Page 32 of Mayhem and Minnie

“He… He didn’t get to do anything… But he was about to…”

Her voice is so light and soft. So damn melodious.

I stare some more at her, as if by staring I can figure out what it is about this pocket-sized girl that made me break so many of my rules tonight—that will make me break even more of them.

“Tell me in detail what he did.”

She swallows.

I should probably gentle my tone. Maybe soothe her or something.

But I don’t know the first thing about soothing, so this will have to do.

She raises those big eyes of hers and looks at me.

Fuck. What the hell is it about her eyes?

“He cornered me outside the bathroom,” she starts. Her hands are in her lap, and she’s fidgeting with her fingers again. “When he saw it was empty, he pulled me inside and locked the stall. He groped me a little and tried to get my pants off. But then you came in…”

“Is that all?” I demand.

She nods.

“Are you sure you’re telling me the truth?”

Another nod.

“It’s not as if you can go back and kill him again,” she adds with a nervous laugh. “You killed him, didn’t you?”

I shrug. “Perhaps.”

She blinks.

“Does that scare you?” I ask.

She wets her lips as she takes her time to answer. Yet for some reason, I don’t want some politically correct answer that she thinks might be the right one.

I grab her by her nape and bring her closer. Our faces are inches apart—familiar, isn’t it? A dry laugh bubbles in my throat. Three hours ago, I would have never imagined I’d be willingly touching someone like this. But three hours ago, I was still on my self-imposed killing exile, and I was certainly not planning to beat a random man to a pulp and kill another in public.

Bloodily kill him.

Disgust rolls over me again. But it’s only at having touched that dirty-ass man.

It’s not directed at her. Now.

Interesting.

Perhaps I can develop a new killing technique after all, and she’ll be the perfect muse.

Perhaps therapy was never the key.

I didn’t need to stop killing. I just needed to find the perfect victim.

“The truth, Minnie. Do I scare you?”

She shakes her head.

“You saved me,” she whispers. “Bad guys deserve bad things.”

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