Page 41 of Love You To Pieces

“Too bad. Now answer me.” With a small jerk, he pulls me off balance so I’m standing right in front of him, close enough that my feet brush his boots. “Have you not figured out what all of this is for? What we are?” There’s a mischievous glint in his eyes that troubles me, but I slowly shake my head from side to side.

“I don’t understand what you’re asking.” I don’t want to say something wrong to offend him. Not when I’m this fucking close and in a not-so-great position in the Shaw’s slaughterhouse.

The thought turns my stomach, and my brain can’t help drawing parallels between this and the auto shop. For a moment, I swear I can hear Scotty’s echoing screams, along with the roar of the chainsaw as I shoved it through that man’s chest.

“Oh, Sadie, Sadie.” The amusement on Deacon’s face grows. He twines his fingers with mine, keeping me close to him. “Like I said before, we only give the pigs the scrap meat, or the spoiled shit. They’re a convenient disposal system, and well…” He rolls his shoulders in an almost modest shrug. “Help thy neighbor, right? No one around here is rich enough to turn up their noses at free livestock food.”

He goes quiet, searching my gaze, and I can feel that he wants me to ask. “What do you do with the rest of it?” I finally force myself to whisper once the silence and the curiosity become too much.

“Well, like I said before, Sadie-Rae”—he leans forward, until his lips are brushing my ear—“waste not, want not. And there’s a lot to want on a body that other people waste. All it takes…” His lips stroke along my ear, his teeth sharp against my skin.

“Is getting a taste for it.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

When his words and their meaning hit me, I feel nausea clawing its way up my throat. I jerk away from Deacon, who thankfully lets me go, to bolt outside the small, oppressive workshop. Barely making it outside, I bend over double, one hand on the side of the building, and this time I’m not able to keep my breakfast down.

At least half of it ends up in the grass in front of me, and my knees shake as I heave with my fingers curled against the rough wood.

Footsteps make me jerk sideways, but Deacon only clasps my shoulder gently and twines my hair around his fingers with a sigh. “You’re taking this about as well as I expected,” he observes as I heave again. The bile in my throat has me shuddering, and I know I’m not a cute puker. I’m rather dramatic about it, honestly, with tears running down my face and my body trembling every time I retch again.

“Get it all out. You’re okay,” he says in a comforting, not particularly cruel voice. “It’s a lot if you aren’t raised around it.” Almost absently, he braids my hair loosely, until he’s twisting it around his hand again to keep it out of my face. The light tug is comforting, the monotony of it is reassuring, then I can finally stand with my head ducked and panting for air, rather than throwing up.

Unfortunately, the tears are still falling, mixing with the mess only partially hidden in the grass. Another shudder goes through me, but after that, I’m able to push myself fully upright and tug away from Deacon to stare at him in the sunlight.

He looks so normal. Gorgeous, yes. A little mean, absolutely. But nothing about him screams cannibal or killer or monster.

But that’s what he is, I remind myself. Now more than ever, it’s impossible to deny that Deacon and his brother are monsters.

I have to get out of here.

“Oh, there it is.” His goading tone makes me blink, and I realize with a flash of embarrassment that I’ve been staring stupidly at him instead of doing something useful. “There’s that look of just abject horror. I’m the worst, aren’t I?” He steps close to me again and brings up his hand to cup my jaw as my hair unfurls along my back now that it’s no longer being held in its braid. “I’m this terrible, awful thing. I eat people. And yeah, Sadie-Rae. I’ve killed people. But”—he bites down hard on the end of the word—“you’ve killed someone too. So…”

“We aren’t the same.” I shove his hand away and jerk back a step. “I killed someone to survive.”

“And that’s not what we do? Look around, Sadie-Rae.” He lifts his arms, gesturing to everything around us. “Look at this place. Were you blind driving through Wolf Lake? Or did you just sleep your way through our little town? It’s easy enough to miss, isn’t it?” He snarls out an unfriendly laugh, his smile morphing into something less understanding that it had been.

“If you think my family started this for fun, then you’re naïve.”

I shake my head at that, though the words don’t connect well inside my brain. I can’t bring myself to fathom the fact that we’re similar. That he does this to survive, just like I did.

“Waste not…” He doesn’t take a step forward, but his words drift into my brain with haunting clarity.

“Want not…”

I run.

Quickly, and without another word or looking at him, I whirl away from Deacon and sprint back to the porch, my feet hitting the warm concrete and worn steps hard enough that I nearly stumble. My hands scrabble for the door handle and I yank it open, not stopping until I’m inside with my back pressed against it and my heart pounding in my lungs.

I must stand there for at least a minute, my breaths coming in sharp pants and gasps that burn my lungs as much as soothe my need for oxygen. “Fuck,” I hiss, smacking my head back against the glass that rattles in the old frame. “Fuck!”

There’s really no other word for it.

Noise from outside finally registers, and I turn without thinking, my forehead going back to press against the glass I’ve been leaning against.

In the grass, Pearl leans forward into a play bow, her stubby tail wagging. With her mouth open and her barks shrill and relaxed, it’s obvious she’s not threatened by Deacon crouched in front of her with his hands outstretched to tease and bat lightly at her shoulders. He grins as she darts in, a laugh on his lips, and chases her for a few steps across the yard.

It looks so normal. So domestic that my body doesn’t know what to do. A laugh bubbles up in my throat, along with the urge to vomit again, and my head aches from how violently I lost my breakfast.