Chapter 44: Payback

Zander POV
My fist connected with Ash’s face. Blood dripped from his lips, and Ash wiped it off with the back of his hand before swinging his fist towards me.

I narrowly avoided getting the impact of his punch. We started rolling around on the ground throwing hits at each other.

Eventually Ash had me pinned under him and grasped my throat tightly with his hands. He started choking me and made me cough. I had to get him to release his grip on me, or my windpipe would be crushed.

He squeezed harder and harder on my throat. It was getting more difficult to breathe.

I reached out and tried to make him loosen his grip on me. I latched onto his wrist and tried to injure him. An odd crunching noise was heard, as I kept grasping his wrist harder.

Ash cried out in pain and let go long enough for me to get away. I tried to get more oxygen back into my system and stood up quickly.

Ash’s gaze burned with pure hatred towards me. “You’re going to regret doing that!”

He ran towards me at full speed, and I barely leapt out of his way. When he was caught off guard, I kicked him in the side. Ash was knocked down.

I went after him and tried to pin him down. Ash wasn’t going down easily. He kept trying to get out my hold and reached out towards my throat. I wasn’t going to let him choke me again.

I put more of my weight on him and punched him rapidly with my fists. Ash hardly had time to block any of the punches. Blood started running down his nose.

Ash suddenly caught me off guard. A shiny knife appeared in his right hand. He maliciously grinned at me.

“No one gets the better of me Underwood.”

Ash stabbed me in the arm which caused me to fall off him. I was surprised he didn’t continue to stab me repeatedly when I was down.

He took the opportunity and pinned me down. I strained against his strong hold and didn’t care about my wound. Blood kept flowing down my arm. The cut felt deep, but that was something to worry about later.

Ash held the knife right under my chin and slowly made a cut. I cried out in pain.

“I can either give you a slow and painful death or end you quickly. Which do you prefer?”

“Neither."

Suddenly a burst of strength ran through my body. I managed to seize the knife from Ash and threw it away from him.

I pushed him off me and sprinted for the knife. Ash ran for the knife but didn’t get there fast enough.

After grabbing the knife, I got behind him. Ash’s breathing got shallow. He smelled strongly of fear.

I rested the tip of the knife against his throat and said, “I’ll let you live if you promise me something.”

Ash defeatedly said, “Okay. I’ll do whatever you want. Please don’t kill me.”

I told Ash, “Leave the pack and never show your face again.”

“Fine. I’ll go but let me stay one more day. I’ve got a lot of stuff to pack.”

Was he serious? He was making demands to someone who had a knife at his throat. I kept my guard up and the knife held against his throat.

I gritted my teeth and told him, “Okay. You have to leave before tomorrow night. No excuses or I’ll throw you out myself. Got it?”

Ash swallowed and said, “Yes. I understand. Let me go.”

I released my hold on him and dropped the knife on the ground. Ash looked back at me and laughed in a disturbing way.

Ash said, “That was way too easy.”

Ash ran towards me and knocked me against the lamp on his nightstand. The lamp went crashing off the table. I felt a warm liquid going down the side of my head.

Ash grabbed my shirt collar and looked into my eyes. I let out a primal growl and bared my teeth. Ash gave a mocking laugh to me and held my shirt tighter and threw me towards the wall.

I slammed against the wall and pain spread throughout my body. Before I stood up, Ash stepped down hard on my ribs. I yelled out in pain.

“You shouldn’t have done what you did earlier. I might’ve let you live, but you had to be stupid and threaten me.”
Ash had a wild look to his eyes and stared me down. “Now you’re going to die for your mistake.”

Ash’s foot stomped harder on my ribs, and I heard my bones snap. I groaned in pain loudly.

When Ash stopped stepping on me, he smiled victoriously. I struggled to move with my possibly few fractured ribs. I crawled towards him and clutched his leg hard. He needed to be brought down. I wasn’t giving up.

Ash looked down at me and laughed at my attempts to bring him down. I felt the wolf in me growing stronger, and my teeth changed to canines. Normally this didn’t happen in my current form, unless I was extremely pissed off.

I pushed up his jeans a little to reveal skin and bit down hard. Ash cried out in pain and fell down while holding onto his leg.

While he was down, I took advantage and made my way towards him slowly. I picked up the knife on the way and reached Ash.

He looked annoyed at me and rushed towards me but somehow, I escaped his attack. I sunk the knife into his thigh and really plunged it deep. Ash screamed out in pain while clutching his bleeding thigh.

Next thing I knew, I heard Cleo’s voice. “You get away from Zander!”

Cleo rushed in and got into Ash’s face. She had a fire in her eyes and took Ash’s shirt collar in her hands.

“Haven’t I been pounded enough Cleo? Would you give me a…”

Cleo didn’t let Ash finish and gave him a sharp uppercut to his face. Ash wiped his mouth of fresh blood.

Ash sighed and said, “Okay. I’m done. Just leave now. I promise I won’t tell anyone that Zander tried to kill me.”

I called out, “Don’t listen to him. He tricked me before. We can’t let him go!”

Cleo kept staring down Ash and said, “You can’t fool me. Leave now if you know what’s best for you.”

Ash shook his head but said, “Fine. I’ll go. But you better check on your mate. He doesn’t look so hot.”

Cleo shoved Ash to the ground and headed for me. The fight was finally starting to get to me. I saw Cleo looking at me with worry before I passed out.