Dead Man Walking (The Fallen Men #6) - Giana Darling Page 0,76

to get at my sex.

Resolve solidified every molecule in my body with vicious intent. Taking advantage of his momentary distraction, I leaned forward and clamped the bottom of his ear between my teeth. He tried to jerk away, which dislodged me from the sink and sent me sliding to my feet.

The extra force of my fall tore the bottom off his ear, lobe and cartilage, like a ripping stack of paper. The wet sound of it tearing was sickening, the splash of blood a rush of moisture like sea spray against my face. The taste of iron flooded my mouth, but I didn’t spit it out immediately, too crazed with panic and self-preservation to care about the sluice of blood down my cheeks and chest.

My attacker staggered back, his hood dislodged so that a strange face glared back at me. I blinked, a little shocked because I’d assumed I would know my attacker; statistics stated that most people were assaulted by those they knew.

But this was some random white man with a shaved head and a tidy beard. He didn’t look particularly scary, minus the blood coating the hand held to his semi-severed ear.

He just looked like a man I wouldn’t gaze twice at on the street.

Then his face transformed, his teeth curling back on a growl as he lunged for me again, one bloody hand grasping and the other holding a knife I hadn’t seen before.

His gait was awkward with the knife in his thigh, but I had no weapon, and I was cornered.

Fear crystalized my sight, turning everything into high definition, vivid motion. I wondered, calmly, if this was how I was going to die. If this was it, it, it, and I was going to be dead, dead, dead.

Before he could reach me, though, he drew up short, eyes blown wide open, torso frozen and arched like a bow with tension. There was a stomach-turning, wet squelch and then the point of a massive knife protruded from his inner right shoulder. I watched it twist, watched my attacker gurgle and actually squeak with pain before he crumpled to the ground unconscious.

Behind him in the shadows of the open door stood Priest.

Bea

A sob boiled up my throat, but I caught it in my hand as I stood, staring wide-eyed at my unlikely hero.

Priest was cloaked in darkness, only the end of his Roman nose and the steep edge of his taut jaw and high cheekbone caught in the artificial red light of the exit sign just behind him in the hall. He looked like an avenging demon as likely to slay you as to help you, dangerous and on edge despite his calm demeanor.

But something was in the wait between us, a vibrating energy like a plucked guitar string that sang through my blood.

He took one step forward, pried the knife from my attacker’s back, checked his pulse, then stepped over his prone body to get to me. His body moved so sinuously—a heavily muscled, grace-greased machine.

My mouth went dry, and my hand shook where it was still pressed to my blood-coated mouth.

He stopped only inches away, the tips of my leather heels against his leather boots. He wasn’t breathing hard, but I could see the way his firm mouth parted over his breath, the way his chest moved beneath the familiar, stiff material of his Fallen cut. I soaked up every inch of him, counting the countless freckles on his cheeks above the beard, drawing the shape of his straight eyebrows and the exact angle of his square chin. Just the sight of him soothed the flapping, anxious bird of angry fear attempting to take flight in my belly on broken wings.

I sucked in a harsh gulp of iron-poisoned air as he slowly lifted his hand and took mine from my mouth. Every inch of me held precariously still as if I was being sniffed by a wild animal when he drew a thick, calloused finger along my already swelling cheekbone, then down to the corner of my mouth where he gently smeared the crying blood onto my lips like a morbid gloss. His gaze intensified as his thumb parted my lips, and the piece of my attacker’s ear, still tucked into my cheek, became visible. Reminded of it, I spat the hunk of flesh out onto the floor to my side. Something in his posture changed, his body tightening and angling toward me.

Slowly, he turned his head to look at the prone body of the man