Page 56 of Voracious

“Nina?”

It’s worse. At least Nina is an adult now, maybe I can stop the other children being ‘broken in’ like Rowan said. He always got more when they were the first owners. Shaking my head, I tell them everything I heard, leaving out how I know Rowan. It’s stupid but I don’t want them to think I’m weak for not doing anything, they don’t know that it was different when I was with Yulia, that I didn’t know what to do yet.It sounds dumb to say that I tried but I ended up burning myself and then I wanted the punishments to stop so I stopped trying.

Maybe,I can torture in a dress.

It’s not that hard with my boots on. Footwear matters not outfit — I make a mental note of that in case I need it in the future. Tali has already left to update His Royal Pain in The Ass of whoever Bianchi is and Dima follows me like a shadow. I can’t think of what torture to do next, and their cheeks are already missing, exposing their teeth like a Halloween mask.Itlooks funny and I press the tip of my finger against the woman’s bleeding gum from where I dug the knife in too deep. The blood coats the glove and I snicker to myself as I mark a B on her forehead and deepen my voice.

“I declare you a sick fuck, be cleansed, you demon.”

My entire body shakes and my vision blurs as I laugh out loud, nearly falling in half. They both get paler and start crying again, they must be losing too much blood and I’ll need to get faster.

“Do eyeballs pop?”

I’m talking to myself, musing aloud, and Dima stiffens beside me with his disgust. He doesn’t like this part, he’s fine with fighting but he gets freaked out with torture, but I want to know if it would sound like a water balloon. Testing my theory, I start with the woman and my helpful assistant pulls her head back despite his lip curling up as I push into her lash line. Her screams bounce off the walls in the warehouse and I choke back a laugh. She wasn’t screaming about hurting two children, she was excited there’d be one for each of them. Sick fuck.

I know Dima thinks I’m crazy, but I have to do it once I’ve got her eyeball free. He doesn’t let go of her hair and I push it through the opening in her cheek as she continues screaming, opening the gate of her teeth and my laugh is louder when I pull on her jaw so I can see it roll on her tongue like a slot machine. Doing it again, I keep her mouth closed and pull her ear as though it’s a lever and I nearly fall over from laughing as I shout, “Jackpot!”

The dickhead chained up beside me throws up and I smile widely up at Dima. He doesn’t look disgusted and softens staring at it. I don’t want to look away from him, his eyes are back to normal being twin moons. But the nonces are crying and talking to each other.

“I love you, Max. Remember that, okay?”

My eyes roll automatically, and I holdMax’sso he can see hers roll too even if it needs my fingers to do it. I can’t keep the exasperation out of my voice as I point out the obvious and stuff the eyeball back in her mouth.

“You’re both going to die, Richard. You won’t remember anything.”

Dumb fuck.

All I’ve fucking heard is that same sentiment over and over again —I love you. Idiots. If they loved each other why are they fucking children? I know they’re married after checking their IDs, children should only be a topic between a couple when they’re talking about raising them, not ruining them. I didn’t even have parents and I know that.

Maxine opens her mouth to return how much she loves the ugly Richard making the eyeball fall to floor. Rude. I jab my knife in the middle of her throat before she can get a word out, sick of hearing them repeat the three words. Richard’s sobs get louder, wailing, and I’m sick of his fucking noise, it’s going to give me a headache after listening to it for five hours.

The slippery bastard tries to pull his tongue free as I grab it between my gloved fingers, and it makes the clean line I’m attempting harder as I’m cutting it out. It doesn’t stop him screaming but the gurgling makes me feel better as he slowly chokes.

When they’re both finally dead, Dima moves forward and taps his phone.

“Stasya found the children, they’ve got them with Inessa at Steorra.”

Rowan won’t know anything until it’s time for the ‘rental’ period to be over. He’s a sicker cunt than the rest because he dehumanizes everyone, resorts them down to parts and his favorite saying was no parts go to waste. Even Yulia would shudder at the thought of him selling the dead bodies.

It’s poetic, two lives for two lives. Two physical deaths over two that would have happened in every other way but physical.It’s a shame they weren’t trusted enough to have Rowan’s details, but I’ll find him one day and I won’t freeze then, I’ll kill him slowly, over years and make him eat every body part I cut off before he dies. I’ll have to research how to keep someone alive in a bag so that I can do exactly as his motto and not waste a single part.

Dima gently removes my gloves and washes my hands with the hose we use for cleaning. He removes his own and I don’t think he needs help washing his hands when he’s old, but I do it because he did it for me.

Smiling down at me, he softly says, “Take your contacts out, your eyes will be hurting.”

There’s still a tinge of unease as I remove them, but I focus on getting rid of all the evidence before Vlad can get his knickers in a twist. I can’t get the declarations of love out of my head. It’s stupid, they both knew they were dying but they wouldn’t stop.

Pausing in hosing down the bloody area, I turn to Dima, hoping he has the answer. “Why did they keep saying they love each other?”

He smiles, taking two steps until he’s stood in front of me, cups my neck and strokes my cheek with his thumb as he implants his words into my brain with the way he’s staring into my eyes.

“Because they wanted to die with the only good thing they had on their tongues.”

I don’t have my contacts in, and he never looks away frommyeyes when I don’t, it’s no different now but his answer doesn’t make sense when they won’t remember.

“That’s dumb, their love wasn’t good, it was something they hid behind to hurt people.”

“Maybe, it’s not to them.”

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