Page 8 of What We Bury

“WHAT THE FUCK, MICAH!” He attempts to kick it back, but his aim is off and it whiffs sideways, sending it flying toward Holden.

Holden, operating on pure reflex, bats it away with the back of his hand. “Oh, hell no?—”

It sails back toward Milo, who grabs Eli, attempting to jerk him into the line of fire.

“I’m not your cock blocker, Milo!” Eli dives to the side like he’s avoiding a grenade, hitting the wet sand at a skid. “Are you fuckingkiddingme right now?”

The limp dick misses both of them and slaps into one of the jetty’s pillars, landing with a wetplopin the sand near Knox’s feet. Knox looks down at it, looks up at us, and I swear I can see him sighing behind that mask.

“You’re all children,” he rumbles, and kicks it back toward the body. He’s nothing if not a tidy motherfucker.

I turn back to the woman, who’s still going at Brock’s corpse like she’s trying to excavate his soul through his abdominal cavity. There’s beauty in it—the way she moves, the complete focus, the utter commitment to making sure he never hurts anyone again. She’s covered in blood and sand and righteous fury.

I think I’m in love.

Eli gets to his feet and approaches her, pulling off his mask and edging closer with his hands up. “Hey—hey, it’s okay. He’s done. You’re safe.”

She’s not hearing him. Blood’s everywhere now—splattered across her chest, dripping from her chin, turning the sand into a muddy slurry under Brock’s body. She stabs one last time, deep into his gut, and twists hard, like she’s carving out the last bit of evil. Brock goes limp, finally, his choking gasps fading to nothing, just the drip-drip of blood hitting the ground.

The moment she stops, I make a move, grabbing her from behind. I wrap my arms around hers, pinning her knife hand, and pulling her back. She fights me—thrashing, kicking, raging—and she’s stronger than she looks, all adrenaline and anger so fucking raw it almost burns to touch. The knife slips, swinging wildly up to catch my forearm, a hot sting I’ll deal with later.

“Stop,” I murmur, close to her ear, trying to keep my voice steady. “Calm, baby girl. It’s over. He’s done. You’re okay. Hey—you’re okay.”

She keeps fighting. Elbows, heels, teeth—she tries to bite my arm and I let her, because fuck it, she’s earned the right to bite someone. But I don’t let go. I hold on, solid and steady, the way you hold someone who’s drowning—not to restrain them but to keep them from going under.

“You’re okay,” I say again. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.”

Somewhere in the middle of the third or fourthokay, she stops.

It’s like someone pulled her plug. She goes limp in my arms, knife slipping from her fingers into the sand, and her whole body shudders hard enough to shake us both.

I lower us both to the ground, tearing off my mask so I can take a decent breath. She’s deadweight against my chest, her head lolling back against my shoulder, her eyes open but seeing nothing. Blood streaks her hands, her neck, the ruined pink dress. It smears across my arms where I’m holding her. It’s fuckingeverywhere.

Above us, Brock swings.

For a long moment, nobody says anything.

“Well, fuck.” Milo pulls off his mask and dumps it on the sand, staring up at Brock like the corpse personally inconvenienced him. “The suicide note is useless now.”

He pulls the folded paper from his pocket and brandishes it as evidence.

“No one’s going to believe he hanged himself and then went stab-happy on his own junk. Do you know how long it took me to fake this fuckwad’s handwriting?”

“Milo,” Eli says, warning threaded through every syllable.

“What? The loops on his g’s were a nightmare. Effort happened. My best work. And now—” He gestures at the mess.“Now it’s arts and crafts for nothing. Well, not nothing. That was a show and I loved watching it. But fuck, if I’d known we were playing pin-the-knife-in-the-rapist, I’d have saved some time and brought throwing darts instead.”

Knox stays silent. He crouches to pick up the knife, wiping the blade on his thigh in one practiced stroke. He’s halfway to sliding it back into his boot when Eli holds out a hand.

Knox pauses. Looks at him. Looks at the knife.

Hands it over.

Eli folds it shut and drops it into his jacket pocket without a word. Knox watches him do it, then straightens, mask still on, expression unreadable behind the smooth bone of it.

Holden lets out a low whistle as he circles the body, mask pushed up over his hair.

“I am fucking buzzing. That was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”