Page 2 of Dead Girls Don’t Forget

With a grip around his ankles, I dragged him off the bed. He hit the floor with a heavy thud but didn't wake. He weighed roughly two hundred pounds. I weighed one hundred forty-five. The math should have been against me.

It wasn't.

Brian had spent two years adding deadlifts and farmer's carries to my training before he let me do anything else. He'd made me drag his one hundred ninety pounds across the concrete floor of his workshop dozens of times, until my heart rate stayed under one-twenty. Every time he reminded me that the men I'd need to move would outweigh me.

I dragged Colt by the ankles down the hall, through the kitchen, and to the open basement door.

Down the basement stairs we went. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. His head bounced off the first step, then the next, then almost every one after that. The blanket softened the blows, but it couldn't silence them.

I dragged him to the center of the basement and let his ankles drop.

The basement was windowless. Concrete walls stood bare except for a few stacked boxes in one corner. A water heater sat in the back. A single bare bulb hung on a chain that I did not turn on. The only light spilled through the open door at the top of the stairs.

It was quiet. Isolated. Perfect.

I stepped back into the shadow of the stairwell and waited.

That was the problem with knocking someone out. You had to wait for them to wake, and the hits to the head on the way down probably had not helped.

I watched him. A monster wrapped in a duvet. Someone who preyed on girls who never stood a chance. Someone who had laughed.

Harmony had been sixteen. She liked terrible reality television and made chocolate chip cookies that came out softer than they should have. She sang in the shower. She was supposed to have a whole life.

I had been thirteen.

My hand settled around the knife grip as I waited.

After a long time he moaned. The sound came up muffled against the tape.

He twisted inside the blanket, fighting the thick duvet. His arms were pinned tight. For a few seconds he could not find his hands.

One hand finally broke free. He ripped the duct tape off his mouth in one wild yank, taking some of his lip with it. He gasped and coughed. “What the hell…”

The other hand came loose. He shoved and kicked until the wrap loosened, then rolled onto his stomach and pushed up onto his hands and knees.

He swayed there, head down. Then he sat back on his heels, breathing hard, eyes adjusting to the dark.

I covered the distance before he could focus on me.

The blade flashed once across the back of both calves before he registered the motion. Deep enough to sever the major tendons. Shallow enough to miss the artery.

He screamed and collapsed face down, clutching at his legs as blood pooled beneath him. With a groan he lifted his head. His eyes darted wildly until they found me.

“What the hell. Who are you, you fucking bitch—”

I tilted my head, stepping closer, trailing a finger along the blood-stained blade.

“Now, now,” I said softly. “That’s no way to speak to a lady.”

I smiled.

Chapter 2: Predator in Enemy Territory

“Do you remember me, Colt?”

For a second the past memories bled through again.

Colt, help me hold this bitch down. Hands pinning me. Legs pried apart.