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When we’ve both finished, we look to Kit. He’s the only one who hasn’t agreed to this. It wouldn’t be in his interest to agree to this challenge. But he can’t win Vincent’s challenge either because he’ll never be able to find and kill The Abyss. None of us can complete Vincent’s challenge for different reasons, so this is the only way to settle it. If Kit wants to surrender, he can. And if Rialta tells me she chooses Kit, I’ll make sure he wins.
Kit leans into Rialta, his lips sweeping against hers. From where I’m standing, I can’t tell if she kisses him back or not. When the kiss ends, he walks over to us and tosses his gun into the pile.
“That’s it?” Andrea asks.
“That’s it.” Kit glares at me. “That’s all this asshole would give me.”
Andrea chuckles, and I smirk. Glancing over at Rialta, I swear I see a hint of a smile creeping up her face too.
“Rules?” Kit asks.
“No weapons. Everything else is fair game. When one of us surrenders, we let them go as long as they promise to disappear forever,” Andrea says.
“And if no one surrenders?” Kit asks.
I have the same thought. But whether this works or not, there’s enough pent-up frustration between the three of us that it would be helpful to beat the shit out of each other.
No one answers. We’ll have to decide that if we come to it.
“Then let the best man win,” Rialta says with distaste in her mouth, clearly hating being a prize to be won.
I expected Kit to be the first one to throw a punch. What I didn’t expect was for him to land a blow to my jaw that has me tasting blood.
Andrea throws a punch to my stomach that takes my breath away before I can react to Kit. I’m a pretty good fighter, but after everything I’ve been through these past few days, I’m not as quick at anticipating punches as I used to be.
I block another punch from Andrea, while Kit gets a kick into my ribs. Blow and after blow hits me.
I don’t know why the two of them are ganging up on me, but I need to do something to change the direction of this, or I’ll be out in a matter of minutes. And if I’m going to die, it’s going to be because Rialta wants me dead.
I sweep Kit’s feet out from underneath him and then tackle Andrea to the ground. Finally, I get a good punch in before closing my hands around his throat, strangling him.
He grips my wrists, trying to remove my hands, but I squeeze harder. I don’t know when I’ll get an advantage like this again, so I use everything in me to get him to surrender. There was a time when I wanted to kill him, but now I think I’d prefer he’d just surrender.
Andrea’s eyes bulge after his head whips toward Rialta’s direction.
Kit has his arm wrapped around her waist and a gun in his hand.
I release Andrea immediately and ease off him. Of course, Kit didn’t fight fair—he kept a gun on him. The cheater.
Andrea and I both stand up carefully, trying to decide how we take him down. Maybe we should both surrender now before he kills us. He doesn’t care about the rules. He doesn’t care to fight honorably.
I guess if that was the only chance he had to win the woman he loves, then I’d understand. But thinking about how well he fought, he had a real chance of winning.
Kit stands smugly behind Rialta with his fingers splayed across her lower belly like he’s already won.
He points the gun at Andrea. “Do you surrender?”
Andrea doesn’t look at him. He looks to Rialta as if he’s waiting for her to tell him what to do.
I furrow my brow in confusion.
“Yes,” Andrea finally breathes.
“Good, then I’ll spare you if you find and kill The Abyss by the end of the week.”
“That’s impossible,” Andrea says.
“Find someone, anyone who can fit the description and frame them then. I don’t care. But we need Vincent to think he’s dead.”
