Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 90211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90211 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
I punch Kieren in the mouth for the fifth time and feel a tooth crack under my knuckles.
His head lolls sideways as he groans, his eyelids fluttering. Blood pours from his lips and dribbles down his chest. He’s filthy, bruised, swollen, and a pale imitation of the man he used to be. If man is the right word for a creature such as him.
I stalk across the basement, rolling my shoulders. Of all the hells I’ve been through, this has to be one of the hardest, mostly because I care about the outcome. Back in the day, when I was a delinquent running around the fucking streets, a stabbing, a fight, a shooting, all that shit flowed around me like water in a lake. I made ripples, I made splashes, but it all ended up back in the pile in the end. None of it mattered, nothing ever clung to me, because I wouldn’t let it.
Now everything’s different.
“You know the sick part of this?” I talk and Kieren listens now. He spent the last half hour screaming, begging, crying, and confirming everything Luke told Regan and then some. The intelligence he gives me about the house in the suburbs is invaluable, assuming it’s not all some fantasy made up to stop the pain. That’s hard to tell sometimes when it comes to torture.
“The sick part is, I’m enjoying myself. I know, right? My wife’s concussed, my brother-in-law is in bad shape, and here you are, a living punching bag at this point. What right do I have? How dare I enjoy myself?” I kneel down in front of him, looking into his battered face. “But god, Kieren, I really love making you suffer.”
He grunts, only half conscious. I flick him on the cheek and he cringes away. I stand and step back.
“I don’t even hate you for what you are. I’ve met men like you a thousand times. Liars, cheaters, manipulators. You played the long game and you almost played it well. I have to give you props. It’s not my sort of thing, but that shit with Luke? I can recognize a master at work, even if I find the end product distasteful.” I pace behind him. “But here’s the thing. You messed with my wife. Oh, she wasn’t mine then, but still. You never should’ve hurt her, you twisted little shit.”
I kick his chair hard, knocking him sideways. He hits the floor with a scream, his head bouncing off the concrete. His choked grunt is like a symphony to my ears. I stand over him, watching his one visible eye as he breathes hard, like a caged animal in a panic. Probably wondering when the end will come.
“I’m going to leave you like this. I’m guessing nobody will be down here to check on you for a while. Think about your many crimes while I’m gone. Or don’t, I don’t care.” I nudge him with my boot before heading to the door.
His strangled pleading moan follows me up the stairs and back into the main Whelan family home.
“You have fun down there?” Finn asks when I find him sitting in the back yard. He’s on the porch drinking coffee and reading the paper.
“I really did. Nothing like some mild beating to get me going.” I flop down across from him wearing a blood-stained shirt while he’s utterly pristine. He smiles wryly at me.
“Want something to eat or drink?”
“Nah, I’m good.” I stretch my legs.
“Get what you needed?”
“He confirmed everything and added a few good details.”
Finn nods. “We should act on it.”
“Agreed. Sooner rather than later. The Baranovs likely realize there’s a problem by now. They’ll start increasing security.”
“We wouldn’t want that.”
“But you still haven’t told me how you found all this out to begin with.” He considers me from across the table, head cocked. He’s got his usual charming smile on his face but I know that’s only a mask. I can ignore it and see the real Finn, the stark killer hiding under the facade of easygoing family man.
“I know I haven’t.”
“And I haven’t asked because I know you’ll tell me the truth, but the fact that you’ve held it back makes me think you don’t want to. Am I getting this right?”
“Pretty much. It’s better if I don’t say.”
“You know I don’t like that.”
“We’ve been working together for a long time. I’ve trusted you, done whatever you asked, burned the world at your word, and now I’m asking for some of that in return. My source is solid.”
Finn’s lips press together. He hates this and I can’t blame him. I don’t like it either. Holding information back feels too much like lying, and I fucking hate liars, but I’m doing it to protect Regan. Not for her shitbag brother—if it were left up to me, Luke would be down in that basement with Kieren right now, if not dead already—but because losing him would hurt her and she’s not ready for that. Maybe one day, but not yet.