Stray (Shifters #1)(45)

I used the bars to pull myself up, shooting Eric my best pick-on-someone-your-own-size look. “Let her go. Now.”
“And if I don’t?” He grinned, jerking her head back.
Abby gasped, and another tear rolled down her bruised cheek.
I growled, showing Eric my human teeth. “I’ll rip your throat out.”
“That’ll be kind of hard from all the way over there.”
“So come closer and give me a fair shot.”
Faced with a personal challenge, Eric couldn’t turn me down without looking like a coward. I’d already concluded—based on his looks—that his ego might get in the way of his common sense. I was right. Yes, I was judging a book by its cover, but Eric was a picture book at best, with no large words to distract from the pretty illustrations. Besides, some stereotypes have their basis in truth, and my bet was that I was looking at one very dumb jock.Elastic snapped as he pulled his hand from Abby’s shorts. Still sneering at me, he tossed her across the cell by her hair. She hit the far wall of bars, but this time her raised arms absorbed the impact. By the time she sank onto her mattress, rubbing her new bruises, he had already swung her cage door shut.
Abby looked from him to me through wide eyes, shaking her head at me in silent warning. We both ignored her.
Eric clicked the lock closed, already leering at me with a slimy smile. “I was hoping you’d wake up soon,” he said, pocketing the key.
“You’re in luck.” I tried to control my galloping pulse, knowing he could hear it. At least, he could if he bothered to listen for it. “Why don’t you come see how far you can get with a real woman? Or do you only have eyes for little girls?” In spite of my bravado, my chest tightened as he ran his eyes over me, lingering in all the usual places. His appraisal showed a pathetic lack of imagination.
“Aren’t you the eager one?” he said, still a good three feet from my cage. “Don’t worry, your turn’s coming. Not with me, though. Miguel wants you all to himself.”
I pressed myself against the bars, trying to tempt him closer. I only needed one good shot… “You scared?”
“Not of you, tabby.” He licked his lips in appreciation of the view, and I swallowed to keep from gagging. “But I have a healthy respect for Miguel. Those jungle cats don’t like anyone else’s shit in their litter box.”
Litter box? I thought. No wonder the guy has to play snatch-and-grab to get some attention.
Flattered as I was by the description of me as someone’s toilet, I managed to keep my reply on topic. “Sounds to me like you’re a scaredy-cat.”
Eric’s eyes hardened as he came a step closer. “Talk to me tomorrow, and we’ll see who’s scared.” He scowled down at me, clearly trying to intimidate me with his height and bulk. Apparently he’d had some success with that tactic in the past, because he seemed unable to understand why it didn’t work on me.
I met his eyes without blinking, letting him see how undaunted I was. I saw no reason to fear a man who preyed on children. Men like Eric chose victims who didn’t fight back; he’d want nothing to do with me when there weren’t bars between us. Unfortunately, that meant he probably wouldn’t come close enough for me to snatch his key, either.
“Stay away from my cousin,” I demanded, hoping to piss him off by ordering him around, like an Alpha to his subordinate Pride member.
Still well out of reach, he gave me a taunting smile, and I was reminded of people who go to the zoo to tease the lions from behind a thick pane of safety glass. “Sorry, but that little tabby’s mine,” Eric said. “Bought and paid for.” 
Bought and paid for? A chill shivered through me at his phrasing, and I glanced at Abby for clarification. “What’s he talking about?” I asked, but she shook her head. She didn’t know.
“You’ll figure it out,” Eric said. “I heard you’re a smart one. College girl, right? You’re a long way from campus now. Long way from home, too.” He started to turn away, and I saw my chance for escape slipping through my fingers.
Desperate now, I clucked my tongue, shaking my head in mock sympathy. “Just not Alpha material, are you, Eric?” I said, daring him to prove me wrong.
He pivoted slowly and wrapped his hands around the bars of my cage, on either side of my own. Staring down at me, he growled deep in his throat.
Unimpressed, I let contempt shine in my eyes. I’d heard better. Hell, I’d done better. “Come on in and prove you’re a real man. Or can’t you get it up for an adult?”
Eric snarled, his face aflame with rage. Before I could react, he thrust one hand into the cage and grabbed the back of my head, slamming the left side of my face into the bars. Pain exploded in my cheekbone, radiating in all directions. Soon I’d have a bruise to match Abby’s.
Wincing, I pushed against the bars with both hands, trying to pull my face away from the cool steel. It did no good; Eric was as strong as he looked.
Great job, Faythe, I thought. You’ve got him right where you want him, now.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, my words muffled from having my jaw pressed into the bars. “Did I strike a nerve?”
His fist clenched, pulling several of my hairs out by the root. “You just remember who roughed you up first when Miguel has you nailed to the floor.”
“Remember this.” My right hand shot out, and I raked my nails down the length of his face, echoing the shape of Abby’s bruise. Though short, my nails were sharp and hard, even in human form, and I gouged four long ruts into his cheek. He howled and let go of my head.
Pleased, I stepped back out of his reach as he clapped a hand to his ruined cheek. It came away bloody.
“You stupid bitch!” he yelled, turning to snatch his shirt from the ground. He pressed the wad of white cotton to his face to absorb the blood. And there was plenty of it, for such shallow wounds.
Maybe they’ll scar, I thought, barely resisting the urge to clap my hands and jump up and down with glee. Instead, I made a show of slowly licking his blood from my fingertips, one at a time. “Mmm. Tastes like fear to me.”
Eyes wide, Eric spun and ran for the steps, tripping and fumbling his way to the top. Voices and light flooded the basement as he shoved the door open, but they stopped abruptly as he stepped across the threshold. An instant later, the new silence was replaced by derisive ribbing. I couldn’t help but gloat.
“The kid too much for you?” Miguel asked between fits of barbed laughter.
“Your bitch-kitty did this,” Eric said, fury rolling from his voice like smoke from a fire.
“Faythe’s awake?” a new voice asked, and my smile died on my face. I scrambled to the far corner of my cage, desperately pressing my still-throbbing cheek into the bars. But no matter how I turned, I couldn’t see into the room at the top of the stairs.
“I told you not to touch her,” Miguel said, his accent thick with anger. “You got what you deserved. Close the door.” Someone pushed the basement door shut, cutting off the light and the voices. But I’d heard enough.
I sank to my knees, numb with shock and betrayal. I’d recognized the new voice. I hadn’t heard it in ten years, but I’d know my brother’s voice anywhere. It was Ryan.Twenty

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Abby said, her voice trembling on the last word.
I wanted to look at her, but I couldn’t drag my focus from the landing at the top of the steps. I drew in a breath slowly, concentrating on each inhale and exhale until I was sure I could speak coherently. “Shouldn’t have done what?” Still kneeling on bare concrete, I turned to face her, not surprised to find her standing at the front of her cage, her eyes wide with alarm.
“Scratched him. You shouldn’t have scratched him.”
“Why not?” I asked, though at the moment I didn’t really care about the answer. I only cared about getting the hell out of that cage so I could rip Ryan’s throat out. Or maybe just his tongue, so he would live to face my father and the rest of the council.
“You embarrassed him, and pissed him off.”
Using the bars to pull myself up, I crossed my cell to the wall nearest her cage. “That was kind of the point, although knocking him out and taking his key was what I actually had in mind.” I smiled and shrugged, pretending I wasn’t completely devastated by my failure. “Besides, apparently Miguel won’t let him touch me.”
Even as I spoke, my cheek throbbed, reminding me that Eric had, in fact, touched me. But I’d touched him back.
Abby sat down facing me, her knees brushing the bars. “Miguel’s bad enough by himself,” she said. “And anyway, Eric will just take it out on me next time.”
Next time. Great. We’d simply have to make sure there wasn’t a next time.
I sat to mirror her position, and nothing separated us but two rows of bars and five feet of bare concrete. It may as well have been the Grand Canyon.
“Are you okay?” I asked, eyeing her cheek. A new stripe was forming less than an inch from the old one, as if her first bruise had developed a shadow. I touched my cheek gingerly, knowing I would bear an identical mark. But at least nothing was broken. I’d live, which was more than I could say for Eric, if I ever got another shot at him.