Page 70 of Nocturne
Wings stretched wide across those broad shoulders, like they’re trying to shield him even now, when he looks the most breakable.
I scoff. Almost laugh. It’s bitter, unreal.
It’d be so easy to end this.
Put a bullet in his skull. Two. Ten.
Or get creative — make him bleed slow. Like he deserves.
But when rage shares space with something else — something I can’t name, don’t want to name — the danger shifts shape. Becomes quieter. Deadlier.
And me? I’m ready for it. More ready than ever.
“Time to wake up?” I slam my fist hard against Hunter’s face. His eyes open slowly, still cloudy, caught in a heavy fog — midazolam running through his veins. “It’s time to fix this mess.”
I grab a chair and flop down next to the bed where he’s lying — arms and legs tied up, powerless. He blinks, confused, staring at the ceiling, breathing uneven as hetries to figure out where the fuck he is.
“What’s up, princess,” I say, voice dripping with mockery and cruelty. “Was too fuckin’ easy to grab you. After all the shit that went down, and you still out here slippin’? For real? Dumb fuck move sittin’ all alone on that rooftop we fucked on. I showed up and you ain’t even look up. Didn’t even feel me comin’. Like you wanted this shit to happen.”
Hunter shakes his head, trying to clear the fog until he feels the ropes cutting into his skin. “Damon... where the fuck am I? What the hell are you doing?” He struggles twice, frustrated, rage building. “You’ve fucked up enough already, you crazy motherfucker.”
I laugh, a rough sound mixed with desire and hate. “You like that shit, huh? Gets you off watchin’ me fuck everything up turn you on, watchin’ me break? I ain’t lettin’ you go, fuck no. But you better listen up — you hear me, motherfucker? We got shit to settle. And when it’s all done, you’ll be standin’ right next to me. Bet your fuckin’ life on it.”
He stares at me, eyes burning, voice thick with pain and rage. “You... you fucked everything up. You were supposed to kill me. They didn’t do shit to Noah.I did!!!!.”
“What’s the point in killin’ you too quick, not seein’ you suffer? You took what I loved most, so I did the same to you. Now, I’m comin’ for Emma and Vincent.”
“Don’t you dare!” He blinks twice, and I stand up, my steps echoing in the tight room while my mind races with sharp thoughts. Silence hangs heavy between us, an invisible wall that only thickens the tension.
“Heard some shit about you... months locked up, suffering. Bet that cracked your psycho head, huh?”
“What the fuck are you talkin’ about? Let me go, Damon!”
I move closer, tilting my face until it almost touches his, feeling the heat of his breath mixing with mine, lips barely apart — a silent war hanging in the air. “You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
I pull back, pacing the room again, letting my words cut through the air like sharp blades.
“Isn’t it true you got captured? Went through the unimaginable? Felt on your own skin what you’re doing to others now? That shit fucked up your head so bad that...” A bitter laugh slips from my throat. “Now you’re haunted by nightmares. Nightmares that barely let you sleep, that make you bleed from the inside, that tear your skin and almost rip your soul from your body.”
Hunter stirs, thrashing in the bed, trying to escape what he can’t, but the injected poison steals his strength, trapping him like an invisible shadow.
“You don’t need to get worked up. We’re gonna settle this, once and for all.” I smile — a sadistic, monstrous smile, a promise of pain and obsession. “The one responsible for this hell of yours, this shitty past, is the very person you called family. But you never suspected, right? What a fucked-up twist.” My voice cuts the silence like a blade. “Thomas O’Connor sold you out to save his own skin. Fuck. You expecting that? ‘Cause I wasfuckingsurprised... You got thrown into torment and carry it deep in your skin. You always thought it was a mission gonewrong, but nah. O’Connor’s the one behind it. You’re his lil’ dog, afucking puppetdoing whatever he tells you.”
Hunter listens to every word and explodes into despair. Wild, monstrous, diabolical.
He shakes with so much fury that he knocks the bed to the floor. His face, already marked by my hands, gets scraped again in the fall.
He screams, struggles, a trapped animal — but none of it moves me. Doesn’t touch me.
I want him to suffer. I need him to suffer the same way he made me bleed when he took my brother’s life.
“Where the fuck you get that from? You’re crazy,motherfuckerrrrr!!!” he yells, spitting with rage and despair, words sharp as blades cutting the air.
The bed’s flipped on its side, he’s still tied up, trapped, defeated.
“It’s all here.” I grab a folder from the chair and slam it on the floor. Sheets, documents, photos scatter across the ground like a map of cruel truths — proof of everything I just threw in his face. “And you know what’s worse? I straight-up butchered some of those Iron Requiem fuckers — and now I’m out. A goddamn renegade. That’s right. Carter said it was ‘reckless, savage, and off the fucking books.’ So guess what? It’s just me and you now, motherfucker. Like it or not.”
EPILOGUE
