In her mind, she chased the blackness with her light. “I’m not going anywhere, Punisher. Nothing you say or do will make me back off. And if you think you can come to me and try to scare me away with your theatrics, think again! Drop the weapon, NOW!” she barked the direct order, fueling it with her gift.
The bloody knife clattered to the ground, but the soldier didn’t look to be standing down. Instead, he took on a fighting stance right back at Meg.
“I’ll make you a deal, bitch. If you kick my ass, you can visit the others as much as you want. If I win, you not only stay away from us, but you have to pick up that knife and stab this body as punishment for losing.”
“Those are some sick terms, Punisher,” Meg moved slowly toward the middle of the room. The obsidian-eyed alter followed her, step by step. “If I weren’t sure your ass is grass, I might have to decline, but since I have no doubt I’ll win, the terms don’t matter.”
The face that belonged to Gideon sneered, chuckled, then full-on laughed. “Those are some big brass balls you have, bit—”
Before he could finish his sentence, Meg grabbed the silver serving tray left on the dresser and flung it Frisbee-style at her opponent’s throat. Racing behind it, she watched him block it with his arm. Even as he dropped it, Meg used both of her hands to brutally cup-slap both his ears, perforating his eardrums instantly.
Dazed and reeling in pain, the Punisher stumbled. Meg used that instant to grab the wingback chair by the door and swung it directly at his head. His thick body smashed to the ground, eyes wild with fury.
He grabbed a leg of the now broken chair and staggered momentarily before swinging the thick wood like a bat at Meg’s head. She ducked onto her knees and bent backward until her long hair swept the floor behind her before springing back upright and punching him square in the kidney.
He backed away holding his side and watched the girl leap to her feet. He tackled her from the side just as she was trying to regain her footing. Spinning her, he moved to control her from behind.
She shoved herself back and rammed his body into the wall. The mirror there shattered behind his head, shards raining from the wall. Meg braced her right arm and elbowed him six times before he unlocked his forearm from around her neck and folded over in pain.
That’s when the Punisher dove for the knife still waiting, blood drying to match the red paint on the walls. Meg kicked it from his hand, spun and back kicked him in the gut. She grabbed the frame of the broken mirror from the wall and, with speed faster than the alter could follow, tangled his arm in it, yanked it back and brought him to his knees.
Meg shoved him face down into the hand-scraped, hardwood floors and jabbed her sharp, powerful knee into his sciatic nerve. He was trying not to gasp in pain.
“You see, Punisher,” Meg yanked his arm back even more impossibly. “You may have been in charge of punishing the system before, but now, you’re one hell of a lame duck because there’s a new sheriff in charge. You better go hide your cowardly ass back in the crevice you came from and send out Sirus or you’ll get to contend with the real bitch inside me!”
The body beneath her fell slack. “Damn witch, get the hell off me!”
Meg didn’t move though she could recognize Sirus’ voice anywhere.
“And this is what you get, asshole, if you ever call me a ‘witch’ again. Are we clear?” Meg yanked his arm twisted and ripped from the shards of mirror still clinging to the inside of the frame.
“Yeah! Yes. Sorry,” Sirus bellowed.
Meg sprang off Sirus and watched him slowly untangle himself from the frame, pick up his dignity and cower back inside the body.
She looked into Gideon’s surprised, hurt eyes by the time the man’s body was standing.
Meg cocked her head, reached to her bed to retrieve the black stockings folded neatly on the perfectly undisturbed comforter then down to the bloody knife still spinning in the corner of the room from when she’d kicked it. One slice with the razor-sharp blade separated a perfect swath of the material. Without a word, Meg walked up to the dazed and confused soldier and wrapped the handmade tourniquet around his upper thigh.
Though he was hurting terribly and bleeding profusely, the pressure of her touch made goose bumps jump across his skin. She yanked the stocking into a tight double knot then grabbed his hand and walked him toward the bathroom. “You’re going to need stitches and I happen to be quite good at giving them. Apparently, the woman who raised me as her daughter used to be quite the soldier herself. I understand she taught me all about battlefield first aid. I saw a sewing kit in one of the bathroom drawers.”
“Meg? What happened?” Gideon gladly held her hand and hobbled beside her toward the light spilling from the half-open bathroom door, but a guy had to know.