Page 70 of Vows of Ruin

She crouches down in front of him, lifting the lid of the box, selecting a pair of pliers. “Oh, buddy,” she murmurs, “I haven’t even started.”

I’m still swiping through the phone, absorbing every filthy breadcrumb he’s collected. I glance up. “There are three numbers in here, I assume one of them is Sebastian. Who do the other two belong to?”

Matthew closes his mouth and looks away from me.

Wrenley taps the pliers against her palm. “Are you going to make this easy, or do I get have fun?”

Matthew sneers. “Maybe if you spent more time paying attention to your enemies instead of fucking any man who gives you attention—”

That’s it. I lunge and drive my fist into his gut, folding him. Then an uppercut catches his jaw with a sickening crack. He slumps, coughing, but I’m already reaching again when Max steps in and slaps him hard across the face.

“That’s our wife,” Max says, voice cold and even.

Matthew coughs again, blood dribbling down his chin. “You’re all fucking insane!”

Wrenley’s smile could strip paint. “We’re not denying that.”

She grabs his hand and flattens it on the armrest. With a slow, surgical precision, she wedges the pliers between his fingers and starts to pry.

He screams. “Start talking.” She says softly.

“I—I don’t know anything!”

She twists. His scream turns raw. Wrenley drops the pliers. Blood runs in fine rivulets down Matthew’s hand. She picks up her dagger, the flat of it brushing his cheek. “When did he come back stateside?”

“I don’t know!” he sobs. “Maybe one… two weeks. I never saw him.”

Max crouches beside him. “You knew he was back and you didn’t say a word?”

Matthew shakes, soaked in sweat. “He comes and goes whenever and wherever he wants. He said if I didn’t help him, he’d do to me what he did to that driver!”

Wrenley drags the flat of the blade across his throat, not breaking skin. “Yet here you are. Still breathing. I wonder if that is a mistake.”

I step forward, voice low. “You’ve got one shot, Mattie. Cooperate… or scream yourself hoarse. Makes no difference to us.”

Matthew’s head snaps sideways under Torque’s backhand, teeth clacking loud enough I can hear it over his wheezing.

“You hit like a bitch,” Matthew spits, blood flecking his lips.

Torque cracks his knuckles. “Want to test that theory again?”

Max doesn’t wait; he drives a fist into Matthew’s ribs, just under where my last hit landed. He jerks in the chair, gasping like a fish out of water. Wrecker follows with an elbow across his jaw, snapping his head in the opposite direction. He’s rocking in the chair now, bleeding from the mouth, one eye puffing shut.

“Fine, you want the truth,” he rasps. “I don’t know where he is. I do know that I am on his side, he said that all of you were crazy. You stole what was rightfully his. He wants it back. That’s all I know.”

“You know more than you’re letting on,” I growl, stepping in to plant a boot against his shin. “So talk.”

He continues rambling, it sounds like half-truths, half-bullshit, Sebastian in Lisbon, Sebastian in Chicago, he’s throwing names and random information like confetti, hoping that something sticks.

Wrenley tips her head, eyes cold. “Enough of this. I’m getting bored.”

That gets everyone’s attention, because a bored Wrenley is dangerous.

She glances at the four of us. “So… who wants to tell him?”

I grin. “Oh, baby… please let me.”

Her mouth curves slowly and dangerously. She nods.