Page 180 of Hunting Pretty

“This,” he said, his dark gravelly voice sending shivers down my spine, “is going to be so muchfun.”

THE SHADOW

It gave me way too much pleasure to tie Dr. Vale up to the chair he’d tied Ava in.

Call me King of Karma.

The Devil of Retribution.

Or maybe I just liked the way he cried out in pain as I pulled the knots too tight, cutting off the circulation from his hands.

“P-please,” he whimpered as I circled him, his face bloody, one eye swollen shut, the other pupil following me.

Ava sat in Dr. Vale’s armchair, one leg crossed over the other, arms relaxed on the armrests, like she was a queen on a throne.

Mydark queen.

And I would build her a throne of the bones of her enemies.

Starting with thisevilfucker.

I planted my feet to face Dr. Vale and brandished the rusty bone saw taken from his bookshelf of antique medicalinstruments. “Such an ancient tool. It’d tear rather than cut, don’t you think? A painful way to die.”

I licked the flat of the rusty blade, the metallic tang sharp on my tongue.

Oh, the sweet irony of cutting him with his own pretentious display instruments.

Dr. Vale’s single eye opened so wide I saw the whites all around it, the pleasure his fear gave me rushing through my veins like cocaine.

“We’re going to ask you some questions, Dr. Vale,” I said, tracing the jagged edge with my finger like it were Ava’s skin. “And you’re going to answer them.”

“Ava!” Dr. Vale cried out, his attention turning to her. “Please, let me go.”

Ava flinched almost imperceptibly at the doctor’s desperate pleas.

But I saw it. I noticed everything about her.

For a moment I thought she might give in, might beg me to stop even before I’d started.

For a moment I didn’t think she had the stomach to let me torture him for the information she so sorely wanted.

But then Ava’s throat bobbed and steel slammed down in front of whatever emotion was left in her eyes.

“Answer his questions,” Ava said, her chin lifting, her voice steady and heavy. “Or I won’t be responsible for what sick, painful things he will do to you.”

Ava pinned her stare on me. She nodded, giving me her approval, letting me off my leash.

A dark grin pulled at the ends of my lips, I smiled so wide it almost hurt.

Good girl.

I would reward her for that later. But for now…

I turned back to the doctor and smiled at him, running the flat of the saw over his neck, trimming a few hairs of his beard and dislodging flecks of blood onto his shirt.

“Let me explain how this is going to work, good doctor.”

He let out a whimper and strained against his ropes.

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