Kill him.

Screw the contract.

Screw the fucking money.

He’s dead.

Alrik gaped like a koi carp at his dead friend with his guts coiled on the floor. His other friend remained unconscious beside him. “You bastard!” Shaking his head in denial, he back-stepped into the kitchen.

I let him go.

Most likely he had another gun stashed somewhere. He thought he had power over me with such a useless weapon.

Idiotic asshole.

Wielding a pistol wouldn’t save him from me. Bullets didn’t stand a chance with the methods of killing I'd been taught.

Discounting him, I pried open Pimlico’s mouth.

Blood made everything slippery and slick.

She winced, tears mixing with her bloody mouth as I forced her to show me what they’d done.

From previous experience, I knew what bled so copiously.

The tongue.

And because I wasn't stupid, I understood why they’d do such a thing. She refused to talk. I’d made suspicions bellow that she spoke to me instead of him.

Why hadn’t she talked to me?

Was this the reason? Because she knew I would leave and did her best to avoid the upcoming brutality?

This was my fault.

I’d done this.

But at least, I’d come back to fucking fix it.

Pimlico struggled in my arms as I traced the damage to her tongue. I expected to find a severed piece of meat, but I hadn’t been too late.

A huge slice had cut her a third of the way through the muscle.

It would hurt. It would continue bleeding. But she wouldn’t lose the power of speech. And she wouldn’t die…hopefully.

“You’ll be okay.” Picking her up, I laid her on the white couch, taking supreme satisfaction as dark crimson rained over the pristine surfaces. “Stay there. I have to finish a few things.”

Alrik had vanished, but banging came from the pantry as he grabbed whatever he could to make him safe.

I let him. I didn’t chase him to start the war before he was armed.

I wasn’t that type of person.

He wanted a fight.

I'd fight.

However, the asshole who’d cut Pimlico’s tongue didn’t deserve such respect.

Pim’s eyes locked onto mine as I strode toward the unconscious man and grabbed the scissors from beside him. My thumb smeared the still warm blood from the girl I couldn’t stop thinking about and fisted the bronze handles.

Pim gasped, holding her mouth, doing her best to contain morbid ruby streams.

I shook my head. “Don’t swallow. Just let it flow. I’ve got you. Just a few more minutes, then we’ll leave.”

Leave to go where?

My yacht?

A hospital?

I’d decide when it was time. For now, I had other things on my mind.

She didn’t relax. How could she with such an injury? But her eyes dropped from mine to the shears in my fist.

She didn’t speak, but I heard her question through the arch of her eyebrow and shimmering hate in her gaze.

What are you going to do?            

I lowered my jaw, watching her beneath my brow. “I’m going to kill him.”

That was the only warning I gave her. Dropping to my knee, I jammed the heavy blades through the throat of the man who’d hurt the woman I’d steal.

The shears were sharp.

His neck was supple.

The two met and did what supple and sharp did.

His throat sliced open, revealing the innards of gristle and esophagus before blood welled and joined the mess of Pimlico’s in an avalanche of red.

A gunshot exploded above my head, whistling past and embedding in the large oval window behind me.

The glass shattered, raining outward, letting sea breezes enter the otherwise calm space.

“Get the fuck out of my house and I won’t kill you.” Alrik shuffled from the kitchen, both hands on his pistol, his fingers shaking on the trigger.

He still thought I’d deliver what he’d paid for.

Even after this.

I laughed. “If you were half the man you think you are, you would’ve shot me.”

He scowled. “I’m a better man because I didn’t.”

“No, you’re just a greedy bastard who still thinks our deal will go through.”

He blanched. “I paid. You agreed. Of course, it will go through. I need that fucking yacht!”

“Need and deserve are two entirely different things.” Moving around the couch, I trailed my fingers briefly over Pimlico’s blood-soaked cheek. “Our deal was void the moment you mutilated a young girl.”

“She’s mine to do with as—”

“As you please.” Raising my hand, I painted her red, red life-force on my cheekbone, dousing myself in the pain of the person I was protecting—just like those of my lineage. We’d fought for empresses and queens. We’d given our lives in the service of others and avenged those who’d wronged us.

This was no different.

The many lessons I’d indulged in came back, flowing like magical memories through my veins. I missed my sword, but my hands would do in this case.

“You went too far this time, Alrik.”

“You have no authority to tell me what I can and cannot do.”

“Yes.” I moved closer to him. “I do.”

His arms trembled. “Think again.”

The flinch of his muscles gave me all the warning I needed. He pulled the trigger and another bullet did its best to break the fabric of air and speed.