Page 67 of Lesson In Forgiveness

Rotten teeth hit the floor like broken, blackened pebbles.

Thrashing, Tabitha reached up and back, blindly groping for her captor’s face. She sliced into his cheeks with her nails, clawing at his neck, his forehead. Anywhere she could reach as her struggles began to wane.

His laugh was utterly depraved. “Sometimes you just gotta throttle a bitch into submission.”

She tried again, fighting the heaviness in her arms. This time, when her nails skated down his forehead, she forced herself to focus and find his eye sockets. He roared when she jammed her nail into the soft globe of his eyeball, the sound escalating to a scream as she jabbed again and felt it pop.

Wet liquid streamed over her hand, down her arm, an instant before she crashed unceremoniously to her knees. The chain clattered beside her in a musical jangle, shocking her into taking a breath.

Fuck, that hurt. Her throat felt as though she’d swallowed razor blades, the delicate column of her esophagus swelling from the trauma.

“Fucking bitch!” A heavy boot connected with her stomach, flipping her onto her back. Another kick to her ribs cracked something, and the third stole what little breath she had left.

Staying perfectly still, Tabitha tried to assess the situation while she had a chance. Mangle was down and out. The man she’d blinded was howling, trying to put pressure on his perforated eyeball, while the guy she’d elbowed in the throat was writhing in an attempt to breathe.

The asshole with the knife through his boot had pulled it out and was conferring with the idiot wielding the baton.

Two left, she told herself. Just two left to disable, then she could dispatch them all and get the fuck out of dodge. But by everything holy, she fucking hurt in a way she couldn’t quite get under control.

Grunting painfully, she clambered to her feet, swaying slightly as her head protested. Ibuprofen wasn’t going to do the trick this time; she’d have to hit the heavy shit to function anything like a human being.

Two pairs of eyes—one unremarkable green, the other an ugly shade of brown—watched her with surprise. Perhaps they weren’t used to their victims standing after one of their beatings, but they weren’t to know she’d spent years receiving worse, and being expected to continue on as normal afterwards.

Pain stabbed down her side as she lifted her arm to point at the three wounded men. “They’re already dead,” she rasped in a tight voice, squeezing the words out through her bruised throat. “That’s the price they’ll pay. You two have a choice to make.”

The fuckwit with green eyes leered at her. “I’m gonna take your ass, girl. Make you scream for your daddy, then watch my boys take you apart, hole by hole.”

She grinned ferally, hiding the wince as her cheek throbbed. “Boy, my daddy did that a long time a-fucking-go.” She laughed, the sound deeper thanks to her near-strangulation. “He died choking on his cock after I cut it off and shoved it down his fucking throat.”

“She’s on something,” the fuckwit said when his friend blanched and took a step back. “Full of bullshit. The bitch can hardly stand up straight.”

That was true. Sheer willpower was keeping her on her feet, but it was her training and will to survive that was going to bring her out on top.

“What’s it going to be? Do you have dicks to choke on or are you just giant pussies?” she goaded, bracing herself for the next round.

They came at her as one.

She blocked a punch, took one to the lower abdomen that almost made her vomit. The baton turned her world to ash and smoke, striking wherever it could. Letting the pain blossom, consume her, she attacked with all the rage she could muster.

Her feral animosity took him by surprise, and she managed to drive him back with fists and feet. When he swung the baton at her head, she caught it in her hand, crying out as agony exploded in her bones, and smashed her boot into his balls with enough force she felt something pop.

He screamed, relinquishing his hold on his weapon, collapsing onto his knees.

Tabitha whirled to face the last man, adrenaline pumping through her like morphine now, flooding her veins so the pain ebbed into the background. She tried to block the knife with her new toy, but it skidded along the metal and carved a deep line through her bicep.

He hacked at her, fury clouding his aim, and she managed to fend off the majority of his thrusts before they made contact. Panting, wanting to be done with this shit, she took a step back, left herself open, and as he came after her with triumph in his gaze, slashed the baton across his face.

It stunned him for only a moment, but it was enough.

She brought the rod down on his weapon hand, sending the knife flying, then caught him across the throat with a vicious backhand. Vibrating with the high of an impending kill, she tossed the baton aside and cradled his skull in her hands.

Breaking a neck was easy when the training was ingrained in her. The right angle, the correct pressure, and a certain amount of strength was required. She had all three at her disposal now, her blood pumping so fucking hard, she felt as though she could tear apart the world with her bare hands.

Snarling like a beast, she twisted his head until his neck snapped with a sharp crack. The thump of his body hitting the floor was deeply, thrillingly satisfying.

Blood began to drip off the ends of her fingertips from the wounds on her arms. The smell of it stirred the need for more, to watch it run in rivers and sweeten the air.

Staggering over to the knife, she bent and picked it up, eyeing the remaining men in various states of agony. Through the sound of her heartbeat pounding in her ears, she thought she heard sirens, and cursed under her breath.

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