He was never really my uncle.
Just a man bleeding out on the floor with both legs ruined and fury burning in his eyes because he understands exactly how this will end.
Beau walks into the room carrying a red fuel canister in each hand. His eyes flick once toward John sprawled across the floor, then toward Seth. Without a word, he sets one of the canisters beside him.
Seth grabs it.
Beau turns and heads back downstairs to the girls, leaving us alone with John.
John’s expression shifts for the first time. His chest rises and falls unevenly, but he lifts his chin anyway, still trying to control the room with his voice.
“Do you want me to beg, niece?” John asks. “Do youwant me to beg for my life?”
My voice stays calm. “It wouldn’t do you any good.”
John’s mouth curves into a thin smile. Blood stains the edges of his teeth. His eyes remain locked on mine.
“You will never be free of me. I’ll live inside your mind forever. You’re still my creation. You’re the weapon I carved out of trauma and fear. You survived because of me.” He points at me with his bleeding hand, fingers trembling. “You’re not the victim anymore, Brooke. You’re a killer now. Just like me. Just like your father. Just like Seth.”
Seth holsters his gun against the tactical belt at his waist, then slides the bloodied knife back into its sheath before grabbing the canister.
He unscrews the cap.
The sharp smell of gasoline floods the room.
John finally glances at Seth then back to me.
“And it felt good, didn’t it?” he continues, his voice lowering as blood runs freely down his wrist. “Killing all those people to get to me.”
Seth steps forward and dumps the gasoline over him.
The liquid drenches John’s chest and pours across his ruined legs. It soaks into the fabric of his cloak and splashes across the marble beneath him.
John flinches hard as the fuel runs into his wounds. His eyes snap back to mine.
Even now, bleeding across the floor and reeking of gasoline, he studies my face as if he expects to find satisfaction there. Some trace of pride. Some reaction that proves he still owns a piece of me.
I pull the lighter from my pocket and strike the wheel with my thumb. The flame catches, small and bright above the metal casing.
I hold his gaze while the flame flickers in my hand.
“Actually, John… I don’t feel a goddamn thing.”
I toss the lit lighter at him.
The gasoline ignites instantly.
Fire races across his body in a violent burst of orange and white, swallowing the front of his cloak before he can draw another breath. Flames climb his chest, curl over his shoulders, and catch in his hair.
John screams.
The sound rips through the villa, raw and animalistic, nothing polished left in it. He thrashes against the marble, but his ruined knees buckle uselessly beneath him. Burning fabric melts against his skin. The gasoline spreads beneath him in a bright, hungry pool, crawling outward in thin streams of fire.
The smell hits next.
Smoke. Fuel. Burning hair and flesh.
His skin darkens and splits beneath the flames. Blisters swell across his jaw and neck before bursting open from the heat. Parts of his cloak fuse to his body while the fire eats through layers of fabric and skin together.
