Page 66 of Damaged Protector
“Y-yes, I understand,” she whimpered. “I’ll do anything you say.”
He stroked the blade almost reverently up the column of her neck and dragged the flat side of it against her cheek. “Good girl. I’d hate to have to clean blood up off my floor. Such a tedious task.”
This fucking asshole!
Hawk jerked her hair, tilting her head back as he leaned closer. “Now open your goddamn sexy mouth and take my cock like the fucking whore you are.”
Every muscle in my body tightened as the memory of being in Moreau’s studio flooded back. The fear. The helplessness. Just like this defenseless woman. He hadn’t used a weapon, but I was no less at his mercy—until I’d punched him in the face.
The fear trembling inside me told me I should run, but there was no way I could live with myself if I left this lady to fend for herself. Even if I called the police as soon as I got outside, there was the response time to think about.
I had a pretty good swing, but I was pretty sure I couldn’t take down Hawk with a punch. Not when he was holding a knife.
Realizing my crossbody bag was slung across my chest, I suddenly remembered something my father had given me before I left Pennsylvania. With my eyes on Hawk, who was now thrusting back into the woman’s mouth, I closed my hand around the small canister and pulled it out.
Flicking the disarm switch with my thumb, I tiptoed toward the door. Hawk’s words from a few weeks ago came back to me: Honey, I could hear a mouse fart in a jet engine.
I literally held my breath when I pushed open the door, grateful it didn’t creak. Holy shit! Here we go.
Hawk Gentry may have superhuman hearing, but I had something else going for me. Stealth. Years of dance training had made me light on my feet, able to walk without making the tiniest of sounds.
I moved across the room on my toes, thankful the man was distracted, making loud grunting noises and talking dirty to the woman servicing him. “Fuck yeah, honey. That’s it.”
I was fucking sick to my stomach, working to hold back the bile rising in my throat. When I lifted the canister and held it straight out in front of me, Hawk seemed to catch the movement out of his peripheral vision.
Fuck. It’s now or never.
As soon as he turned his head, eyes widened in shock, I depressed the trigger on the canister. “Mal—” he started, but stopped when he got a face full of pepper spray. Sucking in a deep breath of surprise, he inhaled the fiery substance before stumbling backward. The big man fell on his ass and scrambled away from us.
“Close your eyes,” I snapped at the woman. I had gotten Hawk right in the face, but I figured some of the mist would sink downward, and I wanted to minimize the effect of the spray on her.
She began sobbing with her eyes cinched closed. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Shhh,” I soothed. “You have nothing to be sorry about. I’ll take care of you.” I picked up the knife he’d dropped and approached the woman. She squinted her eyes open a bit, her gaze dropping to the weapon in my hand.
And that’s when she started screaming bloody murder. Hawk was yelling curse words and making sounds like a wounded animal, and the noise in the room was almost painful to my ears.
Christ, this shit is stressful. The woman’s entire body was shaking when I walked around behind her, and she screeched out a stream of nonsense in her panic.
“I swear I didn’t know. I’m sorry! Don’t kill me!”
“I’m not going to kill you,” I told her, having to speak more loudly than I wanted to because everyone in the room except me was so fucking loud. Leaning down, I slipped the knife inside the cable ties around her wrist as she tried to squirm away from me. “Dammit, be still or I’m going to cut you.”
“Oh my gawwwwd! Don’t cut me. I didn’t know he was married. I swear!” she wailed.
That’s when it hit me. She thought I was an angry wife.
“No, no. I’m not his wife. I’m just trying to cut you loose.” She finally stilled, and I slit the bindings. “There, you’re free. See? I wasn’t going to hurt you.”
She swiveled around to face me and scooted away before covering her ample breasts with her arms. Her makeup was destroyed, and fear radiated from her blue eyes. “Wh-what do you want?” At least she wasn’t screaming anymore.
Casting a quick glance at the man who was spitting curses and writhing on the floor with tears cascading down his face, I held out a tentative hand to her.
“Come on… uh, what’s your name?”
“Katya,” she said warily.
“Katya, let’s get you some clothes, and I’ll take you to the hospital. The police can take your statement there, if that’s what you want to do.”