Excitement had the tips of my fingers tingling. Killing—we were going to kill someone. I nodded, and with a final kiss, he left me there in the kitchen to make breakfast. As soon as he was gone for the day, I missed him.
The quietness left me aimless and bored. Eventually, I ventured up to the attic and opened his special box, going through the photos of the people he wanted dealt with. A few caught my eye, but I knew it wasn’t my choice, and I was obedient. I would listen to Jules about who he wanted me to take out next, but that didn’t stop me from studying the names and addresses and faces until I was nearly going cross-eyed.
A sound downstairs was the only thing that broke my attention from the driver’s licenses, and I froze, eyes narrowed on the top of the ladder that took me down to the second floor. Placing the licenses back in the box, I stored it away safely before I slowly and carefully climbed down the ladder, then raised it back up to its resting place.
I glanced around the small hallway, and when I saw nothing, I took the stairs down to the first floor. The house was quiet, the creaking sounds of the floorboards loud to my ears, but I was cautious, my heart beating so slow I could barely hear or feel it as I took one barefooted step after another past the living room and toward the kitchen. My senses were on high alert, my skin prickling with goose bumps.
Someone was here, I was sure of it.
“I can hear you breathing,” I whispered with a smirk. My knife that I always kept in my pants pocket was heavy, waiting to be used, and I slipped my hand in to retrieve it. “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
The first attack came from my right, and I ducked, avoiding the swing of a meaty fist toward my face. I kicked out and my foot landed on someone’s knee, making their big body buckle under the force of the hit, and a scream echoed through the house, but I didn’t have time to appreciate the pain I’d inflicted before I had to dodge another punch from my left. This time a brush of knuckles managed to get my cheek, and I stumbled backward from the sharp spike of pain that shot through me.
I crashed against the wall, losing my balance for only a second before someone grabbed the back of my shirt and yanked. I stumbled backward but collected myself when another hit was aimed at my head, and ducking, I grabbed the collar of the muscly man in front of me and kneed him in the gut. The man doubled over, and I landed another knee to the nose. The sound of crunching bones and a yell of pain had adrenaline pumping wildly in my blood as I shoved him and turned to face a new attacker.
Three other guys stood in front of me.
I was ready.
Grinning, I waved them forward. “Come and get me.”
The man on the right, with a crooked nose and grumpy snarl, shot toward me first, and I twisted out of his aim, elbowing him in the middle of the back and making him collapse face-first to the floor. The second, a young guy around my age with short red hair, grabbed an umbrella Jules had sitting beside the hallway table and swung it at me—it was a near hit, the pointy end barely missing my nose as I jumped away.
Crooked Nose Guy on the floor grabbed my foot in the process, and I tripped, falling on my ass, and when the young guy came at me with the umbrella again, I kicked out, getting him in one of his legs and making him grunt and lose balance. I grabbed the end of the umbrella, yanking it out of his hold, and turned it on him, smacking him across the head hard enough that blood dotted the beige walls.
I clucked my tongue; Master wouldn’t be happy with the mess.
The young guy collapsed, but another attacker was already coming at me. The last one of the bunch was tall and wide, like a fucking giant. It took no effort for him to grab me by the collar and lift me up, and no matter how many times I landed a punch or kick on him, he barely flinched. Steroids or some other drugs, it had to be.
He threw me and I went flying, slamming into the edge of the staircase. I grunted as a fierce pain erupted from my lower back, and for a moment I was winded, unable to draw air into my lungs without agony searing through me. So, when the enormous man grabbed me and all but dragged me out of the front door, I didn’t have the strength, or breath, to fight him until I’d been shoved into the back of a white sedan.
For a moment, all I could feel was rich leather beneath my fingers before I was able to pay attention to my surroundings, focusing on a man in the seat beside me. I blinked, my lungs still not filling to capacity, the pain a delightful but agonizing sensation.
The man was a stranger, but by the way he was smirking at me I had a feeling he knew who I was. With salt-and-pepper hair, thick eyebrows, and a handsome face with a few wrinkles, I assumed he was in his forties.
“Are you the guy who runs the fight club?” I asked between painful gasps. My spine spasmed and I winced.
“I am. Derek Uhlig.” He didn’t hold his hand out and I didn’t offer mine. He gave off the vibe of a respectable man with a bespoke suit molded to his strong body, but I had no intention of giving him anything until I knew what sort of person he was. “You and your trainer made quite an impression on mine. Janus was both impressed and frustrated that you managed to get one over on him.”
“MyMasterand I were serious, and we had a point to prove.” I straightened, ignoring the sharp firing of pain receptors in my back. Fuck that, I could handle it. “I want to fight.”
“I’m sure you do.” Derek smoothed a hand over his thigh in thought. “A lot of men want to fight. You’re nothing but a boy.”
“A boy who took on five of your men inside.” I pointed toward the house, where the door was wide open and two of the beaten men stood, looking battered and broken. “Five against one. I stood up well against those odds.”
“You did.” There was admiration in his stare as he regarded me shrewdly.
“I believe we gave your trainer a number to call. Have you ever heard of a phone?” I asked, crossing my arms and resting my back against the seat, careful not to show the amount of pain I was in. It still hurt to breathe, every inhale like fire in my chest.
“I wanted to see how good you were.” His smirk widened. “It is safe to say that I am more than impressed as well.”
I snorted. “Next time you could ask me nicely to demonstrate my skills.”
Derek laughed and it was almost scary.Almost.“I have a feeling you wouldn’t respect me if I did that.”
“You have a point.” I shrugged. “I liked this approach.”
“It wasn’t difficult to track down the phone number and who it belonged to. Jules Lindsay Rogers—imagine my surprise at him being a cop.” He raised his eyebrows at me in question, and I sent him a smirk of my own.
