Predatory
36: Never Enough

A/N: Content Warning: There's kind of a lot of blood and violence in here. Proceed at your own risk.

SASHA POV

“Had enough, Sukoshku?” Anselm taunts me.

“Have I had enough, Anselm? You should know better than that,” I reply in kind, but I’m glancing to the sides. I have enough of a vertical leap to get away over the debris to my left, but I want him to think he has me cornered.

“Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. It’s looking pretty hopeless for you, Sukoshku.”

“It’s not over yet. It wouldn’t have come to this if you’d stayed at HQ and let me do my job. You’ve trusted me on hundreds of seemingly more serious cases than this one.”

“I might just as well ask why you decided to stake your career and your life on this target.”

“I told you. No evidence of wrongdoing. Certainly nothing warranting an execution.” He swats at my shoulder and I narrowly avoid it. He’s closer than I’d like him to be, but if I drag this out, catch him off-guard… “My job is to see that justice is served and the law is enforced, but he has broken no laws—”

“You are mistaken. Your job is to follow orders.”

This fucking bastard.

“So this has all been a test of loyalty.” He looks offended. He’s very close, in biting distance. Just a little longer…

“I prefer to know for sure which of my operatives can be trusted to have my back if something goes sideways or—” Sᴇaʀch Thᴇ Findɴovel.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

His thought-speech cuts off as an earth-shattering roar erupts from his throat—likely because his balls are in my jaws. He left himself open and I dove underneath him, rather than leaping away.

Payback’s a bitch, isn’t it, Anselm? I bite down harder. He roars even louder. A glance up reveals some sort of shimmering ripple across the ceiling.

“Our wards can’t handle much more of that, Boss,” Tempest calls from above. He and Ariadne seem to be frantically trying to cast some sort of spell—maybe more soundproofing or something?—but I can’t worry about that now. With a twist of my head, Anselm’s balls tear free from his body, and then I sprint away, zigzagging as much as I can. He should be in too much pain to follow me, but I can’t take any chances. As I round a corner, I discreetly drop my bloody trophy into one of at least a dozen identical dusty boxes. I don’t want to risk that being found in time for Anselm’s fae assistants to make him whole again. I know they’re capable of it.

Anselm is still rumbling and groaning back where I left him. This isn’t over yet. I have to finish what I started.

Have I dragged this out sufficiently to make him bleed for every innocent life he’s snuffed out? I can’t be sure. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve hit him.

And it will never be enough. Even so, as long as he dies here, justice will be served.

Do I have what it takes to finish it?

That sprint took a lot out of me. I’m more tired than I was at the end of my fight with Svartheron, but I can’t let on. He can’t see weakness in me, not now. I practically prance as I approach him again. He’s curled up on the ground in pain, a puddle of blood under his nether regions.

“Ready to retire, Anselm?” I jab. His head snaps up, eyes wild and teeth bared with pain. He struggles to his feet, growling and slavering. I step closer to him slowly, teasing him, and then he’s coming after me with clumsy, heavy paw swipes and snapping jaws. I dodge each strike, keeping the margins narrow. I want him angry, and it’s working; I’m getting snatches of thought-noise from him—nothing coherent, but he’s losing control.

Bob, weave, duck, dodge, rinse and repeat. He’s still coming, inexorable, furious. I can’t keep this up forever. He’s learned from earlier. With every move I make, I’m looking for an opening, but he’s keeping his defenses tight. I don’t want to keep trading minor blows. This needs to end.

Sometimes, in order to win, you have to make your opponent think they’ve won, let them land a devastating blow and make it look like they earned the hit, then strike for the kill while they’re gloating.

I’ve used that strategy before.

It always works.

I fucking hate it.

Rika made me promise to never use it again, after that incident with the rogue mermaids where I would’ve sunk to the bottom of the ocean with them if she and Zoe hadn’t fished me out.

Anselm’s paw barely misses my head. Too close. I have to act soon.

Tempest and Ariadne are still overhead. For now they’re staying out of things, but there’s no guarantee they’ll let me out of this alive, especially if I let him hit me really hard in order to get a chance to finish him off.

But it will be more than worth whatever price I have to pay to have him dead, once and for all.

“Had enough yet, old man?” I sneer, hissing at him.

He gathers his haunches under him and lunges.

“Boss, perimeter compromised!” Ariadne shrieks. A piece of sheet metal flies through the air and pins her to the nearest wall. Zoe?

Anselm’s teeth sink deep into my hip, the one he clawed before, as I twist to try to avoid him. Fuck fuck fuck that huuuuuuuurts.

Hold it together, Sasha. Not a sound, not a hint. Finish what you started.

Slide across the floor under Anselm. Drive all of my front claws into his primordial pouch. Tear down, shred skin and muscle, create an opening—there. Shove my head inside his abdomen. Finish him. Clamp teeth down hard on the organs within.

He releases my hip, roars in pain again. Can’t use that leg. Hold it in the air, back up back up back up, keep teeth closed tight. Entrails pull out of his torso as I withdraw. Blood everywhere, so much blood.

Anselm tries to stagger after me, stumbles, falls.

Behind him, a huge gunmetal grey wolf with blazing golden eyes, primed to lunge. A faint hint of sickeningly familiar scents—wood smoke, healthy evergreen forest, and summer air just after a thunderstorm—mixes with the stench of blood, filling my nostrils.

Drake.

Fuck.

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