Page 54 of Knife Thrower

Logan throws his hands up in mock surrender, his chaotic gray eyes dancing with amusement. “Hey, I’m just appreciating the craftsmanship. No need to throw steel at me.”

We finish the job as the eastern horizon begins to bruise with the first pale streaks of purple and gray. Jonah tamps the loose earth flat with the broad soles of his boots, scattering a thick layer of dead pine needles and broken branches over the disturbed soil. By the time the sun fully breaches the tree line, not a single trace of the monster remains. The earth swallowed him whole.

We trudge out of the dense woods, our boots crunching against the gravel shoulder of the highway, and slip back onto the silent carnival lot. The rigs sit fully packed, hitched to the heavy haulers, ready to hit the interstate.

Jonah rolls his massive shoulders, cracking his neck. “I need a shower. I smell like a crematorium.”

“My favorite perfume,” Logan chimes in.

I stop in the middle of the gravel path. My brothers peel off, but my boots stay rooted to the dirt. I stare across the lot at Sloane’s trailer.

She headed back hours ago, right after Raymond took his last rattling breath. She needed to scrub the blood off her hands.

My muscles ache. I smell like smoke, sweat, and butchery. The logical move is to head to my own trailer, wash the filth away, and grab a few hours of sleep before Elias gives the order to roll out.

I don’t take a single step toward my door.

We spent the last seven days completely inseparable. Between plotting the destruction of Raymond’s life and breaking down her walls, I’ve had more sex this week than my dick knows how to process. We fucked against steel siding, in cramped showers, and tangled in the colorful quilts of my bed. I should be spent. My tank should be empty.

But when it comes to Sloane, the hunger never fades. It only sharpens.

I cross the lot, my boots grinding against the rocks, and knock twice on the Airstream’s metal door.

The deadbolt slides back with a heavy click.

Sloane stands in the doorway, wearing an oversized gray T-shirt that swallows her frame, the hem ending midway down her bare thighs. Her pale blonde hair falls in damp, tangled waves over her shoulders. The severe, guarded posture she usually carries is completely gone. She looks exhausted, stripped down to the studs, and flawlessly beautiful.

She takes one look at the ash smeared across my jaw and steps aside, pulling the door wide.

I walk inside, dropping my blood-stained shirt and jeans onto the linoleum floor. I don’t touch her. I refuse to put the soot of her abuser’s funeral pyre on her clean skin. I head straight into the narrow bathroom, crank the water knob to the red line, and step into the cramped fiberglass stall.

The scalding spray hits my shoulders, turning the water swirling around the drain a murky, violent mix of gray and pink. I grab a bar of soap, scrubbing the grime from my chest, my arms, my hands. I wash the lingering scent of smoke out of my hair, purging the night’s horrors until nothing remains but raw, heated skin.

I step out, dragging a towel roughly over my dripping hair, and walk back into the main cabin.

Sloane lies in the small bed at the back of the trailer. She pulled the quilt up to her chest, her icy blue eyes tracking my approach. The darkness that haunted her stare since the day she walked into the Big Top is almost gone. The rot is burning away.

I drop the towel, sliding into the narrow mattress beside her. The limited space forces our bodies together, and I pull her flush against my side, wrapping my arm around her waist, tucking her head under my chin. Her bare legs tangle with mine, her skin warm and soft against my damp chest.

We lie in the quiet, listening to the hum of the carnival generators outside the thin metal walls.

“Tell me about her.” I brush my thumb over the bare curve of her shoulder. “Tell me about June.”

Sloane’s breath hitches. The muscles in her back go rigid for a fraction of a second, an old defense mechanism firing in her brain. But the fortress is gone. She exhales a long, shaky breath, her body melting against mine.

“She was bossy,” Sloane whispers into the dark. Her voice cracks, thick with a fragile, hesitant warmth. “She used to stick crayons behind her ears and pretend they were alien antennas. She loved bright clothes. And she interrogated me with the skill of a spy.”

I drag my fingers through her damp hair. “She sounds like a menace. I would have loved her.”

“You would have.” Sloane’s fingers curl into the fabric of the quilt. “She possessed absolutely no fear. She used to climb the kitchen counters to get to the cookies on the top shelf. I spent half my life pulling her down from places she wasn’t supposed to be.”

A quiet, broken sob tears out of her throat.

The dam finally breaks.

The tears she held back for years, the grief she locked away behind a flat stare and a dead heart, spill over. She cries. Deep, wracking sobs shake her chest, soaking the skin over my collarbone. It isn’t the suffocating, toxic grief of a woman waiting to die. It’s the cathartic, agonizing release of a mother finally allowing herself to mourn the child she loved.

I don’t offer empty platitudes. I don’t tell her it’s okay. I tighten my arms around her trembling frame, holding her together while she completely falls apart.