Page 23 of Arran's Obsession

Personally, I liked this disposal method, as did the local cops because it took the worst offenders off Deadwater’s streets, and the corpses’ appearances were always in someone else’s jurisdiction. Our city bordered Scotland and England, and the river that split the metropolis formed the boundary. Neither police force wanted to take ownership of dead men floating. Sometimes they even ignored them.

Shade didn’t feel the same. It was too clean for him. But if my friend had his way, he’d have a trophy room in the warehouse of dead eyes and femurs or some such shite, and that just begged for trouble.

With a purity of focus, he tore the tape from the man’s mouth.

“I didn’t do it,” the fucker blabbed, struggling against the restraints, the rope tying his hands together strung up to a chain over the boathouse’s overhead beam. His toes touched the walkway below then dangled over the gap between. “She’s a lying fucking cunt.”

“That a fact?” Shade asked. “Huh. My bad. Hold up and I’ll untie ye.”

Without warning, he snapped back and threw a fist at the arsehole’s face. Bone crunched, and the man moaned, blood ebbing from his shattered nose.

Behind my mask, I grinned.

“You said you’d let me down,” Bradley said between shuddering breaths.

“Eh, changed my mind. Pity, because ye were this close to freedom.” Shade pinched his fingers a centimetre apart.

He never spoke this much unless dealing with business.

“This is about the girl, right? She fucking flaunted herself in the window,” our prey blurted in desperation. His gaze darted between us in our skeleton masks, the terror in his eyes a delight. “Brushing her hair. Dancing around in little shorts. All of it was a message for me. Every night, when I climbed up to the roof to see her.”

Through his eyes, I saw the innocent girl in her bedroom, unaware a predator had her in his sights. In his, she’d become a tease, a target.

Also, not the one we’d taken him in for.

“That’s why you followed her,” I pressed.

“I didn’t follow her. She opened the door. Don’t you see? She wanted it.”

“What was her name?” Shade asked.

“I… I called her my little girl.”

Shade and I swapped a glance. This happened too often as well. Our mark would give up another crime to the ones we already knew about, sometimes as a bargaining chip. This piece of shit had been released from jail a few weeks ago after serving ten years for rape. He’d been on our radar and down to be watched. But we didn’t have eyes everywhere. I hated that we’d had a blind spot for Bradley’s fresh reign of terror.

He’d followed a fourteen-year-old girl into a park and dragged her into the bushes. Forced himself on her. She survived his attack, and her description to the police gave us everything we needed.

Three fucking weeks, he’d been free. Two girls hurt.

It killed me inside, pain I couldn’t handle.

“What about the woman in the churchyard?” I pressed. I had no reason to suspect him for the murder on Genevieve’s road, but it was worth asking the question while I had a captive audience.

“Not interested in women,” Bradley admitted. “Don’t pin that on me.”

Shade turned his back to the rapist and cocked his head at me. “I’m done. Let’s get on with the fun stuff.” He lifted his bruised fist. “Rock, paper, scissors, shoot.”

I copied his action, blunting his scissors with my rock.

Shade’s expression dropped. “Fuck. At least use my blade?”

I accepted his hunting knife and let my grin spread, my need for revenge on men like this waking every part of me. It got me out of bed in the morning. Had my blood flowing like nothing else.

Well, like almost nothing else.

It had flowed straight to my dick in Genevieve’s flat.

I centred myself on Bradley then flicked the knife’s holster open, the action well practiced. A slice opened his shirt, revealing a sagging belly. I cut the rest of his clothes away until he dangled naked.

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