NICHOLAS (old version)

chapter fourteen: win

She still smells like me. Those pants look great on her. She'll hate me one day. I'm disg-

I closed down the link as quickly as I could, knowing the thoughts only got darker. Instead, I swallowed the anxiety in my throat, frowning at him.

"Nick, we need to talk." I said quietly, doing my best to ignore the dirty looks Jasmine was shooting me. 

"No, you don't. You need to stay the fuck away from him." Jasmine interjected, standing up and moving in front of him, arms crossed and leaning to her hip, as though she had some right to speak for him, to interject herself into the conversation. Ruin her, the animal chanted, and I did my best to ignore it.

I took a deep breath, trying to be the big girl. "Jasmine, I don't know who you think you are, but you're not me. And you're not Nick. So piss the fuck off and let me talk to my goddamn mate, because I'm trying really hard to be civilized and I'm getting very close to the edge." I bit out, unable to help the anger and hatred that made it's way into my eyes. 

She rolled her eyes, chuckling. "Oh? What're you going to do? You're five years younger and a foot shorter than me, I could crush you, sweetheart."

She wouldn't shut up. She kept going and going and I was almost tempted to swing right then and there - but that would be inappropriate. I'm a big girl. I'm a big girl. "Jasmine, I didn't chose this. I didn't chose Nick. He was given to me on a silver platter though, and I'm going to give it a shot. Now if you want to keep on fighting like a child, then swing at me. If not, then shut the fuck up and let me talk to my mate." I did my best to be a big girl. I didn't want to fight her, not particularly; I wasn't the fighting type. But at this point, if it would shut her up, I would.

"Fine." She said, and instead of turning and stomping off, she did swing. Hard and fast, her fist hit my cheek and I was stumbling backwards from the sheer weight behind her swing, my frame significantly too small.

She hit me right on the wound and it hurt, even through the bandage. My sanity was thrown to the back of my mind and the animal propelled forward, all instinct and training. She didn't want to cry from pain, she wanted it. The pain fueled her, gave her a fire, made her faster, stronger.

It was over just as quickly as it had begun. I was small, but I'd been taught to end fights, not play around with them. I swung and hit her throat, her eyes widened as she gripped it. My hands flew to her shoulders and I brought her down, my knee slamming into her stomach. I then brought my elbow down on the back of her neck, and she was on the ground, choking on the air.

She'd be fine.

Eventually.

I glanced up to see a crowd had gathered, and even Nicholas stood, looking shocked. Pride flowed into my that wasn't my own and he stared at me with this bewildered, amazed look, as though he'd just seen me take down a full grown man.

It's what I'd been taught, of course. I was small and fragile, I was never taught to be a warrior like Candy and Tyler. So, while they were trained to shoot and be offensive, I was taught to get very large men on the ground very quickly. So a relatively large woman was a step down.

I opened my mouth to ask Nick if we could now go, but I was interrupted by cheering. It took a second for me to realize that the handful of people in the dining room were looking at me with pride and delight, cheering for me. Nick's words from earlier caught up to me, and it occurred to me that a show of power was exactly what they wanted. They wanted to see that I was some big bad Alpha female who didn't take shit.

If believing that would keep them from hating me, then I'd let them. Maybe I could convince them I wasn't some savage, but for now... it was easier.