Page 57 of The Way We Rot
I smirked, but my voice was heavy, shocked. I couldn’t pull this off; there was no way to get the suspicion off me when my expressions said it all. Thank fuck for the lack of video call. I rubbed my hand over my face and considered my options. For all my planning, I hadn’t actually contemplated what would happen next. Once I had her, how long would I have?
“Shit,” I said. “That’s bad.”
“Real fucking bad, so it’s all hands back on the table. Unless your mother is actively dying, I need you in, Darling.”
My jaw tense, my mind whirring, I looked down through the rafters. Penny was still in position; her body relaxed in its strange bend, her skin shiny and wet in patches. I had her. I reminded myself, I had her. This was my victory lap, my final stretch.
I went to turn away, to leave Karner swinging and festering a little longer, but my gaze snapped to something that wasn’t there before.
That tool. It was on the floor.
Either she’d spat it out or she’d dropped it, but I narrowed my eyes at the same moment my depleting cock plumped back up.
“Adrian?” the warden said, and it sounded like it wasn’t the first time he’d repeated himself.
“Fine, shit, I’ll be in,” I said, frowning. This was bad. This was real fucking bad. “Just give me a few hours.”
Penny looked at me as I stepped in front of her, my gaze moving from the tool on the floor to her face, flushed and full of anticipation, eagerness. She licked her chapped lips and took me in. Fucking sick bitch, many screws loose in her crazy head.
Slowly, I picked up the tool, stepping right back into her space, resting the cool metal on her eye socket.
“Do it,” she urged, her gaze sparkling. She was clinging to the edge of consciousness, and I couldn’t decide whether she’d dropped the thing on purpose or not. Maybe it’d fallen from her lips when she fell asleep, or maybe she wanted to push my boundaries, see if I would go through with the threats. She wasn’t going to let on either way though; I knew that.
Well, fuck her, because I was all about following through on promises. I put pressure on the corner of her eye, preparing to gouge it out. My skin heated as I pressed, my jaw creaking from tension as I thought of Jake, what he would think. He would hate me for this, but he’d see the value, eventually.
“Yes, Adrian,” she moaned. “Oh, you’re making me so fuckingwet. Piss on me again, soak me, Adrian. I want it all. All of you.”
My nostrils flared with anger. No, this wouldn’t do. She needed to be beyond afraid. To be terrified. She had to leave this world as scared as Jake would have been, as all of those men she killed would have been.
There would be no joy in her demise. She cackled when I pushed the tool under her eyelid, falling into a moan when my hand grasped the other side of her head to add pressure.
I was going to do it, rip her eyeball from her socket and stamp on it, maybe turn it to mush and use it to fertilize Jake’s grave.
“Yes, good boy,” she whispered, her free eye on my face, urging, demanding. Full of unwelcome glee.
Strain built like a balloon about to burst, like muscles about to tear. The tension bounced back as I pulled the tool away, breathing heavily. Heavier than I realized.
Shit.
Her smile grew, her eyes crinkling, the left one red, bloodshot where I’d scraped the cornea. She looked insane.
“I will break you,” I promised her, leaning in close. “It might not be right now, because your mind is twisted already, but I will break and destroy you before I kill you.”
Twenty-Six
Penny
He left me hanging there. Twisted up like a pretzel, my body open to the theater, my eye throbbing and my limbs screaming for relief from the pain. He said nothing as he strode away, right down the middle aisle of the audience, and left.
Fuck, it felt good. I may have been strung up at his command, but I’d won. He couldn’t d o it.
When I’d nodded off for a moment and that knife had fallen from my mouth, a frisson of panic had rocketed through me, startling me back awake. I didn’t want to lose my eyes; I wanted to see everything he had planned. It would be a shame not to witness his masterpiece in all its glory.
I did not want to miss the expression on Adrian’s face as his internal battle raged. I didn’t want to never learn the way his muscles contracted and strainedwhen he was holding himself right on that blade’s edge, about to tip all the way over into depravity.
Smiling, weak, I watched him go. The way his legs strode, fast and determined. He wasn’t leaving from the same direction he came, and it had me curious.
What was next for us? In this wicked little game?
