Thicker Than Blood (Thicker Than Blood #1)(96)
Their angry stares confused me. The last time I’d seen them, they’d been friendly and smiling. We’d saved them from infected, and this was how they repaid us? Had it all been an act? Or was this the act for the fight? For the viewing pleasure of the masses?
I glared around the ring, then focused on Jeffers, deciding that he was to blame. He was the one who had said we owed him—that he’d wanted the score settled.
Stepping inside the ring, Jeffers took his place in the center, his hands raised. All at once, the shouting dropped to a murmur, and then the murmuring to a whisper.
“For your viewing pleasure!” Jeffers’s deep, gravelly voice boomed through the silence. “In this corner, two of my best scavengers, Bryce and Mike!”
Grabbing hold of Mike’s hand, Bryce thrust their joined fists up into the air, and the audience went wild. Although, unlike the thunderous applause that Misty had received, the crowd seemed less impressed with these two. Amid the cheering there were shouts of ridicule and mockery.
“And in this corner!” Jeffers gestured toward Alex. “Straight from outside the motherf*cking gates…a man with not only a claim on one, but TWO women…WILD MAN!”
As the crowd continued to shout and scream, Alex remained still, his gaze solely focused on his opponents. He didn’t raise his fist in the air, didn’t even turn to acknowledge the crowds. Standing there, his shoulders slightly hunched, his wrapped hands curled into rock-hard fists, he bounced lightly from one foot to the other, and waited.
“Last chance to place your bets!” Jeffers continued. “The payout for this one is gonna be huge!”
“Three cases of my finest!” an older man shouted. “On the wild man!”
“An AK-47 and three boxes of ammo!” another man yelled. “For the wild man!”
“A week of free *!” one scantily clad woman called out. “If Bryce and Mike win!”
I tried to drone them out, their greed, their lack of morals, their sick and twisted need to derive pleasure from the pain of others. I stared at Alex, praying that he would come out of this on top, praying that he wouldn’t be harmed. Yet, I couldn’t help but envision the very worst possible scenario—his death—and without him, the brand on my wrist and Evelyn’s meant nothing.
Without Alex, what would happen to us? The possibilities of such a fate were enough to make me shiver despite the heat from the bonfires, chilling me straight through to my bones.
“DING, DING!”
My breath caught in my throat, my body went rigid with fear. Mike rushed forward while Bryce seemed to be taking his time, as if he was waiting for Mike to attack and while Alex was busying fending off Mike, he would strike. Mike never reached Alex, though, as Alex deftly jumped to the side and out of his grasp, then went barreling into Bryce.
Gripping Bryce’s neck, Alex sent his fist straight into the older man’s face, and just as he was readying to punch him again, Mike jumped onto Alex’s back, his arm encircling Alex’s neck, and then…
I never did see what happened next. One minute I was watching the fight with bated breath, my heart pounding in my chest, and the next a hand was slapped over my mouth, an arm hooked around my waist, and I was dragged off through the crowd.
I kicked and I screamed, thrashing wildly in an attempt to free myself, but this wasn’t Grannie holding me, this was a man, a strong man whose strength was much greater than mine.
This went on for several long, excruciating minutes, me being dragged farther from the fight, and the crowd ignoring me or just plain not noticing as I was hauled off. Once we were away from the gathered masses, the bonfire light waning, I was released and shoved backward.
My back hit a jagged brick wall, the broken cement digging painfully through the thin material of my dress and into my skin. I blinked through the darkness, trying to make out the face of my kidnapper with only the aid of the moonlight.
“You,” I whispered breathlessly, recognizing him as the man who’d approached Alex and me outside of Grannie’s tent.
He smiled at me, several dimples appearing on his handsome face. “Me,” he said, sounding almost proud.
“What are you doing?” I continued whispering, my gaze flitting from left to right, hoping to find someone nearby. But there was no one around this late at night; the market place was empty, everyone either at the fight or the Drunk Tank.
“Your man is gonna die out there,” he said, smirking. “Jeffers doesn’t allow his men to be bested by any outsider. Figured I’d better stake my claim on you before you’re sent to The Cave or put up for auction.”
“A-auction?” I asked, my voice shaking as my body shuddered.
“Don’t you worry, sweetheart,” he said, and I watched, horrified, as his hands dropped to his pants, already working his belt buckle loose. “Be easy enough to cover up that brand and slap a new one on. And don’t you worry, I won’t share you.”
His eyes lifted, meeting mine. In the reflection of the moonlight within them, I could see the sincerity of his madness-fueled promise. He wouldn’t share me.
“I’m f*cking lonely,” he said as he stepped up against me and flattened his body against mine. “I’m sick of whores, sick of having to pay for it, sick of having to share women with every other * in this place.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I turned my head away, evading his mouth.