Carmen felt the spit dry up in her mouth. This was her hero. A thug. And she’d probably just interrupted him having sex or something.
“Yeah?”
She looked at his furious expression and wondered, Is this what the Fury looks like? But no, this was just another angry, young Black man, pissed off at the world.
“I-I just wanted to say thank you.”
He smiled and all the warmth bled back into his features.
Carmen relaxed.
“Oh, yeah. I remember you. You came all the way down here just to say thanks? You didn’t have to do that. I was just doin’ my job. I should have gotten there earlier.”
Carmen smiled back. “No. You came just in time and I wanted you to know how much I appreciated it.”
There was a loud thump, like something heavy falling onto the floor. Lamont glanced behind him and then turned back to Carmen and smiled sheepishly. “Look, I’d invite you in, but you kind of caught me in the middle of something. Thanks for coming by though. You really didn’t have to.”
“Okay, well I’ll let you get back to whatever you were doing. Goodbye and thanks again.” Carmen held out her hand, and Lamont reached for it with a hand coated in blood. The skin on the knuckles was torn and frayed.
“You been in a fight, Lamont?”
A door behind him opened and a naked young girl, no older than sixteen, staggered out into the hall. She’d been badly beaten. “Help meeee!”
That furious expression returned to Lamont’s features as he turned toward the young girl. “Bitch, I tole you to stay yo’ ass in that room!” He turned back toward Carmen. “Sorry about this. We just havin’ a little disagreement. This ain’t got nothin’ to do with nothin’.”
Carmen pulled out the Sig Sauer, raised it, and pulled the trigger, shooting Jesus right through his crown of thorns. Lamont staggered backward, and Carmen pulled the trigger again. A voice in the back of her mind was telling her to stop, that she didn’t really know what was going on here, didn’t know if this was his girlfriend or just some crack whore he’d picked up off the street or somebody’s innocent child.
Another louder, more insistent, more persuasive voice shouted back that it didn’t matter who she was. This is wrong! This man has to be punished for what he’s done to that young girl. He has to die!
Lamont fell to the floor. The young girl was screaming. Carmen held up a finger and told her to shush.
“It’s okay. He won’t hurt you any more. He’ll never hurt anyone again.”
Carmen stepped over Lamont’s body and walked over to the young girl. She gathered her into her arms and hugged her. The young girl sobbed against her chest.
“Shhhhh. It’s okay. You’re safe now. It’ll be all right.”
She let the girl go and wiped the tears from her eyes.
“You okay?”
The girl nodded. Carmen wiped the girl’s hair out of her eyes along with her tears. The girl was very beautiful. She was light-skinned like many of the victims of the Fury. And Carmen had overestimated her age. This girl was barely in her teens. Lamont had probably been turning her out, trying to make her into a prostitute if he hadn’t already.
“Go get dressed. I’m taking you out of here.”
The girl hurried back into the bedroom. Carmen stood and walked into the kitchen. She heard coughing and gagging sounds and looked back over at the front door. Lamont was still alive and was trying to sit up. Carmen grabbed a knife from the kitchen counter and walked back over to Lamont. She kicked him in the chest, knocking him back down onto the floor and eliciting a fresh round of coughing that sprayed blood onto her brand new Kenneth Coles.
Carmen knelt down and straddled Lamont’s chest.
“You like hurting little girls, Lamont?”
“I-I’m dying! Help me! I’m dying!”
“Yes. Yes you are,” Carmen replied as she drew the serrated carving knife across his throat, sawing through his esophagus, down into his cervical vertebrae while he thrashed and convulsed. She slid off him and watched his death throes wind down. Then she began unbuttoning his pants. She pulled out his now limp cock and began sawing at the base of it. In her mind, the Fury continued to scream, urging her on as she collected her trophies.
Table of Contents
Prologue
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
Epilogue
The Killings Page 19