“When is your guy supposed to get back with us? We need one less thing to worry about.”
“No later than the end of the week. I was hoping he’d call by now, but I’m worried all the talk of Snap in the news and papers has turned him off.”
“Let’s hope not. Send him a nudge, and tell Carl and Brad to head back down to start boxing shit up. We’re just playing the waiting game anyhow.”
Keys rattle against the door, and it sounds like they were dropped on the stoop. He gives me a smirk and jumps up to open it, reverting to his one-track thinking. He’s not going to heed my warning, and we don’t needany more issues arising, especially over something as stupid as Dale thinking with his dick.
Dale’s laid-back demeanor vanishes as soon as he opens the door. His hand grips the edge as he stands in the doorway blocking my view, and his body becomes rigid. Suddenly, he leaps forward and scoops Cady up as she collapses on the porch. I jump to my feet to help him, but he swiftly brings her inside and sets her on the couch as I shut the door.
Cady’s red hair is tangled and damp from her tears, hanging limply over half of her face. Her porcelain skin has turned a sickly, chalky white, making the few light freckles across her cheeks look malignant and out of place. Swollen, thoroughly bloodshot eyes stare blankly into the distance, seeing something that isn’t there. Her hands lie in her lap, fingers interlocked and twisted to the point of breaking.
“Cady?” Dale urges her to say something as he kneels in front of her and takes her hands in his. As if cemented together, her hands don’t budge from the knot they’ve formed. “Red.” His voice rises, slightly panicked, as he tries to get through to her.
“I think she’s in shock.”
I stand next to Dale as he searches her face. He begins checking her body for any signs of trauma. There are none. Not a scrape or a bruise to be found on her arms or legs. When he pushes her hair out of her face with the tips of his fingers, Cady jerks back and a shrill cry escapes her. Dale yanks his hand back, but hesitantly hooks her hair with his fingers and pulls it tothe side. A large bruise marks the side of her face along her temple and ebbs out over her cheekbone.
“Oh, Red,” Dale whispers. “Who did this?”
He takes her hands again and tries to ease them apart, but they won’t budge. Dale sits back on his heels and sighs, not knowing what to do. His hand slides from hers, and when it does a red streak follows. My heart kicks up a notch at the sight and my stomach flips.
“Dale,” I croak. “Your hand.”
He opens his hand; the blood covers the finger that trailed it over hers. Jerking his head back to her hand, he finally notices it too. His head bobs as he glances back and forth before gripping her hands and trying to untangle her fingers.
“Red,” he states, growing frantic. “Open your hands.”
Cady squeezes them tighter as tears cascade down her cheeks. Her head begins to shake, slowly at first, then picks up speed until it might spin around completely. Finally, Dale pries her fingers apart, and her hands open. Cady chokes on a sob as we stare at her in shock. Just as I open my mouth to ask her a question, she turns her head in my direction. Her haunted eyes latch onto mine, and it’s as if she checks out completely.
“You have two weeks,” she begins, the words shaking from her trembling lips as she lifts her hands up to me. “Two weeks to bring a million dollars in cash to the old farmhouse.” Tears roll down her cheeks as she stares at the bloody remnants of the ear in her hands. “Ifyou don’t,” she croaks, “he will show you what he’s truly capable of. Starting with Hazel.”
My knees go weak registering her words. Phil’s message is not lost on me. Listen or Hazel could lose more than an ear. My stomach rolls thinking about what she’s had to endure with him to this point already. Not just her, but Joseph as well. Phil has the one person I’ve allowed myself to open up to and care for, and the other is someone who is like a brother to me.
Karma. What you put into the world comes back threefold. It doesn’t care if you were just a child when you did it. Malice at any age is still malice, understood or not. My mother did what she did, my father did what he did, and I did what I did. A chain of events all set in motion by one thing. Anger. Now it’s coming full circle.
I should have never thought that circumstances in my life would get better. I should have never let the hope that I secretly stashed away to be seen by anyone. Especially Hazel. The moment I set it free, Karma swooped in to make me pay for my transgressions. Only I’m not the one paying for them. The ones I love are. But I’m not going to let that happen. As the hope extinguishes, it leaves behind a spot darker and bleaker than the coldness that already consumes me. This is where I belong. This is always where I belonged. I knew it as a child when I watched my father struggle to get out of the noose he hung himself with. I know it now. Nothing’s changed. I’ve never changed, only suppressed it.
“Start from the beginning.” The hardness in my voice has Dale and Cady shrinking before me.
“Give her time—” Dale starts, but I cut him off.
“Time is something we don’t have any more of.” Dale narrows his eyes at me, but he nods his head in understanding. “Now, start from the beginning. I want every detail.”
PHIL
The gurgling sounds coming from the back of the van added to my high as we left town, but now they are just annoying me. Why won’t he just die? I don’t know why he’s trying to ask for help. He’s not going to get it. I reach over and turn the radio on and bob my head to the beat of the music as I stare out the windshield at the dirt road before us. Cady should have delivered my message by now. I smile as I remember her face when I came back with her parting gift. Her hand shook within mine as I placed it in the palm of her hand and closed her fingers around it.
Bobby looked like he was going to vomit. He’s going to have to grow a thicker skin if he’s going to make it around here. I’ve got to hand it to him, though, Bobby held his ground against Erick and didn’t say a word about me shooting him. Or when I cut through his ear with my pocket knife—which, by the way, does not just slice off as easily as the movies make it seem. After today, I’d say it’s a safe bet that Bobby can be trusted. Maybe in the next few days, I can get him out to the lab and have Dustin explain everything to him.
Everything is almost complete. Joseph is reworking Snap, Cash will be delivering my money soon, and Hazel, well, we’ll see if she can survive. It’s all up to her.
The first version of my Snap that Joseph created was not what I was wanting. It made her vomit all over herself and the floor. I had to clean her up, which wasn’t a bad thing, since I got to smooth my hands down her body again. I sat next to her to keep watch over her, and to witness the effects of the drug. Once the sickness passed, she writhed on the bed in a sensual way, as if hands were softly stroking her skin. Beads of sweat made her skin glisten and shimmer. It was like I was getting a personal show from an experienced temptress. I’ve never been so hard in my life. I wanted to go to her, to take away the agony that was building between her thighs that she rubbed together hypnotically, but I had to know all of the effects from beginning to end. Instead, I unzipped my pants and stroked myself to the slow rhythm of her body.
After a few hours, she calmed and woke up. Silver pools reflected the dim lighting and seemed to glow within her face. I leaned forward and brushed the hair from her cheek with my finger. Her lids closed and she shivered slightly. I couldn’t help myself and trailed my finger down her jaw to her neck where her pulse beat steadily. She lifted her head as if offering me her throat, and I didn’t hesitate. My tongue trailed along the marks I had left behind, tasting the salt on her skin, and she arched against me. Her chest rubbed against mine as she moaned so lightly, I almost didn’t hear it.
Once again, I was battling myself. Not that it was wrong, because she is mine. I can do with her what I wish. Butbecause this was an experiment, and if I let myself indulge at all, I wouldn’t take anything away from it. She whimpered when I pulled away and attempted to reach for me, but she was too weak in her state. Now that I know she will be okay, I will use what is left from that batch to bend Hazel to my will. And I’ll enjoy every fucking second of it.
Bobby clears his throat and glances at me out of the corner of his eye. I realize my palm is covering the bulge in my jeans and moving back and forth over it in the same lazy way I pumped it last night. I prop my arm up on the window and allow my erection to deflate, so I can pay attention to what’s going on here and now. We are almost halfway between Trinity and the lab. This will be the perfect spot to dump that dumb shit in the back and get back to business.
