Page 373 of Dark Love

Tomorrow… tomorrow, I’ll be all of those things. Today I want the impossible.

Life For A Life

Vex

“Is he still alive?” I slam my car door closed in front of what appears to be a simple storage facility that I own under a shell company.

Payne shakes his head. “Sadly. How is Ms. Fleur doing?”

“Her hands still shake, and I think she might have had a panic attack.” Being powerless, watching her pain burns like acid in my gut.

“Did you make sure she’s getting help?”

The idea of another man helping her… Dahlia’s mine to care for and protect. “She’ll be fine.” I’m going to make sure of it. “Don’t let me go nuts in there.” Payne is good at pulling me back from the edge. Though, I’ve never felt as close to it as I do now. Murder is a necessity. Something I have to do because of who I am and the people in the world. It’s not something I take pleasure in. You find a roach in your house, you kill it. You don’t do a dance over its corpse and celebrate its death.

But killing this man… this roach… he’s too low even for a roach… this blight on humanity could be the first to tip me over the edge. He hurt Dahlia in a way that can never be erased. I can protect her, but no one can take the realization away that life and safety are smoke and mirrors.

“I won’t.” Payne thumps me on my back. “I can take care of the problem for you.”

That might be the reasonable choice—My fists clench—but it’s not the way to deal with my pit of rage. “I’ll let you know.” And even though I don’t want to, I will. Because once you find pleasure in killing, it changes you.

That pleasure has turned many a man into a thing of nightmares.

We head through a secret door in a back room into a section of the building that’s soundproofed, which is important when we need to acquire information. That shouldn’t be an issue today.

Though I can understand why men of old would put their enemy’s head on a stick as a warning to all.

This guy’s head would look really good hanging outside my club.

And that’s why I’m going to let Payne take care of him.

Payne flips the switch off on the music he left on the entire time. Wouldn’t want the guy to think we’re unfeeling? The lights didn’t go off either, in case he was afraid of the dark…

“See, all safe and sound. If you ignore a few of those bruises.” Payne smiles as the guy stands up from where he was curled up on the floor.

“Who notices a few bruises when they’re about to die?” The man in front of me no longer has the crisp, trustable demeanor that might have helped him get away with bringing his victims home. Maybe I’ll just give him a few more before I leave him to Payne.

“You aren’t going to kill me,” the man manages to stand tall as he says those words.

“Why would you think that? We don’t take people here to make friends with them.” Why am I even talking to the soon-to-be dead man in front of me?

“Because I can give you something you want.”

There’s nothing that filth has that I want. “You didn’t say this man was stupid.”

“Didn’t think he was. Other than choosing your club, which in itself was the stupidest decision he’ll ever make.” Payne doesn’t take his eyes from his target.

“I’m not stupid. I’ve been doing this for decades without getting caught. How did you guess?”

“Is this guy bragging about hurting women?” I turn to Payne to avoid looking at the filth in front of me.

“It seems he’s stupider than I thought. Maybe we should hurt him before we kill him, just so he knows what it feels like.”

Torture would be too kind for him.

“You aren’t going to touch me.”

Stupid and overconfident.

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