Page 55 of Heat Lightning

If I’d just killed Joseph Weber that first night, none of this would’ve happened. Max wouldn’t have been hurt, and my life would be normal. Lonely, but normal. Our paths would’ve never crossed, because they weren’t meant to.

Someone like Max wasn’t meant for someone like me.

I killed people. Bad people. That was all I wanted in life. And the one time I let myself get distracted by a pretty omega who smelled good, everything fucking fell apart.

Even my breathing exercises couldn’t calm me tonight. I needed something more. Something that hit hard and sharp. Something that lit me up inside.

Max’s laugh flashed through my mind, and I tossed it away. That laughter can never be mine.

No. What I wanted was what started all of this in the first place.

Joseph Weber, dead at my feet.

But first, I wanted to see real fear in his eyes. I wanted his blood all over my hands and his screams ringing in my ears in payment for poisoning Max against me; for twisting us together in a way that meant I had a taste of what something other than vengeance and pain felt like before it was ripped away in a matter of moments.

Killing was all I was good at, all I was meant for. I didn’t know how to hold a pretty omega gently, or how to show him he could trust me with something as precious as a first heat.

I was meant for blood, and doing the dirty work others couldn’t—not tenderness and love. I burned too hot and too rough for him.

I was meant to hunt.

I found Weber working at the twenty-four-seven diner in town.

It took me a few hours to track him down, which was frankly unacceptable. Turned out I was so distracted in the build-up to asking Max to help me, I hadn’t realized he’d left his old job and started working here instead.

He was probably fired. The pathetic excuse of a human being never showed up on time.

But the night was looking up, because he’d been put on trash duty, which gave me the perfect opportunity to scare the shit out of him.

It was one of my favorite hobbies that didn’t involve sniffing Max’s underwear.

Tucked in the corner of an alley not unlike the one I first saw Max in, I watched as he tossed the two full trash bags onto the ground halfway to the dumpster and lit up a cigarette, leaning against the wall.

Just the sight of him enraged me. He didn’t deserve to be alive anymore, let alone enjoying a smoke break.

I might not be able to count on my body and mind to function at the level I needed to kill him—at least not without drawing too much attention or getting caught—but that didn’t mean I couldn’t send a reminder now and then that I knew what he was, and he lived on borrowed time.

Stepping from the shadows, I showed my masked face.

He startled, tripping over himself until he was flat on his back, scrambling away. His cigarette fell to the ground, sputtering out on the wet concrete. He smelled of rotting fear and piss. “Stay the fuck away from me,” he said. His hands dug in his pockets, and he pulled out a switchblade, brandishing it between us. “Or I’ll fucking kill you.”

I chuckled and moved closer, my boots heavy on the pavement. From the way he held the knife, it was immediately apparent he had no idea how to use it. “Not before I kill you.”

He got to his feet, the whites of his eyes stark in the dark alley. “I’ll call the fucking cops, then.”

I shook my head and gripped the hilt of my own blade. Thankfully, I had a spare since I’d left my favorite at Max’s. “You won’t do that, either. They’d ask too many questions about what really happened that night, wouldn’t they? And all the others before then.”

His face paled, highlighting the raised and jagged scar slashed across his cheek. The one I’d given him.

We hadn’t spoken like this before, and I was glad for the opportunity to let him know just how much I really knew.

“We didn’t do anything wrong. They were in heat. They wanted it,” he said, voice pathetic and warbled. “Especially the last one. He was panting all over me for months. He would’ve liked⁠—”

I had him pressed against the wall with my knife at his throat before I could blink. The sharp tip pricked his skin, and a tiny rivulet of red spilled down his neck from the cut.

I’d moved too quickly, though, and the world spun around me. My vision tunneled, and nausea roiled in my gut. Honestly, I couldn’t tell if it was from my unsuppressed rut symptoms or the way he fucking smelled, like sick and nicotine.

“Finish that sentence,” I snarled. “I dare you.”