Page 107 of The Fire Went Wild

He’s drenched in blood. His hair is stringy with it, and his arms cord with muscle as he clenches the meat cleaver and his machete at his sides. He meets my gaze and smiles in a way that’s like baring his teeth, and I want him so badly it feels like my heart is going to burst out of my chest.

He didn’t even touch those knives on his belt, and I wonder if he brought them because he was worried about me.

Jaxon smiles at me, a beacon in the midst of all this carnage. “Do you want to take care of him, little Hunter?”

I don’t know who he means at first, but then he tilts his head and I remember the third man. At some point, he started inching his way toward the door, but he stops now, eyes flicking back and forth between us, his fear a scent that makes the back of my throat ache.

Another man who hasn’t done anything to me. Who was probably only here because Tyloch hired him. I’m sure he’s done terrible things. Trafficked young women. Carried out sacrifices and other strategic deaths. Slid heroin into the veins of broken communities.

He’s done terrible things, but so have I.

I turn away from Jaxon and walk over to the man, who whimpers and trembles in front of me. Some small part of me still whispers that wanting to kill him isn’t normal.

Except it is. For me, for Jaxon, it is.

“Please,” he whispers, and I’m struck with a hot, sexual power as I tower over him, my knife at my side. I know whatit’s like to make someone come, to decide whether or not they experience pleasure. I’ve done that hundreds of times. But deciding if they get to live or not?—

It’s a million times better.

“Sorry,” I say, and then I jab the knife into the side of his throat, groaning as I penetrate through the muscles and sinew and some bony structure that grabs at the blade. Blood spurts hot across my face, and I pull the knife out to do it again, and then again, just like I did with Oliver Raffia. I keep doing it until this man’s dead, too, and then I leave the knife lodged in his flesh and drop back on my ass, drawing in deep, steadying breaths.

Jaxon’s footsteps thud behind me. He crouches down and uses his bloody hand to draw my hair away from my throat. Then he kisses me, licking the blood away.

“Fuck me,” I whisper, staring at the corpse I just created, wishing I could make another.

“I was hoping you’d stay that,” he growls, and then he yanks me up by my blood-drenched hair.

CHAPTER FORTY

JAXON

Ithrow Charlotte on my bed and rub my cock as she rolls over, her eyes blazing with that lust you only get after a good kill. I’ve got it myself right now. If I don’t get inside her, I’m pretty sure I’m going to die, Hunter or not.

“Get those fucking clothes off you,” I snarl at her, fumbling with my own zipper. The scent of death hangs heavy in the air, and it just makes me want to fuck her more. Especially as I watch her drag her blood-soaked pants down over her hips and thighs and calves, the movement giving me tantalizing glimpses of her pussy.

“Get your fucking cock out,” she snaps back as she settles onto her elbows, spreading her bare thighs wide for me.

I grin at the lust dripping off her words, and I do as she asks, showing her how hard I am for her and what she’s done.

She runs her tongue over her lips like she’s hungry for a meal. But I have something else in mind.

“Not like that,” I tell her. “Get on your hands and knees.” I stride around the side of the bed, my cock bobbing with each step. I’m so hard it’s almost painful. Charlotte watches me. Doesn’t move, though, the little tease.

“Do it,” I order, and I hear the Hunter in me coming out, as if she’s terrified prey. She doesn’t react like prey, though. She just lifts her chin in defiance and slides her hand down to play with her clit.

“Make me,” she snaps back, her fingers a blur against her pussy.

I nearly come then and there. The only thing stopping me is the need to be inside her.

I hurl myself at her, grabbing her by the waist and flipping her over onto her belly. She shrieks and squirms, fighting back, but I’m stronger than her.Olderthan her. I know her strength will come, too, in time, and then she’ll really be fun to play with.

But tonight, she’s still new enough that I overpower her easily, even though I can feel her muscles straining against her body’s usual softness, a contrast that drives me wild.

I press myself down on her, pinning her against the bed, and whisper in her ear. “I want you to look at what you did while I fuck you.”

Charlotte moans, and, for a moment, relents. I take that opportunity to slide off her and drag her around so she’s facing the room instead of the wall. So she’s facing the blood and the dead bodies. All the things we accomplished together.

“That’s better.” I nibble at her ear, as I scoop my hands around her belly and jerk her up so she’s on all fours. “You like what you see?”

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