Eleanor's POV
"Sorry," I mumbled to Mira. "I just… didn't expect it to be so… loud."
To my surprise, she didn't roll her eyes.
"It's a lot. I get it," she said, her voice low. She then linked her arm through mine, a solid, comforting weight that grounded me. "Just breathe. Look around. Get the lay of the land."
Arm in arm with her, the frantic drumming in my chest began to slow. I forced myself to actually see the scene instead of just panicking through it.
I took in the groups clustered around hoods, lit by the glow of cigarettes and phone screens. I studied the rows of cars, a museum of modified aggression—sleek Japanese imports, hulking American muscle, all rumbling with impatient energy.
Another pair of cars screamed down, performing, their rear ends swinging out in a controlled, beautiful drift before screeching to a perfect halt inches from a spray-painted line on the wall. The crowd erupted in cheers.
Two drivers emerged. The loser, a bulky man with a permanently sour expression, slammed his door so hard the whole car shook. He looked like he wanted to strangle the winner.
And the winner… was a woman.
She was clad in dark, practical gear, her face obscured by a patterned racing mask and a cap pulled low, but her build was unmistakably feminine.
A ripple of surprised admiration went through me. Then, a flicker of something else… a nagging sense of familiarity in the way she held herself. But before I could pin it down, Mira unhooked her arm from mine.
"Okay, stay right here. I'm going to go talk to the woman. Try not to panic. Alright?"
My anxiety spiked again. Was that good? Being left alone? Or bad? Definitely bad. "O-okay," I managed, forcing a neutral expression onto my face that I hoped screamed 'professional bystander' and not 'terrified rabbit.'
She was heading straight for the female racer.
I was alone. I clasped my hands in front of me, trying to project a calm I absolutely did not feel.
A few people glanced my way, their eyes lingering on me. I focused intently on a fascinating oil stain on the asphalt.
Then a low whistle cut through the din from my left. "Hey, sweetheart. You lost?" a voice called. I kept my eyes locked on the ground.
"Nah, man, look at her. She's waiting for a real man to give her a ride," another jeered, followed by a round of rough laughter.
"Bet she'd look real good bent over a hood, huh?"
The comments were like physical barbs, each one landing and making me shrink inward.
Don't look. Don't engage. Just be invisible. I focused all my willpower on Mira, tracking her progress as she gestured animatedly, talking to the masked woman who stood with her arms crossed, listening intently.
I prayed that ignoring them had worked, that they'd gotten their laughs and moved on. The hope was a fragile, fleeting thing. A large hand suddenly clamped onto my shoulder, spinning me around. I flinched hard, my heart leaping into my throat.
The man from the group loomed over me, his grin revealing a gold-capped tooth. His eyes roamed over me with a possessiveness that made my skin crawl. "Hey now, no need to be scared, beautiful," he said, his voice a greasy smear in the air.
"Just curious what a pretty thing like you is doing in a place like this. Came to admire the real machines? The ones with engines, I mean." He chuckled at his own joke.
My mouth went dry. "Please leave me alone," I managed to say, the words coming out as a thin, reedy whisper I hated.
His grin didn't falter. "Aw, don't be like that. Name's Razor. I'm one of the bosses around here. Could show you a real good time. Give you a private tour." As he spoke, he hooked his arm around my shoulders, pulling me into his side.
He dipped his head, his nose far too close to my hair, and inhaled deeply. "Mmm. You smell expensive. We could go somewhere quiet, continue this discussion."
A wave of pure revulsion shot through me. I shoved against his chest, twisting out of his grasp with a strength born of panic. "I said I'm not interested." My voice was firmer this time, laced with a fear I couldn't fully hide.
My eyes desperately sought Mira, a silent scream in my gaze. Look over here. Please, just look over. She was still deep in conversation with the masked racer, completely unaware.
Razor's friendly pretense evaporated. His expression darkened as he took a deliberate step forward, his broad shoulders blocking my view of Mira entirely, cutting off my only lifeline. "That wasn't very nice," he said, his voice dropping to a low, threatening rumble. "I was being friendly. Now you've gotta make it up to me."
Before I could even process a next move, his arms snapped around me in a crushing embrace, pinning my own arms to my sides. It was a violent parody of the comfort Mira had offered minutes before. The smell of cheap cologne, sweat, and gasoline filled my nostrils, making my stomach lurch.
I struggled, twisting and pushing against him, but it was like trying to move a brick wall. He was immovably strong, his laugh a low, ugly sound vibrating through his chest and into mine. Panic, cold and sharp, seized my lungs, making it hard to breathe.
And then, cutting through the roaring in my ears and the thrum of distant engines, a voice. It wasn't an audible sound. It was a thought that wasn't mine, a whisper that slithered through the cracks of my terror. It was soft, yet impossibly clear, chilling in its simplicity.
Kill him.
I froze. What? My mind, already reeling, couldn't make sense of it. It was a foreign impulse, a monstrous suggestion that had no place in my head. Was I hallucinating from fear?
His grip tightened, one of his hands starting to roam lower down my back. The vile intention in that movement snapped me out of my paralysis. I didn't know what that voice was, but I knew what I had to do. I fell back on the oldest trick in the book, the one thing I'd seen in every movie, every self-defense class article I'd ever skimmed.
Gathering every ounce of strength I had, I brought my knee up. Hard.
It wasn't a graceful move. It was desperate, clumsy, and fueled by pure, undiluted terror. But it connected with a sickening, satisfying thud.
The air left his lungs in a pained, high-pitched wheeze. The brutal strength in his arms vanished instantly, replaced by a spasming weakness as he crumpled forward, his hands flying to his groin. A guttural, choked sound of agony was all he could manage as he sank to his knees on the greasy asphalt.
For a single, blessed second, there was only the sound of his ragged, pained gasps. Then, the spell broke. Razor's head snapped up, his face a grotesque mask of pain and fury, his eyes blazing with pure hatred.
"You stupid bitch!" he snarled, the words choked and wet. "You think you can do that to me? I'm gonna break you for that!"
His shouts were a signal. Three of his friends, the ones who had been catcalling me earlier, materialized from the crowd, their expressions shifting from amusement to cold anger. They formed a half-circle around me, cutting off any escape.
"What'd you do to Razor, you crazy whore?" one of them spat.
"You're gonna pay for that," another growled, cracking his knuckles.
"Yeah, you're in deep shit now, sweetheart."
Oh, no. The panic that had receded came roaring back, a tidal wave of pure dread. I was in serious, serious trouble. My eyes darted frantically, but the crowd was just watching, a spectator sport. Mira was still nowhere to be seen.
And then the voice came again, no longer a whisper but a cold, insistent command that echoed in the very core of my skull.
Kill them. Lay waste to them all.
It was so vivid, so violent. A strange heat began to bloom in my veins, a feverish warmth that spread through my limbs, burning away the edge of my fear and replacing it with something else… something terrifyingly primal. My vision sharpened, the details of the grimy alley becoming hyper-focused—the rust on a nearby pipe, the individual pores on Razor's snarling face.
I brought my hands up to my face, a reflexive gesture of disbelief, and my breath hitched. For a split second, I could have sworn I saw my fingernails elongate into sharp, wicked points. Claws. I blinked, and they were normal again. A trick of the shadowy light and my frayed nerves. It had to be.
But the feeling didn't leave. It was a pulsing, hungry need for violence. A bloodlust. The term surfaced from some forgotten corner of my mind, shocking me. How could I, Eleanor, be feeling something called bloodlust?
Razor, still on his knees, reached out and viciously yanked my head down by my hair, forcing me to look at him. Pain lanced across my scalp.
"You think you're something special?" he hissed, his breath hot and foul. "You're nothing. A stuck-up little princess who needs to be taught her place. I'm gonna enjoy taming that fire out of you. I'm gonna make you beg before I'm through."
The heat in my body flared, white-hot. The voice in my head screamed in agreement, not with fear, but with a ferocious, eager rage.
THUD!!