Lover Revealed

Then he heard her broken, desperate voice on the other side. 'I'll kill you… God help me, but I'll kill you… I want you too much.'

He pounded on the door. 'Let me out!'

'I'm sorry—' Her voice cracked, then grew strong. And he feared her resolve more than anything else. 'I'm so sorry. I'll come to you afterward. After it is done.'

'Marissa, don't do this—'

'I love you.'

He beat the wood with his fists. 'I don't care if I die! Don't go to him!'

When the lock finally gave way, he burst into the hall and ran flat out for the staircase.

But by the time he threw open the mansion's front door she was gone.

Across town, in the underground parking garage where the brokered fights took place, Van hopped into the chicken-wire cage and bounced on the balls of his feet. The drumbeat of him warming up echoed through the concrete levels, cutting off the silence.

Tonight there was no crowd, just three people. But he was juiced like it was standing room only.

Van was the one who'd suggested the locale to Mr. X, and he'd shown them how to break into the place. As he knew the schedule of fights, he'd been sure there wouldn't be anyone around this evening and a big part of him wanted to have his glory, his resurrection here in this ring, not in some anonymous basement somewhere.

He tried out some kicks, so very satisfied with his strength, then eyed his opponent. The other lesser was just as lit for the hand-to-hand as he was.

From the other side of the cage, Xavier barked, 'You don't stop until it's over. And Mr. D, on the ground unmoving is not 'over, we clear?'

Van nodded, already used to being called by his last initial.

'Good.' Xavier's palms clapped together and the fight was on.

Van and the other lesser circled each other, but Van had no intention of letting the slow-dance crap go on for long. He moved in first, throwing punches, forcing his opponent back against the cage. The guy took the bare-knuckled pounders like they were nothing more than spring rain on his cheeks and then tossed out a mean-ass right hook. The damn thing caught Van at an angle, splitting his lip open like an envelope.

It hurt, but the pain was good, a strengthener, something that focused him further. Van spun around and sent his foot out flying, a body bomb on the end of a steel chain. Sure as shit it took the lesser down, sprawling the guy flat. Van jumped on his opponent and cranked him into a submission hold, wrenching one arm back and around so the joints strained at the shoulder and elbow. Just a little tighter and he was going to pop this sucker right off—

The lesser pulled a smoothie, somehow nailing Van in the balls with his knee. Quick switch of positions and Van was on the bottom. Then another roll and they were up on their feet.

The fight went on and on, no time-outs, no breathers, the two of them battering the holy hell out of each other. It was flipping miraculous. Van felt like he could go for hours, no matter how beat up his body got. It was like he had an engine in him, a driving force, one that was not as dulled by exhaustion or pain as his old self had been.

When the break in the action finally came, the tipping factor was Van's special… whatever it was. Though the two of them were identically matched for strength, Van was the master at this, and he saw the opening for the win. He popped the other slayer in the gut, nailing a liver shot that would have left a human opponent shitting in his shorts. Then he picked his opponent up and slammed him down onto the ring floor. As he mounted the body and looked down, Van's blood welled from the cuts around his eyes and dropped onto the guy's face like tears… black tears.

The color momentarily freaked Van out, and the other lesser took advantage of the lapse in focus by spinning him over onto his back.

Yeah, not happening, not this time. Van balled his fist and rammed it into the guy's temple at exactly the right force and the right place, knocking the lesser stupid. With a quick surge, Van kicked his opponent over, straddled the slayer's chest and repeated the punch over and over again, battering the skull until the bone helmet went soft. And he just kept going, sticking to the task until the very structure of the man's face let go, the head becoming a loose bag, his opponent dead and then some.

'Finish him!' Xavier called from the sidelines.

Van looked up, panting hard. 'I just did.'

'No…finish him!'

'How?'

'You should know what to do!' Xavier's pale eyes shined with an eerie desperation. 'You must!'

Van wasn't clear on exactly how much deader he could make the guy, but he grabbed the lesser by the ears and twisted until the neck snapped. Then he eased off the body. Though he had no heart that beat anymore, his lungs burned and his body was deliciously logy from exertion… except the logy didn't last.

He started to laugh. Already the strength was returning to him, just pouring in from somewhere else as if he'd eaten and slept and recovered for days.

Xavier's boots landed hard in the ring and the Fore-lesser strode over, furious. 'I told you to finish him, goddamn it.'

'Uh-huh. Right.' Christ. Xavier just had to suck the triumph out of the moment. 'You think he's walking away from this?'

Xavier shook with rage as he took out a knife. 'I told you to finish him.'

Van tensed up and leaped to his feet. But Xavier just bent over that messy, punching bag of a lesser and stabbed the thing in the chest. There was a flash of light and then… gone. Nothing but black smudges on the ring's tarmac.

Van backed up until he hit the fencing. 'What the hell…'

From across the way, Xavier pointed the knife right at Van's chest. 'I have expectations for you.'

'Like… what?'

'You should be able to do that' — he jabbed toward the disintegration mark with the blade—'on your own.'

'So give me a knife next time.'

Xavier shook his head, a bizarre kind of panic flaring in his face. 'Fuck!' He paced around, then muttered, 'It's just going to take time. Let's go.'

'What about the blood?' Man, that oily black stuff suddenly made him dizzy.

'Like I give a shit?' Xavier picked up the dead lesser's duffel bag and left.

As Van followed him out of the parking garage, he found it really fucking annoying that Mr. X was playing it like this. The fight had been a good one and Van had won. He wanted to enjoy the feeling.

In strained silence, the two of them headed for the minivan, which was parked blocks away, and as they went along, Van scrubbed his face with a towel and tried not to curse. When they got to the car, Xavier slid behind the wheel.

'Where are we going?' Van asked as he got in.

Xavier didn't answer, just started to drive, so Van stared out the windshield, wondering how he could get away from the guy. Not easily, he suspected.

As they passed by a new skyscraper that was going up, he eyed the men pulling the nightshift. Under electric lights, the union crews were all over the building like ants, and he envied them even though he'd hated doing what they did.

Man, if he were still one of them, he wouldn't be dealing with Mr. X's crap attitude.

On a whim, Van lifted his right hand and looked at his missing pinkie, remembering how he'd done it. So fucking stupid. He'd been at a construction site, cutting boards on a table saw, and decided to take the guards off the machine to make the process go faster. One lapse of focus later and his finger had ended up flying through the air with the greatest of ease. The blood loss had seemed tremendous, the stuff leaking all over him, covering the saw's flat back, soaking into the ground. Red, not black.