“Check it. Don’t take it, but check the account. Make sure it’s where you put it. Then call me back. Soon.” I pause, waiting for a response. “Can you handle that?”
“I don’t think you understand the shape of my body right now. I need some serious care. Like sexy-nurse-outfit-with-no-panties-type care.”
“Verify the money.” I smile at the tone of his voice.
“Run. Don’t try to be a badass. He’s not Ralph.”
“Which finger was it? The one he nicked?”
“Right index. It’s not nicked. I can see bone. Well, not right now because they—”
“Thanks. Check the money and text me the verdict.” My mouth curves as I drop my voice and use the sexy tone that he loves. “Bye, baby.”
I hang up, slide the phone back in my pocket, and pull on the mask, shoving open the door and stepping inside. The floor feels damp beneath my feet as I move closer to him and I prop up a foot on his body, shove with it until he rolls onto his side, his swollen eyes opening enough for me to see that he has calmed and is pissed. His face strains beneath the duct tape, a muffled curse sounding. I reach down and run my hand along the jeans, finding the bulge and digging into his back pocket, pulling out and producing his wallet. I straighten, glancing down, his red-rimmed eyes leaking as his pupils make the ridiculous path up my body.
“You like what you see…” I flip open the billfold, looking at a driver’s license with a surprisingly stern-looking face, a night-and-day difference from the red-eyed pussy before me. My gaze skips over to his name, my brain skittering briefly. “Marcus Renza.” FingerCutter has a name. A name that tugs on my memory. This is the dickhead from camming. The one with the rape record. The one who was so insistent on meeting. A name that clears everything up in one moment. God. Men and their pussy. I bark out a laugh as I run a thumb over his photo. Wow. First client who’s gone through the steps involved to grace the stoop of my fabulous abode. How neighborly of him. I yank with my foot, rolling him onto his stomach, interrupting his view with one strong motion. “Nice to meet you in person, Marcus. My name, as you now know, is Deanna.” I step back till I am in reach of the counter, my hand sweeping out and gripping my pruners, a Home Depot purchase from today. “And that man… the one you tortured to find me?” I move back, stepping over his body and bending over, grabbing the zip-tie chain and lifting it up, pulling his hands to an awkward vertical angle. “He’s mine. You, Marcus Renza, don’t fuck with what’s mine.” I yank at his wrist, enjoying the tightening of his face. “Now, I’m just gonna need one of your fingers, if you don’t mind.” I skip my fingers lightly over his, till I find and hold his right index finger firmly. “And I’m new at this. So I’m sorry if it takes me a few tries.”
Screams. I have fantasized about them for so long. It is a shame that, the first time I’ve really had a chance to savor them, they are muffled by duct tape.
An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. An index finger for an index finger.
CHAPTER 93
“FUCK!”
Jamie almost drops the glass at Mike’s yell. Turning off the water, she puts the glass gently into the suds, and hurries to his bedroom, pushing open the door and sneaking a glance inside. His cell is on the bed, his arms pushing at the blanket, any trace of sleepiness gone. “What’s wrong?”
“I need my computer.”
“Lay down. Will the laptop work?” She hurries to his desk, unplugs the laptop.
“Yeah. Bring it here. God, that girl’s stubborn.”
“What’s wrong?”
“She’s up to something. I want to know what.”
“What do you need the laptop for?” She perches on the edge of his bed. Watches as he tries to type, the cocoon that dominates his right hand making the task infinitely more difficult.
“Checking her feeds. See this?” He spins the computer around, showing her a ridiculously gorgeous woman, her body spread out on a pink sheet, her face grinning as she blows a kiss into the camera.
Jamie shifts uncomfortably. “Yeah.”
“That’s Dee. This is showing as a live feed, on her website’s cam. But it’s not live. I can rewind the feed, and it doesn’t show an interruption for the phone call we just had. She’s looping an older feed. A normal person wouldn’t have any way of knowing.” His face winces, and he moves his right hand into his lap, pecks at the laptop keyboard one-handed.
“That’s Deanna? The chick who verbally bent me over and raped my ass?” She can’t put them together. Not this bright-eyed chick with the Justin Bieber poster taped to the wall above her bed. The one with a body she would chew off her right arm for.
He snorts, his mouth curving into a smile. “She’s an acquired taste. But don’t judge her too harshly. At the time of that conversation, she was under the impression that I had stolen from her.”
Now it was her turn to snort. “You’ve been stabbed. Are missing half a finger. Plus, you’ve got the money to cover it. She had to have known you’d pay her back.”
He shoots her a look that indicates the intelligence level of the statement. “Not quite. Few people can cover a million-dollar debt.”
Her legs move on their own accord, pushing her to her feet and she gawks, physically gawks at the man before her. “You took a million dollars… she has a million dollars?” She points a shaky finger at the laptop, newfound respect and appreciation for the maybe-not-such-a-bitch.
He doesn’t respond, his brow furrowing as his one hand moves. She moves around, climbs upon the bed next to him, watching as he types, the screen opening and closing browser windows.
“What… What are you doing?”
“The webcam feed is fake, so I’m tapping into her cameras. Activating them privately to take a look into her apartment, see if she is there. Or if he is there. A normal girl would have taken my advice and got the hell outta Dodge, but she…” He presses a complicated sequence of keys, something that changes the screen and opens a window showing the same angle as before, the pink bed and Justin Bieber poster, but no girl, only empty sheets. He types, and the camera changes. The bare floor, the image grainier than normal, almost as if there is some smoke in the room. Fingers fly over keys. Empty wall. More strokes. The bed. Then another. Then another angle. More strokes.
Jamie gasps, and they both lean forward at the same time, watching the screen as a body lies on the floor, jerking, his head tilted back, his face contorting in a duct-taped scream of agony, a body straddling him, the head in a gas mask, her hands moving in some action that is causing the man inordinate amounts of pain. Jamie swallows, pulling her eyes from the screen and finishes the sentence for him. “Isn’t normal.”
“Yeah.” His voice sounds tired. Defeated. “She isn’t normal.” He pushes the laptop away from her, blocking her view at the moment that Deanna severs an appendage, shutting the screen on the image, his stomach rolling with sudden nausea, and she leans against his chest, his arm moving to grant her access, her body curving into his as she buries her face into his warmth. Then, with the image of the man’s face contorted in pain, branded in her mind, she starts to cry.
CHAPTER 94
IT TURNS OUT my hand strength is that of a small child’s. I’d like to say I took his entire finger off—got the whole digit, something with some substance to hold on to. But I don’t. Can’t. With his squirming and howling, and my puny muscles, I have to move the pruners down. To his knuckle, where I don’t have to snip through a bone. Where I just have to cut through the cartilage of a joint. That is easier. I am still covered in blood when I finish.
Accomplishment. I feel like I have run a marathon, my chest heaving, my blood on fire, the still-dripping-blood appendage triumphantly grasped in my hand. He shouldn’t have fucked with Mike. Not my hacker, the man who protects my lifestyle and shares the information highway so freely with me. I have no family. I have no friends. Don’t fuck with the only acquaintance on my payroll. I set the finger on the counter, ripping off a dedicated paper towel for it to
lie on. Then I rinse the cutters under running water, watching the diluted red water run down my white sink before turning the tap closed and setting them down into the sink. I wipe off my hands and turn back to the man.
Marcus Renza. I search my brain. The username had been Freebird-something. It’s been a while since I blocked him. A month or so. And we’d had… three chats? Four? He’d wanted to hire me for an in-person session, if I recall correctly. I look at the man before me, a slow, pained wheeze coming from his chest, his back arching off the floor as he squirms. I grin. Guess he got what he wanted. My undivided attention, my hands on his skin.
I crouch, examine him closer, my bare feet moving soundlessly as I stare. I can’t believe he came here, hurt Mike, all over being blocked, an act I do to a hundred men a week. It seems so excessive of a reaction. I look at his squirming figure, moans rolling across the space at me, and wonder what took four weeks. Why he hasn’t showed up sooner. What he found out about me in that length of time. What his plans for me had involved. I have the bizarre desire to interview him, examine the mind of an evil individual, and compare it to my own. I’m certain that evil was his intent. Otherwise, why condoms? Why zip ties? Why the syringe? He failed to get at me online. Probably felt disrespected by my block. Showed up to fix the situation. Reassert his manhood. But is it really that simple?
I lift my mask, testing the air. Better. Still rancid enough to make me cry like a baby girl, but nothing I can’t handle. I pull the mask back down anyway. Tears aren’t very intimidating. I stand and step closer.
To kill or not to kill? It’d be so easy. I could open up my safe and test every blade I have on his skin. Listen to his screams. Watch the slow slip of death as it claims his soul.
I need a minute. To think. To be intelligent.
I turn away from my prize and sit, in my desk chair. Roll back and forth, toward the man. Away. Toward the man. Away. He is still. Quiet. The sniffles stopped. The whimpers gone. This is the moment. The moment when the whispers of my insanity are quiet, my hands still, no shudder or shake in their movements. I am in control. So… now what do I do?
CHAPTER 95
“WHAT IS SHE doing?”
Jamie and Mike stare, as one, at the screen, this one from a different cam, one that shows the girl seated, staring at the man as she slowly rotates the desk chair—left, then right, chewing on her lip, a blank look on her face. “I don’t know…” Mike responds. “Looks like she’s thinking.”
“About what?”
He shoots her a perplexed look. “Do you have to ask?”
“Jesus. Should we call the cops?”
“I’m not going to even dignify that with a response.”
“We just saw her chop the guy’s finger off!”
“Cut. She cut his finger off.”
“And you think that’s the guy who fucked you up?”
He nods, absentmindedly cradling his injured hand. “It’s him.”
“What do you want her to do?”
He doesn’t respond. Just pulls the laptop closer and begins typing. Jamie watches as screens change, the process slower than she’s seen in the past, due to his injury. Their view into the apartment minimized, different sites popping up in its place. “Text her,” he says.
She picks up his phone, pulls up his texts, her cheeks coloring slightly as she scrolls down, their prior text streams primarily focused on one thing. “What do you want me to say?”
“Tell her I can get back the money.”
She types, her thumbs flying over the metal nubs. “Can you?”
“I don’t know. It’s not an easy process to find out. It would normally take me twenty minutes or so. With my hand…” He shrugs, his eyes on the screen. “It’ll probably take an hour or two. But I don’t want to stand here and watch her scrape off his skin. The news might cause her to step down.” He glances up, his blue eyes meeting hers. “Did you send the text?”
She finishes typing. “Yeah.”
“Then you should probably go. I’m good here. Thanks for breaking my window.” His mouth releases a grin, one that tugs at her.
“Leave now? With your psycho girlfriend about to do who knows what?” She hoists herself onto the bed, leaning her body against him and earning an irritated look for her efforts.
“Go. No need for you to become an accomplice.” He shuts the laptop. Fixes her with a look that is heart-tuggingly sexy in its firmness. Sexy and obtuse. A look you don’t argue with.
She stands, a twinge of jealousy moving through her. Realizing, as she stares into his eyes, that he, by kicking her out, by closing the laptop, is protecting Deanna more than her.
She shrugs, tries to mask her hurt with a smile. “Need me to do anything before I go?”
He watches her eyes, silent for a moment before leaning forward, reaching out with his good hand and pulling on her hand, pulling her over to him and resting his head on her chest. “I’ll be fine.” He sighs, keeping her close. “I’m just so… stressed.”
She knocks him on the top of his head, the motion causing a wince to come from him.
“What? I am!”
“I am not sucking your dick right now.”
He scowls in a way that is ridiculously endearing. “I wasn’t even thinking of that.”
She grins, leans down, presses a kiss on his head, feels his arm wrap around her. “Yeah you were.”
“Maybe I was. Can’t blame a guy for trying.” He pulls away, looks up. “Thanks, babe. Seriously.”
Her smile fades, and she perches on the edge of the bed. “This is fucked up, you know that, right? You almost died. I almost lost you.” Her voice trembles, his hand reaching out and squeezing her hand.
“I know. I’m sorry you had to deal with it.”
She laughs, the reaction a half sob in its composition. “Don’t apologize, Mike! Just don’t…” She sniffs, picking at the edge of her sleeve and wiping at mascara. “Don’t get involved in her shit. She’s psychotic. You see that, right? And she almost killed you! So… please stay away from this. Or call the cops and let them handle it.”
He nods. Meets her eyes in a way that tells her nothing. “You’re the best, you know that?”
She smiles. “Yeah. I know.” She waits, her eyes catching the pulse of his fingers against the covers. “Well.” She says finally, “I’ll call you in the morning and check in. I can come by, change your bandages.”
He nods again and she can see the impatience in his eyes, mixed with gratitude but present all the same. And she hates that it makes her mad. That she feels left out of a fucked-up illegal situation that she shouldn’t want to be included in. Hates that he is friends with the dark presence that put him in such danger. Hates that the dark bitch is so freaking gorgeous.
CHAPTER 96
I CONTINUE TO sit and stare. Think. I’ve worked myself into a bit of a corner. This man came to rape me, do whoknowswhatelse with fourteen condoms. Kill me? I’m thinking yes. He’d had enough darkness in his soul that he tortured Mike and drove fifteen hundred miles to my door. I have, no doubt, fueled that anger. Now that his hysteria, the brain fuck that the gas took his head through, has passed, he is furious. I have watched his swollen eyes. Watched as they gained some ability back, enough to look at me with a look that clearly communicates hate. Taking off his finger was the big fucking pile of straw that broke that already-puny camel’s back. So now I have an asshole in my apartment with every intent to kill me should he regain the ability. That’s grounds for murder, right? My conscience rolls over uneasily. It’s debatable. I can’t exactly call the cops. And I can’t exactly let him go. Cut his zip ties and unhandcuff him, wave a cheery good-bye as he walks off, one finger lighter. And I’m keeping the damn finger. I’ll send it to Mike as a response to his next invoice. I smile, excited at the prospect. It’s witty, I’ll give myself that.
I glance at my watch. Eleven thirty-five p.m. My phone dings and I glance down, read a text, short and sweet, from Mike. “I can get back the $.”
Good. One thing off my plate. I text back. “Do it.” Then I set my phone down, pull off the mask—fuck the fumes—and step over to my visitor.
I should walk away. I should step into the hall, take the stairs down, enter the night sky and let FtypeBaby take me anywhere but here, in my apartment, at the motherfucking witching hour, with a knife in my hand and a body before me.
This is bad. All the elements of an impossible temptation. I feel the moment my soul loses the decision, my madness starting to flow with greedy inhibition. The dam breaking, power surging through my body, excitement in my veins, my limbs unrestrained, my mind at full iwillkillthismotherfucker strength: All are very, very bad. Not for me, not for my sick heart, which is orgasming at the—I unsheathe my knife—future, but for him. The blood pulses, all sane thought leaving my head in the loud rush of excitement. I fight it, try to curl, try to cover my ears, the action only amplifying the sound. It is useless and the moment that I surrender to it… it is the best moment in the world, a full-body rush of euphoria, one that bursts through me with clear and perfect energy. I am high, able to do anything and everything, but I have only one want on my agenda.
I step forward and lean over, roll his body to its back and straddle him, resting my weight on his stomach, his attempt to buck me off met with a warning look. This is bad. I hear the cry of my soul and ignore it as I finger the knife.
I should walk away.
I have so little control.
I smile.
CHAPTER 97
EVEN THROUGH BLURRED vision, waves of nausea rolling through him, tears pooling in his eyes, and pain—worse than any he has ever encountered, every breath a fresh smack of madness—Marcus wants her. Two years since he’s had cunt. He thinks about her naked, the glow of her skin on camera, that impression only slightly dampened by the clothes covering her skin. Gorgeous, her legs on either side of him, the light weight of her body straddled atop him like she is about to give him the ride of his motherfucking life. But her smile worries him. It beams, as if today might just be the best day ever, as if she has just became the fucking prom queen. It doesn’t mix with the knife in her hand, his knife, the one that she flips with surprising efficiency, as if she was born with it in her grip, as if she has plans in store with it.