by Sonya Jesus
“It wasn’t an insult,” she says softly. “Those are the people you can trust.”
327 twitches and moans.
“Kill me before she wakes up.” Both of us know, even with a silencer, there would be too much noise, so I go over to my dresser and grab the switchblade from the second drawer, next to the handcuffs and vibrator, and return to Addie.
I’m momentarily frozen in awe. She holds her head high and neck straight. I approach, and she shakes her head slowly. “Don’t grow a conscience now, boy. We have a deal. It’s time I go join my baby girl and grandbaby.”
I glance at the girl on the floor and raise the blade to the woman’s neck. I position myself behind her, and she tilts her chin upward in preparation. In one swift motion, I stab the steel blade into her neck, deep enough to penetrate the main arteries and slice through them, separating them into two ends. She’ll bleed inward, but she’ll die quickly.
Her body falls limply on the chair, and with the weight, topples it over. I stand back to watch my handiwork, feeling slightly disturbed by the woman’s dead body. It shouldn’t be here.
But that’s not really why it bothers me.
It bothers me because we did not have a deal, and I’d be calling the Mafia Whore’s bluff.
Stone knocks on the door within seconds, probably because he was standing outside, debating on whether or not to intervene.
“Where is Romolo?” I ask after I swing the door open, blocking his view from the body on the floor.
He doesn’t bother to look around me. “He’s on his way up. He was trying to get ahold of Franco to give him the heads-up. Guess going for some chamomile is code for call the cleaner.”
“Store her in the guesthouse.” I ignore any thoughts on Franco’s whereabouts and step aside to allow him in. “Franco will get to her when he’s not busy.” The noticeable irritation in my pitch falls flat on Stone’s ears.
He kneels beside the woman, carefully untying her hands and feet from the wooden bars of the chair, taking time to handle her deceased body with care.
“She’s not your fucking grandmother, Stone. Hurry up before 327 wakes up.”
He flips his gaze to me so fast a smile crosses my expression. Fury. Pure, unadulterated fury meets my gaze, and the words he held back before come bursting out, “You didn’t have to kill her!”
My hand swishing through the air demands silence, and though I doubt I will receive it, he better adjust his tone. “Don’t act surprised. You knew from the moment you brought her here, she wasn’t going to leave.”
Guilt causes him to shift his position. Turning his back to me, he slowly glides his hand over the woman’s face and utters an apology.
Weak! But the thought propels my eyes in 327’s direction. Moving closer to her, I measure the seconds between breaths. The consistent pattern, no longer reflective of earlier erratic breaths, means she’s close to waking up. I take the opportunity to bend down, and though I long to be as bold as my brother, I do not touch her delicate skin, nor do I brush away the strands of hair shielding her face from me; I welcome the layer.
One more barrier in the walls between us. I wish the thought a voice, but people like me don’t have the luxury of wishing.
My brother’s cursing diverts my attention toward him.
“NO!” I shout, as my brother takes the knife from the woman’s neck, not even ten minutes after it was plunged into her. Blood pours out of the wound, not as fast as it would have had she still been alive, but enough to stain the light color of my carpet. Evidence. Not for the cops, because it would be clean by morning, but for 327.
“What the fuck?” Stone’s urgent plea isn’t a question but a confession to himself. “I thought she was dead.”
Further proof he’s not meant for this life. I stand abruptly and walk over to my brother, who is using his shirt to stop the blood flow. He’s covered in red and yet looks colorless, as if the blood on my carpet were his. “You really need to learn how death works.”
“What?” he asks grief-stricken, using his shoulder to wipe the drips falling from his jawline. “Dead is dead, what the fuck do you mean how it works? You stop breathing. Your heart stops beating. And done.”
“Bodies maintain their internal temperature for at least fifteen minutes. Touch her, isn’t she still warm?”
He had been touching her, but I bet he didn’t factor in temperature through all that guilt. “I guess.”
“Algor mortis, the first post-mortem stage, begins after the body loses its ability to regulate internal temperature. If you’re in a cold environment, it will be cold, and if you’re in the scorching hot desert, it will be hot. There’s a bit more that goes into it, but the important thing to know is that moving the body will be easier within the first stage. The body is flaccid. If you want to cut it up, like The Butcher, you wait until the blood has thickened and pooled. Livor mortis.”
“Yeah, thanks for the science lesson, Professor Shithead. It’s disturbing you know all of that.”
“It’s a business lesson.” The Mafia Whore brought up the time I was locked in the closet with those dead bodies, and though it was disgusting and horrible, it was done to teach me a lesson. Costa explained the stages of death to me and broke it down. We visited the medical examiner on payroll at the time, and he forced me to watch the man dissect the bodies and remove the organs. I missed school for a whole week to spend every day in the morgue. When people would come, the examiner would put me on the cold metal slabs and cover me up, or in the storage freezers.
Shaking the thoughts from my head, I glance at the guy who was spared. My vision is splotched with resentment. My stomach hardens, but then the turmoil of hating him surfaces from my gut to my throat, and it burns. As much as I hate him for having a real childhood, I’m also grateful for giving him one.
“You also shouldn’t touch the body.”
Stone rolls his eyes, knowing full well that when Franco is done with them, there isn’t much left of the bodies. “We don’t waste in the Beneventi mafia, everything is turned into profit.”
“True.” I chuckle. Soon bits of the Mafia Whore will be in animal feed all over the Tri-state area.
Our front is the restaurant, which is where a lot of the business happens, but the restaurant was my mother’s, and thanks to my fake Beneventi blood, we’re heirs to the fortune.
But not one I have time for right now. “Get Romolo and get her out of the room.”
“Can’t we just bury her?”
“Where?” I ask sarcastically. “Want to make a hole for her in the backyard and put flowers on it every Sunday?” Too quickly I realize he thought my comment to be an option. “No, and give Franco the knife too. He’ll wipe it and sterilize it.”
Romolo walks in and spots Stone kneeling by the dead woman, me standing beside him. He has a plastic tarp in his hand and tape in the other. At least one of them knows what they’re doing. Within minutes, the tarp is on the floor next to Addie. Stone grabs hold of her feet and Rom her shoulders. They transfer her and roll her up, making sure her whole body is covered in plastic before circling the tape around the ends and hoisting her in the air. Romolo has her on his shoulders just as 327 lets out a blood-curdling scream from the back of her throat.
No one looks at her, not even me.
I nod for Rom and Stone to leave and lock the door behind them. My back is turned to 327 as she scrambles to her feet. I can hear her back slide up the wall and her muffled moans, but she’s weak. Slowly, I circle my head to face her. The soles of her feet are placed firmly on the carpet, and her back is up against the wall. She’s squatting down, tears rolling down her cheeks as she works to free herself from the zip ties.
When it doesn’t work, she throws herself on her knees and elbows, holding her tied wrists in the air as she attempts to crawl toward the bloodstain. I step back, giving her room to grieve. She hasn’t even acknowledged my presence, not that I’m looking forward to the moment.
She reaches the blood a
nd dips the tips of her fingers in, no doubt feeling the warmth. Not even thirty minutes have passed since Addie’s death, and already I’m wondering if I should have waited to kill her. There’s no way 327’s going to talk to me, much less look at me the way she used to.
Before she can look in my direction, I spot the blindfold on the floor and pick it up. While she’s distracted in her grief, I slip it on and hinder her sight. She doesn’t fight me, like I hoped she would. She slumps to the ground and uses the carpet to wipe her tears.
I sit on the bed and watch her mourn the loss of her friend. Eighty percent of me enjoys her misery, because she put me through hell these last few months, but twenty percent despises the pain I’ve caused. Even held up and imprisoned by me, she didn’t bend or kneel or stop fighting. The girl before me isn’t the girl I let escape, she’s a shadow of that person.
I wanted to rob her of her identity, strip her down and make her inhuman, and only now have I finally succeeded.
“Lyla?” I use her name without thinking.
But I say it again because I want to see the person who consumed my thoughts, not the animal I created. “Lyla Vaughn.”
17
Wash It Off
327
Time is marked by the aching in my chest, painful heartbeats clock the passing minutes. The force of my blood through the tiny vessels is excruciating. Anywhere there’s a vein, my body throbs.
It hurts. All over.
My body fights to breathe; the burden of compressing air into life expends my energy. The expanding of my chest worsens the soreness inside me. Sharp, stabbing pains make my blood run still, temporarily ceasing the pain. In those instants, between leaded breaths, the space around me dissolves into the background, taking the people with it, but not my mind.
Barren and not yet vacant, my awareness evaporates, and the compartments of my mind merge together, mixing my past with my future, my dreams with my nightmares, and my reality with the fantasies I created. Deciphering between the actual and the nonexistent is nearly impossible, and there’s a certain kind of solace in the unknown.
Bliss of confusion transforms into numbness, and in the reprieve from the pain, I release the memories tethering me to reality. Each one a protest, a reason to open my eyes, but none pack enough punch to jolt me back to reality, not even the ones of him.
The force of gravity pulls my face to the center of the earth, but there’s something keeping me from disappearing headfirst into the black hole. A barrier, soft and humid, holds me up from being swallowed by the darkness. Resting my cheek on it, I make out the object: a carpet.
The faint scent of Addison’s perfume mixed with the metallic smell of her blood causes my stomach to churn. I rest my cheek on the material to gag, half expecting to puke my heart out in pieces, but nothing comes out because I have nothing in me.
Nothing exists.
“Lyla?”
A name in the distance comes through, but it’s faint and unattached.
That’s not my name. So, I don’t answer. The connection isn’t there—for anything. My body slips toward a stage of detachment.
Thoughts don’t come to mind. Words don’t come out. Even though I have a blindfold, I don’t have the strength to open my eyes. I squeeze them shut, casting out the light shining through the dark material, summoning the darkness and hoping for my torment to end soon.
I don’t want to be anymore.
If I died right now, in this very place, I’d welcome it. Thoughts return to me, but only to offer me a solution. “Butcher,” escapes my lips. “Take me to The Butcher,” I meekly demand the universe. “Please.”
Then I let go of everything, losing my senses one by one and shutting them off. My sight is already blocked, and I taste defeat on my tongue. The last scent I smell is death, and the last external thing I hear is my voice asking for an end.
With no stimulus, I can focus on the internal sounds of my body. On the slowed heartbeat. It almost feels like I can stop it—stop breathing—stop it all. I just need one more sense, and I can embody the nothing I’ve always been.
Touch.
Arms curl around my waist, lifting me in the air and hoisting me up, slightly jarring the state I was in. I don’t have it in me to protest. Spent and defeated, I attempt to reverse the warmth of strong arms, securing me against a broad chest, but my body recognizes the hard heart behind the muscles. With my head limply pressed against his body, the sound of Breaker’s existence is all I hear. It overwhelms mine, as if it’s training it back to life and pleading for me to hold on.
The steady rhythm, like compressions to my chest, and the resuscitating thumps intercalate with the blood rushing in my veins, transcribe into demands from the heartless man before me. Even monsters have heartbeats, Addie. The thought faintly surfaces before a low growl rumbles out of him.
“Come on! Ly-la.” Every enunciated syllable mimics the thrashing beat of his heart.
Boom-Bah-bah-bah.
“Wake up! Mer-cy.”
Boom-Bah-bah-bah.
“Three twenty-se-ven!”
The dread in his elevated tone, though hushed, seems urgent. He transfers my body to something with less distance to the floor. Immediately, without the warmth of arms, chills run along my spine, prickling my skin. Inch by inch, I feel the distance on my skin, and I weaken without the jolt of energy his concern provides. The water runs in the distance, but I don’t want to hear it.
“Buh-br-br-br.” My teeth chatter to the same melody as before, though only extended syllables hit the air. Unable to tell him I’m not afraid, I sit on the slight cushion with my feet planted on the cold floor. I’m conformed to the idea of death, even my body begs him to put an end to this misery—to hurry up and kill me.
Instead, one of his hands holds me up, and the other presses a warm cloth to my cheek. Tears pool in my closed eyes…because I’ve missed this touch, and I’m DISGUSTED! Trapped within myself, I scream at my body, hating every fucking backstabbing cell.
His damp towel glides over my arms, rubbing my skin raw with his tenderness. Stammered gasps escape as both of his hands latch on to the shirts I’m wearing and pull in opposite directions, ripping them down the middle and exposing my body to him, as if I could ever hide anything from him.
Tears drip from my eyes as the cloth—wielded by the same hand that killed Addison—slides down my breasts, over the hole in my heart. My back flushes and my breaths quicken as his hand travels lower, in slow motion, purposely torturing me and prolonging the moment. Extremely aware of the path he’s taking, the farther south he cleanses, the dirtier I feel.
I want his hands on me, but I can’t stand to be touched by him.
My mind revolts against the appalling arousal, and I turn my head away, as if I can see his hand through the blindfold that’s catching all my tears and shielding him from my repugnance. I clench my knees together, and the action causes him to stop.
“Please.” But I’m not sure what I’m begging for anymore. History craves repetition with undeniable urgency, but those moments are tainted by today. I can’t shake the feeling I’m not someone he cares for; I’m someone he cares to play with.
A deep, languishing cry forms in my gut and erupts with full force. I slump, nearly toppling over.
Breaker catches me.
My tied arms go up, bent at the elbow, ready to push him away, but he crushes me to his chest and keeps me steady. With my arms between us and trapped within his tight embrace, the proximity propels my sobs, which progressively worsen. “Please,” I ask between hiccupped sighs.
“Okay,” he says solemnly and lifts me in the air, gently placing me in the cold ceramic tomb—maybe this is where he’ll kill me. My body shivers ferociously as I think of what he has agreed to. I swallow and beg the stars for forgiveness. My bare back is against the end of the tub, and I listen for the sound of a gun: the click of a safety, or for the sound of bullets being loaded.
I imagine what being shot must feel like and con
clude the pain would be less than living. There’ll be moments of stunned reprieve, where adrenalin will stave off the pain and numb the surroundings. My ears will stop ringing, and with the crash of reality will come the tidal waves of pain, but they won’t last long. He’ll shoot me again, because I’m his villain.
I’m the one thing standing in his way of success.
Drops of scorching hot water touch my feet. Reflexively, I scurry them back. I’m going to be boiled alive.
“Shit. Fuck.” The voice registers immediately, and I open my eyes to find the band of material blocking my sight. “Sorry,” he pleads softly. The water is quickly adjusted, and the warmth calms my cold shakes. The goosebumps on my bare skin subside as I turn my senses on, one by one.
Tasting his presence as I inhale his scent, tells me he’s close. Too close. The parts of me I thought had vanished gently stir awake, swishing through my bloodstream with purpose—to dampen the degrading process. As much as I hate the lack of space between us, I’m slightly alleviated by it. His three words echo in my head until they make sense.
He said sorry. I swallow hard and tilt my chin upward, hopefully in his direction. “F-for which part?” I say between whimpers.
I wait for an answer, but only hear the door shutting in the distance.
It feels like hours before he comes back, but judging by the waterline and the parts of my body which aren’t submerged, it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. The water moves, shifting to accommodate something. A cold metal edge is placed against my skin.
The Butcher.
Tears slide down as I search for words to tell him my secret. “You…can’t.” The words come out somehow, as I try to assess the strength in my legs. I wouldn’t get far, and appealing to someone’s human side only works if one exists, but I try anyway. “I need to tell your boss something.”
Hands grab my wrists, plucking them out of the water and holding them up. A knife slides between my touching arms. There’s not much space between the zip tie, but the point of the knife slices through the plastic, releasing me. My wrists are sore, and the warm water stings them, meaning they’re probably raw from the constant movement. The one on my legs remains, but something is different.