I swelled inside of her. Her lips parted in a silent, breathy gasp and her fingers found the top of my dark hair.
“No one can ever love you like I love you,” she said. “No woman in this world knows you like I know you, understands your needs, your pain, your past. No woman can ever give you what I give you.”
And she was right.
I thrust harder and deeper and suddenly the razorblade was wedged between my fingertips and thumb.
I raised my chest from her back, just enough that I could see it.
Seraphina whimpered and gripped the bed when I made the first cut, vertically down her back about two inches. It would soon heal and become like the other scars I’d left there. Then I leaned over and lapped at the blood seeping from the wound with my tongue. Seraphina raised her bottom against me, forcing me deeper. My fingers wound tightly within her hair.
I leaned over farther, seeking her mouth with my own, and I kissed her long and hard and bloody.
“No one, Fredrik,” she whispered and licked my tongue, “no one will ever love you like me.”
I don’t know how long I’ve been staring down into this newspaper, the words printed in black ink blurred across my vision. How long will my memories of Seraphina torture me? Oh yes, of course—until I die along with her like I promised.
My briefcase is on the floor underneath the table, sitting upright between the wall and my legs, hidden in the darkness. The patrons in this diner, like in every public place, are oblivious. They have no perception of the truth, the same truth that surrounds them every day of their quiet, innocent lives—that evil lives next door, passes them on a sidewalk, prepares their meals, or in this case, dines just a table over from them. If they only knew what secrets my briefcase knows, or the horrific things these hands have done. Or the vivid and merciless memories that plague my mind like a wound that never heals.
I curl two fingers around the handle of my coffee and bring the mug to my lips, gently blowing steam rising from the top before taking a careful sip. Again, my eyes scan the newspaper on the booth table in front of me—maybe this time I’ll actually read the words.
I go to set the mug back down, but just before it settles safely back on the table, the kid sitting in the booth behind me bangs his head against the back of my seat again. A few droplets fall from the rim and onto the table. I calmly wipe them up with a napkin.
“Avery!” the mother scolds. “I told you to sit still—I’m really sorry.”
I think that last comment was meant for me.
I turn my head only slightly, not enough to see the woman, but enough she knows I heard her.
“It’s fine,” I say and go back to reading the newspaper.
Three more times—in addition to the probably ten others before that one—the little boy bangs against the back of my seat, until finally the mother hurriedly leaves with him, apologizing to me again just before she walks away with her young son’s hand clasped in hers. And yet again, I told her it was fine. What I didn’t tell her though is that I, in a strange way, welcomed the nuisance. I tend to appreciate the simple, and otherwise irritating things in life—after a night of torturing someone, an innocent little boy beating the back of my seat, being a little boy, is a nice change of atmosphere. I envy this ‘Avery’. What kind of man would I be today if I had been allowed to dine with my mother and not care what the man sitting behind me thought about my head hitting the back of his seat? Perhaps that briefcase underneath the table would be filled with paper and a packaged lunch rather than needles and knives and pliers and poisons and rubber gloves. Perhaps there would be another woman in the world who could love and understand me.
“Ready for a refill?” I hear a sweet voice say.
I look up, pulling my mind back into the moment, to see my waitress whose nametag reads ‘Emily’, holding a pot of coffee in one hand.
“No thank you.”
She smiles down at me from an oval-shaped face with kind lips and kind hazel eyes and cream-colored skin.
“Are you going to have your usual today?” she asks. “Two eggs scrambled. Three slices of bacon—crunchy not flimsy—and a glass of lemon water?”
I glance at her. “No, I won’t be having breakfast today.” I look back into the newspaper.
Silence fills the space between us.
Finally, she says, “Well maybe tomorrow then—”
“No, I won’t be here tomorrow, either.”
“Oh.”
The silence begins to stretch. I never look up from the paper.
“Well, OK I’ll…leave you to your coffee.”
The waitress named Emily, who has been my waitress every other morning for the past three weeks, begins to walk away, leaving her bright personality on the floor behind her.
“Wait,” I call out in a normal voice, and she stops to look back at me. “I uh…”—I look at the table, and then my coffee mug, and then back at Emily—“…yes, I think I’d like to have my usual this morning.”
Her beautiful smile returns, her hazel eyes shining underneath her golden-brown hair.
“Great,” she says nodding, “I’ll be back in a few.”
She’s been trying to talk to me for two weeks out of the three I’ve been coming here, but I’ve always avoided her. She’s beautiful and kind and sweet and that’s precisely why I’ve not given in to her attempts at casual conversation—she’s not the kind of girl I could fuck and walk away from, with no guilt for her hurt feelings.
I’m not sure why I stopped her.
Ten minutes later she comes back with my breakfast on a plate in one hand and a glass of lemon water in the other. She sets them on the table in front of me as I move the newspaper out of the way, folding it up and laying it on the seat.
“Do you work nearby?” she asks as she jots something down on her order tablet in the palm of her hand.
“No,” I say as I sprinkle pepper onto my eggs, “I just enjoy the breakfast.” And I quite enjoy the sense of normalcy having breakfast in the same diner every other morning gives me, I don’t say out loud.
She rips off the ticket and places it face-down on the table.
“Well, I’m happy to be your waitress every other morning,” she says with a pretty smile that suggests something else.
She’s shy, but she’s trying to be brave and I find it endearing.
The silence begins to stretch again.
“Well, enjoy your meal,” she says and then slips her ticket book inside the pocket of her apron.
“Thank you,” I tell her and offer her a small smile before turning back to my meal.
She nods and glances at the ticket just long enough for me to catch her. Feeling like she wants me to look at it before she walks away, I take it into my fingers and turn it over to find a phone number written across the front, instead of my meal or how much I owe.
She blushes underneath her smile. “You can give me a call if you want to go out sometime”—her blush deepens and it alone intrigues me—“that is…if you’re single. Or even…interested.”
She’s very nervous and growing more-so the longer she stands there and I don’t say anything.
“I mean, you’re not married as far as I can tell”—she glances nervously at my ringless ring finger—“but if you’re not interested—”
“You’re a very beautiful woman,” I cut her off so she can shed the regret and humiliation she had begun to feel. “And no, I’m certainly not married. I’m very single.”
She smiles, close-lipped. I notice another waitress standing by the register, watching us, and beaming. She looks away when she sees that I’ve noticed.
I keep my attention on Emily.
“You’ve never asked a man out before have you?”
Her face gets redder and she can barely look at my eyes anymore.
“Is it that obvious?” she asks, wrinkling her small nose.
I let the smile in my eyes touch my lips more.
“Yes, but I like it.”
&n
bsp; We don’t say anything else for a few seconds. She can’t stop smiling and I’m just confused by my reaction.
“Well, I’ve gotta get back to work,” she says and turns on her heels.
I nod and then just before she walks away I say, “I get home around nine tonight. I’ll call you before nine-thirty.”
I guess it can’t hurt to at least talk to her…
Her close-lipped smile brightens, she nods and makes her way to a table where two new patrons have just sat down.
I eat my breakfast, place a large tip on the table underneath the coffee cup and then leave quietly with my briefcase in-hand.
READER QUESTIONS…
· Will Izabel ever tell Victor her dark secret? Or will he find out on his own?
· What will become of Dorian Flynn? Do you think Victor should take Dorian up on his offer to work with U.S. Intelligence?
· Will Niklas ever come back to Victor’s Order? Can he (or should he) forgive his brother?
· What impact do you think Nora Kessler will have on Victor’s Order, positive or negative? What about on Izabel?
· Will Fredrik Gustavsson ever find love? Or do you think he should stay away from women altogether?
· Do you think Nora was right in telling Izabel that her relationship with Victor is pretty much doomed?
Voice your opinions on Goodreads at:
https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/146470-in-the-company-of-killers---discussion
To see more of the characters in SEEDS OF INIQUITY, visit the author’s Pinterest page:
PINTEREST.COM/JREDMERSKI/IN-THE-COMPANY-OF-KILLERS/
~~~ ~~~ ~~~
ALSO BY J.A. REDMERSKI
NEW ADULT/CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
~~
#1 - THE EDGE OF NEVER
#2 - THE EDGE OF ALWAYS
SONG OF THE FIREFLIES
THE MOMENT OF LETTING GO (2015)
CRIME/SUSPENSE
~~
-IN THE COMPANY OF KILLERS-
#1 – KILLING SARAI
#2 – REVIVING IZABEL
#3 – THE SWAN & THE JACKAL
#4 – SEEDS OF INIQUITY
SPECULATIVE FICTION/CONTEMPORARY FANTASY
~~
DIRTY EDEN
YOUNG ADULT PARANORMAL ROMANCE
~~
-THE DARKWOODS TRILOGY-
#1 – THE MAYFAIR MOON
#2 – KINDRED
#3 – THE BALLAD OF ARAMEI
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Born November 25, 1975, J.A. (Jessica Ann) Redmerski is a New York Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author who juggles several different literary genres. She lives in North Little Rock, Arkansas. She is a lover of television and books that push boundaries and is a huge fan of AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’.
www.inthecompanyofkillers.com
www.jessicaredmerski.com
www.facebook.com/J.A.Redmerski
www.twitter.com/JRedmerski
www.pinterest.com/jredmerski
Table of Contents
1 8
2 17
3 25
4 31
5 42
6 52
7 61
8 67
9 80
10 86
11 97
12 104
13 110
14 119
15 129
16 138
17 146
18 155
19 163
20 175
21 181
22 189
23 201
READER QUESTIONS… 210
-ALSO BY J.A. REDMERSKI- 212
ABOUT THE AUTHOR 213
Seeds of Iniquity Page 23