by Billi Jean
It was bad enough he’d just been reduced to being a deficit in the fight, but to have her give attitude? This was going to suck.
“Rules?” she mimicked the guy’s Scottish accent perfectly. “You think I care what he sees or doesn’t see? Don’t count on it,” she said, confusing the hell out of him.
The men seemed to understand because they glanced at each other with worried frowns.
“Well, if that’s the way it will be, just remember, I will not,” she enunciated her t sharply, something the man hadn’t done well, “be responsible for your pain either, pretty boy.”
That was all it took for things to go south. She didn’t prep for a fight, she was a fight. He’d had some of the best training in the world and had been undercover in the pen for months and survived on top of that. He knew how to fight. This woman kicked ass.
The alley filled with quick, hard strikes, and yeah, some crazy moves from her tiny shitkickers. She hit the boys hard, not giving them any mercy, especially in places that made him cringe.
He tackled the guy next to him up against the alley wall, but man the bastard was strong. They fell back into the dumpster, ricocheted off that and ended up right back in the middle of the alley. He stumbled but managed to dodge a straight hit to the face by taking it in the shoulder. The guy hit like a tanker truck.
Doesn’t matter.
Jack dove in low and tumbled him backward by sheer force—and by knocking the bigger man’s legs out from under him. A second later, the sound of metal hitting metal registered past the struggling he had going on trying to keep the man down.
He broke away long enough to gain his feet, but so did his opponent.
“This is none of your concern,” the guy growled, wiping blood from a split upper lip where Jack had landed a few good punches.
Jack didn’t bother to respond. This time he was rammed up against the dumpster. His back protested at the metal corner digging into it, but he swung out, taking the bruises to the spine to get a hit on the other man. He managed to deliver two sharp punches to the face, then drive him back a step. In the second he got, he checked in on the little woman.
The tap, tap, tap of metal proved to be swords. If the Highlander stopped by, he was clocking out.
Little Miss Sunshine was wielding a slim blade with some scary efficiency. She ducked, twisted, muttered something in a language that didn’t quite register, and hit the biggest bastard right in the balls with her foot. When he doubled over, she brought her knee up in his face, possibly breaking his nose. Immediately, she nailed him in the head with her sword hilt. He went down. Hard too, landing on his side so his head took another crack on the pavement.
The one wrestling with him broke away and jumped the distance in a leap a cat would’ve envied.
Jack caught his breath, and ran back into position next to her.
“You’re just trying to piss me off, aren’t you? Get back!” she muttered, twisting away from him to put distance between them. She also drew the pack like hounds on a fox.
Not that she seemed to notice. She attacked hard with her sword. Two backpedaled, trying not to get their asses handed to them, and ended up crashing into a row of old-fashioned metal trashcans. She hit them both again when they were down, knocking them both out, then spun back around, barely breathing hard.
“I can do this all night. Are you sure you want to play?” she asked the remaining men.
It happened so fast, the guys had just stood there, until she said that. One growled a curse and launched himself at her.
Jack tackled him from behind before he could reach her. Unfortunately the grip he had on the man’s waist didn’t stop him from turning around. He lifted a lip in a snarl to reveal long, pretty wicked canines.
With a shock, Jack realized his eyes also…glowed. Or seemed to under the streetlight blinking on and off above them.
There wasn’t time to figure it out. His guy broke free, pretty damn easily too, and struck out with a fist. Jack ducked and still got clipped in the temple. That shit just didn’t happen to him.
Jack swung in return and connected with a jaw. It was like hitting a concrete wall.
Instead of doing that again, he charged in low, circling his arms around the bastard’s stomach to try and subdue him. They went down. Jack landed on his side, gained some space and rammed a knee in his stomach. Quickly as he could, Jack took the slim advantage he’d won and scissor kicked his legs around the guy’s neck, squeezing tightly to cut off the air supply.
From the sounds coming from the alley, his girl was fighting with some crazy sword strokes. It drove his heart rate nuts even thinking that. He felt an urgency he’d never experienced in a fight. It beat at him, harder than the man pounding him with punches along his ribs and stomach. Almost in a panic, he nailed him in the head until, he went limp. Not dead, but clearly out.
He dropped the hold, and scrambled to his feet and over to her as quickly as he could to take one man off her. A swipe of his sword came close to shaving Jack pretty close, but he shoved harder, and used the momentum he’d gained to bash his hand against the brick wall. The sword fell from his grip. As soon as it did Jack delivered a punch that landed the bastard on his ass and Jack hoped out.
The little redheaded ninja was still kicking butt, but had enough breath to shout at him.
“Damn it, damn it, you need to back off!”
So much for damsel in distress. She was really getting worked up. Her voice was sharp, sexy as hell when she was angry, but she was hissing at the man in front of her and still able to shoot a glare in his direction.
“Are you trying to get killed?” she demanded.
A little appreciation for the help wasn’t too much to ask. He didn’t have time to ponder the attitude. The sword carrying freak he’d just knocked out was suddenly back on his feet.
“What the fuck,” Jack muttered, grounding himself for more punishment.
The guy dove in low, the crazy sword in his right hand. Who in the hell invited the Highlander in the first place, he wanted to ask, but he was way too busy to complain.
He deflected the first strike, but almost lost his stomach to the next. He got the hell out of the way and put distance between them along with one of the trash cans. The metal hit the man dead center in the chest but he barely slowed. He simply shook his head as if that was not going to work and dove back in at Jack with a single-mindedness that freaked him out more than he wanted to analyze. The blade whizzed by Jack’s face, missing him by mere inches. Jack kicked out and hit the hand holding the sword, knocking it up against the bricks. This time the bastard held onto it and reached out quick as a snake to grip Jack by the throat with one hand. Jack fought the sword arm, too busy with that to do more than try to kick his legs out from under him in the hopes of breaking the hold.
His little redhead suddenly appeared, hitting his guy so hard that he landed in a heap against the dirty building, clutching a bleeding head wound from her sword hilt and blinking in a daze, but clearly not down for the count.
“Dammit, what are you doing?” she demanded.
“Helping a damsel in distress?” He sucker punched another one of the pack on her right in the face so hard it hurt his hand. He didn’t go down, just growled a curse. Actually, he really growled, like lifting his lip and all that shit too.
“Do I need a rabies shot?” he asked, circling away from her so the lunatic would follow him instead of going at her again.
She laughed after a ten second delay.
Hot damn. She was gorgeous. His face split in a grin he couldn’t seem to hold back. He turned in time to see the bastard who wouldn’t go down was back up. No problem. After that sexy laugh, he was more than ready to prove he had the balls to protect her.
“You like that, huh?” He still circled to the left, away from her so the wolf-man followed him, but glanced over to see the flash of a smile light up her face.
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About the Author
Billi Jean was born in California but didn't stay put for long. She's lived in New York, Indiana, Missouri, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Massachusetts and Vermont. She's lived in and worked from ranches to beach-side coffee shops to the woods in western Massachusetts. Now living and working in China, she continues to write for Totally Bound Publishing.
Billi has been writing since high school when she couldn’t wait for Robert Jordon to write his Wheel of Time series faster. She writes from home in a little two hundred year old farm house in Western Massachusetts where she shares her space with her active children, an old dog and two lazy cats.
Email: [email protected]
Billi Jean loves to hear from readers. You can find her contact information, website and author biography at http://www.totallybound.com.
Also by Billi Jean
Love’s Command: Running Scared
Love’s Command: Safe in His Arms
Love’s Command: Catch Me If You Can
Love’s Command: Trusting Love
Love’s Command: Come a Little Closer, If You Dare
Sisterhood of Jade: Silver’s Chance
Sisterhood of Jade: A Spartan’s Kiss
Sisterhood of Jade: Midnight Star
Sisterhood of Jade: Golden’s Rule
Sisterhood of Jade: Sorcha’s Wolf
Sisterhood of Jade: Eternal Embrace
Sisterhood of Jade: Claiming a Demon’s Heart
Sisterhood of Jade: Gambling on Trouble
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