Page 2 of The Ripper

Had he been… tortured?

“What’s your story, stranger?” I whispered to myself, so low I barely heard it.

I wanted to know.

People whispered around him, throwing glances his way then quickly looking away as if he scared them, but the man didn’t seem to hear or notice anyone as he kept checking his phone, and I clutched the cross around my neck in my palm, willing him to look at me, even for a second, but he didn’t.

Shivers ran down my spine as I watched him grab his suitcase, my eyes glued to his back as he walked away, fixing on the flex of his arm as he pulled the luggage after him, imagining what it would have felt like to be the one he carried in those arms.

He soon vanished from view, but my brain had made a copy of his image and carved it into memory, committing him to prison in my mind.

I’d died… yet I’d never felt more alive.

CHAPTER 1

HOW IT ALL BEGAN

GRIMM

6 years ago

I was an unfeeling ghost.

I ate the same meal almost every day, slept the same number of hours, drank copious amounts of vodka, drove the same car – though I had a dozen of them – and I was bored out of my mind.

The only thing that kept changing was the woman who warmed my bed, and I was slowly getting tired of sleeping around as well, because they were all so… tedious. They never argued, never talked back. Nothing was new anymore. There were no shivers running down my spine, no conversation to keep me interested before or after the no-thrill sex, no fucking essence.

Empty shells, devoid of personality, fucking barren, and I was so sick of it that I considered going celibate.

And I put an end to that “considering” phase,

because in reality sex was one of the two ways I could feel the slightest amount of pleasure these fucking days.

The other was killing.

Sadly, the relief I got out of watching the life drain out of someone’s eyes came less and less lately, since my missions now consisted of sending messages to rival families, threats and such. Brutal ones, not going to lie, but not even those thrilled me anymore, as I missed the thrill that killing everyday used to give me.

Nothing tickled my interest.

All I wanted was a bold woman to push me around a little, keep me on my toes and call me out on my bullshit, and a nice, warm bloodbath. Was that too much to ask?

~ You’re such a pretentious ass.

~ Guess who I learned that from?

~ Not me, I’m a people person.

~ Yeah, a dead people person.

~ Still, it includes the words ‘people’ and ‘person’.

I was dead inside, and barely living on the outside.

That’s what happened when you grew up surrounded by death from day one, given the fact that my father made it his mission in life to toughen me up, prepare me for the future and such, therefore not hiding any of the many bloody ways in which someone could bite the dust.

I was a necessary child, born to carry on his name, raised in his image, meant to rule over his empire and be as ruthless and cunning as him. The fucking heir to his ever-growing organization, ready to kill on command and not question the reason for it.

I was introduced to murder at age five, and almost every day since then. He molded me into the perfect killer, turned me into a machine, and that is all I knew for most of my life.

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