“DON’T SPEAK ABOUT MY SISTER!” My teeth are bared, I’m really fucking mad. I need to calm down.
Nokosi raises his hands but shows no fear. He’s so brave.
“You love her so fucking much, but you don’t know what she’s done or why you two met to begin with,” I hiss, taking deep breaths. Officer Deacon screams for help again so I hit him around the temple and scream, “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” He immediately goes silent with a whimper.
Much better.
“You think she’s so innocent?” I ask Nokosi whose hands are still raised, and eyes are on me. “Yep, sweet Nokosi… you were scouted by my sister for me. Do you recall her trying to entice you to do things to her that could be considered rapey?” He doesn’t answer. I don’t care. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
I press a kiss against his unresponsive lips, standing on my tiptoes to do so. The plastic sheeting crackles under my movements.
I then walk over to Deacon who flinches, and I lift his wifebeater, showing the star-shaped burn on his rounded beer gut.
“Oh God,” Nokosi chokes. “No.”
“I normally heat a knife, or something sharp and burn draw the sigil into their flesh, but I just held his badge over an open flame and pressed it against his skin. Cool, right? He screamed and screamed. Not good when you have neighbors. I had to hit him a few times, but we managed it in the end. Look at it.”
“You’re dying, you’re weak… you couldn’t have killed all of those innocent people.”
“They were rapists and murderers and disgusting arrogant PIGS!” I sneer, pressing the barrel of the gun into the blistering burn on the older man’s stomach. He cries.
I love it when they lament as I torture them.
“You don’t know that, Willow. Arrogance doesn’t mean they were bad.”
“Male means bad,” I respond darkly, turning again to look at him. “All men are vile fucking pigs. You have no idea what they did to us.” I laugh lightly. “Or maybe you do? Because that’s what he did, isn’t it? He fucked you, made you think you were enjoying it when really it was destroying your soul.”
“I’m not destroyed,” he insists. “I’m strong. I survived. I’m okay. Look at me. I’m not damaged.”
“Yes, you are,” I say, raising the barrel of the gun again and pointing it right at the sobbing officer’s eye. “And I’m going to end your pain by ending him.”
“Don’t, Willow… Lilith is dying, she has the same tumor as you. She needs you!”
My lips part as a new wave of pain floods through me. “What?”
“That’s why she’s in the hospital,” he explains, taking a step towards me. “She collapsed. She’s really sick.” His eyes fill with tears despite everything I just said about her.
“You really do love her, don’t you? Even knowing what she did? What she came to do?”
He looks away, at the man behind me who is still shouting for help through the rag. Or trying to. He’s not very smart.
“Shut up,” I snap at him again and he does so, looking at Nok for help. “Don’t you look at him, you fucking pedophile.” I raise the gun. I’m not even enraged anymore. I’m dead inside.
My sister was always supposed to live after me. It was my one saving grace. And now I’ll never get Nokosi because he’ll choose the dying sister that he loves. He doesn’t care what I’ve done for him.
“Well, if she’s dying, I guess I really have nothing holding me back.” I pat Deacon’s cheek. “Sorry, dude. You fucked up touching him. Any last words?” Yanking the fabric from his mouth, listening to him yell for help for a little while, I twist the silencer onto the end of the pistol. I got that from the twelfth guy I killed. His daddy was a hunter who promised me over the news that he’d find me and kill me. He hasn’t yet and I’m glad of it. This doohickey has been a great tool to use for my little hobby I’ve got going here.
Nokosi moves closer and starts to speak, “Maybe we should—”
POP.
My elbows almost buckle when the gun fires and the bullet soars through the air, hitting Deacon in the eye.
The splatter of blood across Nokosi’s face shuts him up and he becomes deathly pale.
Deacon is slumped to the side, a hole where his eye was, the bullet passed through and took a massive chunk of brain and skull with it. They’re on the floor by the wall over there.
Nice splatter pattern.
“He’s dead,” Nokosi breathes, eyes wide and full of fear. “You did it. You actually killed him.”
“What? You thought you were being punked?” I laugh and blow on the end of the gun like an old western movie. I wipe the blood from Nokosi’s face using a white rag and kiss the tip of his nose. “You’re welcome.” I tuck the gun into the back of my pants, it’s hot but not so hot that it burns. “Can we kiss now? I deserve that much at least.”
He turns and vomits onto the ground, so I rub his back instead.
“It’s hard the first time. My first time were the guys that raped me and my sister. I took them out one by one. It was so fucking satisfying.”
“You’re insane,” he breathes, wiping his hand on his mouth and standing. “I can’t deal with this. I need to go.”
“Go? You’re not going anywhere. We need to get rid of the body.” I move to it, throwing a towel onto the blood pooling on the ground from Deacon’s head. I kick him back in his chair and start cutting through his bindings with a knife from my boot. “Help me then, don’t just stand there.”
“I want nothing to do with this.”
I stand and point the gun at him again. “You need to have something to do with this, so I don’t have to kill you. Please don’t make me kill you.”
“If you love me…”
I raise the gun; he’s overestimating how strongly I feel for him. “Help me get rid of the body.”
“Do it yourself. How did you do it before?”
“I had the strength then.”
The door opens slowly.
“Did you tell anybody?” I hiss, raising the gun with my heart racing. I point it at the door as a hooded man steps through.
“Sweetie, put the gun down,” the man says, his voice is so familiar. Pain slices through my chest as he raises his hands and pulls down his hood revealing dark blond hair and familiar eyes. “Put it down and we’ll fix this. We’ll get you the help you need.”
“Daddy?” I whimper, feeling grief from the loss of him hit me. “You’re dead.”
The garage metal shutter door slowly starts to open so I turn and shoot bullets through it. They hit the metal and somebody curses on the other side. Holes litter the metal, tiny holes but no blood.
“Sweetie, it’s just Nash and his father, Dasan.” He then calls out, “You all good, guys? Anybody hurt?”
Nash responds with a disgruntled, “Yes and no.”
“How are you alive?” I whisper, feeling my heart break and pain slice through me. “You killed yourself. You couldn’t handle what happened to us.”
His jade green eyes, like mine and my sister’s fill with tears. “No, honey, I didn’t kill myself. Remember? I abandoned you, I was in a dark place, but I didn’t die. I ran away like a coward. I should never have done that. I know it was wrong.”