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“I used to think so too, but I haven’t felt that way in years,” I replied with a heavy dose of honesty.
“Time, principessa. Give me time to remind you and you’ll feel like a goddess beside a god.” He dropped his hand and looked in the direction of Joey. “When it comes to other men it’s disrespectful to talk about you and then let me find out about it.”
I shut my eyes and groaned. “Judas. He didn’t know you’d have someone go through his text messages.”
“That’s not the point. You are mine. The only person allowed to comment on my perfect ass and my beautiful smile is me. Look. But don’t fucking touch or speak.”
“The saying doesn’t—never mind. So, what are you going to do? Kill him?”
He grinned wickedly. “No, you are.”
“The fuck if I am.”
A snigger came from somewhere behind me. Without turning around I flipped off whoever it was, eliciting a laugh from Owen.
“Come on, Rhiannon. He’s in pain and the longer you delay the worse it’s going to be.”
“I’m not killing him.”
“Okay.” He flipped the safety back on my gun and handed it to Bri as he walked by her.
Then, reaching into the back of his waistband, he withdrew a black matte handgun with a skinny profile.
I hadn’t known he was carrying, but I should have expected him to be. He walked up to the crate Joey was propped up in and not so gently yanked him out, letting him drop to the ground.
“Please don’t,” Joey brokenly sobbed through cracked lips. He looked up at Judas with the same broken plea in his eyes. One hand was pressed against the hole I’d made in the side of his chest when I shot the target.
There wasn’t much blood, just a darkening red stain coming through the fabric of his gray, slightly torn Family Guy shirt.
“I tried to tell her to kill you, but she’d rather draw out your suffering,” Judas stated with a sigh.
“I never said that.”
Ignoring me, he used his dress shoe to pin the poor man in place before shooting him directly in the left kneecap. Joey jerked and wailed, feebly attempting to grab what was now a fissure of broken bone and blood.
“Judas, knock it off!”
“He’s not going to listen to that. He’ll play connect four with his gun until Joey bleeds out or you go over there and kill him yourself,” Brianna quipped.
“This is bullshit.” I strode forward, adding more sawdust to the bottom of my shoes.
Before I could reach them, Judas put another bullet in Joey’s right knee. It was impressively symmetrical with his first shot.
Joey squeezed his eyes shut and moaned in pain as tears leaked out, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs. I grabbed hold of Judas’ wrist to stop him from adding another wound that was only meant to cause pain and pulled the gun out of his hand.
Joey looked up at me with something close to relief etching into his features. He didn’t have a chance to realize I wasn’t saving him. I aimed the gun at the side of his head and pulled the trigger. The impact of the bullet had his temple bouncing off the ground. His body twitched twice before slumping into a motionless state, eyes wide and unfocused.
“Here,” I bit out, shoving the gun back into Judas’ hands before I turned around to address Brianna as I headed for the exit. “Does this place have a bathroom I can use?”
“Yeah. I can show--.”
“I’ll take her,” Judas quickly interjected.
I kept walking, not once looking behind me to see what he was doing.
“Get this settled,” he instructed them. He easily caught up to me and opened the door so that I could exit first. “To the left,” he directed once we were in the hall.
I followed his guide and silently made my way down another sterile hallway, leaving a trail of sawdust behind us. I’d just shot a man in the head—an arguably innocent one and I felt…nothing. No remorse, shame, or guilt.
I only valued the lives of the people I cared about. I had more compassion for animals and children. I was starting to think there was something wrong with me.
“Have you ever killed an ant?”
I glanced over at him. “Um, I’m sure at some point or another I have.”
“Did you feel bad?”
Catching on to his meaning, I shook my head at him.
“Are you seriously comparing the life of an ant with a human?”
“Is there a difference?”
“One is a bug and the other a person. Do you need me to make a contrast and compare chart?”
“Hm.” He acknowledged my response with a slight pursing of his lips. “So, the bug’s life is less valuable because it’s a bug. But they don’t know that.”
“We are not having this discussion,” I argued with a laugh. “I just think I should…I don’t know feel something.”
