Page 134 of 10 Days to Ruin

“Oh, goody.” Her laugh cracks like old porcelain. “The Butcher is here.”

I step over the debris, scanning for threats. But everything seems painfully domestic. Not so much as a throw pillow out of place. “Are you alright?”

“Oh, you know! I’ve been better.” She cackles like she’s losing her grip on reality. “Turns out reading five thousand words calling me ‘Pseudo-Stalin’s brainwashed concubine’ really takes it out of a girl.”

I crouch before her, grip her chin. “Didn’t I tell you I’d keep you safe?”

“You’ve said a lot of things, Sasha.” Up close, I see the red rims of her eyes. Dried tears meander down her cheeks and pool in her sarcastic, dimpled smile.

The bitterness in her voice sears worse than bullet wounds. I thought I could armor her. Instead, I’ve made her a target.

But I’m going to make this right.

“And I meant every fucking one of them.” I rise and extend my hand. “Get up. We have somewhere to go.”

Ariel frowns as she squints up at me. “What are you doing?”

“Erasing my mistakes.”

The Patriot Press headquarters lies in a squalid corner of Long Island. It looks like what it is: a brewing pot of bullshit. Unfortunately for myself and Ariel, it’s the exact flavor of bullshit that fools across the city and country love to swallow by the spoonful.

It’s a two-part building. Half contains the offices of the editorial staff, while the other houses the printing presses.

“The factory side, Klaus,” I order my driver. He pulls up outside the entrance and looks to me for further instruction.

“Stay close. And if you see a man named Marty DiLaurentis trying to run… smear him across the fucking grille.”

Then I step out. Ariel follows.

The squeal of the doors announces our arrival. Workers freeze mid-motion, like roaches caught in sudden light, all of them watching warily to see what’s happening.

A rat-faced man with squinty eyes comes up to me with a sneer. “Who’re you, man? You can’t just come in here and?—”

He freezes when I brush him aside, reach behind him, and grab a crowbar lying propped against one of the pallets of today’s issue waiting to be shipped out.

Then his jaw falls open when I turn and spear the crowbar into the grinding guts of the nearest rolling press.

An ear-splitting metallic scream rings out. It chews the crowbar halfway. Red lights and sirens go off as the machine moans, belches smoke, and finally slows to halt. One by one, the rest of the presses around us do the same.

Gone is the chugging, thudding grind of machinery.

Gone is thethumpof stacks of this vile bullshit hitting the ground, one issue after the next.

In its place is stunned, baffled silence.

I turn to regard the dozens of workers watching me with huge eyes. “All of you,” I announce, “need to get the fuck out of my building.”

The rat-faced man starts spluttering. “Who the— What on— You’re gonna have to pay for?—”

I grab him by his shirt collar and hoist him against the wall. “Ididpay for it,” I snarl in his face. “As of fifteen minutes ago, the ground you’re standing on is mine. The air you’re breathing is mine. And if you’re still here when I finish counting backwards from ten, I’m going to rip the beating heart out of your chest and call that ‘mine,’ too.” I set him back on his feet and step away, dusting my hands against my pants. “That goes for all of you. Ten. Nine. Eight…”

By the time I reach five, the plant is empty.

Ariel and I are the last ones left in here. When only silence remains, she looks at me. “Sasha, what on…?”

“I told you I’d protect you, Ariel. This is how that looks.” My knuckle tilts her chin toward the dead, still equipment. “This plant is mine now. Every lie they sold about you dies right here.”

Her breath hitches. “You—youboughtthe paper?”

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