And he did that.
He fucking killed the woman she once was.
And I…would behisdemise.
Time stands still when I rip Manic’s head back, his eyelids now torn apart from blinking away the staples. The piece of flesh on his face, that Manic began carving earlier when Cherry was here, has now been cut away, leaving only stark white bone among a pool of red. I suck on my front teeth, shoving the blade against his throat with determined force, though not slicing yet, just pressing…teasing.
The coward tries to close what he can of the mangled mess of his eyelids, only I have every intention to make sure we do this with them open. The same way Cherry’s would have been when he raped her fucking raw with a bat, branded her with a heated, glowing piece of a metal.Yeah, he would be fully awake for this.
I jerk my chin toward Rusty. “Can you come here?” I ask, brushing the matted pieces of sweaty hair away from my eyes and behind my pulsing ears.
He steps around me, already knowing exactly what I need, taking my place at Manic’s back when I move away. He tilts his head up toward the staple gun laying on a table to our right. “Over there,” he states.
I shove my dripping hand into my back pocket, pulling out my pocketknife and clicking it open. “Nah, I have a better idea.”
I stare at the glinting piece of metal. It’s the perfect size for what I intend to use it for, and I don’t wait a moment longer, wrenching Manic’s jaw back and pressing the blade to the thin line where his eyelids crease in the middle. I cut the mangled flesh away, slowly and with eager precision. You would think I had done this before, the scalloped piece of flesh so perfectly severed, coming away. I throw it down right in front of him andhis wide, panic-stricken eyes flick to it. And then, I make good on the other.
I know Manic would be screaming if he could, however he already lost his tongue. He just jolts around, twisting and turning like he thinks he might actually get to walk away from this alive. Laughable, really, considering Rusty severed his dick, and I cut away each of his fingers, and that was after Keaton heated a piece of metal he had prepared last night, with an ‘R’ for rapist, and burned it right into the exact same spot they had his sister.
Yeah, we all had some fun.
The sclera of Manic’s eyes is deathly white against his rotten flesh. You would think he’d be a cooling corpse by now, only Keaton is an expert at what he does. He is the master of the death clock, and he had every intention of keeping him alive for as long as he could.
The tiny bones in the tips of my fingers tingle and my pulse mellows out. I know I’m ready. It’s fucking time.
I throw the pocketknife down, stepping back up behind him and taking the knife from my father when he holds it out toward me. My vacant eyes lock onto his.
“Are you sure?” I ask, and Rusty pinches my shoulder.
“Deadly,” he rasps, then he nods once and steps back.
Goosebumps strike the surface of my skin. He needed this too, but he was giving it to me. A father willing to pass the kill to his son, a father who wanted to see his son finally get the revenge he had dreamt about for years. A father who knew exactly what his son needed.
Placing the blade back to Manic’s throat, I bite my lip when I see her, my mother, images of her strobing through my mind. Her long blonde hair, the yellow floral dress she favored, and the smile that radiated from ear to fucking ear like the sun. She was sunshine in human form, and he took her from me. I blink,squeezing my eyes when one tear rolls down my cheek. Then I see her,my girl, her cherry waves, the plea for peace in her stark blue eyes.
I shiver.
Justice was a dish best served when you could watch the evil that had torn your life apart clutch onto the very last speck of their life, knowing damn well you were the one about to snatch it away from them.
Rot in hell, motherfucker.
My knuckles blanch around the handle, and I slice right across his throat, cutting his jugular in one deep, straight, determined line.
What blood remained gushes out of the cut in a thick crimson waterfall as I step back and throw the knife toward Keaton. He catches it midair with ease, wiping the fresh and coagulated blood from earlier over his already drenched black t-shirt. Gurgling sounds leak from behind me, but I don’t turn around.
A palm meets my shoulder, and I know it’s Rusty’s, so when I spin around, I wrap my arms around him. He fists my shirt, the same way I did his. And we don’t say anything, tears don’t fall, we just hold each other as our hearts find a mellow rhythm against our chests.
It’s over.
Years of pure torture.
And we finally got what we both needed,together.
Today I was a killer.
I fed the grisly shadow that lingered beneath the surface…happily.
But tomorrow, I will be the light-hearted rockstar everyone knows me to be.
