Well. That isdefinitelythe wrong move here.
Fucking hell, I’m vibrating with the rage of it all, the blood sizzling in my veins. The only reason—and I do mean theonlyreason—these twin fuckstains aren’t a pile of chunky soup in a bucket right now is because they might still have some useful intel.
I close my eyes. Take a deep breath. Count backward from ten and bask in the aromatic scents of fear and blood.
Delayed gratification,I remind myself.Old school, legendary patience, just how I like it…
“Five grand,” I repeat softly. “Five grand was the fair market price for brutalizing and assaulting a young girl, leaving her with permanent scars, and traumatizing her for the rest of her—oh, wait! That’s right. You didn’t think she’dhavethe rest of her life. You left her for dead on the tracks.”
He’s not smiling anymore, that’s for sure. “No. No! That was an accident. We weren’t supposed to k-k-kill her. They wanted her alive—just scared. Primed, they said.”
“Primed? What the fuck does that even mean? Who paid you? Why did they want her scared? How many were involved? For fuck’s sake, Pomeroy, who were you working for?”
It’s a lot of questions to throw at him, but I’ll take any answer, player’s choice.
Unfortunately, the player doesn’t respond. Just keeps trembling. Sniffling. Pretty sure he’s on his way out.
“Auggie!” I call. “Bring me that metal bin, would you, love?”
A moment later, Auggie joins us and hands it over—current home of Jake’s toes.
I turn on the grinder again.
“Who,” I say, calmly plucking a big toe from the bin and tossing it into the grinder. “Paid.” Baby toe, this time. “You?” I dump in the rest in one go, Jake looking on with fresh horror, arching his back in a failed attempt to get away from the red mist.
When he finally confesses, it’s barely a whisper.
I turn off the machine. It belches black smoke into the air. Jake coughs and spits up blood.
“Say that name again,” I demand, certain I misunderstood, but knowing—just fuckingknowing—I didn’t.
“Eloise,” he pants. “Eloise DeFoe.”
Westlyn’s fucking stepmother.That was her name before she married Brian Avery. And ten years ago? Fuck, she wasn’t even part of the family yet, which means she was plotting against Westlyn even before she allegedly met her father.
And if she was already involved in this shitshow a decade ago, chances are she was involved more thantwodecades ago, too, when Westlyn was born and Hunter started those treatments—both at the very hospital where Eloise worked in pediatrics.
I exchange a glance with Auggie. I can tell by the dark look in his eyes, he’s just made the same damn calculations.
“What did Eloise want with the girl?” Auggie asks Jake, the deep, familiar sound of his voice the only thing keeping me sane right now, because I swear to the fuckingdevil, if he wasn’t here asking the questions, Jake’s head would already be hamburger.
“She wanted us to b-break her,” Jake says. “To make sure the witch was d-d-docile.”
“Why?” he asks.
“She didn’t tell us at the time. But I’m g-guessing it was all for the… the demon ceremony.”
“What do you know about the arranged marriage between Westlyn Avery and Hunter Forsythe?” I ask. “Why her, and not some other witch?”
“I don’t know, man!” he screeches. “I don’t fucking know! I’m not some high-ranking mage. Just… Fuck! I’ve told you everything… P-P-Please!”
I grab his throat and squeeze until his eyes bulge, my fingers slippery with his blood. “Why thefuckdid they spend all that time torturing a young girl just so they could pawn her off to a fuckingdemon? Why did Lennon Forsythe conspire with Brian—”
“Jude.Enough.” Auggie’s firm command snaps me out of it, and I release Jake’s throat, taking a step back and trying to get my bearings again. I’m shaking, my heart booming in my chest, my vision red with blood and fury both.
“Pretty sure we got all we’re gonna get from them,” Auggie says.
I mutter a curse, but he’s right. I’ve been in the business long enough to know when someone’s “I don’t know” is a lie or a bid to cover their arse.
