Page 73 of The Beautiful Dead

I wantedmore.

More ways to get inside her head. More ways to make her question reality until she was drowning in uncertainty. I needed her toknow—not just suspect, not just fear—butknowthat I hadthe power to destroy her in every conceivable way. That every breath she took, every trembling heartbeat, was a borrowed luxury. And that it wasmecoming for her. Me, with the hounds of hell snapping at my heels.

I could see it now.

Her downfall.

Her death.

Her destruction.

It would bebeautiful. Painful. An endless oblivion of torment, and I would be the architect of every moment.

When I told Domino, a sinister laugh slipped past his lips before they curled in satisfaction. His dark green eyes gleamed in the dim light of the lounge, fingers tapping rhythmically against my leg as he considered me. “I have just the man for the job. Go wait in the spare room.”

That’s when I met Ghost—properly.

He was younger than I expected—only a few years older than me—but there was something unsettling in the amused smirk he wore, like he found all of this entertaining. Like he knew something I didn’t.

I was still new to this world, still learning how deep the abyss went. Ghost had been born in it. Raised in it. Hethrivedin the dark. And that’s exactly where we worked.

The only light came from the eerie glow of his monitors, multiple screens flashing with lines of code and intercepted feeds, painting his face in shades of neon blues and greens. But I liked it. The intimacy of the darkness. The way it heightened the tension—thechase.

Ghost taught me how to bypass surveillance feeds. How to reroute alarms. How to crawl into Brielle’s world unseen and make sure shefeltme breathing down her neck even when I was miles away.

“Messy,” he muttered one night, watching me attempt to break into her security system.

“I got through,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, but not cleanly. You tripped two silent alerts last night. If she had a decent system, she’d already know you were inside.” He spun lazily in his chair, cracking his knuckles. “If you’re gonna learn, you better do it right.”

Domino was behind me, leaning against the desk, fingers absently tracing along my shoulder. “Show him,” he murmured. Ghost obeyed without hesitation.

Hours passed. I learned. Perfected. I adapted until I could move through firewalls like they were nothing more than gauzy curtains. Until I could watch her from every angle, track her every move without a single blip on her radar.

Once I had that, we moved on to her finances.

We drained her accounts. Redirected her money. Watched as she broke out in a cold sweat at her desk, her hands trembling over her keyboard as she checked and rechecked numbers that didn’t add up. The hidden cameras Domino had planted everywhere gave me a front-row seat to her unraveling.

Idevouredit.

Her fear tasted sweet.

Her perfect facade melted away, revealing the raw, brittle bones beneath.

“You don’t have to be the strongest in the room,” Domino murmured one night, his fingers drifting to my collarbone, our sweat-slicked skin the only thing between us. “Just the one who seeseverything.”

And Idid.

I saw her at work, barely holding herself together in front of her clients. I saw her at home, double-checking locks that no longer mattered. I saw her in her car, gripping the wheel too tightly, jumping at shadows that weren’t there.

She started sleeping with a gun on her nightstand. She thought it wouldhelp.

It wouldn’t.

Nothing would stop me from wrecking her.

Ghost smirked at me, nudging my shoulder. “You’ve done well, young padawan. But there’s one last thing we need to handle.”

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