“You’re making a mistake,” I say, my mouth still pressed against this duvet cover. God, I hope he washed this after she died. “Please, Leader Thorne.”
He wrenches my arms behind my back and the material of my dress gives way as he pulls down the zipper. I open my mouth to call for Taylor, but he uses one hand to smash my face back into the mattress. “Don’t beg, Miss Piccolo, it’s unbecoming of a lady.” He reaches down, fisting the hem of my dress and pulling it up.
Thumps against the door disrupt Thorne’s actions. He jerks me upright and presses a gun against my temple. I’m seized in a chokehold when Taylor kicks the door almost entirely off the hinges. Her hair is tousled, her face bloodied and bruised, left hand clutching her side, but her other hand steadfastly aims a gun at Thorne.
“Who the hell are you?” Thorne’s stupid question coats the back of my ear and neck with his saliva. My dress is falling down my shoulders but his grip on me keeps it up. Small favors as I wait for the hero to do a heroic act. Taylor can definitely hit him from here, I’m sure of it. I watch the barrel of the gun follow us as I struggle against Thorne’s grip. “Lower your weapon or I will shoot her.”
Taylor glances my way and I get the sensation she’s trying to communicate to me. Whatever it is, I miss it as I wrench against this abhorrent man. I’m too close to losing my senses to understand any secret signals. Her piercing gaze tracks him, and the effect is chilling.
“Shoot her. Miss Piccolo was bait. Go ahead, save the Order a bullet.” My mouth feels like someone has smothered my tongue in sand. Or perhaps in an unwashed cotton comforter.
Thorne freezes. “Order? As in Order of Prometheus?” Taylor’s nod of confirmation sends a shiver through Thorne that shakes me due to our closeness. “If you’re Order, you certainly do not want me to murder a civilian.”
“Miss Piccolo is not a civilian. She is a target, like you. Either let her go or kill her. Do not waste my time.”
Leader Thorne pauses. “I don’t believe you.”
“Nobody has ever accused you of being the smartest leader of the five, have they?” Tucking her gun into the back of her pants, she raises her hands. “Fine. ‘Oh, no, don’t kill her, Leader Thorne. Please, I’ll do anything.’”
The fake, monotone begging only serves to anger Thorne further. But his anger is distracting him from the subtle steps she takes, encroaching upon him. He shakes with rage. “I’ll do it. I’ll blow her brains out.”
“Right, sure. Either do it or don’t.” When he returns his aim to her, she’s close enough where the barrel nearly grazes her forehead. The look in her eyes is not unlike an eagle pouncing upon a field mouse: determined, devious. It’s terrifyingly seductive as the corner of her mouth twitches up. “Are you afraid of dying, Leader Thorne?”
She disarms him in a blink. Her hands move over his like magic and suddenly his gun is in her hand, pointed at him. He gapes like a fish. “How—how did you…?”
“Let her go.”
I don’t hesitate. He’s unarmed, so I tuck my leg behind his and fell us both into a side table. For good measure, I slam my fist into Thorne’s crotch. He swears and tries to reach for me but I skitter across the room behind Taylor. She motions to the foot of the bed with the barrel of the gun. “Over here, Leader Thorne.”
He obeys like a chastened schoolboy, crawling on his hands and knees. “O-okay. Don’t shoot. Please, don’t shoot.”
“Get to the van, Miss Piccolo.”
“What? Shoot this asshole.” I’m going to enjoy watching this scumbag get what’s coming to him more than I’ve ever enjoyed any spate of violence in my life.
“Get out,” she commands, voice low and intense, like the growl of an unseen predator from within brush. It’s reminiscentof my father when he flies into his rages, with an eerie difference. Papa’s tantrums are scary but rapid, a drop of oil on a hot pan. Taylor’s rage is cold. Duly frightened, I nod and waddle to the window, opening it slowly to climb out.
I peer back in from the freezing fire escape. Air snakes in the open parts of my dress, but adrenaline and anger keep out the chill. Taylor ejects the magazine of the gun and lets the bullets spill out onto the floor. “I am not going to shoot you, Leader Thorne.”
“Thank you. What do you want? I will give you anything. What does the Order pay you? I’ll triple it! Quadruple it! You want power? Money? Men? Women?”
“I want you to take your tie and put it in your mouth.”
“What?” His voice raises two octaves higher than it was when he had me over the bed. His power has seeped, pooling around him like urine. “Guards!”
“You soundproofed this room. Do not be an idiot. Take your tie and put it in your mouth. You do not want me to tell you again.” Theia may not be Taylor’s biological mother, but she is very much present in this Taylor. Icy. Disquieting. Powerful. Thorne does as he’s told and lifts his tie from his shirt, folding the fabric into his mouth. “Stand up.”
Thorne shakily gets to his feet, blood dripping from his nose over his lips. His entire body convulses in fear. Conversely, every single inch of Taylor is taut and rigid.
“Thank you.”
In one fluid movement, Taylor lifts the gun and whacks Thorne on the temple, making him crash sideways into a forgotten boudoir. With an iron grip she wrenches him by the shirt and punches him straight in the crotch. He howls in pain as he’s tossed on the ground like a rag doll. She twists one of his arms in such a harsh manner I hear the splinter of broken bones from the window. My hand flies to my mouth to prevent me fromscreaming or throwing up, or some embarrassing combination of both. With my attention turned away from the window, I catch the van creeping out of the alleyway. It must be too hot for Mason to keep his cover. Point B it is.
Turning back to the horror within, Taylor breaks Thorne’s other arm, eliciting an agonizing scream from Thorne into his makeshift gag. She gets on her knees and flips him onto his back, straddles his waist, and uses her free hand to shove his tie farther into his mouth, choking him.
She withdraws the gun from her waistband, lifts it up and brings it down on his face. The barrel of the pistol makes a sickening crack, and blood sprays her arms as she whips him in the face over and over again. Thorne moans and Taylor pulls out the tie, blood spurting from his mouth onto her face and chest.
“Please!”
