He didn’t answer. He opened the door and walked out.
“Sincere!”
The door shut behind him, and I stared at the door, throat burning, hands shaking.
Then I broke down all over again.
SINCERE BELLAMY
It was now early in the morning, so there were only a few people in the laundromat when I stalked in. A woman was loading towels into a washer. A man sat in a plastic chair watching a dryer spin. A teenage boy dumped detergent into a machine while music played from his phone.
Their eyes followed me for a second, then dropped and they went back to minding their business.
I pushed through the door marked Employees Only, then took the stairs down two at a time.
Saint and Reek were already down there waiting on me, just like Saint said in his text.
Kodi was in the middle of the room, tied upright to a St. Andrew’s Cross. His head hung forward. His face was swollen on one side. Dried blood ran from his hairline and down his cheek.
When Saint and Reek pulled him out of that wreck, he was alive but out cold. Saint called the Cartier doctor down here and had him patch Kodi up enough to keep him breathing. The doctor said Kodi had broken bones and likely internal damage.
Saint and Reek waited for Kodi to wake up because I told them I wanted to be here when this happened.
Kodi lifted his head when he heard my steps.
His eyes found me, and fear and wonder showed up on his face.
Saint looked me up and down. “You sure you down for this? I know you said you wanted to, but this your first kill.” His smile got wider but meaner. “I’ll gladly do it if you want me to. I been needing this, been too long since I got to really work a nigga over. I miss it.”
Kodi shifted against the restraints, breathing harder now.
I never took my eyes off him.
“I want to do it,” I told Saint.
His grin stayed. “You sure?”
“That man put a gun on my woman with her babies in the car. He was willing to kill them. He almost burned my family alive.” I stepped closer to Kodi, saying, “I should be the one to retaliate for them, and I want that more than the fear of killing someone for the first time.”
Kodi started snarling as much as he could. “I wasn’t—”
“Shut the fuck up,” I roared. I looked at Saint and Reek impatiently.
Reek reached into his waistband and handed me a gun. I took it, looked at it, then handed it back.
Saint frowned. “What you doin’?”
Reek looked confused too.
“Cut him down,” I told them.
Saint’s brows lifted. “Cut him down?”
I looked at Kodi again. “Yeah, cut him down. I want him to feel this shit.”
Saint and Reek looked at me like they were seeing me in a new light.
Reek stepped behind the cross and pulled out a knife. He cut one restraint at a time. Kodi dropped hard the second the last restraint gave way. His legs folded under him, and he hit thefloor with a grunt. He used his healthy arm to try to push himself back up. He was hurt bad enough that he couldn’t get far. He dragged himself across the concrete, breathing ragged.
