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Shit, is he smiling?
My brain screams at me to run, but as his slow stride continues, the heartbeat threatening to shatter my chest climbs into my throat.
I hear him before I see him.
“Ruby, if you can fuck half as well as you can throw a kick, I’m willing to hold your ass down until I break that wild streak you got.”
Lumberjack.
I unfreeze at the sound of his voice and slide my hand into my open gym bag. Tightening my grip, I find my voice and hope it sounds as steady as it does in my head.
“I’m surprised you’re still upright. I thought you’d be sleeping it off by now.”
He takes another step forward. “That’s cute coming from a dirty whore.”
Strike one.
I plaster a smile across my face. “You didn’t think I was so dirty when you were trying grab my ass.”
Another step forward and a sneer. “A starving man will eat out of a trashcan, honey. You think we don’t see that.” He trails a finger down the ridges on the inside of my arm.
Strike two.
“I don’t think you could get it up if you tied a string to it and wrapped it around your head.”
We’re almost nose to nose and his breathing escalates. “I watched you eye fuck that big bouncer. You got daddy issues, bitch?”
Strike three.
Without warning, I slam my knee between his legs and give a sharp upward thrust. While he’s howling, I grab his pinkie and bend it back as far as I can until he’s caught in a distorted backbend. Jerking my hand from my bag, I shove a ten-inch blade against his throat. His eyes widen in shock, fear, and maybe slight disbelief.
The unleashed power fills me with adrenaline. “Now I’m going to do all the talking and you’re going to listen, got it?”
He closes his eyes, nodding furiously as beads of sweat roll down his temple.
“Ah, ah, ah,” I scold. “Eyes on me.”
He opens his eyes and tries to focus, his pupils dilating more with every syllable.
“You’re going to leave and never show your face here again, or you and I are going to have a serious problem. Do we understand each other?”
More nodding. More sweating.
“Say you understand.”
“I…I…” He clears his throat, his voice high and soft. “I understand.”
I slowly pull the knife away from his neck and step back. Within seconds he peels himself away from my car and disappears. Standing alone, my adrenaline high plummets. Familiar throbbing wraps my head in a vice, and I press the back of my hand against my eye, blindly stumbling toward the car. Opening the driver’s side door, I slide behind the wheel and manage to close it behind me.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I try to block the overwhelming fear I can’t escape. For eight years it has been my companion during the day and my demon every night. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
Seven.
Laughter bubbles out of my chest, and I begin to shake. Within seconds, the laughter dissolves into familiar tears as I watch them fall onto my lap. My focus turns to the weapon I’m clutching. Through a haze, the shine of the sharp point catches a gleam of moonlight, and I see the white petals of an orange blossom reflected in the flat end of the knife’s blade.
As if burned, I drop the knife in the passenger’s seat and unlock the door. Flinging it open, I vomit until I’m so weak I can do nothing but slump into the seat.
He’s back.
