Page 84 of Knockout Queen

“We’ll get through this,” Mag promises. “I’m going to figure it out.” He peeks at the door, and I know he’s thinking that our time should be up.

I hate letting him go, but we don’t need to arouse any more suspicion. “I have one demand, Jacob.”

He swallows and glances back, awaiting my words.

“I kill Big Daddy K. In the end, it’s still me. I don’t care what else you have to do, but in the end, it’s me and him. Promise?”

He kisses the inside of my palm. “Promise.” He bows his head over my hand again. “I’ll hold him off tonight. I’ll keep him in meetings about our next step. I—”

I swallow and cup his cheek. “You’ll do exactly what you need to do to not get us all killed, Jacob. You understand? Even if that is letting him stab me in the hand again. I don’t care. You. Me. Johnny, Brawler, and Oscar. That’s all that fucking matters. You will not sacrifice them for me. Promise me.”

His jaw clenches. “I—” He breaks off with a groan.

“Just this once, let go of your need to take care of me first and foremost. The bigger picture is at stake, and that means more to me than anything. Promise me, Jacob.”

His hazel green eyes spark. I see a future in them. I see the need he carries to have exactly what I wish for all of us. “I promise.”

With that, he stands and leaves, and even though I’m alone again, I don’t feel that way. I’m trusting Jacob to do what I asked. That’s what love is, sometimes. Setting aside your own needs for the one—well, in this case,ones—you love.

35

Rough hands shake me awake. When an unfamiliar pair of eyes stares at me out of the darkness, flight mode kicks in. I kick away, but hands grab for my own until they have me under control. A body pins me to the couch. “Shh, Kyla,” a sinister voice says. The more the sleep wears off, I figure out it’s Trey. Man, I never liked this asshole. “Big Daddy wants you.”

A nugget of fear roots itself in my stomach. It almost feels like bad cramps.

His eyes practically laugh at me. He knows as well as I do that getting summoned by K in the middle of the night is bad. Really bad. With all the talk he gave me earlier, I was hoping he was… Well, I don’t know because all that hope seems ridiculous now that I’m being forced off Johnny’s couch and dragged to K’s suite. Another guard joins Trey, and they bypass the living areas, the areas I’ve been to already, and take me right to an open door. A humongous bed looms in the center of it. They throw me to the edge and then stand back, arms crossed while flanking the door.

In the bathroom, the sound of the shower shutting off turns my stomach. I’m outnumbered. Surrounded by enemies.

I’m about to get raped.

The sobering thought ignites indignation in the center of my chest. I didn’t take hundreds upon hundreds of martial arts classes to end up like this. I didn’t perfect my fighting technique to become the victim of a deranged, narcissistic psychopath who thinks I’m my mother.

Before I can hype myself up even more, the bathroom door opens. K steps out in a dark blue bathrobe tied loosely around his waist. The top falls open, showing off a chest that might be called defined if I hadn’t been able to compare it to my guys. Looking at him, all I see is dad-bod.

“Leave us,” K says. “But stay close.”

The two guards who brought me here leave and shut the door behind them. I imagine them standing just on the other side. How often do they do this? How often does K rape women?

“You’re disappointing me already, Kyla. I was hoping for that smart mouth of yours.”

There are a few thousand things I want to shout at him, but I’m stubborn as fuck. If that’s what he wants, he’s going to get a silent fight.

“Take your clothes off.”

“No.”

K bores holes into my skin as if he has x-ray vision and can see right through the material now covering me. “I never understood why Johnny let you wear these garish clothes. Then when I saw you at the club after your fight, I understood. He doesn’t want anyone else looking at his toy.”

“Or he just lets me wear what I want because he’s not a fucking asshole.”

He drops his head back and laughs. “Now I know your feelings for him have blinded you. My son is an asshole. He’s just like me. I made him who he is.”

It’s my turn to laugh. “He used to be, but he’s nothing like you anymore. I’d tell you what you are, but I think you’d like it. You don’t see it for the insult it is.”

“You got a point there.” He loosens the belt on his robe and pulls it off his shoulders.

I swallow. He’s full on naked. Erect, too. It’s clear what he thinks he’s going to do.

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