Page 83 of Sick Bargain

“You can piss yourself anytime and I’ll get hard over it,” I say, grinning behind my mask. “But mostly, I just enjoy the way you get scared. It brings you to life. It feeds a need I never knew I had.” I turn onto Malone’s street while he cries in the back. “You’re the one with the fear kink, Remiel.”

“No, I’m—” His palms rub again. “Yeah, I guess I am. I never knew. Until you.”

Backing into the Malone’s driveway, I admit, “I never knew a lot of things until you either.” I tug on his mask to make sure it stays on, and then get out and walk to the back. I open the hatch and wait for Remiel.

“Are we taking him out?” he asks.

“No,” Ghost answers, standing next to his brother. “He stays there.”

“You love this shit, don’t you?” Remiel asks Ghost. “That you can walk into a club wearing a mask that earns you respect and walk out with a man’s life in your hands.”

Ghost has a sinister mind and a need to be superior to everyone else, so I know he’s smiling behind his mask. “Fucking right, I do. But that respect was earned, not demanded. Don’t mistake the two, Remi.”

Menace walks down the porch steps with Gregory Malone’s wife. She knows, but she’s not crying. She wraps her housecoat around her, holding it tight, and keeps her chin up as she approaches us. She nods in respect, and we part to let her see her husband.

Malone gets himself into a sitting position, two daggers still sticking out of him, but the one in his ass is gone. He’s bleeding all over, but it’s his eyes bleeding lies that are the worst. He wants to promise his wife all sorts of things, but she doesn’t look willing to listen.

“What’ll you do with him?” she asks us while Gregory pleads for her mercy.

“He’s going to disappear,” Menace says, voice modulated. “Forever. Do you want access to him? We can grant you that.”

“You’re keeping him alive?” she asks.

“Yes. For now.” I hand her his wallet and keys. “Do you want a say in when he dies?”

Her eyes scan our masks, taking extra long on Remiel’s. Our masks have voice modulators, but his doesn’t, so he better keep his mouth shut. “If you wait until he turns fifty-five and actually give me a body, I can collect his pension.” She shows us his ID. “That’s in two years.”

Wow, he’s older than I thought he was. He looks young for his age, and Remiel must not believe it because he reaches out to take the ID from her. “You realize you’re agreeing to two years of his torture, right?” he asks her.

Ghost shakes his head, Menace looks at me, and I squeeze his defiant fucking ass for speaking again.

But Marnie Malone is attentive and discreet. “He tortured you for way longer,” she says to Remiel. “Tortured me even longer than that. I don’t need his pension, just thought it’d be a perk to come out of all this… madness. I don’t want a say.”

“Two years and a body,” I state. “Hero?”

Remiel nods. “Two years and a body. You’ll get his pension.”

Marnie nods, tossing his wallet into the trunk with him. “You don’t even deserve a goodbye. This is on you, husband.” She slams the door, and Malone barely gets his legs inside before it comes down. “You don’t need to warn me about discretion,” she says to us. “Guilt kept me away, but I’d love to drop off my harp.”

Remiel tenses, but he gives her a nod. Obviously, she knows who he is, so naturally, I will come back to threaten her if she so much as breathes his name. But truthfully, she looks relieved, like an era is ending and she can finally live without her husband’s stench surrounding her. Why she never did anything about him isn’t my business. A person trapped in a dangerous marriage isn’t my place to judge. She’s free now.

We don’t drive to Vile House. We head to the asylum, and Remiel gets nervous the closer we get.

“Why here?” he asks. “Don’t put me back in there…”

“You wanted to know how we come and go from Vile House. This is my act of trust, Remiel.”

“What? I don’t get it. What’s the asylum have to do with Vile House, other than Dr. Cooper working here?”

“Get ready for a long, dark walk underground. Moros is multilayered, and the tunnels are how we get around.” I pull into the lot closest to the ward Remiel was kept in. I won’t make him go back to that chamber room, but someday, I’d love for him to face it and get comfortable in its history.

“Tunnels,” he whispers to himself, thinking it all over. “But Vile House is in the middle of town.”

“Long and dark walk, like I said. First, we’re dropping Malone off in his new cell. He’s gonna be a patient here. In the ward I chased you through.”

Menace and Ghost get the back of the SUV open, and once Malone is out, I pull into a parking spot. One of the initiates will clean the back and put the vehicle somewhere to sit for a while, so I leave the keys under the visor.

“What is it? The ward?” he asks. When we walk inside and head through hallways to get to the secluded, locked-up ward, I pull our masks off.

---