Page 28 of Vengeance of Childhood Proportions

Sitting down at my desk, I woke my computer up. Despite the late hour I’d been at the club, I’d woken up and gotten a ten mile run in before learning that Mira would not be making it to work on time. I liked coffee, but I was not dependent on it like manyof my colleagues. I’d had a single cup following my run and that satisfied me for the day. I preferred water or iced tea.

Glancing at the case number on the front of the accordion file, I noted that it was for the murders in Atelihai. It was too soon to have anything inside this folder for the new body we’d looked at yesterday, so it was likely the preliminaries on the John Doe discovered at the high school. I needed to do more research on Atelihai, the school, and that weasel of a principal. Unfortunately, other cases had more of a priority and this one had been pushed to the bottom of the pile while waiting for information from the crime scene techs and the coroner.

Pulling out the first manila folder, I noted that John Doe had finally been identified. Christopher Evan Harrow. Based on his California driver’s license, he was thirty-one years old. What was a Californian doing in these parts?

It didn’t take me long to find that answer. Son of a bitch—he was an alumni of Atelihai Highandhe’d been on the hockey team the first year Atelihai had won the hockey championships. I’d put money on the fact that, when Jane Doe was identified, she’d also be a native of Atelihai Valley.

Chapter Sixteen

Jason

I brought the bullwhip down,the leather cracking like thunder. I didn’t know the name of the one I had, because I truly didn’t care. He was the one that was allergic to gluten, which was a fucking ridiculous allergy in my opinion. Was life really worth living if you couldn’t eat cake?

Personally, I thought Holly’s torture for the man was diabolically ingenious. While none of her prisoners would starve to death because we fed them three meals a day, she offered this one only cake, cookies, and other treats that one would expect gluten to be in. After the one with the bananas, would this one really expect her to give him gluten-free food? Nope, which is why she had. Everything was safe for him to eat, and yet he was starving himself to death because he thought it all contained gluten.

Fucking twisted—and that was something coming from me. But then, she had a lot of years to think ofexactlywhat she wanted to do to each of these sorry souls.

I was working on my whip-work while trying to understand the annoyance I felt about last night. Noah had been a decent fuck, a little too willing on my part but then what did I expect from fucking someone at the club. Ridiculous consent rules. Ididn’t like fake resistance. I could always tell and it bugged the shit out of me. No, I wanted my fucks tohatethemselves for agreeing to let me fuck them. For whatever reason, be it blackmail or losing a bet or paying off a debt, I didn’t care. Those were senseless details to me.

I didn’t care if they got off either. That was their business, not mine. If they did and cried about it, again, not my problem. I got what I wanted.

It was why I generally only went for women at the club. I didn’t have that urge to mindfuck them like I did with other guys. But Noah was so far in the closet that he was living in Narnia. He already hated himself for being gay and therefore hated that he desired what I could do to him. It was close enough to what I needed to count but left an irritation running down my spine that I was now trying to work through.

I wasn’t gay and I didn’t consider myself bisexual. I did not get turned on by the male form as I did with women. I’d never touched a penis other than my own, never given a blowjob. Had no desire to do any of that, but I did get off on sexually humiliating men. Maybe that did make me bi. I didn’t really care what society wanted to label me.

I cracked the whip again and another cry of pain echoed through the bunker, followed by some pathetic as fuck whimpers.

I had no intention of fucking Holly’s captives. That provided no challenge and there wasn’t any incentive for them to submit to me because they were going to die anyway. Wasn’t like fucking me would save their lives.

But I didn’t mind using them for some entertainment and target practice.

I heard footsteps on the concrete stairs behind me but didn’t bother to turn around. Wasn’t like it could have been anyone else other than Holly.

“’bout time you got here,” I grumbled. I didn’t care if she wanted to fuck the special agent to get information, but what I’d seen last night went beyond espionage. There’d beenemotionsinvolved.

“Sorry,” she said as she approached. Her voice sounded like she’d just woken up, but it would have taken her time to get from our apartment to the bunker. Looking down at her, I saw that she was dressed simply in lounge pants, a hoodie, and boots. It might be summer, but we were still in Alaska. “What happened last night? I don’t really remember.”

“Do you remember giving your boy toy a private show at the club?” I made sure she was clear of the recoil and then snapped my whip again.

Gluten Guy moaned. Blood dripped from his back. I’d managed to hit the same spot three times in a row, finally breaking skin.

Holly rubbed the heel of her hands against her eyes. “Honestly, I thought that was a dream. I really danced for him?”

“Yup.” I rolled my right shoulder, preparing for four times in a row. “What’s the plan, Hols? Are you going to fuck him again?”

She shifted in that way she did when she thought she was under a spotlight. Even I had picked up that she seemed to only have a backbone when it came to avenging her rape. Personally, I found the contradictions in her personality to be refreshing.

“I don’t know,” she finally replied. “I shouldn’t, but…I want to.”

I snorted, cracking the bullwhip again. Fuck, I missed. The stripes on Gluten Guy’s back were starting to look a bit like a zebra’s. “Well, I’m the last person to tell you not to go after what you want, Hols, but I’ll also be the first to tell you that you need to be careful.”

“I know, I know.” She let out a long, forlorn sigh. “He’s investigating murders I’ve committed. I can’t risk getting too close to him.”

I coiled up the whip in my hand. I needed to give my shoulder a break, plus now I was hungry for cake. Not the shit we kept on hand for Gluten Boy, but the real stuff.

“That too, but I was referring more towards you, Hols.” I turned, looking directly into her contactless eyes. “I won’t risk what we’ve built here and our plans because you fell in love. Fuck him if you must, but if you fall for him, I won’t hesitate to kill him.”

Chapter Seventeen

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