“Raised him? You didn’t raise him. Hesurvivedyou. He endured your endless fucking mind games. Don’t you dare take credit for Zane. He grew up to be who he isin spite of you,not because of you, you fucking bridge troll,” Felix snarled. His claws flashed as he spoke, the light skating along them dangerously.
Bev sniffed, giving Felix a hard once-over. “Of course, you people love him. You’re just like him.”
“And that makes you fucking crazy, doesn’t it?” Felix asked. “Zane’s getting to live the life you always pretended to have. He has a family, children, a fanbase, a book career. He’s made a name for himself—a legacy. My children will grow up knowing he’s just as much a father to them as we are.”
“Speaking of,” Avi said, idly twirling the screwdriver in his hand. “I should carve out your tongue just for daring to insinuate that you wanted our children taken away from us. I’ve killed for less.”
“He’s killed for fun,” Felix said. “He has a bucket list.”
“You’re all monsters,” she spat. “How are you acting as if you’re somehow better than me? Because you have money? You’re perverts who have family orgies. And torture old ladies.”
“No, we torturebadpeople. Traffickers, pedophiles, serial killers…child abusers,” Avi said, flipping the screwdriver again so the handle thudded against his palm. He tilted his head. “I am curious, though, where you came up with these…wild stories. Dad being a lizard who drinks babies’ blood was my personal favorite.”
“I was right, though,” she snapped. “Look at you.”
“Credit where credit is due, Bev,” Avi said, waving a hand. “Youwereright about many things. One: Dadiselite. He does have connections with some of the highest levels of government. Two: Archer is, in fact, a secret agent—but he doesn’t work for the CIA. He helps run a school where the government teachesGen Alpha psychopaths how to become deep-cover assassins. Three: The four of us are in a relationship, and it’s not a secret.”
“Freaks,” she muttered under her breath.
“How does it feel?” Felix asked.
“How does what feel?” she sneered.
Felix shrugged. “You were right…about so many things…but the world will go on believing you’re crazy, because tonight you die screaming.”
The words hung heavy in the air, settling over the hum of fluorescent lights. The metallic tang of blood mixed with motor oil, clinging to the back of Felix’s throat. It was partially adrenaline, partially rage.
Felix watched the way her eyes darted, the tiny betrayals in her pupils. She kept scanning for escape routes, for an ally, for something that would reverse whatever was about to happen. But there was nothing. He let his claws hover a hair above her lip.
Bev’s nostrils flared. “You have kids. You know what it’s like—how they can be. You—I—he needed discipline,” she croaked. “He was soft. Weak. I?—”
“Needed discipline?” Felix echoed, incredulous. “No,youneeded an outlet for your rage. You needed the high of having someone under your thumb. You hated having a constant reminder of your fuck-up, and he was too small to defend himself.”
Bev turned up her nose, the skin around her eyes twitching with the effort of pretending she wasn’t afraid. Her gaze drifted somewhere over Felix’s shoulder—to the door, the wall, anywhere that wasn’t the truth closing in on her.
“You might as well just kill me. If you’re hoping to make me feel bad, I never will. I did what I felt was right.”
Felix turned to Avi, who nodded.
He tried to maintain an outward calm, but listening to this decrepit bitch talk about one of the people he loved more than life made something dark crawl beneath his skin. He wanted to rage, to make her bleed, to watch the realization dawn that she was prey now, not the predator. But she wouldn’t beg, not yet. Not until they reached the point of no return. So Felix would have to satisfy his bloodlust in another way.
He dragged one claw across her jawline with the barest pressure; a thin red bead welled up and trembled, clinging to her skin like guilt. He locked eyes with her, making sure he had her full attention before asking, “Ever wonder if Gage killed himself just to get away from you?”
He got the pleasure of watching the blood drain from her face a split second before she screeched, struggling against her bindings. “He loved me. My Gage loved me. He was beautiful and perfect and special and you don’t know what you’re saying,” she raged, spit flying, flecking her chin.
“Wow,” Avi said, unimpressed. “And we’re the perverts?” He moved closer, taking out his phone and swiping upward. “When you gave Asa Gage’s computer all those years ago, our analyst combed through everything, and we found something that you might find interesting. Writing assignments. They were part of a clinical psychology class he had to take. He was to write a letter to the person who shaped him. He chose you. Just how sure are you that Gage loved you?”
“Positive,” Bev snarled.
Felix turned away from Bev so she didn’t see his surprise. Was this a real journal entry or was Avi improving?
Avi cleared his throat. “God, I fucking hate you. You’re so miserable, and you make everyone around you miserable too. I almost don’t want to write this because you don’t deserve to be called the person who shaped me. But you did. You shaped both of us. And since you’ll never see this, I’m gonna be honest—I don’t even care about my grade. I just have so much shit I want to tell you.
You spend all your time bragging about me. Your athlete son, your straight-A student, your son who volunteers, says all the right things, does all the right things. But I’m just a trophy to you, someone you could brag about at parties and bridge games. You constantly told me I was the son you wanted. But you wanted a story, not a person.
And poor Zaney was never part of that story. I hated the way you looked at him, like he was a rival, not a little kid. But you never saw him that way. You used me as a weapon to hurt him. Always comparing us. Always humiliating him any chance you could so you could somehow feel, what? Superior to a little boy who loved you?”
The silence that followed was heavy and wrong. Even the hum of the lights seemed to fade. Bev’s breathing grew ragged, the first real sign of something cracking beneath her brittle arrogance.
