Moth to a Flame

7. CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER SEVEN

Landon

I pull on Clayton’s short hair while driving a spoon into the corner of his eye and— whoops , it’s out.

This is fun. The type of activities I’ve been avoiding.

The type of activities I’m actively seeking these days, thanks to Regan.

It’s more than pure fun for me, though. I’m doing this for a reason.

I broke into Clayton Sims’s dingy apartment in one of Manhattan’s less-than-appealing neighborhoods for her.

Regan.

She’s the question and the answer for everything I’ve been doing ever since I laid my eyes on her.

I want to be with her.

I can’t be with her. Not now, when I’m on edge. When I’m waiting for my algorithm to do what I designed it to. Go through our subscribers’ private information and their personal records. Track down anyone with a friend or a family member in Brinestone.

While it runs on my laptop at home, I’m here. Visiting the man who I presume jerked off to Regan’s photo then ghosted her.

Punishing him is how I take the edge off.

It’s giving me an excuse to visit her later.

Win-win.

“Hmnmnm.” Blood and what used to be his dinner dribble down his chin.

Bloop. His eyeball lands right next to the place where I kneel. On the tarp I spread out in his living room earlier.

Tonight, unlike yesterday, I came prepared.

Before I left the car, I put on a notorious politician’s mask. I’ll burn it with the long-sleeved T-shirt and jeans I’m wearing in a street barrel in a nearby alley once I’m done. Along with Clayton’s body.

Other than the wool hat and tarp, I packed a change of clothes, proper latex gloves, a sharp knife, lighter fluid, a match.

And a black velvet box.

Regan won’t be getting her gift in a shitty trash bag today.

Everything’s as it should be.

Almost.

Lester Burkes is alive. Whatever torture this motherfucker might’ve endured in prison, it’s not enough. Nothing they’d have done to him is enough.

Nothing will ever be enough.

For raping her.

For the scars on her stomach.

For whatever else he did to her.

There was more, I know there was.

The thought blinds me with rage over and over again. Especially since she won’t tell me everything. I can’t help—can’t take the heavy weight off her shoulders—if she doesn’t let me in.

I could’ve researched her case. I haven’t.

The news painted a distorted picture of my family fourteen years ago. They hunted me down for months. Fucking leeches.

I won’t hear about the tragedy that Regan went through from them .

She’ll tell me everything.

Just a matter of time.

“Hmnmnmnm.” More murmuring.

Blood erupts like a mini volcano out of Clayton’s chest where I buried my knife. The first strike shocked him. From there, it was child’s play, shutting him up with my gloved hand while I arranged the set for our playdate.

With one hand, yes. I’m nothing if not an overachiever.

“What was that, Casper?” Calling him by the iconic ghost’s name is hilarious, given what he’d done to Regan.

Hilarious to me. Less so for Clayton.

His one remaining eye, the green one, stares back at me. He blinks, and I can tell moving his lips is a challenge. He’s afraid, the miserable fuck.

I put my knife away where he can’t see it. Maybe if he thinks he’s spared, he won’t be so choked up.

Avenging Regan shouldn’t feel this good.

What feels even better is Regan’s arousal on my tongue. I sucked on my fingers on the way home. Hours later, I can still taste her.

She’s my everything.

Have I already crossed the line to insanity? Traipsed over the edge?

Maybe.

Except I won’t kill Regan.

I’ll kill for her.

That being obsessed and then some isn’t all that bad.

You’d do that? For me?

Anything for you.

Like fucking up Clayton.

He’s about to beg and I’m about to enjoy this.

“Please.” He drags in one of his last breaths. “Please.”

My eyes lift to scan his shitty apartment. The old wood boards are chipped. The plaster on the walls is crumbling. Blue, green, and brown mold is scattered along the ceiling and one corner of his living room.

“It smells like spoiled milk in here.” When I look back at him, his skin has turned ashen.

I’m not an expert on murdering people. I’ve only killed one man before, but it seems to me that I’m running out of time.

Don’t want him missing out on me scooping out his second eyeball.

“Come to think of it, I’m actually doing you a favor.” He heaves when I raise my knife again. I think it’s an attempt to scream. “The mold would’ve killed you slowly. Instead, here I am, merciful as all fuck.”

“Chchhhhhht.” Blood splutters. He’s foaming at the mouth.

“You’re absolutely right.” The blade slides beneath the corner of his eye, slicing through the optic nerves. I drop the knife, bending to pick up my spoon. “A merciful man wouldn’t make you go through this. Although…”

Bloop. The other eyeball lands next to its sibling.

Bringing my lips to Clayton’s ear, I ignore the stench of his blood and his vomit.

“I could’ve prolonged it.”

He’s short and lanky. It’s no trouble at all to bring him to his hands and knees while I’m still holding on to his hair.

“Lucky for you, I was only after the eyes. Goodbye.”

Dash, dash, dash. Blood splashes on the tarp as I bash his forehead in. His suffering will go unnoticed. No one will hear him losing his life so violently, seeing he lives on the first floor.

Before I clean up this mess, I trade my filthy gloves for a clean pair.

Being vindicated feels good. That, too, isn’t so bad, either.

Nothing in me screams Decapitate Regan, or she’ll end up running from you.

I’m normal. Justified. Fulfilled.

Almost.

A knock on the door has my head whipping back.

A neighbor?

Nah.

I’ve been cautious. The most noise I’ve made was bashing Clayton’s head into the floor.

Maybe someone heard that and called the cops?

If that’s the case, I’m not answering. They’ll leave on their own.

I shrug, recovering the velvet box from the duffel bag. One green eye, one blue, and I snap it closed. Though I hope Regan won’t remember what that prick looked like, she probably will. You can forget a lot of things. It’s not every day that you see one person with two different eye colors.

Three more raps come from the door. “Landon, I know you’re in there.”

At that, my hackles rise. I’d recognize that voice anywhere. “Vince?”

“Yes, Vince,” he groans. “Open up, L. I’m not having this conversation through the door.”

My CFO and best friend since kindergarten shouldn’t be here. I turned off the location on my phone. All I said to my secretary was to clear my schedule.

I even stopped stalking Regan through our app.

“Are you coming, or what?”

Well, nothing to do about that now.

“Yes, dear.” I throw my velvet box into the duffel, lose my gloves, and head to the door.

Before I open, I glance at the round mirror by the door and…perfect. Not a smudge of blood on my face. I styled my hair in a half-up half-down do, so no vomit or blood got on me.

With a large, not entirely fake smile on my face, I open the door, slide through the small crack, and go out into the hallway.

It takes some maneuvering since Vince blocks my exit. I make do, given he’s five inches shorter than me, and while he’s muscular, I’m bigger than him.

For obvious reasons, he can’t come inside.

“How did you know I would be here?”

“Hello to you too.” He runs a hand through his short blond hair. Fixes his glasses up his nose. Scowls. “You don’t live here.”

“Such a stark observation.” Deflecting isn’t my thing. I don’t have much of a choice. I won’t admit to why I’m here, in a crappy apartment in the middle of the night. “Or are we playing a game? Guess it’s my turn, then. You’re wearing a jacket over a white shirt and have dark blue pants on.”

“For fuck’s sake, Landon.” His blue eyes narrow. “Beverly came into my office this morning. To talk.”

“That’s usually what coworkers do.” Except I didn’t talk to anyone in the office today. Oops.

“Yes. Coworkers and friends .” He emphasizes the last word. “At first, I thought she was overreacting when she said you were jeopardizing the future of Moth to a Flame and yours.”

“That does sound a little dramatic. Another stark observation, good job, Vince.”

“Stop. Stop.” Another shove of his glasses. “You’re not getting out of this.”

I flutter my eyelashes. “Of what, exactly?”

“Not going to work.” He huffs, and his gaze flickers to the spot my shoulder.

That does it. I drop my act. Move to block his view, even though the door is closed.

What I have back there is my business, not his.

My arms cross over my chest. “How did you track me down here?”

“I thought she was overreacting,” he repeats, his voice lower. “Until she called me into her office a few hours later and showed me your little worm.”

Makes sense that he’d call it that. This thing I infected our systems with.

And it doesn’t just collect information from our existing database.

My search reaches everywhere online. To our users’ social security number, his workplace. My worm goes as far as finding out what his family members have been up to.

Because this is the endgame, isn’t it?

Locate someone who has connections in Brinestone.

I tilt my head at my friend.

“What the fuck.” This is a hiss. He inches closer, angling his head up although he feels just as tall as I am. Just as furious as I was before I let off some steam tonight. “What the hell were you thinking? We have the authorities breathing down our necks. They don’t just let anyone into the stock market, and you know it. If what you’re doing comes out, we’re done. Finished. The stock market will be the least of our problems. We could all face hard prison time.”

This isn’t the worst that could happen. Actually, I’d pay for a short stint in Brinestone if it means I’ll get thirty minutes with a certain Lester Burkes.

A smirk spreads on my lips at the thought. My heart pounds louder. Can’t help it.

“Are you listening to me? This”—he waves a hand to the door behind me—“whatever it is you’re doing here, all our hard work would go to waste.”

Annoyance is a snake slithering inside my veins. None of it is aimed at Vince.

Moth to a Flame is mine.

Mine. Mine. Mine.

I’m almost as mad about some strangers poking through my company as I am about the men who looked at my Regan.

I’m tempted to call the whole thing off. Vince’s angry stare tells me this isn’t the time to do it.

So I keep being an asshole. “It’s you who’s not listening to me . How did you know I’d be here?”

A shake of his head. “You didn’t even bother covering your tracks. You were on this girl, Regan’s…”

I growl, the sound reverberating in my chest. No one’s allowed to say her name like this. Like she’s just a face in the crowd.

“…profile,” he goes on, undeterred. Fixes his glasses on his nose in an impatient gesture. “Then on the profiles of the two other matches she had. Two. Only two. She’s beautiful. We have dozens of subscribers who are the perfect match to her kink.”

This time, I back him up to the wall. Push at his chest. No one talks about my Regan’s kinks but me. No one.

“I went to her apartment. And Marshall’s. Your car wasn’t there. I went into every parking garage around their blocks before I came here.” His shoulders sag. “What is this? You’re into her?”

I growl.

“Since when are you into anyone? You’ve been anti-relationships ever since…” He shoves my hands off him. I take a step back. “Your parents.”

Technically, ever since my sister. But I’m not in the mood to reminisce.

I’m interested in getting rid of a body without getting caught. In delivering my woman her gift.

“She’s intriguing.” The understatement of the millennia. I take another step back, glancing over my shoulder for any nosy neighbor. Don’t hear footsteps, nothing. Good. “And the worm? Don’t worry. Once I find what I’m looking for, I’ll kill it.”

And him.

“So considerate. Wow. I truly appreciate that.” He doesn’t sound appreciative at all. Can’t blame him. “It won’t be needed, though. Beverly took it down. You can thank her later for it.”

“She what?” This isn’t the moment to lose it. This isn’t the place to start the first-ever fistfight with him. “You know what, never mind. Go home.”

“I instructed Bev to remove the wall you put up around Regan’s profile too.”

A thousand knives slash through my sanity, tearing at it, demolishing it.

Men. Men will respond to Regan’s innocent, beautiful face. They’ll drown her with messages, begging to be the one to take her for a wild ride.

To help her cope with her rape trauma.

That’s my job.

“The fuck you did.”

He shoves my chest, indignant, as if he has a right to. I shove him back to the wall. He doesn’t even blink.

“I’m doing it for you,” he hisses.

Like hell he is.

In my head, I see her inbox blowing up.

I have my phone in my hand, fingers flying over the screen.

“I hope you’re not going to her profile.”

I’m most definitely in her profile. “I’m not.”

“Landon.”

She hasn’t unsubscribed from the website. She hasn’t been online either.

Ever since the evening Marshall talked to her, Regan hasn’t logged in to Moth to a Flame.

Mine.

Dozens of messages are already flooding her inbox, just like I expected. Emails were sent to notify her about her possible matches.

And she’s not online. Not interacting with any of them.

“You got what you wanted. Great. Time to leave.” I level a gaze with him. “I have business to take care of.”

He hesitates. “Fine. We’ll discuss this in the morning.”

I pocket my phone. “We’ll discuss what a compassionate CEO I am for not firing either you or Beverly on the spot.”

“You love us too much to let either of us go.” With one final push to the bridge of his glasses, he retreats.

“I don’t love you.”

“Sure thing, man. We don’t love you, either.”

Without waiting for my response, Vince disappears into the night, leaving me alone here.

I’m mad. I’m elated. I’m confused down to my core.

I can’t handle these feelings.

But I can act.

Rolling Clayton in the tarp soothes the pounding in my temples. Dousing him in gasoline and setting fire to his body and my clothes in the barrel in the dead of night does wonders to my head.

Once I’m back behind the wheel, I’m still not what you’d call okay . I’m more levelheaded. Ready to tackle my new problem. The men who keep messaging Regan.

I scroll down to the first message. To the first motherfucker to hit on her.

The next person I’ll kill.

TripOnThis: Can’t wait to fuck your ass, babe. You’ll scream for help, and no one will hear you. They won’t, because I’ll drown your mouth in bleach. That’s my rape fantasy, and you’re going to give it to me. You’ll let me damage you beyond repair.

Alarm bells go off in my head, telling me that if I’m not careful, in three, two, one, I’m going to drive up to Tripp Cantrell’s home and murder him. No slow death for this person who lives on the Upper West Side.

He’ll have bleach drenching all his holes.

Kinks are supposed to be practiced safely. That’s one of the clauses from our terms and conditions section. The first clause.

Yet here he is, without so much as a hello, fantasizing about hurting her. Actually hurting her.

I make a mental note to talk to Beverly—who I’m not going to fire—about this. Apparently, we have to go add bleach to the shit that’ll get you banned from Moth to a Flame.

We have to protect our subscribers.

I have to protect her.

Deep breath. A million of those.

Okay. I’m under control of my newly found homicidal cravings. I can think straight.

Tripp is a menace. The forty-year-old with eyes the same light brown color as his hair might hide his cruelty from the world.

Expensive haircut, a megawatt smile.

None of that fools me.

He’s violent. Someone else in his family might be just as violent if not more.

Meaning Tripp could have someone related to him in Brinestone.

“Thank you, Vincent,” I tell my friend, even though he’s long gone.

My gratitude multiplies a couple of minutes later after I send my worm to search go through his personal information.

“Hello there, Bobby Cantrell. Tripp’s brother.” His info is like a neon sign on my screen. My way to get into Lester’s prison. “Thirty-five, as ugly as your older brother. Serving ten years in Brinestone for rape.”

Finally.

Someone to go and fuck Regan’s rapist up for me.