lost. You lost the idea of me...and I?...I lost the dream of you."
Voice thick, he wondered, "What dream was that?"
"...the one where the I love you is followed by the right name...and you say it to the right girl." Ada shook her head, "...stay out of my way from now on, Leon. I mean it. I've had a hard enough time keeping you alive. Stop touching on things you can't begin to understand. Stay away from Wesker's bloodline. Stay away from mine. You want to make a difference? Start looking at the people selling nightmares. Ask yourself why the ESR is suddenly making a name for itself. Look at the President and how she suddenly rose to power. Fight the fight you can win...and stop fighting the ones you can't."
She stared at the barrel of his gun on her as she shook her head, "...you won't do it. Maybe someday...but not now. Now? You still think you love the bitch in red you're aiming at...and you're not a man who can kill the woman he loves...for what it's worth...I'm sorry."
She closed the limo door.
He sat in the dark shaking. She'd screwed him - literally, figuratively, personally. She'd already taken out Anita Muller and was hunting the missing kid. She'd find him first, he had no doubt. She had fingers in pies in every part of the world.
It was time he stopped being one of them.
She was about to find out just large his net was. He was done trying to hold her. It was time he pulled the wings off that butterfly.
Post Note: The game is winding down here. How does it end? Once blind, he can see her now. In Damnation, I think it's the first time he really starts to see her for what she is - a woman with her own agenda, and a willingness to see it through, no matter what it takes. Where he falls in that whole equation is a mystery...which is exactly why I wanted to write it, and find out for myself.
Thank you, as always, for coming along on this journey with me. It isn't sweet at all, it's like they are, dysfunctional, but under it all...kinda beautifully done. And maybe...the most honest love story out there.