“I want to hear it.”
Stupidly, I nodded again. “Yes,” I said, after fighting to regain the power of thought.
“Good girl.” He gave me a moment to recover the ability to walk, then led me toward the street where, I presumed, he’d parked.
We’d only taken two steps toward the intersection of the alley and the street when a shadow fell across the sidewalk, followed quickly by a form that I recognized. Bruiser.
A second guy flanked him, tall and lean, with the kind of sauntering walk that told the world he could beat the crap out of just about anyone.
A shock of panic—hard and fast and cold—shot through me. How could this have happened? I never take my guard down when I’m outside, and sure as hell not in a dark alley. And yet I’d been totally unaware of everything. I’d seen nothing, heard nothing, noticed nothing. From the moment we exited the club, there had been only Evan. I’d let myself go with him—I’d let myself fly—and everything had gone to hell. Fuck.
“He the one that horned in on your girl?” the lean guy asked.
“My girl? More like my slut.” Bruiser aimed his beady eyes at me. “What would your mamma say about you doing the nasty in a dark alley with that son of a bitch?”
“Fuck you,” I snapped. Or, at least, I tried to. Instead, the words stuck in my throat, trapped there when I spied the glint of the knife in Bruiser’s hand. A chill crept over my entire body, icy fingers trailing up my spine. I sucked in air, and tasted salt water. I closed my eyes, and saw blood.
This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening.
I didn’t realize that I’d taken a step backward until I felt Evan’s hand closing tight around mine, locking me in place. I froze, taking shallow breaths, trying to concentrate only on the reassuring feel of his hold upon me.
He was order to my chaos, calm to my storm. Fear might have me tight in its grip, but Evan slipped out of its fist like butter. The alley—hell, the whole damn situation—was his to command.
“I think you owe the lady an apology,” he said smoothly.
“Fuck you.”
“I’d really rather not,” Evan said. “Now get the hell out of my way.” His voice was hard, his manner equally so. He took a single step toward them, forcing me to take a corresponding one. I bit my lower lip, then tasted blood. I saw Bruiser’s mouth moving, but I couldn’t make out the words. Though I knew I was looking at this dark Chicago alley, what I saw was the barnacled posts beneath the pier. What I heard was the crash of the ocean against the beach. It was as if I’d fallen into one of my dreams, and I couldn’t fight my way out of the nightmare.
Then Bruiser lunged, leading with the knife, and the sharp pierce of a scream ripped me back into reality. It took a second before I realized that it was my scream, and that in that minuscule amount of time, Evan had released my hand, raised his arm, and managed to block the oncoming knife.
“Shit, Chris!” the lean guy shouted as Evan twisted Chris-the-Bruiser’s arm behind his back and wrested the knife free.
“Motherfucker!” Chris snarled, but he didn’t struggle, and from where I stood I could see why—considering Evan’s grip, if Chris even breathed wrong, his arm was going to snap.
“You fucked up bad, pretty boy,” the lean guy spat, already in motion with his own knife tight in his hand.
In the kind of move that Hollywood directors probably spent weeks choreographing, Evan shoved Chris aside, spun toward the lean guy, knocked his knife arm out of the way, then thrust the tip of the knife he’d taken off Chris into the flesh at the base of the lean guy’s throat. Chris cursed and sprinted down the alley, leaving his buddy to Evan’s mercy.
Evan didn’t even spare him a glance, his attention focused entirely on the lean guy with the knife still twitching in his hand. “Give me a reason,” Evan said. “Give me just one reason, and I’ll slice through you like butter.”