And I catch Maart’s voice. “Behind you! Behind you!”
I twist off Pavo—who is still unconscious—and drop into a low crouch as I find Anya standing just a meter away holding that fucking knife.
We stare at each other. And I don’t know how it happens for her, but everything in my world suddenly goes silent. All I hear are the words that she’s not saying.
Her face is a bloody mess. Her nose may be broken and her plump, fleshy bottom lip is split. Blood is dripping down her chin.
She says nothing. And now that I know she’s silent, that makes sense.
But when you live in a world of sick hearts and dead voices, you only need eyes to say what needs to be said.
And hers tell me… she is furious.
There is nothing but hate in her gaze. And for a moment, I’m caught off guard. Because when I saw her earlier up in the command center, I would’ve never guessed she was capable of that kind of hate.
She walks towards me with the knife. The crowd is screaming. Pavo has lost. He’s barely conscious. Low, primal moans from him and nothing more. They all know I’ve won and that means this girl is mine. Or she will be, once I put Pavo out of his misery.
Or will she? Seems Anya is beginning to have an opinion about how this night ends.
She stops less than one pace between us. Our eyes lock.
Does she want to kill me?
No.
She looks at Pavo and then she holds up the knife.
I shrug and make a little gesture. A little wave of my hand that says, By all means. Be my guest.
She pushes past me and then, without hesitation, she straddles Pavo’s body, crouches down, and then, again without hesitation, she buries that knife right in his gut.
Oh, Anya. That’s gonna be messy.
Pavo gulps air. Blood spills out of his mouth as his back bucks up, arching and twisting.
Anya stares down at him, and then rises up, leaving the knife right where she put it. She turns to me, wipes the blood away from her mouth and lets out a long breath.
I look down at Pavo, then back up at Anya. Tears are streaming down her face. They leave a track of blurry white body paint on her cheeks.
Then I shake my head and sigh as I pull the knife from Pavo’s stomach and drag the blade across his neck, making sure to cut right through his trachea, because I’m ready for what comes next.
The blood pours out of him and suddenly he is lying in a pool of crimson scarlet. The drones hover just off my shoulder, barely ten feet off the ground, filming the entire death scene so that all my watchers tonight can replay it back in 4K ultra.
But this isn’t enough. This ending had a twist, that’s for sure. But it won’t haunt them. And I need to haunt them. This is my real heat-of-the-moment payment. It’s not the girls. It’s not the money. It’s certainly not the fucking accolades.
It’s the ending.
It’s the look in their eyes when I catch them by surprise.
And so far tonight, Anya is the only one who has made the news.
Yeah. I can’t leave it like that.
When I look down, the knife is still in my hand. I hold the hilt in my fist and drag the blade down Pavo’s body from neck to belly, splitting him open. And then I thrust my hand inside him, dig under his ribs, grab hold of the thick, still-trembling muscle, and use every bit of energy I have left to pull his heart out of his chest.
The entire universe stops to watch me.
The crowd says nothing. They don’t even dare to gasp.
Oh, shit, they’re thinking. What will he do with it?
I consider the optics of eating it. That would really give them nightmares. But I can’t stomach the thought of biting off a piece of Pavo and the drones are too close to fake it.
So I just stand up and throw it as far as I can towards the closest group of people, and when it slaps into the blocking arm of Lazar, I look down so the drones can’t see me smile.
“Sick Heart. Sick Heart. Sick Heart.” They chant it now. Not for me. They don’t chant for me. Their chant is submission and nothing more.
They know who’s in charge on this platform.
I point to Anya and she sucks in air. Then I motion for her to grab Pavo’s arm. She does this without hesitation and we drag his body across the rough concrete, leaving a river of black in the white glow behind us.
He is just meat.
We position him until he’s teetering sideways on the edge of the helipad.
The silent night breaks and I hear him. Anya’s father, that fucking prick, is screaming my name. My real fucking name. “Cort van Breda! Cort van Breda!” in his stupid Hungarian accent.