Page 50 of The Heart of a Villain

And then there is a folder that’s called Everyone.

Dread fills my soul, my palms sweating, but I click on it, and that’s when seemingly thousands of photos appear, one more horrible than the other, but I’m so shocked, all I can do is just stare at them.

Countless tortured, dead bodies with their limbs detached from them lying on the floor… with all the men who raised me holding the weapons.

Some men are wrapped with a chain to a metal pole as blood drips from their various wounds. Others sit in electric chairs, complete fear etched on their features, while others are on their knees, their toothless mouths open as they probably begged for mercy, but their captors had none for them.

Knives, chains, guns, canes—it seems all the devices a person can come up with to hurt another human being are in there for their pleasure, to play with people as they see fit, while they grin and reap joy from it.

The bile rises in my throat at the sight of arms, legs, tongues, and dicks spread over the floors, just imagining how they got there.

All these images are straight from my nightmares, and although my mind knows what to call such cases, my heart that breaks into tiny pieces with each new photo desperately clings to hope that it’s a mistake.

That I’m wrong and these men who are mostly shot from their shoulders down aren’t my family.

Only… reality doesn’t let me hide from the truth, as I recognize the tattoos, the scars… the signature orange-and-blue hair.

“Oh my God,” I whisper at seeing Uncle Arson lighting up a man already bruised and beaten, then see in the next picture how he burned it up, leaving nothing but a skeleton in his wake.

“Uncle Arson!” I shout, racing to him with all my might and opening up my arms wide. “Catch!” That’s all the warning he gets, and he manages to lift me up at my loud giggle, right before I have a chance to smack my face into his knees.

“Hello, princess,” he greets me as I circle his neck, pressing my cheek to his.

“I’ve missed you, Uncle Arson.” I lean back and palm his head, frowning at him. “You missed my show. I was a prima!” I wiggle my foot. “Everyone clapped.”

“I’m sorry, darling. It won’t happen again.” He smiles at me, his gray eyes softening, and he winks. “But I brought you some presents.”

“It’s okay! I’m glad you’re here now.”

Uncle Arson is my favorite person in the whole world because even when he got his own children, he never stopped loving me. Mama said that if Daddy didn’t despise church so much, my uncle would also be my godfather.

“Me too, darling.” He puts me back on the ground and takes my hand. “Let’s find your dad before he goes ballistic.”

I laugh at this but speed up my pace because he’s right.

Daddy doesn’t like it whenever I’m out of sight.

And now all the memories in my head are overshadowed by the pictures of said uncle doing such unspeakable things to people that I didn’t think even half of them were possible.

My whole family consists of serial killers eager for the anguish of their victims.

The minute these words flash in my head, I palm my head and groan, rocking on the chair because how could this be possible?

They are all loving husbands and fathers and never, ever showed anyone cruelty in my memory.

How could they be these monsters… these creatures who bring so much pain?

I grip my hair, almost pulling it out as thousands of flashbacks pop into my head one after another with them all in them through the years.

Happy, kind, and joyful flashbacks that are now nullified by all their horrible deeds, which have no justification for them!

I struggle for breath, desperately gulping air into my lungs that seem to shrink inside me, while still looking at all these pictures, blinking several times and hoping to see something else, but the view doesn’t change.

My pain doesn’t go away.

My state of shock doesn’t allow me to fully succumb to my hysterics, so my mind is still focused.

Which means I see that among all this gore, I don’t find my father.

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