Page 44 of Heart of a Devil

“Yeah. A tale as old as time. I thought it was pretty fucking cute, anyway. Look, just to let you know I’m in the car with Taylor. You’re not on speaker phone, but I’m guessing from the look on his face that he heard that last bit because he’s blushing like a virgin bride.”

Taylor has the good sense to avoid my eyes and concentrate on the road.

“Oh. Hi Taylor. Anyway—what’s your situation?”

“It was caught on camera, and now someone is threatening to make it public.”

She’s silent for a few moments, and I can picture her face as she calmly processes it. She has as much of a temper as I do, it just takes longer for her to get there. “Is it Torres? I kind of hope it is. I’m sick of knowing he’s out there and wondering if or when he’s going to step things up.”

“That was my first thought, but I don’t think so. I think it’s Jimmy McIverson. Apparently he had a thing for filming the female staff.”

“Well, that’s not nice. What are you planning to do to him?” I can hear different background noise now, beeping car horns and human traffic, which means she’s gone outside to avoid having this kind of conversation in a courthouse.

“I kinda thought I might kill him.”

“No. Please don’t do that. Look, I don’t give a shit about a man like that on any moral level—the world would probably be a better place without him. But I do care about you, and it’s not worth the risk. I couldn’t bear it if you got sent to prison.”

“I thought you might say that, but Lauren, I can’t let it lie. I’d kill him for watching the video himself, never mind going public with it.”

“Seb, he might have watched—but you got to touch. He’s just a sad little man who gets his kicks spying on women, probably because none of them will go near him in real life. He’s not worth it. If a sex tape gets leaked, I’ll survive it—if I lose you, I’m not so sure. So don’t kill him. At least not yet. Maybe give it a year so nobody links him to you.”

I have to laugh. She really is something else, this woman—the perfect combination of Montoya and lawyer. “Is that your legal advice, Miss Hayes?”

“Yup. You can pay me in orgasms later and make it official. Look, I’ve got to go. I have a meeting. I’ll call you later—be good, now, you hear?”

Taylor stays wisely schtum as he pulls up outside Jimmy’s apartment block. We get out and climb the stairs to the first floor, which is sadly not high enough to be lethal if I throw him out the window. “Can I get a crack at him too, Boss? Don’t like the thought of him watching Chantal with her knickers down either.”

“You can be my fucking guest, Taylor. But as my lady friend said, we shouldn’t actually kill him. It’ll be messy, and there are too many ties between us. He’s not exactly kept his trap shut about the way he feels, and I’m pretty sure some forensic IT boffin could find out he tried to blackmail me. I’m mad as shit, but she’s right. He’s not worth doing time over.”

“Doesn’t mean we can’t hurt him, does it? Make him wish we had killed him.”

There is absolute conviction in his eyes, making it clear that he was born for this kind of work. We reach Jimmy’s door, and I can hear sounds of porn in the background. It better be professional and not another one of his homemade efforts or Lauren’s advice will evaporate from my brain. I nod at Taylor and silently count to three, then kick out at the door, aiming my heel below the lock. The wood splinters. There’s a shriek from inside, and I finish the job and bust it wide open. Taylor follows me and closes the door behind us while I advance on Jimmy, who is sitting in front of the TV with his dick out.

I glance down at his rapidly diminishing hard-on. “Oh dear. Don’t worry, Jimmy. I’m told that happens to a lot of men.”

He shoves his shriveled member back inside his pants and tries to stand up. Gotta give him his due, he manages a good bluster even though he must be shitting himself. Taylor turns the volume up, which creates a pretty fucking weird soundtrack, butit will drown out any screams. Jimmy yells at me to get out, and I shove him hard in the chest. He falls back into the chair, all the wind knocked out of him.

“Find his laptop and his wallet,” I say to Taylor while I hold Jimmy down. He’s struggling and swearing, and I punch him once in the face. “Shut the fuck up, you twat.” His eyes start watering and his nose is bleeding, and he looks comically shocked. I can’t believe a man like this has made it so far in life without someone punching him in the face before.

I get my duct tape out of my bag and secure his hands to the sides of the chair, then punch him again just for fun. His nose cracks this time, which is a sweet sound. “I said shut up.”

He whimpers and chokes on his own blood, snot, and tears, but apart from that, he does shut up. Taylor passes me his wallet, and I shake the contents loose on the table—the usual shit, plus a wrapped condom that looks like it’s been there since they were invented. There are three bank cards, and I check each one of them. Sure enough, one matches the account details in the email.

“Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy… You’re not exactly a criminal mastermind, are you? Didn’t you think we’d figure it out? Now, what’s the passcode to this laptop?”

He snarls and shakes his head, displaying an admirable level of stupidity. His eyes widen as Taylor stalks toward him. The boy grabs hold of one of his taped hands and pulls back the pointer finger until it breaks. “I could really get used to the sound of your bones snapping, Jimmy. Passcode?”

Once he stops crying, he tells us, and we’re in within seconds. Jimmy snivels in the background, telling us he’ll delete it all, that he’s sorry, that he’ll do anything if we leave him alone. I ignore him and flick through the video files on his computer without opening any of them. They’re all nicely labeled, detailing date, time, and who’s on them.

Lauren’s is right at the top. He really did have all the bathrooms wired, the sick fuck. Taylor’s face darkens when he sees Chantal’s name, and I lay a hand on his shoulder. He looks at it like he’s considering snapping it off, and I stare him down until he nods. Jimmy starts shouting for help, but his voice is drowned out by the porn film. “Do the honors, mate,” I say to Taylor, who punches him in the gut so hard he can barely breathe.

“Right, we’ll be taking this laptop with us, Jimmy. I’m sure you won’t mind.”

“We need to find out if he has a backup, or if it’s on the cloud, Boss.” I acknowledge Taylor with a wave to go ahead and check. I still don’t understand what the fucking cloud is, but I’m sure he’s right. Jimmy is doubled up and looks like he’s about to be sick. “No. No, it’s not on the cloud, that’s the only copy, honest.”

“I don’t believe him,” Taylor says, snarling. “Bet he had them all backed up so he could wank over them any time.”

The thought of this sick little fuck watching that video of me and Lauren while he jerks off makes me want to kill him and then bring him back to life so I can do it all over again. Not only her, but all those women who were violated so Jimmy McIverson could get his rocks off. Suddenly, taking his laptop and slapping him around a bit doesn’t feel like enough punishment—nowhere near enough. He looks up at me and starts to cry as I walk toward him. “No, please, I’m sorry…”

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