Tales of Darkness & Sin - Pepper Winters Page 0,89

back and hissed. He was bleeding far more than me and his moves were getting slower, less skilled, while I was barely out of breath.

Time to end this.

The next time he came at me, I lunged forward and threw my right fist up… the one with my brass knuckles. I slammed my fist into his throat and I felt it… his mangled bones. His throat caved in, his eyes widened, his breathing stuttered and he crumbled.

I saw a broken bone sticking out from the side of his neck.

His blood pooled onto the surface of the arena.

The gun fired again, indicating the end of the fight. The crowd roared at my win. My name echoed as the chants grew louder and louder.

The door opened and I stepped out of the cage. I took in the crowd as they spilled closer toward me. I growled in warning. No fucker better touch me. I was going to rip their arms out of their goddamn sockets. The adrenaline was practically bursting through my veins. I was fucking high – on this place, this crowd, the need to kill… to fuck this out of my system.

I scanned the spectators, looking for tonight’s fuck.

My heart pounded for a second. My gaze snagged on her. Like she had been calling to me, as if my body recognized her and told me, “Look, there she is.”

But she hadn’t been calling for me, nor did she belong here.

Long brown hair, round eyes, plump lips and so fucking small, the crowd was practically eating her.

The look on her face… she was appalled at what she had just witnessed. A crowd roaring for blood and death. Me fighting. Me killing that man without a second thought.

She was standing against the farthest wall, as if she was trying to hide in the shadow, to blend in…

She trembled and her face paled as she brought a shaky hand up, covering her mouth. Her eyes flared with shock and… indecision.

This girl looked completely out of place. The innocence in her gaze and in the way she curled against the wall told me she didn’t belong here, in this underground death pit.

This little pixie had just unknowingly walked into a monster’s lair. It must have been her curiosity.

Too bad, her little curious mind brought her to me.

I took a step forward and the crowd parted for me. She noticed me, walking toward her. Her whole body was shaking and my lips curled, grinning at how frightened she looked.

I cocked an eyebrow, amused.

When I was merely a few feet away, her lips parted with a silent gasp.

Her eyes widened with fear and shock, then the girl turned on her heels and sprinted away.

She ran.

She. Fucking. Ran.

I threw my head back and laughed. Tsk.

Instincts kicked in. The animalistic part of me growled at the challenge.

It had been a long time since I hunted someone.

CHAPTER THREE

Talia

What had I been thinking?

My God.

This man…no, this monster was something straight out of hell.

I didn’t stop running until I was upstairs in one of the bathroom stalls. My heart pounded in my chest, my pulse thudding fearfully in my throat. With a choked gasp, I opened the toilet lid and threw up my dinner. My stomach kept constricting. The smell of blood clung to my clothes like the memory of the man’s cruel end. How he’d bled to death at Killer’s feet who hadn’t shown a flicker of pity.

I wanted to return to New York, forget about my daring plan and just go on with my life.

But hadn’t I chosen Killer exactly because of his ruthlessness, his brutality? He was good at what he did, and I needed a man like him.

Slowly, I made my way back underground, glad to find Killer gone and a thinned-out crowd. If I wanted to stick to my plan, I needed to keep this job. It was my only way to get close to Killer.

Only, I was terrified of having him near me after what I’d witnessed today.

Over the next two days, I worked the official bar, deemed too squeamish for the underground service—which suited me just fine.

I didn’t see Killer on my shifts, but I couldn’t shake off the feeling that someone was following me. I had been asking Britt and a few of the other waitresses about him, trying to figure out how best to approach him with my request, but they had been evasive, only increasing my anxiety about the matter. When I walked home at night, I could feel a presence in