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Adam
“Eyeballs are fascinating.” I mused as I yanked my prisoner’s chin up. His head cracked onto the floor, his body trapped under mine as I pressed my knee into his chest. “They tell you so much.”
“No, please!” He seemed more interested in the sharp blade skimming along his cheek than my words.
Of course, he probably hadn’t spent the better part of his adult life studying eyes like I had.
There was something sickly interesting about them. Made mostly of collagen and sugar. Arguably, they were disgusting. Wet and spongy, but still, it attracted us. Grabbed our attention. Considered beautiful on some.
Not because of what they were physically but because of what they were emotionally. The windows to the soul. Each one unique. Even if they were the same color, they were never exact.
I should know I’d been hunting a certain pair of eyes for seven years. The exact shade of honey I’d fallen in love with. I wasn’t even sure what I would do if I found some that matched hers. I couldn’t explain it. It had become a twisted fascination of mine.
But no matter how many I killed. How many eyes I plucked from their bodies; they were never right.
Never light enough. Or with the flecks of gold. Too hazel or brown. They were wrong. All wrong. Just like my life had been since I last saw them.
Since I last saw her.
He screamed in agony as I made the first cut. Bucking his hips, he tried to throw me off, but his hands were bound behind his back. His legs were wrapped in thick chains.
I didn’t even know his name. But he’d pissed off my boss and friend, Matteo. It was dangerous to anger the head of the Gallo Mafia family.
I slid the knife around the socket. Easily slicing through the tendons as he yelled. Instead of the sound grating my nerves. Or disgusting me. I smiled. Let his pain soothe my own.
My heart rate slowed as I sucked in a deep breath, letting the high wash over me. Letting his blood on my hands calm my soul.
Maybe I was sick. But I’d been like this for so long that I didn’t know anything else. I hadn’t been able to feel since her.
No guilt. No pain. No happiness. I was a void. Driven only by the hunt.
He curled into the fetal position as I pushed off him. Bringing my hand to my face, I examined the eye in my palm. My mouth turned down again as I realized the color was too dark. The iris almost matched the black pupil.
I tossed it to the floor, feeling it pop beneath my foot as I moved to the sink. Matteo’s personal torture chamber was nicely designed. There were white tile floors and walls, making clean up easy. A sink and hose on one wall, and another had shelves full of the various tools you’d need to get answers.
I washed my own knife in the water. I still preferred it over all the others available. It was specifically designed to curve along a round object. I flipped it closed, stowing it in my pocket as I left the room. Not giving a second glance to the man bleeding and whimpering on the concrete.
My footsteps echoed on the marble floors as I walked up the stairs. I’d spent a lot of my teenage years in this house. I started working for Matteo’s family when I was barely twelve.
Back then, his uncle, Carmine had been in charge. He liked using kids to run his drugs because we wouldn’t face hard time if we were caught. And who would believe a kid when we said the respectable businessman made us do it?
There was no shortage of desperate kids and teens like me, willing to serve under one of the most powerful families in the city. Some because they had no home to go back to. Others to feed their own habits. A few who wanted more. A better life. Little did we know this life was just a different kind of worse.
I did it for my mom. So she didn’t have to work. So she would be happy. Turns out it didn’t matter in the end.
But I’d made an impression on Matteo, who was my age but already being groomed to lead. He’d seen something in me. Probably my lack of a soul.
I made my way through the ranks, becoming his personal guard at eighteen. I stayed with him for five years before it all imploded. Before being in this house made me want to peel the skin from my body.
But now I was back because he needed me. Because I owed him my life.
I noticed movement in the dark hall as I reached the top of the stairs. Matteo’s shape came into view as the light from the kitchen illuminated the space.
He raised a brow as he saw me. His eyes tracked the blood staining my clothes. “Can’t sleep?”
I didn’t answer. The line of my mouth flattened the longer he stared. He had the kind of eyes that saw more than I wanted. Or maybe that was the years of friendship that made him see through me.
