"Are any of them named ice cream?"
Blond curls shook.
"Sprinkles?"
Lucille let out a snort, and almost choked on her ice cream. But before they could continue their little game, the phone rang. "Hello, this is Jaspierre."
"Ma'am, I'm a doctor down at St. Mary's and I've got a Detective Edward Darbonne here, and he's been asking for you. He's been in..." There was a long pause. "...an accident. He could really use a friend."
"I'm on my way." Jaspierre stood up, clicking her phone off, nerves strung thin. "Lucille, honey, I'm sorry. We were having so much fun, but we have to go to the hospital. Edward has been in an accident." She rolled the word around in her mouth. The doctor had hesitated far too long and an ominous feeling was creeping up Jaspierre's back. She considered dropping Lucille off at the house with Arnold, but that would be almost two hours of driving the wrong direction.
She'd just have to tag along.
Jaspierre gripped Lucille's hand tightly as they entered the hospital. "I'm here to see Edward Darbonne?" The secretary recited his room number with a pained look on her face.
"We're all so very sorry," she said, pressing her hand softly into Jaspierre's.
Jaspierre's stomach flipped and she held Lucille's hand tightly as they walked to the elevator. Once inside, she pressed the third floor. Her chest grew tight, and she looked down at the little girl who was depending on her.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Chance watched the two eating ice cream. He sat in the stolen red truck and watched with his binoculars. He had his machine gun warm on his lap. His whole body trembled with excitement. She answered the phone, and then they both stood up to leave. Once they were in her car, he followed along behind slowly. They went to the hospital.
Good. It was well beyond time for them to go to the hospital. Get a little message he left her. But as he impatiently waited in his truck, it seemed like it was taking too long. Had they left through a back door? What was going on? He stared at the entrance doors sliding open and shut as a group of people passed through. Fuck it. He couldn't wait any longer.
He stepped out of his car and took the machine gun with his twenty-five clips of ammo strapped to his chest.
Maybe he wanted to deliver this message himself.
Chapter
Forty-Four
Jaspierre stood in the hallway of the hospital. Lucille held her hand tightly. Edward's doctor had called her and asked her to come talk to him.
Why hadn't Edward called her directly?
The hallway seemed too quiet, and she felt uneasy walking up to his room. She didn't know anything more, just that he had been hospitalized.
The sinking pit in her stomach was enough for her to know. Chance had done whatever she was about to see.
How had Edward survived it? Chance didn't seem to let many people live.
Lucille held her little hand. It would hopefully do Edward some good to see how the child was faring.
Finally, she opened the door.
"Edward?" she whispered tentatively. He seemed to be asleep. His face had been shredded and long black tattoo lines drawn across it. Both his feet were bandaged and lifted in a sling. His left arm was in a cast.
She recognized immediately what this meant. His toes had been removed. His arm would be broken; probably, he had been raped. This was Chance's signature, his love note to her. She stared, rage brewing inside her soul. An old hatred rekindled and ablaze; her whole world spun. And that was before he spoke.
"You left me." His tone was dead. He wouldn't turn his face any more towards her, not even flickering his eyes in her direction.
"When?"
"I ran across this country for you, I chased you to the ends of the earth, and you left me with him. You left me for him to destroy." His voice seemed raspy and painful.
It struck her suddenly what he meant. He meant Canada and only now did she realize that he was the one in the silver car. "I didn't know. I'm sorry." Her voice took a cold bite from the anger. From the rage. She should have killed Chance earlier. If he could even be killed.
He let out a hoarse cracking noise that sounded like the hint of a sob. She couldn't give him anything more. Her heart had frozen over, and every ounce of his pain was absorbed into the black hole of her heart.
He coughed, holding back his tears. "He gave me a message."
Her eyes grew wide.
"You fucking owe him."
Chapter
Forty-Five
Jaspierre stepped into the elevator to leave the hospital more ready than she had ever been. This was what she had trained for.
When she was in prison, assuming Lucille dead, she had trained and prepped and planned for one thing, and one thing only.
And now it was time. Her heart was pounding feverishly inside her. Lucille's tiny hand held hers. She couldn't stop the grin from creeping across her lips as she pressed the button for the ground floor. She'd go home and get her blade, she had a small one strapped to her leg like always, but she wanted the big one.The doors opened at the bottom and there he was.
"Mine Forever" sparkled on her neckline.
She nodded before he spoke, already agreeing.
"You owe me." Chance wasn't even trying to hide himself, his scarred, tattooed flesh revealed for the world to see. No hat. No sunglasses. He had his gun out, a machine gun of some sort, if Jaspierre could recognize such things. He pressed the tip of the gun against the elevator door, holding it open. Jaspierre scanned the room, more out of habit than any need to know.
Bodies lay crumpled everywhere. The wall had a little dotted line of bullet holes. Here and now, this was where it would end. Lucille quivered behind her mother.
"Give her back or pay me what I am owed." The large gun swung its nose to the little girl's blond curls. Her beautiful blue eyes grew wide with fright.
"Lucille." Jaspierre's voice was cold and distant. She pointed to the desk and Lucille nodded and started to run. Chance swung the tip of the gun to follow the small child as she scrambled. But Jaspierre was already upon him. Her body tumbled against his and they were down. Her breasts were pressed tightly against his skin, and his erection was already throbbing for more.
"Mine Forever" dangled in front of his nose.
"You owe me!" he screamed, bellowing his horny hateful noise into her neck, kissing at her in a frantic way.
She smiled, a hot, sexy smile of a girl who has just been told she is beautiful. A girl who just finally believed it. His gnarled lips attacked her neck and his dick was firm between her thighs. She let out a soft gasp and pressed her nose against his.
His eyes grew soft staring at hers. And they froze like that, breathless and wonderful right before she pulled out the blade. She drove it downward and he bucked up with his hips, blocking her with the machine gun. She wobbled, and he let out a hot and dirty cry of pleasure.
"Fuck, Jaspierre, fuck, don't. Fuck." He had a desperate ring to his voice.
Chapter
Forty-Six
Her breasts were so close to his face he could taste them. Saliva dripped from his mouth. He had to have her. She could fucking shoot him, stab him, rip off his arms, as long as his cock got to nestle in her fuckhole. No, her pussy. Her fucking pussy.
He roared to life again as she desperately swung her little knife. He had never been so alive. He was more alive than anyone had ever been in the entire universe. His cock held half his blood and still he had room to think, to block with his gun. His arms knew no limits, and he rolled her underneath him, she kept futilely pressing the blade tight against the machine gun. Tossing her underneath him made the gun slip slightly, and the blade pierced his chest at least an inch. Fuck, it was good.
He shoved both her hands above her head, holding them down with the gun.
And they kissed. She kissed him just as hard as ever. Just as fucking delicious as the very first time.
"I love you, Jaspierre." His hoarse, growling voice said the words he had n
ever before uttered aloud as a man.
She gasped, a hot, breathless cry of pleasure. She loved him!
He started grinding against her and said another word he had never bothered with before. "Please?" He let a soft little whimper trickle off his tongue as his eager cock throbbed against her moist place.
She let out the prettiest smile he had ever seen. Jaspierre. His beautiful soon-to-be bride. The only woman he had ever loved. Fuck, the only person who had ever loved him.
His mind raced back to the first moment she had loved him. They had been so little. Mere children. And she had helped him burn his first corpse.
22 Years Earlier
Jaspierre cocked her head to the side curiously. She hadn't said anything yet, and Chance wasn't sure she would.
"Are you mad at me?" Finally, he said, slowly, unable to look at her little brown nine-year-old eyes any longer. Chance was only ten himself. Jaspierre hadn't reacted as strongly as he had expected.
"Why would I be mad at you?" she asked, wrinkling her brow.
"Did you kill your Mother?" he said again. He hadn't seen Severina in at least a year, maybe even longer.
"She is just on a business trip. I've said that." Jaspierre lied again, but she kept staring with those big eyes. It was as if she was searching inside his soul.
"I was kind of hoping you had..." He paused and bit his lip nervously. "If you did kill her, what would you do with her body?"
She sat down on the steps and let out a long breath. "I'd burn it, of course. Don't you know anything? Didn't Liddy teach you how to do that? Sometimes I wonder if she's taught you a damn thing." Jaspierre wasn't one to curse but sometimes, she let it slip out. It felt especially grown up.
"I didn't kill her. I don't know where she is. She just... vanished." Jaspierre didn't say Mother went missing when she let out Pierre and Jasper. That somehow, moments before, that was the last time she had seen her mother.
She wished she knew where Severina was. She wished it so hard it made her stomach hurt. Jaspierre tried not to think of it; she hated to cry in front of Chance. He always took it so personally.
"Jaspierre." He snapped her attention back to her. He was in front of her, his big beautiful eyes staring into hers. "How hard is it to burn a body?"
Jaspierre let out a long sigh. "Who did you kill?" That was it. No judgment, no surprise. He was going to marry this girl someday. She could take such an enormous secret in one breath without even the slightest hint of worry. He would have kissed her right then and there if he thought he knew how to do it.
"I-I don't think you want to know."
She stood up suddenly and clapped her hands together, dusting them off. "We're gonna have to drag it to the office. You might as well let me know. Where did you put her?" Jaspierre continued; she had a little edge to her voice now. A hint of coldness. That coldness had a tremble to it, and he could see her eyes grow shinier and shinier like magic. They grew so shiny and bright he could see his own face reflected in them, and as he stared, his heart thumping, he saw his reflection step out of her eye and run down her cheek. She was crying.
"Don't cry, Jasp. You don't have to help."
"She's my mother. I'm the only one who has to be there." Her tiny voice was calm, but her body shuddered as the words slipped through her lips.
"Your...? Wait, no, Jasp." The little girl didn't turn her head, using every muscle in her body to control the terrified sobs. "No! Jaspierre! It's not your mother. I didn't kill her. Believe me! I would have if I thought it would have helped you, but I didn't kill her!" Chance grabbed the little girl and kissed her forehead in a sweet gesture. His voice cracked as he continued. "I didn't kill your mother." He emphasized the word tightly, and his stomach flipped as he told her his biggest secret ever. "It was Liddy. I killed my Liddy. I shouldn't have done it. I shouldn't have. She just made me so mad, and she just stood there and let everything happen." He was suddenly racked with his own sobs, burying his head into her tiny shoulder. "I'm so sorry, Jaspierre. Please forgive me. I know you loved her."
And then, in the best moment of his entire life, she said, "You really would have killed Mother for me?"
"Yes, Jaspierre. I'd do anything for you."
"I love you," she whispered into his stringy brown hair, her tiny voice mending his heart and breaking it all over again. She wrapped herself around him perfectly, sweet and innocent with no understanding of the way his heart was pounding inside him. He kissed her softly, on the lips, the way a man did to a woman in the movies. And both of them, tear-stained and giggling, went skipping away to the corpse.
It was the first day that he believed she loved him back. The first day that he had been swallowed alive by her love. He would never forget it. He would never let her go. She was forever his.
Chapter
Forty-Seven
Jaspierre writhed below Chance, screaming and pushing him away while he kissed at her frantically. He was gone. It was like he wasn't in the room anymore. She knew it, but did he? She stopped struggling, and he just continued kissing her and saying over and over that he loved her.
She found her heart pounding, and her grin became uncontrollable. A laugh was bubbling up her throat and out her lungs before she could check it. He was insane! It struck her as so funny that she let out another hysterical laugh, almost dropping her knife as she cackled.
She took a deep breath and looked at the man still kissing down her neck, her hands still pressed tightly to the floor with the machine gun. "It's been so long, Chance, I'm not even sure we know how to do this anymore."
He looked at her with his dark eyes and they focused on her, and then went wild again. He was gone. Whatever it was he was experiencing wasn't in this room anymore. She smiled and adjusted her hips underneath him. She scanned the room; there was a dead woman lying not two feet away. She had dark hair and large breasts. Would Chance realize she was slipping him farther and farther onto a dead woman? Quickly, she shifted, scooting closer to the woman. She somehow thought that maybe he wouldn't even notice. He'd just fuck himself exhausted before he finally realized he was plowing his seed into the dead instead of her.
He might even like it more.
Jaspierre stared at him while he kept humping at her, holding her wrists with the gun. "Chance?" she said, and he let out a moan of delight. She tried to shift herself closer to the corpse.
"Say it again, baby."
He couldn't get his pants off with his hands pressed into the gun, holding her hands steady. He was already starting to shift so he could free one hand to let loose the kraken. Jaspierre glanced up at his hands, planning the exact moment to throw her weight and stab him again. But with a gasp, she realized the machine gun was pointed at the desk. Those frightened blue eyes peeked out from the desk, and Chance shoved his weight into the gun, shifting himself to try to free his hand. Jaspierre let out a scream as the gun suddenly fired.
It woke him. He was back, his eyes clear as day, mad as fucking hell. "I would have killed her for you if I thought it would have helped."
"She was my mother. I should have killed her myself," Jaspierre replied, her head spinning from the rickety pop pop pop of the bullets. Lucille was silent. Surely even a mute would scream if you shot them.
Surely she would scream.
Scream.
Please.
Hot tears started to surge and Jaspierre fought to hold them down.
Fucking scream already.
Chance threw his body against her, knocking her breathless, and he struggled to unbutton with one hand. But it was enough; her right hand freed momentarily as he jerked his cock out. The blade slid into his buttocks, the only place she could reach to jab, and his cock jumped, thrusting harder from the pain. "Fuck, get your fucking panties off!" He tore at them frantically, finally able to slide past them into her. He wasn't even trying to stop her, just desperately needing to fuck. She let out a scream of pain and pleasure and the knife kept stabbing, digging into him over and over, into his ass, h
is thigh, his back, his side.
Fucking and dying.
"Jaspierre, you are going to kill me. Just let me finish, dammit!" he screamed into her face, fucking hard and fast, screaming at every slip of the blade. "You owe me!" It pierced him, and he pierced into her, thrashing, blood and sex and sweat soaking them both. She drove it in again, without hesitation. He screamed again, fucking harder. She stabbed him fifteen times before he came, pulsing deep into her.
He wept, kissed her, and told her he loved her. "You have always been mine forever. I've never felt more loved than now," he whispered, spent, and collapsed on her, gushing and bleeding.
She writhed underneath him. Her blade pierced him, twisting five more times. "You were my best friend. I loved you too," she said. Halfheartedly, she kept swinging and stabbed him five more times before he finally shuddered and died. The sobs bucked out of her. He was her only true friend. "Why did you make me kill you?"
She wept and held him as he grew cold in her arms. When her world finally stopped spinning, she slowly rolled him off of her and left the knife, still twisted in his cold back. "I don't have anything else to live for," she whispered. Sirens were starting to wail in the distance. She should just let them come.
She sat up slowly, blood-soaked and broken.
Her sobs grew as cold as he had, her empty heart hardening again, and then she heard it. They weren't just her sobs. She flickered her eyes up to the sound, and Lucille stood in front of her with big sobbing eyes.
"Lucille! I thought you were dead. I thought..." Jaspierre reached for the little girl, both blood-soaked hands outstretched.
Jaspierre's Last Chance (Jaspierre Trilogy Book 3) Page 16