“Yes, but I’ll get a great amount of satisfaction watching it get pulverized.”
“All right. If I win, I’m kicking Sky out of the House.”
He frowns at me. “She’s my assistant.”
“And she’s my pain in the ass.”
The way she spoke to Jessie tonight was the last fucking straw. I know my little mouse thinks I was flirting with Sky right after our House announcement. I did laugh at her, but only because she was being fucking ridiculous.
“How long before you dump that mortal and come back to my bed?” Sky had said.
I’d laughed and replied, “When the sun stops rising and the air no longer fills my lungs.”
The Sheriff’s car pulls up behind us, the lights still flashing. We’re on a desolate back road, not a house in sight.
Damien sighs. “I suspect Kelly won’t want Sky around anyway. So you have a deal.”
“Bowing at her feet already, are you?”
“Fuck off.”
In my side mirror, I see the deputy climb out of his car. He’s late twenties by the looks of it, stocky, likely works out. I hear the crackle of his radio from inside the car.
“I’ll get the deputy,” I tell my brother. “You get the dash cam and the radio.”
“Count of three,” Damien says.
“One.”
“Two.”
We’re out of the car on three.
The deputy sees the blur that is my brother and me, but it takes his stupid mortal brain an extra two seconds to comprehend what that means.
His hand is on his duty belt, unclipping his gun by the time I reach him. I tear off his body cam, drop it and smash it beneath my boot.
Damien rips off the passenger side door of the car, wings it into the field, and tears out all of the comms.
I use compulsion to bring the deputy to a standstill and his hands go limp at his sides.
Damien shuts off the flashing lights and then comes around the front of the car, a cigarette clipped between his lips. He lights the end, curling his finger around the filter as he takes a long hit.
“Evening, Deputy”—I look for his gold nameplate—“Kent. What’s your first name?”
He blinks at me. “Mike.”
Damien takes another hit from the cigarette, the smoke curling in the light of the deputy’s headlights.
“Mike, tell us your biggest secret.”
His pupils pulse beneath the compulsion. His face is blank, but his hands are trembling.
Sometimes the big dumb ones can fight against being compelled, but never hard enough to get out of it. Geniuses are the easiest to control. It’s the hubris and the naïve belief no one can outwit them.
Mike starts sweating.
“He probably thinks murder is the worst sin,” Damien says and hands me the cigarette.