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“All deals with the Devil are double-edged swords; you die on either side.”
Shifting my weight, I grind the metal tool into the meaty flesh of his thigh; he’s thin, so it pops through the membrane without much force, and I pull back on the handle, carving out a large chunk of skin and muscle. It falls through the head of the instrument and onto the floor, and as blood streams from the wound down the length of the man’s body, I position myself at his other leg, his gurgled wails of agony like a goddamn symphony I want to play as the soundtrack of my life until I die.
“Wait,” he sobs, the word barely coherent through his gag. I glance back at Elia, wondering if he’s willing to stick around awhile longer or if he wants me to speed things up. He shrugs, pulling his sleeve up to check his watch, and then gives me a curt nod. Gia runs a hand over his short, dark buzzcut, watching my every move.
Like I have any interest in hurting the brother-in-law of the girl I’m falling in love with.
The realization hits me like a sucker punch to the gut, knocking the wind from my lungs at once; I stumble forward, catching myself on one of the bars holding our victim up, trying to suppress the voracious shake in my bones. The one that calls out for someone I’m not worthy of.
Someone already so broken, I’m afraid all I’ll do is make her worse.
But I can’t think about that now, don’t want to imagine her while I’m finishing this guy off.
I rip the leather from his mouth, his teeth rattling as they come back together. “Speak,” I bark, reveling in how he winces in spite of everything. Like he’s aware of just what I might do to him if he pisses me off any further.
His face screws up, an expression of pure suffering twisting his mouth and making his eyes pinch closed. I tap the toe of my boot, pushing the cool metal tool against his thigh impatiently. Inhaling a deep, ragged breath, his bloodshot eyes pop back open, seeking mine.
“The woman you’re looking for, the lady behind the existence of the trade in this part of the state. You kill me, that doesn’t stop her from coming for you.”
“What woman?”
“Theboss.”
Elia steps up, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re telling us a woman’s behind the missing kids, the kids being sold. All of that?”
“I mean, I only know the rumors we heard between transports. We never saw her or anything.”
Boyd clears his throat. “There’s a woman on our surveillance tapes from The Bar. She’s always hooded, standing just off to the side like she knows she’s being recorded. Only ever watches, doesn’t move to come inside the club or anything.”
My head whips around, eyes narrowing at my best friend. “Why the fuck is this the first I’m hearing about it?”
“I didn’t realize it was a woman until now.” He shrugs, leaning against a crate full of assault rifles. “Ithoughtthe person was on the smaller side, but them being a woman didn’t cross my mind. It makes the most sense, though. None of us would ever go out of our way to look for someone like that, especially as the head of a fucking sex trafficking ring.”
Fuck.“Then we’ve been investigating the wrong fucking people.”
The junkie’s face starts to pale beneath the sheen of his blood, still steadily dripping from his thigh. “Can I go now?”
Elia grumbles something unintelligible under his breath, moving back to discuss logistics with Gia over where to head next. How to shut this whole thing down, how to find the elusive woman. My gaze hones in on the gap in the junkie’s skin, and instead of continuing on with the other, scraping out pieces of his flesh until he resembles Swiss cheese, I yank the .22 from the holster around my waist and fit the mouth of the barrel against his temple.
“You ever show any of those girls mercy?” He swallows, his cries starting up again, hiccups speeding up the flow of his blood with each intake of breath. “Ever let any of them go, let them leave with their innocence intact?” Without giving him a chance to answer, as if he could lie to me anyway, I cock the gun and let my finger brush against the trigger.
Painting the walls with the blood and brain matter of my enemies is my calling. Nothing can change that; this is what I sold my soul for. The preservation of my family’s legacy in exchange for tarnishing my own.
* * *
When I crawl through Juliet’s window later that night, I find her slumped asleep at her desk, drooling on top of an open textbook. Her summer semester doesn’t start for another couple of weeks, but she’s been trying to catch up on readings so that she doesn’t fall too far behind the other students.
I don’t really understand, given that she doesn’t really seem interested in marine biology in the slightest, but what do I know? I’m just the warm body helping her sleep at night.
Scooping her into my arms, I bring her limp body to the bed and settle her in the middle, pulling off her socks and tossing them on the floor. She stirs, blinking up at me with sleepy eyes I want to drown in, tucking her hands beneath her cheek.
“Did I fall asleep during sex again?”
“Again?” I frown, shucking my jacket and jeans off and climbing in beside her, pulling the covers up over us.
“Yeah.” She yawns, scooting over and fitting herself into my side. My arms encircle her tiny, pliant body, heating from our connection as my pulse kicks up a notch. “Sometimes I do that.”
My fingers flex against her bare shoulder. “kitten, I promise that if you ever fall asleep when I’m inside you, I’ll fuck you so hard you can’t ever sleep again. And if you don’t stop remembering the men before me, I’m gonna strap you down and fuck your ass until you bleed.”
