Some things you just can’t escape.

No matter how fast or long you run from them.

Me? I had an ingrained need to unleash violence on people who hurt those weaker than them. Those who harmed the innocent. The impulse had been in my blood for a long damn time, and hadn’t weakened much over the years.

I’d just gotten better at resisting it.

But now was not the fucking time for resistance.

Not when I’d burst into Cat’s shabby little apartment to find her fighting off two whacked-out junkies at the same time. I spared her the briefest of glances to make sure she wasn’t seriously injured before I focused my attention on the scrawny guy with the watery, red eyes that had a wild glint in them. Those tears were no doubt from the pepper spray Cat still had clutched in her tiny hand. Frankly, the fucker was lucky she’d had that pepper spray. Because if she’d been completely defenseless and he’d hurt her in any way, he wouldn’t have been leaving this room alive.

I grabbed the bastard by the back of his shirt and flung him out the open door. His body slammed into the hallway wall, splitting the drywall. His body started to slump before I yanked him back up by the neck and made him look me right in the eyes.

“You broke into the wrong apartment, motherfucker,” I whispered, my voice cutting.

“P-please,” he sputtered, spittle flying out of his mouth. “We didn’t do noth—”

I drove my fist into his jaw. This time, when his legs began to crumple beneath him, I let him fall like the cowardly pussy he was. And even though I knew he had no fight in him, and wouldn’t even dare to challenge me, I hit him again.

And again.

And again.

My fists pummeled his face, ferocious and savage, each punch punctuated by my own growls of rage. But it wasn’t only anger coursing through my veins. I was getting a sick amount of pleasure from bashing this lowlife’s face into a bloody pulp until he was knocked out cold. Every contact of my knuckles with his paper-thin flesh was like a breath of fresh air to my insides.

The release of adrenaline. Endorphins.

So much repressed energy.

It built up inside me every day. If I didn’t have an outlet to release it all, it was likely to explode in the most self-destructive of ways.

I’d learned that before.

I was eventually able to rein myself in, but only because I didn’t want Cat to see me commit murder. No doubt, she was already freaked out enough by what she’d just witnessed. Probably thought I was some kind of psycho. She most likely wouldn’t give me the time of day now, let alone get anywhere near me.

Or let my blood-stained hands get anywhere near her.

Turning away from the poor excuse for a man lying on the floor, I rose to my feet. If I hadn’t heard his stilted breaths, I might have thought him dead. I stomped back inside Cat’s apartment to find her standing stock-still in the same place I left her. I plucked the other man off the floor, who’d been watching the scene with terrified eyes and a trembling lip, as he held his mangled knee. I tossed him out into the hall to join his unconscious buddy, rolling my eyes at his moans of pain.

“Get the fuck out of this building right now and don’t ever come back,” I grated in a sinister voice. “And if you ever think of going near her again, I’ll kill you.”

That was no idle threat.

I considered it my sacred duty to rid scum like him from this earth. He wasn’t doing society any favors, especially if he was the type to go after innocent women.

The frightened man with the injured knee nodded rapidly and hobbled to his feet. With only the weight of one leg, he nearly buckled under the additional weight of his friend, but managed to limp them both down the hall and out of my sight.

Just before I whipped around to face Cat, I commanded my faculties to regain control of themselves. Especially the homicidal look in my eyes that I knew was there. Slowing my breaths, I carefully wheeled around, cautious not to spook her. This was one I really didn’t want to scare off.

If I haven’t already.

My shoulders barely fit through the narrow doorway. After flipping on the lights, I was able to see just how small her studio apartment was. My king-sized bed wouldn’t have fit inside the space, which explained the twin mattress that was shoved against the wall and looked more like a cot than an actual bed.

Everything about the place pissed me the fuck off.

I pushed the black hood off my head.

Cat sucked in a sharp breath. “You…”

If I was capable of laughing in that moment, I would have busted a damn gut at the look of bewilderment on her gorgeous face. But I didn’t laugh easily these days. My funny bone had been numb ever since my time with the Rangers. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to laugh again after seeing a tweaked-out asshole lunging at Cat with a deranged look in his eyes.

That shit was now permanently etched onto my brain.

I grinned wryly. “I sense a pattern developing here.”

She opened and closed her mouth several times before she was able to get out, “What are you doing here?”

My expression hardened. “Apparently, finishing what you started.” I tipped my head toward the hallway. “I think you broke his knee. Not bad. Maybe I didn’t need to intercede at all.”

She’d definitely handled herself. Impressively. Capably.

But the mere fact that something like that had even happened to her sent me into another state of mind. Back to my ops days when I was the personification of living, breathing destruction. They’d send me in when our snipers couldn’t get the target in their crosshairs. Or when the situation needed to be contained within close quarters. They sent me in when a threat needed to be not just neutralized, but obliterated.

A minute ago, I went back there.

Back to the desert. Back to the blood. Back to the obscurity.

Just moments before, I’d been seconds away from taking that motherfucker out. It would have been so easy. A quick snap of his neck would have required nothing more than a flick of my wrist. Barging into her apartment and seeing her in that defensive stance had my protective instincts firing on all cylinders. The need to keep her safe had suddenly become the only thing in my world, my only purpose in this life.

All in a matter of about thirty seconds.

The scariest part? That urge hadn’t left me. It was still there, scraping at that locked door, desperate to get out. It was alarming how certain I was—especially after beating that guy to within an inch of his life—that I’d do whatever necessary to keep harm from ever touching this woman again. I’d carry out any crime. Commit any sin.

Whether she liked it or not, Cat was now in my domain.

She needed to understand what the hell that meant. Sooner rather than later.

“Yeah, well, you broke that guy’s face,” she said defensively. Then narrowed her witchy hazel eyes. “And I think you liked interceding.”

My grin spread, baring my teeth. She sees. “Guilty. You going to tell me I should feel bad about busting him up?”

Her forehead scrunched in confusion. “No.”

I heard my father’s voice in my head when I responded, “When the stronger don’t remove the evil from this world, the ones who suffer for it are the innocent, the weak, and the defenseless.”

The corner of her mouth twitched. “I think Batman said something like that once. What, did you forget your cape at home?”

“Of the dark avengers, I’ve always had a soft spot for The Punisher.”

She didn’t look surprised by that. “Of those three, which one am I, Luka? Innocent, weak, or defenseless?”

Sensing a trap, I chose to answer honestly. “None.”

Now she looked surprised.

My gaze flicked down to the canister of pepper spray still in her hand. “You’re one of the strong. Your instinct was to fight rather than flee.”

“I didn’t exactly have a choice.”

Oh, but she was so wrong. “You had a choice.” She could have screamed bloody murder, shed tears, begged for her life. Cowered in the corner and allowed those two men to do whatever they wanted. “And you chose to be brave.”

She would have been amazed at how many grown men I’d seen do the exact opposite when human lives were on the line.

“That may have just been my temper taking over.”

The instant chuckle that escaped my mouth shocked me. But she had no idea how well I could relate to those words. “Having a temper can be a useful survival skill. Believe me.”

“How did you know where I lived?”

A few seconds ticked by in tense silence. “You really want to know?”

She straightened her shoulders, sending a clear message that she wouldn’t be intimidated. “Yes. I want to know.”

This could all end right here. Depending on how she reacted.

“I followed you here from the gym.”

She stilled.

For any clear-headed woman, those words were giant red flags that you saw on the road to a restraining order. If she had any sense in her at all, she’d kick my ass right out of here and haul her ass down to the closest police station.

Her tongue snaked out, shining up those fat lips. “Why would you do that?”

Her voice was soft—

But not afraid.

I’d backed off earlier at the gym. Even though I’d wanted nothing more than to shove her against the ropes of my boxing ring and drive my aching dick inside her so hard it would permanently brand her pussy, I’d exhibited the most restraint I ever had in my entire life by acting like I didn’t remember her. I knew how intense I could be. And something had told me in that moment to not come on too strong with Cat.

As strong as she appeared to be, I sensed a skittish nature in her.

I was known in my family as the loose cannon. The untamable, unpredictable one. Standing in the middle of my gym with the woman of all my darkest fantasies, I’d withstood every primitive urge surging through my bloodstream.

But in just five minutes, everything had changed. She’d just witnessed the worst side of me, and she hadn’t run away screaming into the night. That told me she might just be capable of handling my level of intensity.

Which opened all kinds of fucking doors.

I’d initially pegged her as more sweet than spicy. But as I watched her lick her full, plump lips—two soft cushions that would perfectly cradle a man’s dick as she voraciously sucked it deeper and deeper—I was amending that assessment. Cat was…sultry. Provocative. A sinful siren, but in a way that I didn’t even think she was aware of. The way she smelled brought to mind sweltering nights, carnal passions, and her voluptuous body swathed in silk sheets that eventually get torn beneath my boorish hands.

My limits had been pushed beyond the veil tonight. I hadn’t wanted to take charge with her earlier at the gym, but I was done with that shit. She was about to get an up close and personal look at the real Luka. The former special ops Luka. The Luka who could never wash all the blood off his hands. She was going to know me a hell of a lot better by the end of the night.

When I felt convinced that she wouldn’t shy away from my brand of brutal honesty, I finally answered her question.

“I followed you tonight because I wanted to figure out why I haven’t been able to get you out of my head for two damn months…Raven.”