Page 56 of They Break Beauty

Adrenaline pulsed, reverberating through me.

Just keep walking. You’re being paranoid.

Of course I was. It was just my terror of the dark skewing things.

I was just starting to spiral. It wasn’t real.

I forced myself to remain calm even as the adrenaline didn’t dissipate and, instead, started to climb, making my hands shake with it.

I turned the corner, going the opposite route to the parking lot, this way leading to nothing. Whoever was behind me should then pass right on by, then I could relax and come out, and not be in a highly-strung state by the time I reached my car and needed to drive.

I squinted through the dark, the faint glow of moon high in the sky providing just enough light for me to see a shrouded figure nearing the corner I’d just taken.

My breath caught in my throat when they slowed down instead of continuing on.

And then they turned, coming the same way I had.

Coming toward me.

I used the darkness and shadow to my advantage, ducking into a slight alcove and flattening my back against it.

They were actually following me.

It was a fact now, not merely a paranoid delusion.

As my anxiety threatened to take the wheel and make me useless and likely freeze up, I channeled the adrenaline into something else altogether.

I focused it into strategizing, into what needed to be done.

I also reminded myself that I had the skillset to defend myself and to dispose of a threat. I wouldn’t let myself freeze up and compromise that. I wouldn’t let fear rule me.

I wouldn’t let it hurt me.

Not anymore.

I was sick of it.

So fucking sick of it.

The heavy footsteps drew closer.

Closer. Closer.

As soon as the figure was within reach, I struck, snatching their arm, using it as leverage to yank them into me as I bent at a ninety-degree angle, then used their weight combined with the momentum to haul them over my shoulder.

Satisfaction surged through me as the stalker landed with a brutal thud on the unforgiving concrete, grunting as the wind was knocked out of them.

It had taken me ages to learn that move and I’d only employed it once in a real life fight prior to now.

I didn’t have too long to bask in the success of it and the power I felt as a result, I needed to incapacitate the offender quickly before they were able to recover.

Pouncing, I straddled them, driving my knee brutally between their legs, feeling my knee cap grinding into a hard cock. He grunted again as I brutalized his balls in the process too.

I used the opportunity to pin his hands down with one of mine against his chest, digging my nails into his palm.

Then I reared back with my free hand to deliver a knockout blow to his temple.

I never made contact.

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