Page 3 of Never Tamed
With a yell, I kick out. Catarina jumps away at the last minute and my foot slices through open air.
“Poor little girl playing with the big boys.” Catarina smirks and tucks a stray lock of icy blonde hair behind her ear. “What’s the matter? You can’t hold your own?”
My eyes tear up. Sniffing, I try to track her through the blur, keeping her in front of me at all times. I swing for her and connect with her shoulder.
She barely looks winded. I’m struggling.
We move at the same time and clash together like two trucks on a highway. Her hit knocks the breath out of my lungs. I recover faster than I would have as a human and grab for her hair, the perfect updo she’d worn for the wedding, tugging until she screeches. Hair pulling might be highschool, but it still brings a tear to her eyes.
When I shove her away, I’ve got a few strands between my fingers as a souvenir.
I fall on her, legs settling on either side of her hips, and slam my head into her face until her scream cuts off.
Blood erupts from her nose as the bone breaks. I can’t get a grip on her arms. She bucks, tossing me off, and reverses our positions.
“Stupid bitch.”
Catarina sneers in my face, blood and spittle leaking onto me.
“You know, I’ve been called worse.” I cut off with a grunt when her claws fasten around my neck, the same thing I’d imagined doing to her.
“You think a mate bond is going to stop me?” She leans in close and draws a deep breath. “I’ve smelled it on him from the second you walked into his life. I knew exactly when he broke and decided to fuck you. It doesn't matter.”
“I know who you’re fucking, too.” I grimace, struggling to breath. Stars wink at the edges of my vision. “Does that make us even?”
A yelp sounds from our right, but Catarina doesn’t break her attention away from me. Not until something huge and solid knocks into us. Catarina flies off me and rolls across the floor.
Mathis straightens beside me. Holding out a hand, he helps me stand.
You okay, sweetheart?
His concern trickles through my head and I nod, hauling air into my lungs and hoarding it like a camel with water in the desert.
The tendons in my neck are halfway crushed, and I rub my hand over them; the skin is already bruised. Catarina struggles to right herself.
Without waiting for her to recover, I throw myself on her, yelling. My muscles scream to shift, to show her exactly who she’s messing with, but I’m not in complete control of my wolf yet. And as much as I want to win, I’m not sure I can take her if she transforms.
Catarina has much more experience with her wolf. Not to mention whatever filthy tricks she’s learned as Andras’s whore.
We collide together and she keeps her feet, absorbing my hit.
Eyes wide enough to burn, I reach for the power inside me, the one I’ve always used to make it through my days. Waitressing isn’t for the weak or faint of heart. It takes grit and stubborn stupidity to deal with the public and make it through a twelve hour shift on your feet with only fifteen minutes stolen for food.
You want to yell at every idiot who asks for more beer or an extra side of ranch when they haven’t used the one they’ve got.
And I’ve survived more years in public service than Catarina.
She might be a werewolf but she’s polished. Her hardest days are in a swanky office with carpet and designer heels she gets to kick off the second she’s behind a desk.
I’m not from the streets but close enough. Street adjacent.
And it’s time for me to kill her and be done.
The power I’ve called tingles through my fingers and curls them into claws. The tips of each talon sharpen, lengthen, growing as black as pitch before I swipe them toward her eyes.
Her makeup isn’t even smeared. She bends like she’s doing the limbo and comes up swinging.
Panic flashes through me.Shit, shit.
