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My heart is racing a million beats per minute, but it isn’t blood pumping through my veins. It’s panic. Fear. Decades-old trauma like concrete weighing me down.
Fight, I beg myself.Push him away. Fight back.
“Not so tough now, are you?” The man grins. One of his front teeth is brown and the other is broken in half. The smell of vodka is so thick I’m going to gag.
Goddammit. Fight, Piper!
But I can’t overcome what I was taught as a child: if I stand still and don’t fight back, it will be over sooner. The man will tire himself out hitting me. He’ll slink away once I crumple to the floor in a useless heap.
I learned all that the hard way. There’s no unlearning it now.
The man wraps his meaty hand around my neck, and I close my eyes.
This will all be over soon.
2
PIPER
The man with the broken tooth starts to squeeze. My throat closes up. The world begins to blacken at the edges like someone is holding a match to one corner of my vision.
So this is how it ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper.
Then, as suddenly as he appeared, the pressure is gone.
A deeper snarl joins the fray. I swear I’m hearing the voice of God.
“Am I interrupting something?”
When I manage to pry my eyes open, I’m positive I’m right. This man is a god, alright—and I’m ready to convert.
The stranger angles his body to shield me from my attacker. All I can see is the thick swell of his biceps and the broad set of his shoulders.
“Who the hell are you?” My attacker sneers. “Her boyfriend?”
“I’m the man who will separate your hands from your arms if you touch her again. Do you understand?”
The guardian who attacked me suddenly doesn’t look so scary. As he stands up from where the god threw him to the ground, I see him stumble. He’s drunk. I probably could have tipped him over with a good shove to the chest.
But I didn’t.
I didn’t do anything.
Shame washes over me in a hot wave. I’m surprised the rain on my skin doesn’t evaporate in the sudden heat of it.
The drunk gives me one last look. His glassy eyes narrow in distaste before he hunches against the rain and scampers away down the alley. He rounds the corner and disappears.
Relief knocks me back against the brick. I press a hand to my chest and inhale shakily. “Oh my… Holy hell.”
“Are you hurt?”
I look up and realize my rescuer is facing me now. His dark hair is short but curly, plastered to his head by the rain. Black-ink tattoos slip out of the ends of his rolled-up shirt sleeves to wrap around his wrists. Sixty seconds ago, I would have been afraid to run into him in this dark alleyway alone. Now, I’ve never felt safer in my whole godforsaken life.
Our eyes meet, and I inhale sharply. Even in the dark, his blue eyes are luminous. Bright and clear…
And pinned on me.
I swallow down the surge of conflicting emotions rising up in me and shake my head. “No. No, I’m okay. He didn’t—You got here just in time. Nothing happened.” I roll my shoulders. “Maybe once the adrenaline wears off, I’ll be a little sore. But otherwise, I’m perfectly—”
