Page 130 of The Masks She Wore

?Besides, the thought of having her by my side on assignments, working with me, fuck, it made me so goddamn happy.

27

Jack

January 17th, 2020

The house was quiet. No television playing her favorite movies, no music, no breathing.

?I walked into our room and found the bed was just how I had left it before I flew out two days ago. I knew she would have gone straight to the cathedral, but I hadn’t expected her to stay there.

?I wasn’t worried, more so irritated that she hadn’t returned any of my calls or texts since I left. I had to show some compassion, given what she might have discovered while in that basement, but I still expected her to follow the rules. She was strong enough to follow my rules even during a life-altering revelation.

?I picked up her phone and grabbed a syringe from the bathroom on my way out, just in case.

?It took me five minutes to get there, and only one minute to get to the basement door.

?I shoved it open and immediately knew the truth by the smell that wafted from the stairs.

?Goddammit.

?I had expected a lot. Missing toes, missing fingers, maybe muffled screaming or some tongues on the ground. Even a dick or two, but not this. Not this particular smell.

?I ran down the steps, slowing on the last few when the room came into view.

?I had to admit that if Azrael had been in the country, I would have assumed that he had done this and left the mess for her to clean up, laughing the entire way back to the fucking Wonderland he lived in.

?As it was, he was gone, and Zo was still in Texas. Rae was the only one around for miles, save for the two initiates I had put a few miles down the road.

?Limbs had been severed, a flood of blood pooling below the four bodies, splattered along the walls. Teeth were missing, fingernails gone, chunks of hair ripped out. Dicks and balls on the floor, some of the flesh charred, others shredded.

?She had done her due diligence.

?They were all dead. Long since by the smell. All of them, what was left of them, hanging from the ceiling by chains wrapped around her neck.

?I hadn’t left them like that and neither had Zo.

?I turned to the workbench and found her sitting on the floor, leaning against it, blood soaking her, most of it dried. She was still holding a pair of pliers in her hand, her stare blank, her wrists propped up on her knees. She hadn’t slept since I left. Not a blink, I could see it. She massacred four people in a way that would make my youngest brother overjoyed and she hadn’t slept, she probably hadn’t eaten or had anything to drink either, and her mind had just shattered in a way I might not be able to fix.

?At least Azrael would be proud.

?I couldn’t remember a time in my life that I had felt this kind of fear. I wasn’t going to lose her to her own mind. That wasn’t fucking allowed.

?I shoved my hands into my pockets and lifted my chin. “Princess—”

?“They have a tape,” she revealed, her voice holding a kind of rage I had never heard come from her mouth before. Her voice was cool and clear, chilling. It sent shivers down my spine hearing her speak like that.

?Her eyes lifted to mine, the blank stare shifting into something I had only seen one person give me: Azrael.

?Fuck.

?“What do you mean; they have a tape?”

?She wiped her bloody forearm across her nose, still wearing the clothes she had put on two days ago by the way the blood crusted and cracked in certain places.

?She shoved herself to a stand, steady on her feet. “A tape,” she said, gesturing towards the dead with her pliers. “They have a tape. His name is Blanchard, no first name, just Blanchard,” she went on, walking around the bodies, still hanging from the ceiling. “Just Blanchard,” she said, looking up at Nora as if she had given her the answer.

?We already knew that. She had probably pushed for another name or perhaps she had simply forgotten that we had gotten that name already. Sleep deprivation was the worst thing a person could go through. No sleep, no eating, no drinking, all while torturing four people, listening to them screaming, trying to pull answers from them. Even if she hadn’t found out a single thing, this whole situation would have made her mind a little unsteady.

---