Sasha would love this.
She’d probably laugh, call him an idiot because she could do it better, get louder screams like artists gauging the success of their performance by the applause as Helene attempts to twist her head. The shit streaking her cheeks dirties my gloves. I drop her face, leaving her to Daigon’s taunts as my breathing turns shaky. I’m hit with the remindershecreated the fucking world that made me lose my boy.
“Paint her fucking face,” I snap as I pull open the drawers, the cutlery clattering from my harsh movements. The burner on the stove hisses as I turn it to full power and hold it down with my thumb, stretching my little finger to hit the ignition. But I can’t reach as a smaller, clean hand stretches around me, igniting the fire around the cast iron ring.
“What’s wrong?” Delilah asks softly, pushing her cheek to my bicep as she wraps one arm around me.
I can’t say it.
Even now, I can’t fucking say it without my chest feeling like it’s going to cave in under the weight of the grief. Her eyes are so open, but I can’t say the words.I killed our son.Four words is all it would take, but they’re four life-changing words. Instead, I press my lips to her forehead. “She fucking stinks.”
A small airy laugh blows out of her, but she doesn’t push me to say more even though she doesn’t believe me. I can see it in her eyes as she watches me bring a deep soup spoon to the flame.
“Where does she keep the arrows?” I whisper as Helene’s screams get louder.
Daigon drops the knife on the floor, folding in half to dig his fingers into the mangled parts of her leg between the dog bites and what he’s already cut. The tendons are too thick to allow him to literally pull chunks out, but he’s doing it for maximum pain rather than ease as he picks the bloody knife back up to make small cuts through the muscle while pulling.
“In Melantha’s house,” Delilah says as she watches the torture. “I killed that bitch for spawning the devil. Now I wish I kept her alive to practice on.”
I’ve already heard her recount the details of how she tried to run away, but she was afraid I wouldn’t be able to find her, so she tried to hide at this cunt’s mother’s house. It may have been in between her bouts of sickness while working through the initial withdrawals but she was fucking glowing while telling meshe set the cunt alight in her sleep. My wife likes fire, something uncontrollable that sparkles just like the stars.
Hooking my left arm around her neck, I bury my nose in the top of her head to fill my senses with everything Delilah. The stench hasn’t fully soaked into her skin so I can still smell myself on her as the handle of the spoon begins to heat up, softening the gloves. She may not have met Kid, but he knew her. He and I made plans on what we’d do, mainly how he’d team up with Delilah when we play charades so they’d be a super team. Instead of him picking random things Jasper had told him, like superheroes always stand in high places with their hands on their hips or birds jump really high rather than flying, he’d choose things he’d seen. I’d watch them both act out things I’d probably guess straight away, but I’d say I couldn’t get it because he always smiled wider when he was winning.
The edges of my vision blur through the tears collecting on my lashes as I walk back to the cunt. None of it is enough to stop me seeing her scream when the hot spoon glides over her cheek as I push it into her bottom lashes. The smell is strange, like a mix of burning hair and a faint metallic scent as the outer portion of her eye bubbles. I don’t do it quickly to scoop it out in one go. That would be too generous. I make sure my hand is steady, slowly increasing the pressure to the point I can see her bottom eyelid stick to the spoon. It slowly peels her skin away as I continue pushing deeper into her socket. The hooks and drugs keep her still enough. A shame, when it would cause her more pain.
Daigon continues digging his fingers into the wound on her leg so her senses are overloaded with the pain before I manage to seat her eyeball on the dip of the spoon. I don’t have anything sharp to sever the nerves keeping her eyeball in place, so I push the spoon up as I tap Daigon’s foot with mine for him to moveout of my way. He huffs, but he doesn’t stop me as he walks over to the table to collect a new knife.
“You…” I slowly turn the spoon to the right. “Will…” The left. “Never.” And back again, higher this time so I can see the way her eye protrudes out of the socket as she screams. “Look. At. Anyone. Again.”
It takes some maneuvering. but I manage to get enough leverage behind her eyeball to force it out. The nerve hasn’t been fully severed so it limply hangs against her shit-stricken cheek as I step back, kissing the top of my wife’s head.
Daigon makes me miss Sasha even more as he delicately cups Helene’s eyeball while she whimpers, then carelessly slices through the nerve so it rolls onto his palm. Holding it up with his thumb and finger, he turns it to face her before covering the one eye left in her head with his hand. “Can you see?”
She mumbles something, exhausted by the pain when she’s done worse to so many people who have survived in spite of the abuse.
“Okay, how many fingers am I holding up?” he asks, pushing the knife into her empty socket. She screams instantly while he explores the cavernous, bleeding hole in her head. “Trick question, it’s a knife.”
“She’s not worth wasting our time,” Delilah says.
Daigon steps back, dropping her eyeball on the floor before we lock her inside. Something squelches under my foot, causing me to slip. I look down at her nasty fucking eyeball as I catch myself on the coffin. The box jolts but it doesn’t fall while I try to clean my shoe on the sharp corner.
I gently move Delilah back before I open the small viewing window to ensure the bitch hears me clearly. Her muffled shouts are undermined by the smell of shit seeping through the small gap.
With strength in my voice, I declare, “My mother is Dora Xandros. My father is Damian Xandros. My mother was an orphan. She had one sibling, Lennox. And my name is Kane Xandros.” Delilah hugs my arm, pressing her lips to the side of my chest as Daigon carries the accelerants he found. “The Kobalt name dies here with you. The empire has crumbled, God is dead, and no one will ever worship you in fear of their lives again.”
I take a bottle of turpentine, holding it up for my girl to unscrew the safety cap, then pour it through the window until it pools through the cracks at the bottom. There’s no way to notify anyone of the island’s existence without incriminating myself, but a fire should do the trick. Then Rowan will be lost, hunted—fucking haunted by everyone without a safe place to hide. None of his auctions will get close to mine now I know his enemies, his secrets, and we have the locations of his Dollhouses. Between Vlad, Decker, and their mystery helper, they should be able to afford a few million each for the information.
Delilah steps away from me to trail the other accelerants around the house, dousing the floors, the walls, the piano, until she skips back to me with a huge fucking smile on her face. Daigon clicks his fingers, waking the dogs as he opens the basement door with a large bottle of turpentine in his hand. “Let’s go, boys.”
I don’t know how he’s managed to subdue them, but they obediently walk in a single file line down the steps. He holds the door open for us to walk ahead but I keep Delilah behind me as the dogs sit at the bottom of the stairs.
“Boys,” he says low in his throat. “Walk ahead.”
They slowly walk to the other end of the hallway as he spills a trail of the flammable liquid down the stone steps then walks behind the dogs towards the tunnels.
“Do the honors, pretty girl.” I hand her my lighter. “Fires are your forte.” I rip a corner off the paper carton of my cigarettes,so she doesn’t get close to the dripping liquid as it pools on the third to last step.
She smiles up at me, running her thumb on the roller to ignite the flame. The orange flickers dance across her face as she breathes out, “Let it all burn.” She lights the card to throw it on the steps. “Everything but us.”
