The pain…oh, the pain. No longer ignorable.
Stars winked in her line of vision. She heard laughter behind her, and knew Horns was there, ready to claw her again. She darted forward, out of the way, and tripped.
Horsey caught her by the forearms, preventing her from falling. He let her go—only to punch her in the face. More pain, more stars, but when he lifted his hand for a second blow, she was ready. She jerked the chair up and nailed him under the jaw, then spun so that he broke his knuckles on the seat of the chair rather than her cheekbone. His howl rent the air.
Footsteps behind her. She kicked backward, connecting with Horns. Before her leg landed, she spun and kicked out with the other, scissoring her ankles to double tap his gut. When he collapsed, wheezing for air, she flipped the chair upside down and finished him off, slamming the metal rim into his trachea.
Black blood pooled and bubbled around him, frothing and sizzling as it seared the tiled floor. Steam rose, curling through the air.
One minute to go.
Maximum damage, she thought.
Horsey called her a very rude name, his entire body shaking with his wrathful intent. He closed the distance with stomping steps and lashed out with those clublike arms. No claws, just fists. Playtime was over, she supposed. She blocked, ducked and bowed her back to ensure those meaty hammers only ever swiped the chair. All the while she punched at him with the dented metal, landing multiple blows.
“Why did you come for me?” she demanded. “Why?”
A flash of bloodstained fangs. “Just for the fun. Why else?”
Always she asked, and always she received the same reply, no matter that each of her opponents was different. The creatures came once, only once, and after raining havoc, creating chaos, they disappeared forevermore. If they survived.
She’d cried after her first kill—and her second and her third—despite the fact that the creatures had only ever wanted to hurt her. There was just something so terrible about taking a life, no matter the reason for doing so. Hearing the last breath rattle…watching the light dim in someone’s eyes…and knowing you were responsible… She always thought of her parents. Somewhere along the way, her heart had hardened into a block of stone and she’d stopped crying.
The backup guards finally arrived, three hard bodies slamming into her from behind and knocking her to the ground. When she crashed, she crashed hard, cracking her already injured cheek on the tile. She experienced a sharp lance of pain as the taste of old pennies filled her mouth, coated her tongue. More of those too-bright stars winked through her vision, corrosive things that grew…grew…blinding her.
That blindness panicked her, reminding her of that terrible, fateful morning so long ago. “Let me go! I mean it!”
Inflexible knees dug into her bleeding shoulders, her back and her legs, and rough fingers pressed all the way to bone. “Be still.”
“I said let me go!”
Horsey must have fled because the scent of rot was suddenly replaced by the scent of bacon and aftershave, warm breath caressing her cheek. She didn’t allow herself to cringe, didn’t allow herself to reveal her abhorrence for the doctor now looming over her.
“That’s enough out of you, Annabelle,” Fitzpervert said in a chiding tone.
“Never enough,” she replied, forcing herself to calm on her own. Deep breath in, deep breath out. The more emotion she displayed, the more sedative he would have to use.
“Tsk, tsk. You should have played nice. I could have helped you. Sleep now,” he crooned.
“Don’t you dare—” Her jaw went slack a second after the expected pinch in her neck. In a blink of time, there was white lightning in her vein, spreading just as swiftly as the stars.
Though she despised this feeling of helplessness and knew Fitzpervert would be paying her a visit later, though she fought with every bit of her remaining strength, Annabelle slipped into the waiting darkness.
ISBN: 9781460306420
BEAUTY AWAKENED
Copyright © 2013 by Gena Showalter
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
www.Harlequin.com
Beauty Awakened (Angels of the Dark) Page 37
