4. ManMonster?
Man or Monster?
Ikept my head down and my eyes closed until the very last second, focusing on each steady breath as the atmosphere’s buzz penetrated my skin.
My heart rate slowed. I stretched my fingers.
Rolled my neck. The darkness was seeping in, taunting me and beckoning me.
I savoured the last moment of silence before the noise-cancelling headphones were ripped from my head, and his hand slapped my shoulder, forcing a growl from me at the unwelcome contact.
The roar from the crowd slammed through my veins in a single, rapid blast, and I could no longer hear my own thoughts. My body vibrated, shaking with the effort to contain the beast within for a few more seconds.
The metal clasp around my neck released. I lifted my head and bared my teeth.
“Kill.”
The one-word command, muttered into my ear, sent me flying forward, charging through the crowd with my eyes locked on the target behind the metal fencing.
He was huge, taller and heavier than me, but that wouldn’t matter.
Not with the way he was prancing around in the cage, riling up the audience to inflate his ego.
They never learned. His rage was a performance.
But mine? That’s all I was. Rage and pain.
Pain and rage. It was always there, simmering beneath the surface.
And once it’s unleashed, no one survives it.
No one survives me.
In one swift move, I climbed the edge of the cage and hurled myself into the ring before he realised the fight had already begun. I grabbed the back of his neck and tossed him across the octagonal floor. The crowd went wild, which only blackened my vision.
It turned vicious fast. There was no circling or sizing each other up.
The ring shrank to fists and bones, swings and kicks.
My knuckles sank into his sides, stomach, and back, while he caught my ribs, but I didn’t slow.
I grinned and sent three consecutive blows to his face, which had him stumbling back into the wired fencing.
He grabbed my shoulders and tried to knee me in the groin. I twisted just enough to make his knee slam into my quad. It should have sent white-hot pain through my body, but I felt nothing.
I drove my elbow into his nose with a wet, hollow thud. Blood spurted from him, and he staggered back, clutching his face. I was on him before he could think, my fist in his hair, yanking his head back as my other hand drove up hard under his chin. Deliberately fatal.
Something in his neck collapsed. I felt the wrongness after the impact.
His body slumped, and his weight fell forward as his legs gave out. I shoved him aside, and he crashed down, his skull smacking the mat with a dull thud that silenced the crowd for a heartbeat before sending them into a frenzy.
I stared at his paralysed body and felt numb. I never feel guilt, only the awareness that I should. My chest heaved with each sharp inhale as I waited. The crowd chanted for me to end him, to deliver the final blow. The louder the noise around me grew, the tighter I clenched my bloodied fists.
Straddling his torso, he stared, his eyes bulging, and I saw the moment he knew it was over.
Look them in the eyes. Never let them die alone.
My fists pummeled his face, blow after blow, until the light faded. I climbed off his lifeless body, strolled out of the cage, down the steps, and back through the crowd that was chanting my name like a fucking prayer.
But I was no God. Only Death itself.
McKenna was beaming; there was no doubt I’d just made him a fortune.
The heavy chain was clasped back around my neck, biting into my skin as he continued to praise me, but I was barely listening.
The whooshing in my ears, the noise of the hysterical crowd, the fucking overstimulation was making me want to crawl out of my skin or kill again.
“And in under two minutes!” McKenna slapped me on the shoulder, which made me swing at him. He jumped back, laughing because he knew I would. “Excellent. You did well tonight. I’ll have a reward waitin’ for you.”
I grunted, hoping to fuck it was more ink or a new pillow so I could ditch the sack of shite wrecking my neck every night.
The headphones were placed over my ears, and I instantly relaxed, letting my mind drift towards the hope of a good night’s sleep for once.
They shackled my wrists and attached the leash to my chain, giving it a tug to signal me to move.
We climbed back into the SUV, two men flanking me on either side, their eyes shifty. No one wanted to draw the short straw and ride in the back with me. Not after I head-butted one of them on the drive back last week for sneezing.
The familiar countryside came into view as I straightened my shoulders, stealing more space and making them squirm closer to the doors. When the car pulled up outside the hidden bunkers, I spotted her. My so-called reward.
Fuck’s sake. Not what I needed.
Dressed in a tiny leather skirt and a tank top with ‘Dolls’ written across it, she was clearly another of the club girls Sean hired. She tossed her cigarette, stubbing it out with the heel of her boot, and bit her lip as they tugged me from the car.
I swallowed the growl clawing up my throat. I wasn’t in the mood for fucking pussy. I’d have taken one vial of ink or a pillow not made of rocks over this, but I knew what acting ungrateful would get me. Tonight, I couldn’t be arsed with it.
Either way, a fuck was a fuck.
She followed as they led me down the dark steps into my bunker and unlocked the door. The headphones were removed, the leash unhooked, my wrists freed, and I was shoved back into my space.
I whirled around, ready to break the hand that dared touch me, but the whore was on me like a bitch in heat.
I grabbed her throat as her tongue assaulted my mouth, then shoved her away.
She stumbled into the damp wall, her eyes blown wide as she stared at the dried blood all over my chest and hands.
The soldier shut the door and stood on the other side with his back to us.
Rage fed my movements as I prowled towards her, forcing her to her knees.
She started panting as she watched me undo my cargo trousers and release my soft cock.
Grabbing her hair, I used her mouth until I was hard enough to fuck, then grabbed her throat, forcing her back to her feet and spinning her around.
I slammed her against the wall, pressing her cheek into the hard stone.
I growled into her ear, knowing she’d have been prepped beforehand for what was expected. She held up the condom between her long red nails, and I snatched it from her hand, ripping it open with my teeth.
Once I’d rolled it over my dick, I hiked up her skirt and tore her underwear clean off, letting it fall to scraps at our feet. She gasped, then giggled.
“Kylie said you were rough. Don’t hold back on me, Monster. That’s just how I like it.”
I didn’t give a shite what she liked. Her pleasure was no concern of mine.
I drove into her hard, burying myself to the hilt and drawing a scream from her that darkened my vision.
Her hands slammed against the wall, clawing for something to hold on to as I hammered into her, rough and merciless, not giving her a second to adjust to my size.
The sooner this was over, the better. Her cries of pain turned into loud, distracting moans that echoed off the walls as she demanded more. I’d never be able to finish with all that fucking noise. I’d just end up killing her instead.
I clamped my hand over her mouth and nose, not caring if she couldn’t breathe.
At least she’d shut the fuck up. I fisted her hair with my other hand, yanking her head back until her spine arched.
The flare in my ribs burned with every thrust, and I focused on the pain.
It got me off more than this woman’s pussy, until I finally came, feeling only a thin thread of relief that it was over.
I stepped back, letting go of her, and stripped off the condom, tossing it in the bin by my single bed.
The metal door creaked open as I walked to the far corner and slumped into my worn chair. Her jaw dropped as she looked at me, then at the guard, Nolan, holding the door open, waiting for her to take the hint.
“Out. Now,” he ordered her when she didn’t move.
“What? That’s it? But I didn’t even come?”
“And you think he cares?” Nolan laughed, shaking his head. “He doesn’t give a shite about anyone, love. Better luck next fuck.” He smirked at me as I lit a cigarette and took a long drag that scorched my lungs.
She huffed, adjusted her skirt, and stormed past him. The door slammed shut with a loud bang, and then… silence. Just how I liked it.
I closed my eyes and took another drag, but they snapped open when my sharp instincts told me something wasn’t right.
I wasn’t alone.
My gaze locked onto the huddled body in the opposite corner of the large converted cellar.
A tumble of messy brown ringlets hid her face as she stared down at her knees, her arms wrapped tight around them as if trying to fold herself out of existence.
I took another slow drag, watching her through the smoke, wondering who she was and why she was down here, in my fucking space.
There were only two reasons McKenna threw anyone down here with me. To scare them into compliance, or they wanted them dead. I was too exhausted for this. I’d get it done quickly.
I pushed myself out of the chair and crossed the bunker. She didn’t scurry away or shrink further into the shadows. She stayed unnaturally still. For a second, I wondered whether she was already dead.
Crouching, I shoved my hand through the curtain of tangled brown curls. I grabbed her jaw and forced her head up. When her big hazel eyes met mine, two unexpected things happened. First, she didn’t scream. She didn’t even flinch. Second, I had a thought that wasn’t rooted in violence.
She’s beautiful.
Too beautiful. More beautiful than anything I should ever dare to look at. I didn’t see beauty in anything. I didn’t value it. My world was solely darkness and decay. Nothing and no one could survive in my orbit. Especially not something that looked as pure as her.
I gripped her jaw tighter, forcing her full lips apart.
I waited for the emotions that always took over when they saw their death in my eyes.
The hysterical crying or fearful whimpers as they begged me to spare them.
They never understood that it only made me end them faster so I could restore the silence again.
But neither came. She just held my gaze.
That threw me. And it kept the monster in me caged.
Acting on impulse alone, I leaned closer and breathed in deeply, catching the new, invasive scent of her in my space.
If I’d ever had the chance to walk through a meadow of wildflowers on a warm summer’s day, I imagined it would smell just like her.
Feminine, sweet and intoxicating, yet it had no right to belong in a place like this.
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to rub it all over me or kill her for how much I liked it.
I let her go and stood, glaring down at her. She kept looking up at me from the filthy floor, those innocent hazel eyes holding more fighting spirit than most of the men I faced in the cages.
After a moment, she lowered her chin to rest on her knees again and stared at the ground. I clenched my fists.
Backing away, I headed to the small bathroom and splashed my face with cold water in the grubby basin, trying to decide what the fuck to do about my new problem.
I knew what I was supposed to do. Terrify her so she’d scream for them to help, and if they didn’t come to her rescue, she’d become another victim of my darkness. So why the fuck hadn’t I?
I never hesitated. But I’d never killed anyone in silence. I was conditioned to react to noise and aggression, to begging, shouting, and crying. If I sensed a person’s anger, pain or fear, whether I heard it or saw it, I acted without thought. I’d kill without feeling.
A hollow man with no soul, only pointed at targets. A weaponised monster.
She was obviously in shock. The reality of her situation would soon catch up with her. When it did, the noise would come. Until then, the silence was the only thing keeping her alive.