Chapter 33 #2
Gabriel steps shirtless into the pit, and I don’t recognize him.
Gone is the man who held me two days ago, who agreed to do this together, who whispered “day by day” against my hair.
In his place is something else entirely. Something cold and controlled and utterly terrifying.
The Beast.
His opponent is bigger. Taller, broader, with arms like tree trunks and a neck thick as my thigh. He looks like he could snap Gabriel in half without breaking a sweat.
Gabriel doesn’t seem concerned.
They circle each other, testing, feinting. The crowd is screaming, but I can’t hear them anymore. All I can see is Gabriel—the fluid grace of his movements, the predator’s focus in his eyes, the coiled power waiting to be unleashed.
The big man lunges first.
Gabriel sidesteps, drives an elbow into his opponent’s kidney, spins away before the counterpunch can land. It’s beautiful. Brutal. Like watching a dance choreographed in hell.
“Breathe,” Anissa murmurs beside me. I realize I’ve been holding my breath.
The fight lasts longer than I expected. The big man is skilled, and lands several blows that make me wince, including one that opens a cut on Gabriel’s lip that sends blood streaming down his chin. But Gabriel keeps coming. Keeps pressing. Keeps finding openings where there shouldn’t be any.
And then, suddenly, it’s over.
One moment they’re trading blows, evenly matched, both breathing hard. The next, Gabriel’s behind him, arm locked around his throat, squeezing with a cold efficiency that makes my stomach turn.
The big man taps out. Goes limp.
Gabriel releases him, steps back, and looks up at me.
His face is bloody. His eyes are wild. The beast is fully awake, fully present, and it’s staring at me with an intensity that should terrify me.
It doesn’t.
I stare back. Hold his gaze. Let him see that I’m still here. Still watching. Still not running.
Something in his expression shifts. Softens, just slightly.
Then he turns and disappears through a door at the edge of the pit.
I’m on my feet before I realize I’ve moved.
“Back corridor,” Anissa calls. “Third door on the left.”
I push through the crowd, relieved when I reach the relative quiet of the corridor. I follow the sound of running water until I find an open door—third on the left, just like she said.
Gabriel is inside, washing blood from his hands in a sink. His back is to me, muscles still taut with unspent adrenaline. Water runs pink down the drain.
I shut the door behind me and lock it.
“You should have stayed in the box,” he says without turning around.
“Since when do I do what I should?”
A sound escapes him—not quite a laugh. He braces his hands on the edge of the sink, head bowed, water still running.
“Now you know,” he says quietly. “What I am. What I have to do to stay human. To keep the demons at bay.”
I cross the room. Press myself against his back, wrap my arms around his waist. Feel the tremors running through him—aftershocks of violence, the beast slowly retreating into its cage.
“Now I know,” I repeat, then press a kiss to his shoulder blade. “And I’m still here.”
He stills for a moment, then turns in my arms. His face is a wreck—bloody lip, bruise forming along his jaw, that wild light still flickering in his eyes. He looks feral. Dangerous. Beautiful.
“I don’t deserve you,” he says.
“Yes, but who would, really?”
As I’d hoped, he laughs, and I take advantage of the moment to pull his head down and kiss him hard.
His control snaps.
One second I’m standing in front of him, the next I’m pressed against the wall, his body pinning mine, his mouth devouring me with a hunger that borders on violence.
But it’s not the beast—not entirely. There’s desperation in it.
Need. The raw, ragged edge of a man who—I hope—finally realizes that he’s not alone.
“Bella.” My name is a growl against his throat. “Tell me to stop.”
“No.”
“Tell me you don’t want this.”
“I want this.” I arch into him, feel his cock pressing against me. “I want you. All of you. Man. Beast. Everything.”
There’s a cot in the room, and he throws me down onto it. I gasp, reaching for him, wanting him right there with me.
And then he is, his mouth on mine as his hands make quick work of my top and my slacks until I’m naked beneath him, and his shorts have disappeared as well.
I squirm until he lets me up, then I straddle him, his cock hard against my ass as I let my hands roam over his torso.
Every scar, every ridge of muscle, every place that makes him gasp when I press my mouth to it after my hand maps the way.
Not tender, but wild with teeth and hunger and need.
To have him. And—oh, dear god, yes—to be had.
This isn’t tender. This isn’t controlled.
This is something else entirely.
He takes me completely apart. Every touch is electric, every kiss feels like a bruise. And when he finally thrusts inside me, I feel the last wall between us crumbling to dust.
We move together like we’re trying to crawl inside each other’s skin. Like if we get close enough, nothing can tear us apart again. His hands are everywhere—my hips, my breasts, my throat. Claiming. Possessing. And I give him everything, holding nothing back, meeting his intensity with my own.
When I shatter, his name tears out of me like a violent prayer. He follows moments later, his whole body shuddering, his face buried in my neck.
For a long time, neither of us moves. We just breathe together, tangled on the narrow cot, his weight pressing me into the thin mattress. I don’t mind. I want to feel him everywhere.
Eventually, he rolls to his side, pulling me with him so we’re facing each other. The wild light has faded from his eyes, replaced by something softer. Something almost peaceful.
“I love you,” he says quietly. “I loved you when I thought I hated you. And I’ll love you until there’s nothing left of me.”
“Then don’t let there be nothing left.” I trace my fingers along his jaw, feeling the bruise forming there. “Don’t let the beast consume you. Don’t let my father win.”
Something shifts in his expression. Sharpens.
“Is that what you’re afraid of? That I’ll kill him?”
“I’m afraid you’ll destroy yourself trying.” I press my forehead to his. “I just got you back, Gabriel. I can’t lose you again. Not to death. Not to prison. Not to the darkness.”
He’s quiet for a moment, his hand stroking slow circles on my back.
“I do want him dead,” he finally says. “Every time I think about what he did, what he would have done to you—”
“I know.” I kiss him softly. “I know. But want and action aren’t the same thing. You can want him dead and still choose to let the courts handle it. You can be the beast and still decide what the beast does.”
He stares at me for a long moment. Then something in his face breaks open—not grief this time, but something else.
Something that looks almost like hope. He pulls me closer, tucks my head under his chin, and I feel his chest rise and fall beneath my cheek.
For this one moment, the beast is quiet. The darkness is at bay.
This is what we’re fighting for.
Us. A life we can build together.
I just have to hope he’s brave enough to choose it.