My interest was piqued as she headed for one of the dregs, her cab rolling through blocks of cheap apartments before finally pulling up at the sidewalk amongst some rancid, mediocre housing blocks.
For a moment, I had a flash of rage that maybe I’d read her journey wrong, and that by some bullshit fuck up I’d been following a random fool to the wrong part of town. But no. It was the same blonde beauty that swung her unsteady legs out of the cab ahead of us, teetering her way towards the block entrance.
I checked out the sign. Gaol Street. What an utter shithole.
“Here,” I told my driver and threw him a handful of notes before bailing out of there. He sure as fuck didn’t hang around for me to answer any questions, just raced away with a screech of tires along with the rumble of Elaine’s ride.
I was lucky she was a clumsy mess as she fished in her clutch for some keys under a flickering orange light. I was close enough to hear her curse as she dropped them to the floor and struggled to feel around on the concrete to find them.
“Well, well, well,” I said. “I never expected to find you here.”
She lurched back to her feet without the keys in her hand, then backed away towards the door.
“What the fuck? It can’t be . . . It can’t be . . .”
I gave her a smirk as I pulled the fake glasses from my face. “Oh yes, darling. It most certainly can be.”
Even in her fear, I saw the rage burning on her cheeks.
“I said it was you. I told Tristan it was you, and he wouldn’t believe me! Told me I was a crazy bitch for thinking you’d lower yourself to check out such a weird little club downtown!” I hated how she smirked right back at me as she paused. “Hmm, I guess we can both say we didn’t expect to find each other in such a loser part of town, then, can’t we?”
I laughed a malicious little laugh at her. “Believe me, Elaine, I don’t enjoy such a loser part of town. It stinks like liquid shit.”
I despised her childishness when she laughed right back at me. “Yeah, well, so do you. You’re a loser who belongs in loser hell, Lucian Morelli. Eat shit and die.”
“Watch your mouth,” I told her with a sneer.
Once again, I couldn’t take my gaze from the beautiful siren’s eyes. Interesting didn’t cut it. Not for a second. Not about her.
I felt my gut churning, my mind trying to untangle the knots of her and fathom just what the fuck the girl was made up of.
She was a whirlpool of chaos, flashing colors melding as one. A mess of them, splashing and clashing, so consumed by their own momentum that I didn’t stand a chance of understanding the taste.
She was a mass of confusion, and rage. Rage and want. Rage and fascination. Rage and shock. Rage and lust. Rage and being so fucking butchered by her own bullshit addictions that she was a cesspit of risk, waiting for anyone around her to step up and take what they wanted from her.
Money. Or blood. Or pussy.
Somehow, it was the thought of people taking her pussy that made me grit my teeth.
My words were quiet and cold. “Your disgusting excuse for a family would destroy you for being such an obvious reprobate. All they’d need to know is that you’re here.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” she hissed. “After all, you’re supposed to be some kind of genius IQ business freak, aren’t you?”
“Amongst other things,” I said, and stepped closer.
She pressed into the wall, flinching as another sweep of fear flashed through her eyes. I reached down and picked up her keys, jangling them in my fingers.
She was quiet as I carried on speaking. Silent as her whirlpool kept on spinning.
“Amongst other things like the fact I’m a sadist who pushes so fucking hard that people never come back from the pain. Amongst the fact that my family owes yours so much torment that none of you would make it through alive. Every scrap of your heritage would be burned to hell with every living breath of ours.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she butted in. “I know, I know. We hate you, you hate us. La la la. Like I give a fuck about anything anymore.”
I took another step closer, and this time she didn’t flinch. Didn’t even drop her stare.
The whirlwind was speeding up inside her, sure as fuck not slowing down.
I could taste her as I closed the distance, my mouth watering at the orchids and plums.
“You’ll give a damn fuck when you’re the very next Constantine I punish,” I told her, but again, the whirlwind inside her kept on spinning.
I could feel it pulsing from her. Fear. Rage. Hate. Confusion.
But more.
I could feel so much more.
She took a breath and slumped her shoulders, casting a glance up at the shitty night sky.
“What makes you think I’d give a damn about anything?” she asked me. “Just get on with it, or get the fuck away from me, will you?”
10 Elaine
I really was done with it. I was done with caring. Done with feeling. Done with living.
Maybe Lucian Morelli would be the monster that liberated me from this crappy existence of mine.
To the outside world I had it all, but my inside world was a pit of pain. A pit of pain I’d been breathing through in agonizing little gasps since I was a little girl trying to be good for Reverend Lynch and his sick associates. Fucked up, and used, and twisted. Hurt by so much of the life I’d held dear.
Yeah, I was done.
Seeing Tristan gazing so adoringly at Blue Hawk that night, and knowing Blue Hawk’s dick was coming to him, had only compounded the
