And then as I looked into his face, his eyes swollen shut from the pepper spray, tears covering his cheeks, sweat coating his forehead, I took that blade and started sawing at his wrist. His cries were loud and would have drawn attention if we weren’t in Desolation. But he’d find no hope or rescue in this city. They’d hear his pleas and screams of pain and go in the other direction.
The sound of bone crunching apart from the blade, of flesh being torn away filled my ears. The scent of coppery blood filled my nose, surrounding me in a grizzly depiction of what my life was. Of who I was.
His hand fell to the dirty alley ground with a thud, spurts of blood spraying out from the stump that topped his forearm, splattering against my hand and arm. He was weeping as if he were the victim.
I let go of his wrist and stood, taking a step back and appreciating my work. He cradled his arm to his chest, his tears now from pain and fear. But I wasn’t done with him yet.
I reached down and curled my fingers around his neck again, lifting him easily off the ground. He didn’t struggle anymore, too weak, too afraid. He kept pleading, kept whimpering.
And still I didn’t fucking care.
I wished I could look into his eyes and watch the light fade.
I ran the blade down the center of his chest, causing him to still, to pant. It would be so easy—feel so good—to just sink the knife into his belly and jerk it upward, opening him up so his intestines covered the ground. But instead I placed the tip right over his crotch and watched him hold his breath and freeze.
A slow smile covered my face as adrenaline moved through me even faster. I slammed the blade into his dick and let it sink in just enough before I twisted the handle and jerked it upward, opening up the part he would have used to brutalize Lina.
He screamed and thrashed, a burst of survival energy moving through him. I pulled the knife out and let him go before stepping back, letting him sink to the ground. He’d bleed out soon enough from the arm wound and now what I’d done to his dick.
I bent down to wipe the blood off his blade on his shirt but kept the weapon. I didn’t need to wait around to make sure he’d die. The wounds I’d inflicted on him were sufficient, and my knowledge on how to deliver a deathblow was accurate. The fucker would be found at some point, tomorrow no doubt, but it would just be another body found in Desolation with no leads.
When I left the alley, I should have gone home to shower the death and violence off me, but I found myself heading in the opposite direction, toward the one woman I should leave alone.
Five minutes later I stood outside of Lina’s apartment building in the shadows and stared up at what I knew was her bedroom window. When I found out her address and what apartment she lived in, I’d walked by more than once. I turned into the stalker I’d never been.
The bass of music came from one of the many dilapidated homes, the scent of stale smoke and car exhaust a constraint in the air. I moved closer to a sparse-looking tree on the verge of dying in the “backyard” of the building.
I made my way to the tree, my focus never leaving Lina’s bedroom window. The moon was bright enough that it cast light over the back of the building, allowing me to see her tiny shape moving behind the sheet.
I still held the knife in my palm, had the fucker’s blood drying on my hands and clothes. Adrenaline was humming through my veins, a high an addict would kill for.
And they did. I did.
I had no business being here, being close to her. I shouldn’t have followed her, but I wanted to protect her. I wanted to make sure that her almost assault hadn’t hurt her more than I knew about.
I didn’t know what was happening to me, and I should have put her behind me as easily as I did everything else. But then this vulnerable, tiny woman had inserted herself into my life unknowingly, crossing paths with the hungry wolf. And as I stood there, wanting nothing more than to go to her, to tell her she was mine, I knew how dangerous that was for her. For me.
I knew how dangerous she truly was to me.
And even if I should’ve left her alone, put her out of my head and my life, I knew the outcome would always be the same.
I’d go to the diner tomorrow night. I’d watch her, talk to her. I couldn’t help it, because the truth was, for the first time in my miserable fucking existence, I had a weakness… and that was Lina.