He snapped the narrow leather together, the sharp crack that usually got his blood humming filling the air.
Right now, his blood was boiling, not humming.
He moved around to the front of the bench, grabbed Vernon’s hair and jerked his head up, holding the folded belt in front of his face. “Normally get off on this shit. You’ll be lucky I ain’t shovin’ my dick up your ass when I’m done. Can’t guarantee I still won’t, but can guarantee this bench will be the last fuckin’ place you take a breath. Also ain’t promisin’ how you get there’s gonna be fast and easy. It ain’t. Gonna suffer like you made Red suffer and while you are, want you to think about all those fuckin’ times you had her strapped to this same goddamn bench.”
Vernon made a muffled sound behind the cotton stuffed into his mouth. Sig didn’t want to hear what he had to say.
He just didn’t give a fuck.
Not fucking one.
He dropped the fucker’s head and moved to the back of the bench, then glanced over at the leader’s young wife.
Sig trailed his fingers down Vernon’s back and then over the man’s ass, making sure she was watching his every move. “See all that white flesh? Watch what happens to it.” He lifted his eyes to Deacon. “Make sure she watches it all, Deke.”
He turned back to the bench, planted his boots apart, and lifted his arm. For the first time ever, he gripped the end without the buckle.
He began counting. One strike for every month Red endured being on that mountain and held captive against her will. Then he gave one strike for every day. And if he needed to, he’d do every hour, every minute, every fucking second.
But he lost count.
One blurred into the other and he no longer knew what was happening around him. His focus had narrowed solely on the man in front of him. The red, swollen, bloody, ripped open flesh that used to be whole.
Like Red used to be whole.
His arm lifted and dropped over and over in a mindless, endless rhythm, until blood began to spatter him. On his clothes, his arm, his face.
And still... he didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.
He wouldn’t stop until the need for revenge was gone, until the rage had disappeared.
Until he could think clearly again.
The leather became slippery from the sweat of his palm and Vernon’s blood, but he only adjusted his grip and continued.
Until his arm felt like lead, his fingers were cramped, his heartbeat had slowed and his breathing had steadied, following the cadence of the never-ending strikes.
And still... he didn’t stop.
He wasn’t going to stop until he couldn’t lift his arm any more.
Until he could see clearly, until he could hear clearly.
But right now his vision was nothing but a pinpoint, his ears still ringing.
Nothing else existed but him, his belt and the flesh before him.
Chapter Twenty
“Sig!”
Sig’s arm raised.
“Brother!”
His arm fell and a warm spray splattered him.
“Sig!”
It raised again.
“Jesus fuck!”
The belt was yanked from his fingers and he didn’t have the strength to fight whoever it was.
Then someone was grabbing him and yanking him away from his target.
He wasn’t done.
Not yet.
Not fucking yet.
Why was someone stopping him?
He blinked when hands grabbed his face and another appeared within his narrowed vision.
Trip.
“Sig!” His brother’s face was pale, his eyes holding a deep worry, maybe even a little fear.
Maybe something was wrong with Red.
“Fuckin’ Sig, breathe. Breathe, brother.”
He was breathing, wasn’t he?
Trip’s face remained in his and Sig concentrated on his brother’s moving mouth. “Sig, breathe, damn it!”
Sig forced out, “Not done.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re done. You broke your belt. You sliced him to the bone, Sig. You’ve filleted the fucker open a few times over.”
Sig breathed.
And breathed again.
He concentrated hard on his brother’s face.
The brother who he’d thought was his best friend so long ago and would be forever. The brother who’d offered him a place to land. A place to keep his shit together and his ass out of jail. A family.
He frowned, then turned his head to look at the bench. What used to be whole no longer was. Nothing but bloody and shredded flesh remained.
But he hoped Vernon Shirley was still breathing.
He hoped that fucker felt every strike.
“He breathin’?” Sig asked, his voice sounding strangely flat and as if coming from a distance.
“Don’t know. If you’re worried ‘bout that, slice his fuckin’ throat and let’s go. We need to get the fuck outta here.” Trip dropped the grip on Sig’s face, dug a knife out of his cut and offered it to him.
Sig watched his own fingers wrap around it like they belonged to someone else.
He wasn’t slicing that motherfucker’s throat. Fuck no.
Sig tightened his blood-covered fingers around the hilt of the large knife and frowned as he stared at it in his hands.
No, he wasn’t slicing that fucker’s throat.