“Stay back,” I order.
“But–” She doesn’t finish her sentence, and instead pulls me to the side.
Disoriented by the suddenness of it, I look up, and notice her evading Jedediah’s punch. She swivels out of his way, then presses her heeled foot to his shin, making him yelp.
He goes after her again, but she hops up on the table, and when he’s near, she grabs a landline receiver before smashing it against the side of his head. He loses his balance, but not fully. With blood now flowing freely from his right temple, he tries to knock her down, but she dodges him successfully, then gets off the table before kicking him right in the middle of his legs.
Jedediah cries out in pain as he falls to his knees, and his head rolls back awkwardly when Cigs repeatedly clocks him in the face.
Left, right.
Left, left, right.
Uppercut, kick in the crotch, and then a quick hook in the jaw.
She steps back, and just when I think she’s done, she twists her body around, and delivers abeautifulroundhouse kick, right to the lower half of Jedediah’s fucked-up face.
She exhales heavily when he topples over to the floor, and once she’s satisfied with her work, she looks at me, gesturing at Jedediah and inclining her head a little. “All yours.” Flicking back her hair, she then walks to where Varsha is holding Selina,with the latter’s hands pinned behind her back, and high-fives Alex when he offers a hand to her, palm up.
“Right.” I clear my throat, then grab a wooden chair from behind the disheveled study table before dragging it over to where Jedediah is.
He pushes himself to rise, and for the first couple of times, he fails. But then he does it; he rises.
I steeple my fingers under my chin. “So, Mr. Jedediah Russell, how does it feel to have your ass handed to you?” I ask.
He sneers at me. His mouth, mind you, is bleeding a river because of Cigs’ jaw-dropping kick. “You think you’re so high and mighty, don’t you?” He spits blood close to my feet. “Where the fuck were you when I was forcing my cock into Sylvia’s defiant little cunt? When I had her pinned against the locker room floor, naked and defenseless?”
I grit my teeth as my body shakes in anger, which makes him laugh.
Selina is full-on sobbing now, and it only irks me further. Aras and Magner look so on edge that I can practicallyfeeltheir rage from where I’m sitting.
I look up at Alex, then snap my fingers at him. “Do it,” I command.
He grins, then moves behind Selina, just as Varsha lets go of her.
I make sure to meet Jed’s eyes, then smirk when he stares at me. “Watch,” I tell him softly.
His breathing quickens as he whips his head to where his wife is. Varsha pushes her down to her knees, just as Alex pulls out Jayce’s curb chain from his pant pocket, then wraps it around Selina’s neck.
She gasps, trying to yank at it, but Alex wraps the chain around his fingers and tightens his grip.
“No!” Jedediah gets on all fours and starts crawling to her, but I stand and grab his hair, pulling him back. When he falls down on his back, I straddle his waist, and memories from over sixteen years ago come flooding right in.
My mom on her back. Me on top of her, with a nail file in my hand.
Her soulless eyes. The fear in them.
The sirens. The police station.
Jayce…
I blink myself out of it, then swallow and look down at Jedediah. “Pinned her to the floor, did you?” I grit out, before grabbing his wrists and pressing them against the carpet on either side of his face. When he tries to jerk out of my hold, I shift and push my left knee down on his crotch, making him scream. “You sounded so proud of yourself there, Jed.” I push in further, and he in turn screams louder. “Wanna show me how you did what you did?” I all but slam my knee into his groin, and he’s so worn out because of the pain that he can barely make a sound now.
“What you did to Sylvia was a cruel violation – of her mind, and of her body,” I say, punching him in the eye. He just grunts and takes it, so I punch him again. “You could have used your power and influence to do something good, but you wanted to prove your worth by being amonster, didn’t you?” I grab his chin and tilt his head to where Alex is choking Selina. From what I can tell, she’s barely holding on, and that’s only because Alex has loosened his grip on the chain.
“Look at what your heinousness has caused,” I tell him. “Look at howshe’spaying the price for whatyoudid.” I slap him, then turn his face to me before raining down a series of rear and lead hooks on it.
He mumbles something I can’t understand, so I stop my assault and grip the back of his neck, forcing him to meet my stare.
