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Brian brushes a strand of hair out of my eyes and smirks. “What’s Halloween without a little scare?”
I feel his hard length pressed against me, and I wonder what part of this entire situation has him so worked up.
He wipes the tears off my face with the pads of his thumbs while he holds me like I’m the oxygen that makes his life possible. And I let out a long slow, steadying breath.
“What about him?” I ask, nodding at Gregor.
Chapter11
Brian
Ileave Mina alone in the room to gather myself, under the guise of getting something to transport Gregor. I’ve got about an hour before the drug wears off, and I want to be fully set up before that happens.
Everything inside me is racing around, panicked, angry, unsettled, buzzing with worries and lists inside my head, but outwardly I’m the glassy surface of a lake, completely unperturbed.
A thousand emotions fight for dominance. Nothing has gone according to my plan tonight. Why make such elaborate plans if they crumple to dust at the first interaction with the real world? I don’t regret taking out the target when and how I did—you don’t return a gift like that to the universe unopened—but it feels like a million tiny loose threads that I can’t tie back together, and everything inside my brain is a chaotic storm.
Then there’s the lingering fear of what could have happened to Mina if I hadn’t gotten there in time, if I hadn’t been convincing enough to get close and get Gregor distracted enough to sink that needle into his throat. I can’t let my mind go there. I don’t know what would happen if I ever lost her.
I love having a partner to do this with. I never thought I would, but I do. But maybe I’m being selfish putting her into all this risk and danger. For what? To fulfill some latent Bonnie and Clyde fantasy? We all know how that story turned out.
And then… there’s the cold anger, a gnarled and twisted thing resting in the pit of my stomach. However irrational, that anger is at Mina for allowing herself to be lured away by a rival. For kissing him. For not knowing it was me. Rationally I get it. Adrenaline is high. I get how he could feel a lot like me. We have a similar build, same hair color, same eye color. Logically I know, but there is a part of me so angry at her, and that anger terrifies me because though I may do dark and twisted things, my rage has always felt very controlled to me—even if it’s felt chaotic to others.
My rage doesn’t feel controlled right now. Now that the danger has passed I’m not sure I trust myself to be in the same room with her. I take a long deep breath. This is not what I need to be focused on right now. I need to finish this and get us safely off the radar before bodies are discovered.
I can still salvage part of the plan, it’ll just be used on a different person. I put my mask back on and go up to the second floor bathroom. I’d planned not to return here, and this feels far too dangerous. There’s a risk of being interrupted, and returning to the scene of a crime is never a good thing, but I have a new plan forming.
The bathroom door is still locked and undisturbed from the last time I was here. I take one more quick look before picking the lock.
Once safely inside, I secure the door again. The bleach smell is mostly gone. I studied the entire layout of this house for countless hours during early planning, and I’m ninety percent sure I know what’s outside under this window. I lean out into the crisp fall night air and am rewarded with the sight of giant holly bushes. Perfect. And it’s on the back side of the house which no one is watching at the moment. Why would they? All the real ways into the house are closer to the front, and the Windsor Estate’s entire security detail is focused on the logistics of the party as Windsor promised they would be.
I pull back the shower curtain and let out a relieved breath when I see the body still right where I left it. Did I expect it to get up and move? With the way this night is going? Nothing would surprise me.
I remove his glasses and put them in my pocket, then I drag Windsor out of the bathtub and push him out the window, watching to make sure the body is completely covered by the shrubbery and no stray pieces of his clothes or any limbs are hanging out.
I nod, satisfied that everything is well concealed. I get the bleach and clean out the tub where he finished bleeding out. I leave the window cracked to air out the room again. With any luck no one will even step inside this bathroom until tomorrow. I make sure there’s no remaining evidence in the bathroom, then I slip downstairs to a small room near the kitchen and pull mine and Mina’s change of clothes from their hiding spot. I change into the staff uniform and go to the kitchen to get the rolling cart.
When I return to Mina, I toss the other bag of clothes to her. “Change,” I say. My tone is abrupt, and I find I can’t look at her. Now that the immediate danger is gone, I just… can’t.
She hurriedly changes out of the formal evening gown and into the clothes she normally wears when we go on these jobs together. The dress is a slinky material and seems to convert to a liquid when she puts it in the bag.
My jaw clenches as I imagine Gregor peeling that dress off her and fucking her. Had that been his intention? To defile her in the barely-lit room before I discovered them? Hewaskissing her after all. And she was letting him do it. I take another measured breath. She didn’t know it wasn’t me. But it doesn’t matter how much I repeat this truth to myself. Surely some part of her had to know. Some dark place within her that she can’t acknowledge.
Am I not monster enough for her now? Before the changes in her, I never would have thought that she needed a monster in her life. Unlike the pieces of shit who had her before me, I’ve never believed she somehow wants a man who hurts her. Out of all the men in the world I was the least likely to be safe for her. And yet… here we are. But am I still safe? Am I enough for her?
I don’t know if I need to be more man or more monster to keep her, and that thought enrages me. She cost me millions to possess, but what if at the end of it all, I can’t keep her heart? I hate that I’m thinking these things, feeling these things. What the fuck is wrong with me that I should care about any of this?
I want to punish her for kissing him. For making me feel all these things I can’t process. For making me doubt myself. For twisting me up into this sad hybrid creature… not quite a man, but not quite a monster—a least not with her anymore.
“Grab his feet,” I say when she’s fully changed. Mina grabs Gregor’s feet and I grip under his shoulders, then we neatly transport my new prey onto the bottom of the rolling cart. I cover it again with the long white tablecloth and roll him out to the location we set up for the original target.
An hour has passed when my captive starts to wake and slowly rise up out of his groggy haze. I’ve got him chained up in the conservatory, several acres away from the main property. With everyone at the party, and the dark blanket of night wrapping around the gardens, it’s unlikely anyone will be out here again until sunrise… unless...
Just outside the conservatory, the Windsor Estate has a large pumpkin patch. It’s just the kind of place a couple of lovers might slip off to in order to get away from the party. But at least for now, it seems no one has been tempted by the call of a pumpkin patch on Halloween. I guess nobody believes in The Great Pumpkin anymore.
Windsor’s body is slumped in the corner of the conservatory. I went back for him once I got Gregor secured. I want all my bodies in one place for tonight.
Mina helped, but we still haven’t really spoken—not since my initial relief at her safety. I think she senses something is very off about me, and I pray silently to any dark god who might hear my prayers that what I’m about to do will sate the beast inside demanding she be punished—that I can get all my rage out on Gregor and spare Mina my simmering wrath.
