Page 33 of Capturing Sin

I’d never admit it, but a part of me missed this.

Before any of the fighters knew what to make of me, I darted forwards, shoving Roane towards the cage door. He sliced out with his blade as he stumbled, and I narrowly avoided getting nicked before his face smacked into the metal bars.

I was on Harper in the next breath, kicking high.

My foot slammed into the side of her face, knocking her out cold before she hit the bloodstained canvas.

“Fuckin’ bitch!” Roane snarled, rounding on me with a kick to my middle.

I took it on the shoulder, feeling the impact reverberate through my arm hard enough to numb but not do any serious damage. I pounded his kidney as I twisted into him and kicked his stomach, shoving him back before his blade could find a home in my chest. It sliced shallowly across my raised knee instead.

The fucker was trying to kill me.

But he’d forgotten about the bigger threat here.

The demon materialised behind him, a menacing beast of nightmares, but his silver eyes pinned me. They dropped to my knee wound, seeping blood down my jeans, and narrowed with a flash of something dark before leaping back to my face.

A cruel smirk twisted his lips, and my blood turned to ice.

He kicked forward, sending the unwitting hunter slamming into me before I could move. We went down in a tangle of limbs, my face throbbing as his elbow caught me. Years of brutal training had me rolling aside and popping back to my feet before my brain could process what had happened.

Roane wasn’t fast enough.

The demon slammed his foot down on the man’s face. Bone snapped. Blood gushed. Sickening wet sounds filled the air as Roane’s head became a gory mess of pulp.

Hunters yelled obscenities beyond the cage, booing and jeering, but nobody interfered.

The demon’s smirk widened into a full grin, painted with flecks of red.

My mouth parted in horror.

The yelling grew louder. But, really, nobody cared about a hunter who was too weak to defeat an already injured demon.

I stumbled back, half tripping over another body.

Harper groaned at my feet, pushing herself up to all fours. She stilled as she caught sight of her partner’s mangled face.

The demon gave one last stomp and stared back at me, ignoring the other hunter waking to a nightmare.

“You killed him,” I murmured, shocked by his brutality. I shouldn’t have been though. Demons were violence given flesh.

“You weren’t his to hurt.” A low growl spilled from his throat, raising the hairs on my nape. “You shouldn’t have stepped into this cage with me.”

I swallowed thickly, tasting the metallic tang in the air. “Come back downstairs. Nobody else needs to get hurt.” My voice came out steady, and I silently applauded myself for not devolving into a puddle of terror. He wasn’t the first scary bastard I’d faced down.

But I wished he’d be the last.

The blood-smeared creature stepped over his victim, ignoring the other trainee hunter as she whimpered, scrambling back to the far side of the ring. Shaking, she hugged her knees to her chest and rocked back and forth, muttering something lost to the roaring crowd.

I couldn’t look away from the monster stalking towards me in slow motion.

My back slammed into the bars, rattling whatever brain cells I might have had left. Heat ringed my neck as the demon’s enormous hand gripped my throat in a blur of speed.

My chest rose and fell in rapid succession.

I supposed the reaper had a sense of irony about him. One blood demon had stolen my life from death’s embrace, and now another was going to deliver me right back.

“You think I’ll just come quietly, poison? That I’ll let you lead me right back into your cage?” he purred, a low and deadly sound. Dark hunger glittered in starlit eyes. “I have a better idea, and it involves snapping your flimsy little neck right now.”

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