I wipe the blood from my knife onto his shirt and look down at what’s left of him in the chair. His body twitches in uneven pulses, his chest rising in shallow pulls that never seem to reach all the way in, like every breath stops halfway and dies there.
I glance at Brooke. “He’s crashing.”
Brooke is already moving.
She reaches for the metal table beside us, her hand closing around the syringe. The tray rattles softly as she pulls it free, the needle catching the light for a split second before she turns back to him.
She steps in, grabs his shoulder to hold him still, and drives the needle straight into his chest.
The plunge is clean. The liquid disappears into him in one push.
His body reacts instantly.
He jerks against the restraints, hard enough that the chair legs scrape across the floor. His head snaps back, his mouth falling open as a broken gasp tearsout of him. Blood bubbles up over his lips, spilling down his chin as his lungs fight to catch up.
Some people think adrenaline turns you into something stronger. It doesn’t.
It wakes everything up. It forces your body to feel every bit of what it’s going through, every nerve firing at once, every signal hitting faster and harder than it should.
It won’t save him.
It makes sure he feels it.
The panic comes first, flooding his face as his breathing speeds up, his chest pulling harder even though it isn’t working. Then the pain follows, catching up all at once, dragging through whatever is left of him as his body lights up under it.
I let him feel it.
Let the fear rush in before the oxygen does. Let the pain catch up with what’s left of his brain.
His eyes shift past me.
They land on Brooke.
Something ugly twists across what’s left of his face. He forces the words out through his ruined jaw.
“I should’ve killed you,” he slurs at her. “That first night.”
Brooke smiles. “Shoulda, woulda, coulda.”
I smile slowly, letting him see every inch of it as I stand to my full height.
“And see, like I told you.” My voice drops as I hold his stare. “She is the last fucking thing you’ll ever see.”
I move behind him. I lean down and wrap my hands over his eyes, clamping his skull in place.
“You don’t even deserve to look at my girl.”
Then I shove both thumbs in.
His sockets cave under the pressure with a wet pop, soft tissue collapsing beneath my thumbs. His scream cuts loose a second later, loud, high-pitched and feral.
It fills the room. And I love it.
Blood pours fast. I feel it slip down my wrists. He thrashes, head jerking back, body jerking forward, blind and fucked, hands clawing the air like he thinks someone might help him.
I crouch again, close enough that he can hear me through the fog.
“You’re not going to last much longer,” I say softly. “You’re already dead.”
