Page 78 of Smoke and Mirrors

His smirk tells me I’m on the right track. “You know, Kace, there’s so much you don’t know.”

Scoffing as I walk back around to his front, I shake my head. “People keep telling me that. But no one will tell me exactly what I don’t know. That’s why I am here, Mark. You’re going to tell me everything I’m missing.”

“Oh, I am?”

Smiling, I nod. “Yes, you are.”

“And what makes you think I would tell you, Kace? Because I’m such a nice guy?”

Smirking, I shake my head. “No, because when I did some digging at the internet café, I found my father’s records, the ones that say where he died.”

He tilts his head and shrugs. “And?”

“And I want to know how he was killed at home on U.S. soil? Where he should have had backup. Where he should have been safe and protected.”

His hard glare intensifies, and his lip curls up in disgust. “No one is safe in this line of work, Kace. Don’t be so naïve.”

I let out a small, sarcastic laugh. “I want to know what happened, and I want to know now. This can go one of two ways, Luthendale. Either we can do it the easy way, where you tell me what I want to know, or we can do it the painful way, and I can torture you till you cave. Up to you.”

Lily winces, and I tense up hoping she doesn’t have to see me torture someone, but Luthendale is a weasel. Hopefully, scaring him will work.

“I won’t talk, Kace. Camilla would kill me.”

Wincing, I slump a little, while I like torturing people for information if they deserve it—like Mark does—doing it in front of Lily is not something I want to do.

“Okay, the hard way it is,” I say.

Lily swallows hard as I walk past her and into the kitchen looking for something to use.

“Where do you keep your pliers, Mark?” I ask more as a scare tactic than anything else.

“Fuck you, Kace.”

“No pliers? Okay, I’ll improvise,” I say, opening a drawer to find a roasting fork. Smiling, I pull it out, the silver shines against the pale moonlight that filters in through the window, and I sigh. “Lily, turn around.”

She whimpers and turns facing the wall. I stalk over to Mark as his eyes focus on the giant meat fork.

“One last chance, Mark, talk or you get the fork. Ha… that rhymed,” I say, trying to sound like I’m having fun with this.

Mark’s tension rolls off him as his body shudders, and he shakes his head. “Stop playing about, Kace. I’m your superior, and if you do anything to me, your career is ov—”

I stab the fork straight down into his thigh, so deep it goes all the way in, the metal pulls against his thigh muscle as it penetrates his skin. Blood seeps down his leg and runs onto the floor as he screams out in agony.

“Sorry… you were saying?” I ask and pull it out torturously slow twisting it slightly as I do. He writhes on the chair and breathes so harshly in and out of his mouth that spittle flies off his lips.

“Fuck you, you fucking little bastard. I’m going to make sure no government agency ever looks at you aga—”

With those words, I stab it into his other leg right above his knee. He kicks out and screams in pain as I hear Lily whimpering behind me, but I can’t focus on her right now. I have to get at the truth.

“Mark, c’mon. You know it only gets worse from here. Next stop is your eyes.” I pull the fork out positioning it in front of his face. He breathes heavily and murmurs under his breath, but I don’t quite catch it.

“Sorry, what was that?”

“I’ll fucking tell you, you fucking son of a bitch!” He looks up at me glaring as he pants harshly.

Grinning a toothy grin, I nod and take a deep breath knowing how easily he caved. “Okay, first things first. You and my mom… true or false?”

He exhales and nods. “True. We’ve been together for the last seven years.”

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