Page 207 of Boy of Ruin
The Forgues chanted it to me all night, a single, red candle lit in their hands.
To suffer, so I can be born again. Become the son they need. The missing link in the 6.
I’m the holy one, they told me. I’m the cure. The answer. But I have to be scrubbed clean first.
I grit my teeth, my stomach growling, my bladder physically aching.
I can’t do it.
I can’t…
I let go. I can’t hold it. Warmth seeps from me, surrounding me on this cement floor.
Another sob escapes my throat.
I think of the last time I saw my mother. Broken. Beaten.
Dead.
“You remember what it’s like, don’t you, prick?” Lucifer whispers, leaning close to me, his breath against my ear.
I close my eyes tight, pushing the memories away. How long have I been standing here? How long has he been talking?
Why is he still alive?
“Alone in that cage, exactly where you belonged?”
I see red behind my closed eyes. I hear my own screams. I smell my own filth.
And something else too.
The ways I paid them back for all of it.
The news reported I shot them.
A smile curves my lips. I would’ve never let them go that easily.
My eyes fly open, thinking of how good it felt to have them broken underneath me.
I’m going to do the same to him.
I grab him by his hair, drop the knife, and reach for the gun holstered behind my back. His eyes widen in shock. He should’ve paid better fucking attention. I went for it when Maddox had Sid, but I couldn’t get a clear shot, and he was too busy getting ready to throw himself at her that he didn’t notice.
“I have, up until this point, resisted breaking your fucking jaw against the floor. Do you think that’s because I can’t? Are you really that idiotic?”
“Jeremiah, please don’t,” Sid begs me, her voice raw.
I don’t listen. No one listened to me when I begged. No one fucking cared about me. And this fuck? He could’ve saved me.
He doesn’t speak, because I have a gun in his mouth. Tends to shut people up.
“You should’ve fucking left her alone. You should’ve crawled back into that miserable church you belong to and sucked your friends’ dicks and fucked. Off.” I shove the gun further down his throat and I have to hand it to him. He doesn’t even flinch. “But you didn’t, did ya, prick? You couldn’t leave her to the one person who has always loved her.” I push the gun further back, hear it hit his molars. His eyes are watering, but I don’t stop. “Now I’m going to fucking kill you, raise your goddamn kid, and teach it to call me daddy, you piece of shit.”
I don’t let him go.
My finger is on the trigger.
I want to end it now, but it would be too easy. Too good for him. I let him beat the shit out of me up on that balcony, after Sid had found out the truth. Because I deserved it. I deserved to hurt for her.
