Page 53 of Club Blood

I tutted, brushing dust off the top of a stool and bringing it closer so I could sit before him. “No need for such animosity. We’re all friends here.”

“I’m not your fucking friend. You work for thatbitch–”

Before he could even finish his sentence, I had smacked him hard across the face. He flinched away from me as my hand wrapped around his throat, squeezing tightly.

“You’re right. We’re not friends. But you know who is my friend?That bitch.So watch your disrespectful fucking mouth, or I’ll tear your tongue out and make you watch as I eat it. Understand?”

Jonah nodded, gasping for breath when I released his throat.

I walked over to the table in the room’s corner, examining the requested tools. Picking up a rather large, rusty pair of gardening shears, I turned to face Jonah again, noting the way his pupils widened in the horror he thought he was going to endure.

“This could be over very quickly, you know.”

“What do you want?”

I grinned, flashing my teeth and setting the shears back on the table. I heard Jonah release a breath, thinking his quick mood change would stop the torture. Poor little love clearly hadn’t heard the rumors about me, or why I was never forced to join a coven against my will.

A love for pain and torment was invaluable and everyone always wanted me on their team, never willing to try and force my hand lest they ended up at the other end of my wrath. Murder sells, even as a Known.

The gleaming edge of a surgical knife caught my eye, the glistening silver calling to me like a lover’s whisper. I picked it up and pressed it against the pad of my thumb, beaming when it sliced through the skin and a droplet of my blood formed. I licked it away, the tang of my own tainted blood not quite as exquisite as a human’s, and chuckled when the wound repaired itself.

Oh, playing with him was going to beso fun.

* * *

Dried blood covered my hands,crusting beneath my fingernails. Jonah slumped in his chains, his legs barely able to hold him up. The only way anyone would have been able to tell the hell I had just put him through would be the sheer terror in his eyes as I tilted his head up with the tip of a blade. The serrated edge of the knife cut into his chin, but not deep enough to make him bleed.

I had spilled so much of his blood that it wasn’t fun anymore.

“Please,” he whispered pathetically, averting his eyes from me. “Please just tell me what you want so you can kill me. I want it to be over.”

I sighed and shook my head, sitting back on the discarded stool from earlier. “I wonder why you think saying please will do you any good. Whatever gave you the impression that whining would make me go easy on you? It’s not like pleading made you stop going after Cecelia inAmbrosia.”

“Listen, man, I was just following orders. I wanted to cause some trouble for your boss and I was paid a load to do it. You get it, right?”

Smiling, I brushed a strand of my hair behind my ear, not worrying about smearing blood across my face – it was probably already covered. Looking down at myself, I couldn’t help but chuckle. It looked like I had taken a page out of Elizabeth Bathory’s book, bathing in the blood of my victims. While she wasn’t one of us, she wasn’t far off; human blood really could perfect beauty and make you live forever, but you needed a certain parasite inside you to do it. The countess was searching for something that she could have found if only she looked in the shadows, rather than creating her own.

The fact that my insanely expensive attire was now ruined was a bit of a buzzkill, though.

“Oh, I totally get it,bro. Don’t really think Cece would though. Or Mercy for that matter. You did try and kill her claimed one. It's a bit rude.”

“I was just–”

“Following orders, I know. I heard you the first time. You should probably go ahead and tell me who gave you the orders.”

Jonah shook his head furiously, the grease and sweat from his hair landing on the ground and mixing with his blood. “I can’t! They’ll kill me!”

I clicked my tongue at him. “They’re not going to get the chance. Remember how just a second ago you were beggingmeto kill you? I’m the last face you’re going to see, Jonah. And you get to decide whether I’m going to savor every minute of your death, dragging it out until you’re an empty shell, or I can make it quick and let us both move on.”

“It was Carlisle, okay! Carlisle sent Henrik to meet me and offered me two million to do something that would set Mercy off, make her lose control so everyone could see she shouldn’t be queen. Carlisle wants the throne, man. He wants to own all the territoriesandthe Authority.”

“Thank you,” I whispered, patting his bloodstained cheek before I shoved my hand through his chest and twisted, relishing in the crunch of his bones as I yanked his heart out.

I held the husk in my hand, a victorious smile spreading across my cheeks. It squelched against the floor as I dropped it, digging the heel of my shoes into it until I felt it turn to nothing beneath me.

30

CECELIA

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