I slam a hand over his mouth to shut him up, mostly because his constant screams grate my nerves and wince when I take look at his nose. Blue is already coloring under his eyes, his nose swelling, blood congealing, just a thin trickle smearing under my glove. The bridge is smashed and slightly crooked
Fuck.That’s got hurt.
Good. He deserves worse.
“What the fuck do you want?” His muffled screech turns my stomach.Fucking coward.“I have money. Lots of money. Just fucking let me go and you can have whatever you want.”
The fact he still has no idea who I am sends red waves of anger shooting down my arms, to my hands, making me shove him back harder into the glass door.
Is he really this fucking stupid?
Does he really think we’re just going to let him have Cora? The arrogance makes me release his mouth and grip his throat, then I drive him again into the glass. It rattles so hard, I debate doing it again and again until he crashes through it.
“Fuck.” The curse is cut off as his head hits the glass, knocking his vision off balance. His eyes swim for a second then land on my visor. “I have money in my wallet.”
Asshole. Always about money with him.
“I have pills too,” he says. His pulse is beating so hard, I feel it thumping through the gloves, pulsing into me. I tighten my grip, ready to consume his terror, letting it fuel my rage.
This fucker put his hands on our girl. He hurt her in some way that she refuses to fucking talk about. He scared her, hit her, thenshamedher into silence. I grind my teeth, wanting to press my hand brutally into his windpipe, crushing it until he chokes on his blood and terror.
“There’s pills up upstairs,” he chokes out. Blood drips into his mouth. He licks his lip. “And other stuff. Name it and I have it. It’s yours. You can take it all. The pills are the good ones. Prescribed stuff.”
I shake my head. That seems to hike his terror up a few degrees. Little does he know he’s going to need those pain pills.
Gripping his hair again, I drag him toward the kitchen table. I have a good three to four inches on him and at least fifty to sixty pounds of muscle. Fighting me has already proved futile. Using my boot, I kick out a chair and slam him down into it. He goes so easily that I almost laugh.
Does he really think if he cooperates, I’m going to go easy on him? Has he really no sense of the things he’s done? Maybe he’s a true psychopath. Maybe he really doesn’t comprehend why I’m here, right now, pulling wire from my pocket.
“Why do you have that?”
Jesus.
He tries to get up, tries to kick, which makes my heart skip a little. But I punch his temple, which hurts like a mother fucker, but worth it with the way his eyes roll around dazed. My next hit lands to his gut and has him doubling over, so he’s not fighting me.
I grab one of his wrists and wrap the wire around it, then place his palm on the table, smashing it down with my fist to keep it from wiggling free as I secure the other end of the wire around the table leg, repeating the same wrapping and securing with the other wrist, until both his palms are on the table surface.
“What the fuck do you what?” Zane tugs the restraints and releases a sharp hiss as the wire digs into his flesh.
Doesn’t take him long to realize that if he tries to wriggle free, if he tugs too hard, the wire will end up slitting his wrists. He’ll bleed out and it’ll be his doing.
Taking his hand, I pull his phone from my pocket and use his thumb to unlock the screen. It takes me only a second to find the security app that controls the cameras. I disable the ones in the kitchen, the hallway and outside. The videos are uploaded to the cloud so I can’t delete the footage of us arriving, but I can at least make sure what happens next isn’t seen or heard.
The song playing through the speaker changes to Beethoven’sAppassionata.
This man is a raging asshole with a murderous streak, but he has really good taste.
I place my hands on my hips nodding, then twirl my finger in the air, silently telling him I like his choice of music. When Zane tries to break free again, I tick my finger back and forth, and back away to the center island, rooting through the drawers collecting tools. On my way back to the table, I snag the paring knife from the block. Reaper loves these little knives. They’re always sharp.
While I collect items, Zane tracks my every movement, wincing each time I pull out a new utensil to inspect it. Maybe he’s not so dumb after all. He’s finally figured out he’s fucked.
Maybe he even knows why.
“Did she send you?” he asks. My arm freezes mid air, but I keep moving trying not to show my surprise. “I did as she asked.”
That makes me hesitate, but I cover it up by inspecting the mallet I pull from a drawer, holding it up to the little hanging fixture over the island so he can see the light glinting off it.
Satisfied with my selections, I head his way.