The End of Gods (A Welcome to the Underworld Novel, Book 4) (35 page)

“Still think this is funny?” she snarled, tightening the chokehold she had on him.

“You know . . .” he laughed in between words, “if you slid just a little further south, this would be the perfect position to make my pain go away.”

“Ugh!”

Furious that she couldn’t scare the shit out of him (and instead unknowingly turned him on), she childishly grabbed a handful of mud and flung it at his face. If she couldn’t scare him, she might as well temporarily fuck up his face.

Tae Hyun groaned dramatically. He began to rub his eyes in surprised pain. “You got my eyes!”

“You’re lucky I didn’t gouge your eyes out,” she muttered before getting up and high tailing it out of there like a scared kitten.

“What about the first ground rule?” he bellowed behind her.

When all she did was flip him the middle finger, she heard Tae Hyun utter with a laugh, “Oh, it’s on, Princess. It is on.”

“Because it’s the only thing that makes us human . . .”

17: Further South

Soo Jin was enraged when she kicked the punching bag the next evening. She had avoided Tae Hyun like the plague the entire day: she hid out in Yoori’s old sleeping quarters in the morning, she distracted herself by enjoying a day out on the town during the afternoon, and she only continued to avoid him by barricading herself in the lake house’s workout room that evening. If she could not be productive at home, she might as well be productive and train here.

Soo Jin continued to brood as she attacked the punching bag. She did not understand why she was entertaining him. Why the hell was she still here when she could be doing more useful things at her Siberian Tigers’ estate?

“Is that punching bag supposed to represent someone?” asked a familiarly infuriating voice.

She turned to see Tae Hyun leaning against the doorframe. He wore an all black attire that made him look more harmless than he was. He was smiling as he gazed at her with doting eyes.

“Your corpse,” Soo Jin stated in an annoyed voice.

Like water coursing over steel, Tae Hyun let her hostility roll off of him. He strolled into the room and handed her a water bottle. “Truce?”

She took it without saying anything. Ignoring him, she downed the drink, tossed the water bottle to the side, and continued to hit the punching bag.

Undeterred by her chilly treatment, Tae Hyun persevered with his advancement. He went to the other side of the room and stood across from her. The punching bag was a few feet between them.

“Can I train with you?” he asked innocently.

“I prefer to workout alone.”

“Afraid I might show you up?”

Soo Jin ceased her workout and glared at him. “You really want to go there? Especially after what happened last night?”

“When we kissed?” he reminded sheepishly.

“When I rammed you into the ground. I could’ve choked you to death.”

He had a faraway look on his face as he recalled that event.

“I went easy on you,” he mused out loud. “Both last night and that homecoming night.”

Considering that she didn’t strangle him the night before, it was safe to say that she showed him the same courtesy. “As did I.”

“If we’re going to have our once-in-a-lifetime duel soon, then we might as well see what the big deal is.”

Soo Jin paused to consider his words. It intrigued her that he would want this. It
would
be entertaining to get a prelude to what their war would be like.

Her lack of response—and by default, her agreement—triggered Tae Hyun’s smile to broaden. When he started to slowly unbutton his shirt, Soo Jin’s breath became lodged in her lungs. She did her best to maintain a cool expression as he stripped his shirt off, revealing the muscled body beneath it.

“Were you a stripper in a past life?” she inquired pointedly, getting sick and tired of him disarming her with his provocativeness. It was obvious he was the most handsome bastard in the world. He did not need to use that as his ultimate weapon against her. “Is it that difficult to keep a shirt on?”

His soft chuckle permeated the workout room. “Apparently I’m a stripper in this life too.” He winked suggestively at her. “Maybe you should give me a good tip later on.”

“I’m out of dollar bills.”

“I accept other forms of payments.” His eyes did not conceal his carnal need for her. “Especially when it involves stripping for you.”

She rolled her eyes.

He released a thoughtful sigh. “But this is not about stripping.” He pointed a reproving finger at her to get them back on point. “I’m mad at you.”

Now this was a new and interesting development. Curious, Soo Jin folded her arms. She slanted her head and decided to humor him. “Why?”

“You fought dirty last night.”

Her lips threatened to edge up in a grin. “You gonna do something about it?”

“Yes,” he stated solemnly, his stern voice holding an edge of seduction. “You are going to be punished tonight.”

“How?”

“I’m going to do what you hate most: show you up.”

With no warning, he took one powerful swing at the punching bag. The bag vibrated from the impact, nearly falling off its hinges.

Soo Jin glowered at him as the punching bag swung like a pendulum between them. “You have some gall to say that.”

His lips stretched into a serene smile. He easily retained his charisma while simultaneously pissing her off. “I did not become a King because of my good looks alone.”

“I think I just swallowed my own vomit.”

Tae Hyun pleasantly shrugged off the acidic remark. “Truth hurts.”

Soo Jin tightened her jaw in controlled rage. The constant swaying of the punching bag lured her like a bull to a red cape. It was taking everything she had to not unleash the monster inside her.

“This is a change from your charming personality last night,” Soo Jin noted, wondering why he was deliberately pissing her off.

“You’re mean to me when I’m charming,” he voiced with a slight pout. He shrugged again, his expression becoming more mischievous. “Now I’m mad at you, and I think it’s more fun to piss you off.”

“You piss me off by existing.”

He faked a dagger to the heart. “You have an ‘insult-of-the-day’ flashcard in your mind or something? You can do better than that.”

Soo Jin chewed her lower lip. She had a witty one-liner to say, but given his recent insult, she kept it to herself. She would rather respond by punching his neck.

Tae Hyun laughed as though reading her mind. “Let’s train together. I can teach you a few things.”

He struck the bag again, and it swung at her like a wrecking ball.

Without hesitation, Soo Jin punched it like a tether ball, and it flew back to him. As his retaliation, Tae Hyun triple-kicked the bag with brute force.

Boom!

The punching bag caught Soo Jin off guard when it slammed into her and caused her to crash to the ground.

What the fuck?

She breathed in disbelief. Did she just let her opponent knock her off her feet, and with a goddamned punching bag, no less? A fiery rage swept through her when she peered up at Tae Hyun.

He offered her an apologetic smile while hugging the punching bag. “Sorry about that.”

Soo Jin clenched her fists. She would most certainly make him sorry.

Hungry for his blood, it was Soo Jin’s turn to catch him off guard. With an angry growl, she leapt up in the air and kicked the bag with an intensity so brutal that it sent Tae Hyun slamming into the squat rack behind him.

Boom!

Soo Jin feigned an apologetic smile as she watched him tear away from the squat rack.

“Sorry about that,” she murmured, mocking his previous words.

“It’s alright, baby,” he uttered, unexpectedly propelling up and striking the punching bag right into her stomach.

Boom!

Although Soo Jin did not tumble over, the force was enough to knock the wind—and the pride—out of her. She hunched forward and pressed her hands into her stomach to assuage the unanticipated pain.

“I’m the one who should be sorry,” he finished with a breathless whisper. He laughed to himself and appraised her injured state. “Is that how easy our historic battle is going to be? Do I have to go extra easy on you?”

“You piece of—!”

Unable to control herself, she rocketed forward, grabbed the punching bag, and then swung it at him. The bag blasted into him like a cannon, whacking him off his feet.

Although he was on the ground, his taunting laughter did not cease. “Someone’s mad.”

Still pissed off, Soo Jin seized a fifteen-pound dumbbell and chucked it in his direction.

Displaying amazing dexterity, Tae Hyun evaded the flying dumbbell.

Boom!

As the heavy weight crashed into the wall behind him, he rammed into Soo Jin and thrust her onto the floor.

“Bad girl,” Tae Hyun crooned, easily pinning her writhing form to the ground. “That dumbbell could have knocked me out cold.”

“
I
could knock you out cold,” she snarled before head-butting him.

Bam!

“Aw, shit!”

Tae Hyun recoiled from her after their foreheads nearly split open. Blinking to clear his vision, he stumbled off of her and crashed into the weights beside them. Before he could surge to his feet, Soo Jin raced over to him and kneed him in the solar plexus, sending him flying back onto the weights.

Boom!

A long, thunderous crash infused the room. This time the remaining weights on the shelf came crashing down, falling onto his unmoving body with pitiless force.

An unsettling silence spread over the room after the last of the weights hit his body. It was so eerily quiet that chills started to materialize on Soo Jin’s body.

“Hey,” Soo Jin called, staring at him with apprehensiveness. He was lying face-first on the ground, breathing quietly. “You alright?”

Tae Hyun remained silent. Apart from the slow rising and falling of his back, he did not move an inch.

“Tae Hyun?” she called out with a louder voice. Soo Jin’s pulse raced once she realized that he was not moving at all. Shit, did she go too far? “Stop playing and get up.”

When he still did not respond, Soo Jin started to panic.

“Shit!” She sped over to Tae Hyun with the intention of helping him up. She was three inches from him when he unexpectedly whirled around, swung his leg, and stole the ground from her feet.

“Ugh!”

As Soo Jin fell towards the floor, Tae Hyun repositioned himself and caught her in time. With a satisfied chuckle, he laid back down on the ground and pulled her with him so that her legs were on either side of his body.

“You have a death wish, don’t you?” Soo Jin asked after she registered the precarious position he placed her in. She was sitting on his abs while he was smiling up at her.

“I like you on top,” he drawled before repositioning himself so that she was under him. He leaned on his forearms and gazed sensuously down at her. When he voiced his next words, she felt this primal need stir inside her. “But you should know that I can be dominating with my positions as well.”

“I should skull-bash you again,” she gasped, uncertain of how much longer she could resist him.

“But you were so worried about me,” he countered with a knowing laugh.

“Why were you playing dead?”

“Because I wanted to see how worried you would be.” He chuckled, leaning down and favoring her with a kiss to the cheek. “Were you worried?”

Heat swarmed her cheeks.

She said nothing.

“I heard it in your voice that you were worried,” he insisted, hovering his lips over hers.

She continued to say nothing as she felt his tempting body press closer to hers.

His breath was a hot whisper against her fiery skin. “Should I play dead again?”

His laughter became warmer in her silence.

“Are you playing dead now?” He suspended his lips over hers. “Should I wake you up, baby?” Her silence did not make him relent from his advances. If anything, it only spurred him forward. “Please wake up, baby. You’re too pretty to play dead.”

What transpired next was a distorted haze to her.

She was ignoring him one second, and before she knew it, she had shoved him off of her, propelled to her feet, and pushed him against the wall. She had every intention of breaking his nose. Yet, all control was lost when he smiled at her and said, “You are the sexiest and most stunning thing when you’re mad.”

Instead of punching him as she intended, she hurtled herself to him and pressed her lips against his.

When she realized her error and tried to break away, he tugged her closer and deepened their kiss. To her horror, Soo Jin found that she could no longer deny this walking aphrodisiac. He might as well lace his lips with an addictive drug. The more their lips met, the more she wanted him—the more she yearned for him. She was out of her league and had been since she lost the shooting challenge to him. Resigned to the fact that it was fruitless to deny herself this intoxicating moment, Soo Jin did what she had been dying to do: she ran her hands over his statuesque body.

The sensual concession did not sate her needs. If anything, the indulgence only served to worsen it. As she felt his muscles undulate beneath her touch, she became drunker with need. An unstoppable inferno consumed her, and it took all her power to maintain her sanity.

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this.”

The very guttural sound in his voice caused an excess of heat to shroud over her. Anymore of this, she was sure she would faint from a lack of oxygen.

“You ready?”