Page 21 of Butcher & Blackbird
“Stay here,” I say, and with one finger at a time, I release her from my grasp.
I take one final look at her, my blood little more than a glistening black smear on her skin, before I pivot on my heel and stride away.
My pace quickens when I spot my prize as he limps from the vehicle. One foot scrapes behind him, a broken arm clutched to his chest. He turns as my footsteps draw closer, his eyes wide as they land on my wicked grin.
“I’m going to love every fucking second of this,” I say.
Francis is already begging for mercy when I grasp the back of his shirt. I clutch his hideous pink tie in my fist to strangle him with it but it pulls free of his neck.
I glare at the fabric balled in my fist. Then at Francis. Then back again. “A fucking clip-on? What are you, twelve?”
“P-please man, let me g-go,” he begs beneath me. Tears glass his eyes as I toss the tie onto the driveway and grip him with both hands.
My rage burns my throat but I swallow it down. “Tell me what you were doing in the wall.”
His eyes flick to our surroundings, maybe hunting for Sloane, maybe searching for a savior. “I wasn’t g-gonna hurt her,” he says when his attention lands on me. “I was j-just watching.”
His fear is like a drug that invades every cell in my body, every desire coursing through my veins. A slow grin creeps across my lips as he struggles when I shift my grip and catch his throat. “Two things. First, I don’t fucking believe you. I think you were going to watch her and then your plan was to kill her. Wouldn’t be the first time, would it, Francis.”
“No, I swear—”
“Second, and this is the most important part, so listen up, motherfucker.” I raise his trembling body off the asphalt until his ear is next to my lips. “That woman you were watching…?”
My fingers tighten around his throat as he desperately nods.
“She ismine.”
I’m sure he begs. But I don’t hear his pleas. They’re fucking useless words that won’t save him now.
I drop Francis on the pavement and tumble after him into madness.
My first blow hits his jaw. The next strikes his temple. One fist after the other. Jaw. Temple. Jaw. Temple. I miss and shatter his nose with a satisfying crunch and he wails. Blood spews from his nostrils to coat my knuckles. His jaw breaks next with a pop. Broken teeth slice his lips and fall to the driveway like chips of porcelain. Like memories I want to forget. So I fight them away. I grit my teeth and hit harder.
The scent of blood and piss and asphalt. The gurgle of choked breaths. The slip of his split flesh against my fists. It’s fucking fuel. I think of him watching her. I think of her face. And I keep hitting. Even when he seizes. Even when he drowns in his blood.
Even when he dies.
I’m beating on a hunk of ruined flesh when I finally stop. Breaths saw from my lungs as I place one hand on the warm asphalt and stare down at my knuckles where pain throbs with every heartbeat. It’s a welcome sensation. Not because I deserve it, but because he did, and I fucking delivered. Destruction with my bare hands. Suffering where it was meant to be found.
Only now does a sliver of fear burrow into my chest.
“Sloane,” I call to the shadows.
I’m met with only silence.
“Sloane.”
Nothing.
Shit.
Shit shit shit.
A fresh wave of adrenaline floods the chambers of my heart as I lean back on my heels and scan every shade of darkness that surrounds me. The excitement of the kill is washed away as a tidal wave of panic rolls in.
I’ve fucking scared her off.
She probably ran back to the hotel to grab her belongings and book it out of here. The screech of car tires will likely be the next thing I hear as she leaves and never looks back.
