Twisted Loyalties (The Camorra Chronicles 1)

Fabiano shook his head. “Life isn’t fair, Leona. You should know. Your attacker won’t be a one hundred pound female with delicate feelings. He will be a two hundred pound fucker who likes to hurt females with delicate feelings.” And then he towered over me again, all muscle and strength and power, and I wanted to kiss him, not fight him.

“That knife,” he said in a low, threatening voice as he held out the blade between us. “It can be your salvation or your downfall.” He gripped my arm and whirled me around. My back collided with his chest as he pressed me against him. I was frozen with shock. He touched the tip of the blade to the skin between my breasts, then he slowly trailed it down to my stomach. The pressure wasn’t enough to leave a mark but my stomach turned at the thought of how it would feel if it were. “That knife can give your opponent another advantage over you. If you can’t handle the knife, you shouldn’t use it.” He let go of me and I staggered forward, out of his embrace. My heart pounded in my chest as I looked down at myself. I could still feel the touch of the blade on my skin. I closed my eyes, trying to stop my rising panic, and worse, arousal.

Fabiano was right. If my attacker got hold of my knife, he’d use it against me. The knife had given me a sense of security but now even that was gone. I turned around to Fabiano who was watching me intently. He held the knife out to me. I approached him slowly and took it.

“Cut me,” he said.

“Excuse me?” I asked.

“Cut me. I want to see if you have what it takes to hurt someone. Cut me.”

I shook my head, taking a step back. “I won’t. This is stupid.”

Fabiano shook his head in obvious annoyance, then snatched the knife from my grip. His eyes held mine as he pressed the blade against his palm and slashed. I staggered back, not from the blood welling up, but from his actions. He dropped the knife to the ground. Blood dripped down on the grey flooring. He squeezed his bleeding hand into a fist, and more blood coated his knuckles.

“I can see that you are scared. Fear is never a good companion in a fight,” Fabiano said, looking completely at ease in the fighting cage. No sign of pain either.

For him this was familiar ground, a place he felt at home in. For me the high cage seemed to tower over me menacingly. Even its luxurious surroundings couldn’t change that. And it wasn’t really helping that I was supposed to fight Fabiano. With his rock-hard stomach, muscled arms and keen eyes he looked already a fighter. And I had seen him fight. There was nothing to compare it to. His speed. His strength. His determination.

I, however, felt out of place.

Fabiano opened his arms, palms outward. My eyes lingered on the gash in his palm he seemed oblivious to. “Hit me. That’s something you can do, right?”

I took a step toward him.

“Curl you hands into fists. Don’t even think about hitting me with your open palm. You’re not swatting at a fly.”

He was making fun of me. I clenched my fists as he’d ordered and took another step toward him. I wasn’t even sure where to hit him. He took a sudden step toward me, startling me, and I backed off.

“Hit me,” he ordered again.

I propelled my fist forward and rammed it into his stomach. A second before the impact I could see his sixpack become an eightpack as he tightened his muscles.

My knuckles collided with his hard stomach and I winced. I pulled back immediately.

“Was that your hardest hit?” he asked.

I frowned. “Yes. Why? Was it that bad?”

His expression gave me an unmistakable answer. “Now kick me as hard as you can and aim as high as possible.”

Hitting had already felt strange but kicking someone was completely out of my comfort zone.

I swung my leg and landed a kick against his ribs. He shook his head. I might as well have batted at him with a feather boa. “That’s no good. I’m not even moving and your aim and force are already bad.”

Had he anything nice to say? I was starting to get annoyed.

He got into a fighting stance and faced away from me. Then he did a high kick against the cage. The crash made me jump and the ground vibrated under my bare feet from the force of Fabiano’s kick. It was still hard to believe how high he could raise his leg and how hard he could kick with it. My leg would have fallen off if I’d tried to move it that high up.

“Perhaps you don’t have the right incentive. Most women only ever dare to hit hard when they’re cornered. Let’s pretend I’m attacking you.”