Chapter 1 First Meeting
Isabella POV
A murder, a real murder. It happened so fast that by the time my brain registered it, the moment was already gone. I didn’t call the police, I didn’t even think to. I didn’t have a weapon or any way to intervene, and only an idiot would run toward danger without knowing what was happening. For all I knew, it could’ve been two homeless men fighting over a trash bin. It wasn’t even nine yet, but the streets were empty thanks to the brutal cold. Of course I had to be the only person stupid enough to be outside.
I hadn’t heard a single sound. Nothing to warn me and I always sensed danger before it found me but this man wasn’t ordinary. He moved like a ghost with no crunch of boots in the snow, no shift in the air.
His hand clamped over my mouth, cutting off my scream before it even rose.
Then the knife touched my throat cold steel against cold skin pressing hard enough to tell me he wasn’t bluffing. His voice was as frigid as the blade, as sharp as the winter air stinging my lungs. Snow fell harder, swallowing the glow of the nearest apartment building. A perfect backdrop for violence.
“Make a sound and I’ll slit your throat. I’ll leave you to bleed out like livestock.” Why the hell hadn’t I taken a different route home?
I forced myself to breathe and stay still. “That’s my girl,” he murmured.
I hated that phrase, hated the condescension dripping off it. I tried to speak against his palm.
“Fuck. You.” “What did I just”
I stomped on his boot, trying to flip him the way my father taught me, but the man was enormous. He barely budged.
I gave up on the maneuver and bolted. “Stupid fucking girl.”
His hand hooked my ankle, yanking me down so hard my body smacked the concrete. He came at me again, knife raised, ready to follow through on everything he promised.
He pinned me, positioning the blade above my throat but then he paused.
Something flickered in his eyes. Recognition? Confusion? I didn’t know. For the first time, I saw his face fully, fair skin, shockingly blue eyes, a sculpted jaw. I’d pictured a filthy stranger, some deranged drifter.
Not a man who looked like he belonged on the cover of a magazine.
He still held the knife, but hesitation crept in. The bloodlust was there I saw it but something held him back. This wasn’t the type of man who made empty threats.
He shoved me down again, right into a mound of snow and with reflexes too fast to follow, he pulled a gun from his jacket and pressed the barrel against my cheek, the metal colder than the ice beneath me.
I stopped screaming. Panic wasn’t going to save me, I needed a plan.
A slow smirk tugged at his mouth, his eyes narrowing with amusement.
“Why’d you stop screaming?”
“Because I’m trying to figure out how to kill you.”
His grin widened into something wickedly entertained. A short laugh left him as he pressed the gun harder against my skin. “You’re cute.”
He stood and holstered the weapon like I wasn’t a threat at all. He shouldn’t underestimate me.
He even turned his back, walking toward the mangled corpse he’d left behind. “Don’t run,” he warned. “It’ll only end worse.”
He dragged the body across snow and asphalt, placing it beside me on purpose.
I’d never stared death in the face like that. The man I’d shot while escaping Rowan who wanted to rape me and that was different. I hadn’t stopped to look.
But this corpse, has his skull had been crushed so severely his face was unrecognizable. Bile rose in my throat.
The killer crouched until our eyes were level. Shadows clung to the angles of his jaw, dusted with a light stubble. His hair was dirty blond, messy but almost stylish. Everything about him was impossibly attractive, wrong for this place, wrong for this moment.
“You don’t want to end up like that, do you?”
I couldn’t look at the body again. “You don’t either,” I rasped. “So let me go.”
He laughed again, amused like this was all a game. “I can’t remember the last time someone made me laugh.” “There’s nothing funny about your death.”
His smile deepened as he fetched a body bag from his van. My eyes flicked toward the alley opening. If someone walked past, even for a second, I could sprint or maybe I could quietly dig out my phone it was still in my purse.
I had one second. I went for the phone. He slid the corpse into the bag, not even glancing at me as he spoke.
“Call whoever you want. The cops won’t touch me. Make it worth the effort.” My father was too far, so was Varos my brother but I had to try something.
He lifted the body into the van, the thud echoing. I tore open my purse and reached for my phone.
He snatched the purse from my hand and tossed it into the van. “You’re slow.” “Fuck you,” I spat.
Again, my defiance only entertained him. “Get in the passenger seat. Or I’ll put you there myself.”
I stared at the van, then at the street. “Baby,” he warned softly, “don’t. You won’t get far and the punishment will be brutal.” “Don’t call me baby.”
“You’re my baby now,” he said casually. “I’ll call you whatever I want.” “You’re going to kill me anyway.”
I stood, brushing snow from my clothes.
So I might as well ran with full speed, lungs burning. If I got into that van, I was dead. No question. I’d rather die fighting than let him torture me.
I didn’t make it far. His hand clamped on my shoulder, and a sharp sting hit my neck. A taser.
My entire body seized, limbs locking before I collapsed onto the asphalt. Dazed, shaking, but stubborn enough to stand again I pushed myself up and tried to run. He burst out laughing.
“Jesus Christ, I’ve never seen someone get up after that.”
He caught me easily, pressed the taser to the other side of my neck, and held it twice as long. Pain exploded through me, ripping a cry from my throat.
I crumpled again, weaker this time. My body begged to stay down, to quit, to accept that I was outmatched. He was too strong, too fast, too powerful.
My size meant nothing, my skills meant nothing and he knew it.