Page 49 of Kael

Then he nodded once. “Okay.”

The word landed heavy.

I blinked. “Okay?”

“Yes.” His voice was low and calm. “He’s yours. How do you want to do it?”

The question hung between us. I didn’t have to think long.

“I want him awake,” I said quietly. “I want him to know it’s me. I want to cut him first—slow. Make him feel every second of what he did to me. Then I want to put the gun in his mouth and make him beg before I pull the trigger.” My voice stayed steady, almost soft. “I don’t want it quick. I want him to pay for what he turned me into.”

Something flickered across his face. For the first time since I’d known him, he looked almost caught off guard.

“Fuck, Bria,” he murmured, eyes searching mine. “That’s… colder than I expected.”

I held his gaze. “You asked.”

He exhaled slowly, then reached up and brushed a strand of hair behind my ear. The corner of his mouth twitched, and I could see the approval in his eyes.

“Alright,” he said. “We’ll do it your way.”

Chapter 28

Bria

The motel room in south St. Pete smelled like stale cigarettes and old sweat. It was funny how gentrification couldn't wash the desperation out of a place—it just painted over it and called it progress.

I had gotten high here before. Did other things, too—things I'd spent months trying to forget. The stains on the carpet were probably older than me. The cheap floral bedspread had seen more bodies than a morgue.

Now I was standing in the same room, sober.

I was different now. This room was exactly the same, but the circumstances were different. Yet, I still felt a surge like a high.

Kael had a man pinned against the wall—some greasy, fat dude from Philly who came for a gun deal, then ran with the weapons and money after shooting one of Kael's men. Kael had one hand around his throat, his voice low and calm. "You stole from me.”

The man was shaking, his face red, words coming out in wet gasps. "I didn't—I swear—I was gonna pay it back—"

I stood in the corner like Kael told me to.

I knew I should have felt something—fear, disgust, anything—like before when I watched him cut those bodies up in the Everglades. But something had shifted. I wasn't scared of him anymore. That fear had morphed into fascination, intowanting, into needing to see what he'd do next. The fucked-up thing was that I knew better than to ever feel completely safe around him, but I didn’t want to be anywhere else.

My eyes stayed locked on Kael's hands, the way his muscles flexed. My heart was pounding.

This was what Kael wanted. I knew it now. After what we did when I killed Brook, he looked so proud. After that, he started taking me with him—three murders, six gun deals, and four money pickups. I realized then that every deal he brought me to, every bloody mess he let me see, every time he put a weapon in my hand, he was building something. He was molding me into his equal. He saw my darkness, my rage, a capacity for violence underneath the girl who used to be terrified of him.

He was changing me into what I had always wanted to be. So many nights I had wanted to kill Darius for what he'd done to me. I dreamed of it, planned it in my head, imagined the look on his face when he realized I wasn't weak anymore. But I was too scared back then. I had no power, so I shot up instead. Drugs were my escape, my numbness, my way of surviving without actually living. They took the edge off the rage I couldn't act on.

But now? Now I had Kael. Now I had his hands guiding mine, his voice in my ear, his belief that I could be more than just a victim. And for the first time, the rage didn't feel like something to drown. It felt like fuel, because watching him was like breathing for the first time after almost drowning.

The man's hand moving caught my attention as it darted toward the nightstand. He pulled the drawer open with a flick of his wrist. I saw the glint of metal: a gun.

He swung it toward Kael.

I didn't think.

My hand closed around a broken bottle on the floor. I moved. I shoved Kael. I swung.

The glass sank into the guy's shoulder. He screamed, and the gun hit the floor.