Suha doesn’t rage. He doesn’t roar. He works in a grim, terrible silence. He pins Kyungho with a knee between his shoulder blades, immobilizing him, and then he begins to beat him. His fists rise and fall with a rhythm that is neither fast nor slow, just inevitable. They connect with bone—the crunch of a cheekbone giving way, the duller crack of ribs. Blood begins to fleck Suha’s white sleeves, bright red against the pristine cotton.It spatters across the gray concrete, forming dark, spreading pools.
Kyungho’s cries are muffled, gurgling things. He tries to struggle at first, his legs kicking weakly, but Suha’s weight is too much. The fight bleeds out of him quickly, replaced by sheer, animal agony. The only sounds are the wet impact of fists on flesh, the crackle of breaking cartilage, and Kyungho’s increasingly faint whimpers.
I watch, my own pain distant and secondary. There’s a strange, hollow feeling in my chest, watching Suha do this. Not horror. This is the man I bonded myself to. This is the violence that lives under his skin, the fury he keeps on such a tight leash. Seeing it unleashed is terrifying and, in a fucked-up way I won’t ever admit out loud, perversely beautiful. It’s the truth of him, raw and ugly and magnificent.
Finally, Suha stops. He’s breathing a little harder now, a faint sheen of sweat on his brow. He stands up, leaving his uncle a broken, weeping heap on the floor. Kyungho is barely conscious, his face a swollen, bloody mask, one eye completely shut.
Doyun, Suha’s right hand, steps forward, holding something out. A gun. A sleek, black semi-automatic. Suha takes it without a word, his grip firm and sure. He checks the magazine with a practiced flick of his wrist, then chambers a round. The metallicsnick-clackis intensely loud.
He turns back to his uncle, leveling the gun at the center of his forehead. Kyungho’s one good eye rolls wildly, focusing on the barrel. A wet, pleading sound escapes his ruined mouth. Words are beyond him now.
My own breath catches in my throat. This is it. The end of the line for the old fox.
Movement catches the edge of my vision.
Near a stack of crates, a figure stirs. Taewoo. The loan shark must have been playing dead, or maybe he’d just been knockedsenseless and was coming to. He pushes himself up onto his hands and knees, shaking his head. His eyes, bleary and unfocused, land on Suha’s back. Suha is completely absorbed, his attention fixed on his uncle, the gun steady in his hand.
I see the moment the idea forms in Taewoo’s panicked, stupid brain. He sees an opening. A distraction. A chance, maybe, to save his boss, or just to lash out. He scrabbles on the floor, his fingers closing around a length of broken pipe that had fallen during the initial breach.
He gets to his feet, unsteady but determined, and he starts to shuffle forward, the pipe raised like a club. He’s going to try to brain Suha from behind.
A slow, tired smile touches my lips. My cigarette is still between my lips, forgotten during the beating. I don’t even take it out.
As Taewoo draws back the pipe, gathering himself for a swing, I push off from the wall. My body screams in protest—my ribs, my hand, my legs—but the movement is pure instinct, fueled by a surge of adrenaline. I take two quick, limping steps and launch myself forward.
My boot connects with the side of Taewoo’s jaw just as he starts his swing.
The impact travels all the way up my leg, a solid, jarring thud that feels incredibly satisfying. There’s a loud, wetpopthat might have been his jaw dislocating. Taewoo’s eyes go wide and blank with shock. The pipe drops from his nerveless fingers, clattering to the concrete. He doesn’t make a sound. He just folds, collapsing in a boneless heap, out cold before he hits the ground.
I land awkwardly, my bad hand instinctively going out to break my fall. White-hot agony lances up my arm, and I curse, sucking air through my teeth. I straighten up slowly, cradling the hand against my chest again.
Suha has turned. He hadn’t even flinched at the sound. He just looks from Taewoo’s unconscious form to me, one dark eyebrow lifting slightly. His expression is unreadable, but there’s a question in his eyes.
I shrug with my good shoulder. The motion pulls at my ribs, and I wince. “He was annoying me,” I rasp, my voice rough from screaming and lack of air.
A faint, almost imperceptible smirk touches Suha’s mouth. It’s gone in a heartbeat. He gives me a slow, deliberate nod. An acknowledgment. Then he turns back to his uncle.
Kyungho is watching this little exchange with his one good eye, and whatever hope might have flickered there when Taewoo moved dies completely. He understands now. There is no rescue coming. No distraction. He is utterly alone.
“Please,” he gurgles, blood bubbling on his lips. “Suha... nephew... family...”
Suha looks down at him, his head tilted. The cold smile is back. “An eye for an eye, Uncle,” he says softly, almost kindly.
He doesn’t hesitate. He doesn’t draw it out for drama.
He simply pulls the trigger.
The night air bites at the fresh cuts on my skin, but it’s almost welcoming after the damp humidity inside the warehouse. I lean against the cool brick wall, sucking on another cigarette I’d fished from my own pocket—miraculously unbent—and watch the show. Suha’s guys move with a quiet, grim purpose, hauling bodies wrapped in tarps out the back loading doors of the warehouse. It’s like watching a particularly morbid ballet, all heavy lifts and silent coordination. The only sounds are the scuff of boots on concrete, and the low rumble of a van engine.
Suha stands a few feet away, rolling his sleeves back down over his forearms. He’d handed his jacket off to one of his men, and now he’s meticulously fastening his cufflinks, the platinum catching the weak yellow glow of the security light above the door. He looks like he’s just finished a board meeting. The only evidence is the faint spatter of dark red across the stark white of his dress shirt, high on the chest, like a macabre boutonniere.
He finishes with his cuffs and his eyes land on me, doing a slow, assessing sweep from my busted lip down to my scuffed boots. “Are you alright?”
I take a drag, letting the smoke burn the cut on the inside of my cheek. “I’ve had worse.” It’s not a lie. The throbbing in my ribs is a familiar song, the ache in my jaw an old friend. The ring leaves a different, deeper kind of hurt. This is just surface noise.
His gaze zeroes in on my left hand, which I’m cradling loosely against my stomach. Blood wells sluggishly from the deep gash across my palm and trickles in a sticky line down my wrist. “And that?”
I hold it up, turning it so the wound catches the light. It’s a nasty slice, clean and deep. “A souvenir from your dearly departed uncle.” I grin, tasting copper. “Must run in the family, huh?”
