“I hate you,” I snarled with venom.
He walked towards me with short, stalking steps, until we were only inches apart. “Good, then we’re finally on the right terms.”
My eyes were drawn away from his face and to the blood running down his arm from the wound I had caused.
I sucked in a breath when all I saw was a thin scar.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SAD TRUTHS
I mulled the idea of leaving and fending for myself around over and over. How could I have lived in this violent world and never known how to protect myself? I didn’t doubt that if I wasn’t with Weston, I wouldn’t have made it this far. No matter how much that bit of truth pissed me off, I couldn’t deny that it was the truth.
I was between a rock and a hard place. I was so angry that he would use me as he had, but the thought of being alone was gut wrenching. I needed to be stronger if I wanted to make it in this world.
My hair was different. My clothes were different. But now, I was the weak farm girl from Alger. And I didn’t want to be her anymore.
Weston might have been an enigmatic man with no conscience, but those Untouchables were surely worse. He hadn’t physically hurt me nor had he tried to rape me. And that was what made me decide to stay. That, and to learn how to protect myself.
We hadn’t said a word to each other the rest of the ride. It’d taken an hour before the shaking in my hands disappeared; it was mainly from the intense anger boiling in my veins.
“Do whatever you did to me again and I’ll kill you in your sleep,” I told him.
He gave me an indifferent look as he sat across the fire that showed me exactly how worried he was about that particular threat. He wasn’t. With the raging inferno in my mind dissipating, I realized something.
He could move in a blink of an eye and could have dodged my knife easily.
He let me stab him.
It must have been his strange way of making amends. He might have been a psychotic assassin, but now I knew that he knew it, too. I caught his glare above the fire, announcing his meddling around in my head.
“Stay out of my head,” I sighed, truly aggravated at the lack of privacy. “I thought you would rather endure torture than listen to my thoughts?”
“They are hard to block out when you shout them to the world.”
“How am I supposed to know how loud my thoughts are when it’s abnormal to be able to hear them? You’re the one with the problem. Control your creepy impulses to listen,” I said but heard no reply. “What are you teaching me tonight?” I continued. I could feel the protest in the air,
so I stood up and unsheathed my knife. “Say anything about not agreeing to teach me and I will stab you again.”
He was silent and still for a moment. Too still that I became aware I’d stepped over the line. There was a blur, and my own knife was pressed against my throat from behind. The cold of the steel made me shudder.
“Threaten me again and you won’t live to regret it. We both know I let your knife hit me. I promise you, I won’t let it happen again,” he growled. “Now, try to get away from me.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Your first lesson is right now. Try to get away.”
There was still a knife at my throat, and I had no idea how to begin. “I don’t know how,” I admitted.
He sighed. “Lean all your weight back, and grab my wrist holding the knife and push it away. That will give you some room to bring your head back to head butt me. Now, you can take your other arm and swing it down into my groin. It’s the best spot to hit a man, but since I’d prefer you didn’t do that, you can elbow me in the stomach instead. Now I’m dazed, and you can run. And you’ll run fast because you have little to no chance if I catch you again. I wouldn’t have my guard down.”
I took it all in, and then leaned back and gave his wrist a push, which I was sure he let happen. It was a bummer, but I rolled with it. I brought my head back, and it bounced off his hard chest.
“Ow,” I said while I rubbed the back of my head.
“You don’t have to use the force you would in a real fight. Most men are shorter than me. So, you might hit them in a better spot.”
“But I need to learn how to defend myself against you.”