The smaller man hesitated only a heartbeat then lunged for me.
His hand clamped around my forearm. The grip was rough, urgent, already bruising. He dragged me to him, breath hot and sour.
Kane moved with a violence that stripped the air from my lungs.
He drove his body into the attacker with a tackle so hard it sent both of them flying across the concrete, the hold on me broken. The man’s back hit the floor with a thud. Kane landed above him, pinning him with a forearm across the chest.
The other three groaned on the floor, clutching ribs, wrists, faces. None dared move.
Kane straightened and stood over the last one, his chest steady and breath even. His expression held no fury, no heat. Only cold precision, the icy calm of a man who had learned how to finish a fight before it truly began. Or survived worse.
A smear of someone else’s blood darkened his knuckles. He wiped it on the hem of the nearest man’s hoodie with the same disinterest he’d show if cleaning a spill from a countertop.
“Warned ye,” he said.
He turned toward me.
His gaze tracked my body, taking in the rapid rise and fall of my chest, the tremble at my knees, the flush that had spread all the way to my collarbone. The light above us buzzed. Somewhere, one of the men whimpered.
None of it mattered.
He was the only thing in my focus.
Everything had happened so fast that my fear barely grew, not when I’d become an observer in a real life MMA match. It had been far from a fair fight, though. Four to one, except none of them had stood a chance.
Deep, startling attraction curled inside me, winding up my spine and down low. I’d never seen anyone take another down so easily, let alone a whole gang. He’d barely broken a sweat.
“Are ye okay?” he asked.
I nodded. Words refused to form.
His gaze deepened, slow and deliberate, as if recognising my struggle for what it was and absorbing the reaction straight into his bloodstream.
Behind him, the gang leader tried to push up on an elbow.
Kane placed his boot between the man’s shoulder blades and pinned him flat again, focused on me rather than the restrained body beneath his foot.
A sharp shiver travelled through me.
“We should go upstairs,” I finally managed.
“Aye, we should. Before I do something I’ll regret.”
As if tonight’s violence counted as nothing on his ledger. I had no idea what he meant. My pulse hoped it involved me.
Chapter 15
Lovelyn
We travelled to the seventh floor and Kane’s apartment. Inside, thankfully un-littered with semi-conscious gangsters, fashionably exposed pipes bracketed a tall window. Shades of grey made up the colour scheme, all matte surfaces, and an industrial feel. Very Kane, though I could see little of any personal possessions. No pictures. No ornaments or random clutter.
“You live here?” I turned around in the space.
He strode across the living area to a door, revealing a bedroom. “Get some more sleep. I have work to do.”
Okay, so we were back to non-communicative.
I passed him and entered the room, discovering a wide bed with grey sheets and a mostly empty bathroom to one side. A solitary bottle of bodywash waited in the shower, and packets of hotel toiletries lined the counter.
