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to—“
    Dian a backhanded him across the face, sending the guard staggering back. “I said shut up.”
    “Hey!” Alex snapped. “Leave him alone. It’s cool. There’s no call for that.”
    “Lady,” Lambert huffed, snatching for the pepper spray on his belt, “you’re under citizen’s arrest!”
    Diana’s eyes flared. She seized Lambert’s throat with one hand. She snatched his wrist with the other, turning it until he dropped the pepper spray. D isplaying surprising strength for her admittedly fit frame, Diana lifted Lambert by his neck.
    “Aw, shit,” Alex grunted. He shoved the motorcycle helmet down on his head. Not for the first time in his life, Alex wished he had a better plan, but there wasn’t time to think one up.
    Alex drew back one gloved fist and planted it as forcefully as he could into Diana’s back, right at her kidney. The blow forced Diana to grunt and step forward to maintain her balance. She dropped Lambert to the concrete floor, turning to look at Alex with frustration plain on her face.
    “We could talk this out…” she growled.
    “Run!” Alex shouted at Lambert, already backing away.
    “…if you would just listen to me! ” Diana finished, showing sharp, fearsome teeth as she rushed forward. Alex caught only a glance of the suddenly feral look in her eye before he turned to flee.
    He didn’t get far. Three, perhaps four steps at the most separated them for only a heartbeat, and then he felt her catch his arm. Diana flung him against the trunk of a parked car. She shoved him back against it with one hand on his chest before he could fall or dodge away.
    “Now then,” Diana began again.
    Alex caught her square in the cheek with a right hook.
    The hand on his chest clutched at his jacket. She heaved him up and slammed him back into the car several times. “Stop hitting me!” Diana demanded.
    Jostled and hurt by the brutal treatment, Alex gasped to breathe again. Were it not for his helmet, he’d have been hurt even worse. Diana took a quick, heavy breath as if to calm herself. “I enjoy a little rough play,” Diana told him, “but not so soon. Don’t make me be like this.”
    Alex glanced off to his side. Lambert wisely took off—either for escape or for help. Knowing what Diana was capable of, Alex hoped it was the former. He didn’t see what good more security guards would do. Regardless, he needed to buy the guy a little more time.
    “I’m in a relationship, alright?” he grunted. “A serious, committed, permanent relationship.”
    “You are under the sway of a demon.” Her hand kept him up against the car.
    “She’s a good demon,” he countered, then winced. “Okay, that’s not true. That’s just stupid. But she’s not a threat to me.”
    “I am no threat to you.”
    “ Could’ve fooled me!”
    Diana tilted her head thoughtfully. “You bring this on yourself.”
    “You were hurting that guy!”
    “No one of consequence,” Diana shrugged. “I’m sorry if I frightened you, but you’ll learn not to take such things so seriously.” Her voice dropped somewhat, becoming almost playful. Flirtatious. Intimate. “ We both know you can defend yourself. You are mortal, but far from ordinary. I would not desire you so had I not seen you in action.”
    “ I’d be happy to avoid violence altogether if it’s all the same to you.”
    “It is not. You feel lost. Weak. Vulnerable, despite your vi ctories. I can smell your fear.” Her face drew in closer to his. “I would make you stronger, Alex. Faster. Deadlier. Powerful, like the wild. Like me. With me.”
    Alex tentatively reached out to take her shoulders. She allowed his touch, smiling. Then he slammed his helmeted forehead down on her nose with a crunch. Blood burst from her nostrils as cartilage fractured under the blow. The raised plastic visor of his helmet cracked and shattered as he swung his own head like a flail against her skull.
    With a half-feminine, half-animal roar, Diana lifted him