Page 25 of Lawless

This guy, with his classic good looks, was the fucking devil.

His eyes were black and glowing like a demon in a movie and I realized there was no getting out of this. My fate had been sealed. With every step the devil took toward me the fear I felt increased higher and higher until I’d hoped I’d die of a heart attack before this lunatic could carry out whatever sick plans he had for me.

The devil set the wrench down by the toolbox and pulled his shoulder length hair on top of his head with an elastic band. He bent his head from side to side, making a sickening cracking sound. He did the same with his knuckles.

Then he came for me.

While Gus looked at me like he was lusting after my blood the blond devil looked natural. In his element.

Possessed.

He reached up and unhooked one of the cuffs, catching me before I fell to the concrete floor. My arms still raised above my head as they’d become completely useless and disjointed. “Nooooooo!” I tried to scream behind the tape, tears ran out the side of my eyes. He carried me to the tarp and laid me on top of it, binding my ankles together with the tape.

“You can take the tape off. She wants to make sure her screams make the video,” Gus said. “Start with the teeth, they are the most painful.”

“Why are you still here?” the devil asked. I was shaking so hard I could hear my jaw rattling behind the tape.

“Just wanted to watch the fun start.”

“I don’t do audiences,” he said adamantly.

“Come on man, just one tooth, then I’ll leave.”

“Do it yourself then,” the devil said, standing up as he tossed him the wrench. Gus’s face lit up and he practically ran over to me, crouching down by the toolbox he lifted out a metal contraption.

“Just one. And then I gotta go,” Gus said, ripping the tape off my mouth. He pried it apart using pressure points on the roof of my mouth to force me to comply.

It wasn’t the first time he’d done this.

The blond devil stepped back and looked down at us with an annoyed look on his face. He was pissed that Gus was taking his work away from him. “I got shit to do so hurry the fuck up.”

“I’d love to take my time, little one. But this is going to have to do.” He pushed the wrench into my mouth and clasped onto one of my molars. He didn’t just start to yank on it, he started pulling slowly, building the pain, setting each nerve on fire, prolonging the pain as he pulled harder and harder until I felt as if my entire jaw was being ripped from my skull. I screamed so loud my chest hurt. Warm copper flooded my mouth.

Gus sat back, his chest heaving up and down. My bloodied molar between the tongs of his wrench. “That was fucking fantastic.”

“Great. Now get the fuck out or I’m leaving.”

“Fine,” Gus said, standing up and setting the wrench down on the tarp. “Just make sure she screams, she was adamant about that.” The devil nodded and knelt down next to me again, picking through the toolbox. I started to choke as the blood dripped down my throat. He pushed my head to the side so the blood could run out of my mouth, the spreader bar painfully tearing into the flesh inside of my mouth.

How could someone so beautiful be so evil? I thought to myself. And then I remembered something Bear had said.

He looks like sunshine. Blonde hair and blue eyes. The kind of looks you’d see on one of them TV shows all the teenagers like these days. But that kid’s got the devil in him. Only human lives he values are his wife Abby and now his kid. Jake’s the only person in the world who scares the shit out of me. You know, besides you.

It was my only chance. “Jake,” I said. But I was tired, so very tired, and with the spreader in my mouth it sounded like “gggggggech.”

He ignored me and shuffled through his toolbox and that’s when I realized it was over.

I was going to die.

I love you Bear.



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