I’d become cocky, even though to the rest of the fighters believed I had lost some rounds, I’d never really met a worthy adversary. Insert Tyson. I smelled his ass before I saw him, and a smile of satisfaction overtook my mouth. Finally. I’d waited for the day when I would have a fair fight. Little did I know Tyson used to be a boxer. That was okay, though, because while I had never held an official label, I had fought my entire life. After Dad left mom and me, people and shifters alike thought we were an easy target. A woman and a child typically wouldn’t be all that threatening, I guessed, but most women weren’t my mother. She was hard as nails and made sure I was, too. She fought harder than a lot of men I’d been in a brawl with, which always made me wonder why she put up with Dad’s pathetic ass. It was a mystery I’d never understand.
Tyson and I battled until we were both exhausted, and we still did to this day. It was the type of relationship we had. We were brothers through the club, but based on the amount of shit we gave each other, most outsiders thought he and I were biological brothers. Truthfully, he was the closest thing to one I ever had.
286
Trista
A bright light abruptly flooded the room, sending a throbbing pain directly into my eyes. I’d been in the dark for so long, I’d grown accustomed to it. My eyelids squinted as I raised my arm to block out some of the light and try to make out my buyer, shocked when the first thing I saw was his dick.
“Told you we should have run.”
“Shut up!” I muttered to her and scrambled to my feet, spitting out the first words I could, “I’m not going to fuck you!” I shuffled backward until my back was against the wall, and I tried to cover my naked body with my hands.
“Fuck me? Are you insane?” His dark brown eyebrows rose over a pair of soul-shattering light blue eyes. “What in the fuck would give you that idea?” He paused and stepped further into the small room and rubbed his temples.
“He’d make the perfect mate,” the liger within me purred, appreciating the view before us.
“I won’t be bought and bred. Fuck! We’re trying to move forward into the future, not backward.”
“Suit yourself,” she groaned in a bored tone.
“Nothing?” He took a step closer and pinched the bridge of his nose, unknowingly breaking up the fight between the liger and me. “Did you kill Dodger?”
“Who?” My heart pounded the closer he got, but I wasn’t sure of the cause.
“Probably the guy’s blood all over you and the pile of remains he is eyeing, Trista.”
Shit! Fuck! That had to be who Dodger was. Apprehensively, I lifted my arms, praying there wasn’t blood all over my skin. There was.
“Is this his?” He reached out and grabbed my forearm, and I jerked it out of his grasp, fully remembering why he was here. If he knew Dodger, then he had to be the buyer.
“Hard to tell, might be mine,” I snapped, brushing my hair away from my neck to expose the fresh puncture wounds the shackles left as a parting present.
His eyes flickered from my neck to the opposite side of the room, following my pointing finger. Immediately, his face softened, and he sucked in a deep breath. “Did he have you down here against…Were you his fucking prisoner?” His voice rose as he walked over and scooped up the dog bowl I had received my meals in—when Dodger decided to feed me, that was. He held his breath and glared at me, awaiting an answer.
My eyes nervously shifted from side to side, unsure if I should tell him the truth or lie. It was probably a good sign he was pissed at the poor living conditions I was kept in, or at least, I hoped that was the case. This man could be a sick fuck and be on the verge of slapping his giant hand over my mouth as he raped me.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“How long?” he growled, and his chest rose and fell rapidly as a deafening boom of thunder vehemently announced the storm on the horizon. Seconds later, the small basement we stood in was illuminated with a blinding light blue light, similar to the stranger’s eye color. His right fist punched the stone wall at the same time lightning struck Dodger’s body behind him. “Enfermos bastardo!”
“I don’t…I don’t know.” My voice quivered with fear.
“He’s like us! A shifter.”
“No shit! Could you not smell it on him?” my liger chuffed.
“I can now, but I was too busy trying to figure out what our next move should be to sniff him. Excuse me!” I sharply retorted, keeping my attention on him. I was able to control the elements, so it wasn’t his power that scared me. It was him. He was the nearest thing to an equal I’d ever met other than Tatiana.
“Please choose your words carefully when you answer my next question,” he slowly spoke, his irritation undeniable. “Why did he have you down here, and was this,” he turned on his feet and motioned his opened hand to Dodger’s carcass, “self-defense?”
“All I can tell you is what he told me.” He nodded and cracked his neck. “He abducted Tatianna and me. She’s already gone—”
“He fucking killed her?” he shouted.
“No, I
