I park out of view, further down his path, and wait for him, for my opportunity.
It’s coming.
Number Two keeps walking, keeps looking over his shoulder. When he passes the alley where I’m waiting, I lunge for him and plunge a needle into his arm while pulling him deeper into the shadows. The tranquilizer does its job while I drag him out of sight and to my truck. His body goes limp right before I toss him into the back. After taping his wrists, elbows, and knees, I climb into the driver’s seat and drive him to my girl.
Rylan.
Pink and red. The girl and the blood. It’s all one now. There is no longer a distinction.
When I arrive, she’s pacing the clearing deep in the woods where I dropped her off. She eyes the lifeless form heaped over my shoulder as I walk to her. My shoes sink into the dirt with my heavy load. I drop Abraham at my feet and throw my pack down next to him.
Rylan stands on her toes and throws her arms around my neck to greet me. “Everything go smoothly?” She can’t hide her excitement.
My fingers trace her throat while I pause to seal my lips against hers. She hungrily returns my affection. My tongue fills her mouth, and we kiss as if it has been ages instead of hours.
I only pull away long enough to answer her, “Couldn’t have gone more perfectly.”
She looks down at our victim. “He isn’t dead, is he?”
“No, baby. I wouldn’t finish the job without you.”
“Will he wake?”
“Worried you won’t be able to see the fear in his eyes when I take his life?”
“Would you look at me differently if I said yes?”
“No, baby. He’ll be conscious soon. What do you want to do till then?”
“I want to start. I want him to wake confused, terrified, and in intense pain.”
Even though this is my job, even though I love this side of her and have even felt the same pull, her desire for these things is a little unsettling. Not knowing what she’s hiding underneath the brutality—and I’m certain she’s hiding something—makes me anxious.
“You want to watch, or do you…” I let the question hang.
She answers quickly, “I want to do it. I want to hurt him.”
I stand back and let her go at it. She overturns the bag I dropped and picks a scalpel before kneeling by his body. Her eyes close, and her face tilts up to the sky. I’m fascinated by every move she makes. She opens her eyes, looks down at Number Two, and presses the blade to his flesh. Tiny spurts of red bubble from his skin as she presses down. She starts slow, but soon, she’s covering him with tiny surface wounds. I kneel on the opposite side of the body for a better view.
Her eyes never flick to me.
Her twisted smile produces dimples on her cheeks.
Satisfied noises fall from her lips.
The sight of her captures me, worries me, makes my cock hard as steel.
Number Two stirs, and then he fucking screams.
Rylan’s laugh takes over while Abraham struggles in the dirt.
I stand and retrieve a gag. He can’t continue to scream like that. We’re out miles from neighborhoods or people, but authorities are on the lookout for a killer.
Rylan couldn’t care less and gouges deeper as I secure the gag between his teeth.
“Kiss me,” she demands.
And who am I to deny her?
He bucks between us, but that only fuels our lust for each other and for what we’ll do to him tonight.
She’s breathless when she pulls away.
I hesitate when she throws a leg over his body. She mounts him with her legs on either side of his hips. The sight of her on top of someone else has the pure red resurfacing. I restrain myself, though, curious about what she’ll do next.
WHACK.
Her open palm makes contact with his cheek.
She grinds her hips into him, and I’m ready to push her off.
WHACK.
Another blow.
“What’s the matter, Abraham? You can’t get your dick hard when you’re this helpless?” She hits him again. “You couldn’t please me even if you could get it up.”
She balls her fist and uppercuts him. I’m pretty sure the crunching noise that follows is one of his teeth being knocked out by the hard gag in his mouth. She rips her shirt up, taking it too far for me.
I don’t know where she’s headed with this, but I don’t want her skin touching his.
Quickly, I tackle her to the ground beside our victim and distract her. I palm her tits in my hands and rock my knee between her legs. “Too far, baby. I’m drawing a line there.”
“What?” She appears confused.
“Your body is mine. His pain is ours, but your body belongs to me.”
Abraham’s muted howls play in the background while Rylan and I pay attention to one another. Her fingers slip into the waistband on my pants. My hands push up the cups of her bra. The weight of my body pushes hers into the dirt. I lean down and take her pebbled nipple between my teeth. She cries out when I apply pressure.
“Hurt him,” she begs.
Again, who am I to tell a lady no?
CRUNCH.
My fist hits his already battered face, collapsing the left side of his jaw. His fragile skull is no match for the ball gag in his mouth and the force of the hit. His mouth hangs loosely to the side. The torture continues. Rylan gets more revved up. She begs me to inflict more pain on him, and each time I give it to her, the sexual tension between us increases. Abraham receives more injuries, and the two of us lose more clothes. He teeters on the edge between life and death, and it only makes us stronger, more aggressive, better satisfied.
I’ve had doubts, but out here, everything is clear. Walking away from her was never an option.
I have to wonder, though. Have I found a partner to keep me sane, or will this drive us straight over the edge together?
While Number Two dies in front of us, Rylan drops to her knees in front of me, and I can’t bring myself to care which it is.
This girl. This beautiful, sexy girl. Dangerous. Bold. Confident.
I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I vowed to have her after seeing her that first night with Tatum at the club. No fucking clue.
My fists lock in her dirt-soiled hair while she peers up at me behind long lashes.
I attempt to pull her up to me, but she protests, “No. I want to make you come this way. I want to suck you dry. I need to show you how much this means to me. Let me show you.”
Her full lips wrap around my cock, and the twist of her tongue causes my eyes to roll back. She fights through a gag and takes me in deeper. Her fingers rub against her clit, and the groan she releases from deep within her throat vibrates my shaft. My balls stiffen, and my dick grows impossibly harder. Drool drips from her chin while she continues to fuck me with her mouth. My knees lock, and Rylan goes at me faster. I grab the side of her head and release myself into her mouth. Her throat constricts as she swallows. She continues to lick my cock, making sure to get every last drop.
When she pulls back, she gives me a breathless smile.
I look over and take stock at the brutality of our night. Number Two’s mutilated body will be front-page news tomorrow, but the reporters won’t know what happened here between Rylan and me. The public won’t ever know about the sick fetish we took part in while he died. They’ll be unaware of the way something like this makes me unhinged with the girl by my side.
“Finish him.” That girl looks up at me, letting me see the lust possessing her.
I can’t do anything but fulfill her request. I can’t deny her this. I don’t want to. The kill has always been a part of me, but I’m consumed when doing it with her.
As if to solidify my order, I pick a boning knife up and then turn to watch as Rylan’s fingers circle her clit. Moans of elation and satisfaction leave her lips. She stalks my movements, and I grow hard once more as her body vibrates when I come to a stop above our victim.
He’s unrecognizable, and the only sign that he’s still alive is the slight, stuttered rise and fall of his chest.
“Do it!” she pleads as her fingers move faster against her clit.
I kneel beside Abraham, and Rylan crawls closer, never letting up on the pressure she’s building within her own body. Holding the knife in both hands, I raise it above my head. A gurgling sound from his throat rises between us.
“Yes, yes, yes! Please, Callen!” she moans into the night.
I strike, sinking the knife deep before pulling back up and splattering blood in an arc across Rylan’s body and face.
“Again!”
The blood of the man between us paints our naked flesh with each plunge of the knife.
“It’s. Too. Much. It’s. Not. Enough.”
She watches my hands, the knife, and the multiplying wounds.
Her tits bounce for me as she falls through her orgasm.
I stab him until Rylan finishes.
She finishes hard, leans over the body between us, and feeds me her wet fingers. The sweet taste of her pussy slides down my throat, and I groan, palming my dick. The knife sits lodged in Number Two’s chest, despite him probably having died many minutes ago. The sheer joy taking over her emotions knocks me back a bit, and I release my cock. I have zero room for judgment, but I can’t help but wonder how Rylan’s life path led her here to these woods.
Then, her high is gone. Replaced by something I can’t identify.
She pulls away, leans back, and starts to mumble a chant. The words aren’t loud enough for me to make out. I grow confused. Rylan leaves this moment with me and goes somewhere else entirely. I focus in on her lips and study their movement.
She repeats the two sentences like a mantra, “I’m sorry. I love you almost as much as ice cream.”
“Babe?”
Nothing.
“Rylan?”
Still nothing.
“Little Bird? Come back to me.”
Her eyes flash with recognition, and she’s pulled back to reality. Her emotions fight between good and evil. She looks down at her naked body, tainted with dirt and blood.
“Go get cleaned up. There’s a bag by my truck with extra clothes and supplies. Don’t touch anything, except the bag and the contents inside, until I get over there. I’ll clean up here.”
She turns to leave, but I stop her again. “Rylan…I don’t want to pressure you, but I need more. I need you to trust me. I need you to open up to me. I need you to tell me what’s really going on here. Or else we can’t continue like this. I need to know your darkness if we’re going to continue creating our own.”
She walks to the truck, and I look down at Abraham. With the knife that ended his life, I add the final touch to the body, carving his skin with the number two.
One more kill to go.
And Rylan has a choice to make. It’s nonnegotiable.
If she wants to be my partner in crime…
If she wants this…
If she wants me…
If she wants us…
She needs to let me in—dark soul to dark soul.
Rylan
Rumbling voices and hushed gossip run rampant around the coffee shop. Not a single person is quiet as they whisper to those closest in proximity to them. It isn’t like the normal chatter of a public place; it’s more like news spreading at rapid speed, as if everyone knows a secret I don’t.
“Did I miss something? What’s going on?” I ask Tatum.
Have they found Abraham’s body at Pond Lily yet? Callen told me he hung him from a tree overlooking the mass of lily pads.
“You didn’t hear the news this morning?”
“No, I haven’t turned on the television or checked social media all day.”
I was too consumed with all my secrets. With Callen basically giving me an ultimatum.
Open up, talk to him, or else we can’t continue.
“There was another murder last night, and the police found a connection between the murders that are happening now and a girl that went missing a few years ago. The four men that have been found dead and one man who still lives were all people of interest in the unsolved case at one point. Their names were never released because they were questioned and then eliminated as suspects. They all had airtight alibis.”
Callen must be freaking out.
“Wow,” the single word is all I can manage.
The people around me gossip. They pass around juicy pieces of information. Not one person realizes my secret. None of them realize they’re sharing space with someone who knows who the killer is, someone just as responsible. Not even Tatum. I’ve lied to the only two people I’ve let into my life in years—Tatum and Callen. But I’m at the end of my rope. I can’t go on, not letting them in on the things I’m hiding.
I push the voices from my mind and turn to my friend. “I’ve been pretty honest with you but not completely.”
I fear that Tatum won’t understand the truth. My honesty is ugly. She’ll hate me.
“What do you mean? What have you lied about?”
I can’t look at her. Not yet. First, I need to work it out in my head. “Just listen to me, and it will all start to make sense. Stay open-minded. Please.”
“I promise.”
“I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want this to end our friendship.”
Tatum leaves her chair and goes down to her knees before me. “I’m not going anywhere. No matter what,” she declares.
Her eyes bore into mine, attempting to convince me. The problem is that it’s a promise I can’t hold her to.
“I hope not. I love my awkward, apple-loving friend.”
She laughs, but the tension around her eyes doesn’t leave.
“I love you, too.”
The things I’ve been through distort loneliness until being alone becomes a survival skill, and I didn’t recognize the solitude until something disrupted it. I’m no longer alone. My reclusive coping mechanism has been dismantled. I could survive if Tatum hates me for what I’ve done. If the past has taught me anything, I know I can withstand any situation, but I don’t want to simply survive anymore.
I take a deep breath before I tell Tatum the truth.
Before I can pull the trigger, heavy boots stomp against the tiled floor, putting a stop to my conversation with Tatum. These men have come for me. They’ve connected the dots.
Before Tatum and before Callen, I didn’t care about what happened to me. I wasn’t cautious. I knew there was a chance I wouldn’t get away with it. I didn’t care.
But I care now.
I don’t want to leave Tatum and Callen. I don’t want them to hate me.
Their uniforms, the guns on their hips, the badges on their chests are clear signs of the trouble that I’m in. Three policemen look directly at me. Tatum, still on her knees, looks back and forth between the officers and me. She looks scared and confused. At this second, I’m painfully aware that I dragged her into my crap.
She deserved more from me. I should have been a better friend. I should have stayed away. But I couldn’t. I can’t. I hope, no matter what happens, that Tatum meant what she said earlier about sticking by my side.
“I’m sorry, Tatum.” I lean down to kiss her cheek and then move my lips to her ear. The words I speak next are hushed, a plea only meant for her, “Call Callen. Tell him I need him. If you’ll really stand by me through anything, then do that for me. If not, then I’ll understand you’re done with me. Either way, it’s okay.”
I write Callen’s number on a napkin for Tatum and stand from the chair I was seated in as the officers move closer.
“Rylan Pierce, we need you to come with us,” the officer leading the pack says.
“Am I under arrest?” I can’t look at Tatum as I say the words.
“Should you be?” The same officer arches a brow in my direction.
“You tell me,” I counter.
“No, but we need to ask you a few questi
ons. We can do that here or down at the station; it’s up to you.”
“Lead the way,” I offer.
The man who spoke turns and takes point, but the other two officers fall in line behind me, boxing me in. Whispers break out among the shop once more as I exit. It’s ironic that now is when I’m being brought in for questioning. Right after Callen gave me his conditions about us going forward. Right after I decided to be honest but before I got the chance.
My timing was too little, too late.
I’m escorted into the back of a police car while onlookers going about their day stop to be nosy. The stench of human excrements knocks me back. I’m sure the drunks and hardened criminals who took this ride before me soiled these cloth seats, and they are soaked in everything from sweat to vomit. I hold my breath.
I told Callen I didn’t care about the consequences of my actions. I told him I wasn’t worried about him covering my tracks from the law. I told him I didn’t care about what happened to me. Problem is, I’ve changed my mind. Even though I’m not being arrested, I’m still in the back of a police car, on the way to the station. I guess the joke’s on me.
Consequences have weight and meaning now that I finally have reasons to live again.
Two reasons actually. And those reasons are Callen and Tatum.
Callen
Rylan is inside the building I’m parked behind.
Tatum called me and said the police brought Rylan in for questioning, but she wasn’t under arrest.
How have they even singled her out to get us here in the first place?
Before they took Rylan away, she told Tatum to contact me. Rylan’s in trouble, and she reached out for me, but I don’t know what she expects me to do. The right thing to do for me battles with doing right by Rylan. I’ve been on my own for a long time. It works for me. The trouble is that I’m not so alone anymore.
The decision is made for me when I see her calmly walking away from the building and straight toward me. She doesn’t appear rattled in the least. I roll down my window and let a whistle blow through my lips. Her head whips around in my direction. Her sight locks on me, and she changes course. The passenger-side door of my truck opens, Rylan slides inside, and I pull away from the curb.
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