Chapter 16 Julian
Amara’s blade is still in the air, trembling not with fear, but anticipation. Blood streaks the white of her dress, a stain that will never come out. She doesn’t flinch at the spray—if anything, she seems to breathe it in, growing steadier as her father’s blood seeps out.
I’m not the only one watching. Dahlia circles her post with a violence that’s almost ballet, her bare arms splattered and slick, face lit up in ecstasy as she drives a knife under the ribs of Mr. Steele.
He sags against his post, piss pooling at his ankles, the sack over his head mottled with blood and spittle.
Bam stands with his hands full of fingers, each one cut off at the first knuckle, a small bouquet of human flesh. The Board member he’s working on is unrecognizable, face swollen and leaking, each new snap greeted with a sound like a kicked dog.
But it’s Amara who draws the eye. Always Amara. She’s the slowest, the most deliberate, her movements measured as if she’s gaining courage the longer she watches her father.
She steps closer to Dean Marcus. The cut she left on his cheek is thin and elegant, a single line of red that mars the perfect canvas of his face. He makes a sound, muffled by the gag and the tape, but Amara silences him with a touch to his lips—gentle, almost loving.
“Listen,” she coos.
He does. We all do.
She presses the blade to the underside of his chin, tilting his head back.
She speaks, and each sentence lands with the certainty of a verdict:
“This is for the years you locked me in that house.”
A new line appears, just below his ear. The blood runs down his throat, beads on the collar of his shirt.
“This is for the girls you fed to this place, year after year, knowing exactly what would happen to them.”
She slices the length of his jaw, slow and shallow, the skin opening like a seam in fabric.
“This is for the examination,” she says, and her voice cracks for the first time, only to harden a moment later. “For letting them treat me like that, for standing in the hall while they scraped me out like a spaghetti squash.”
The knife glides down, opening a slit in his arm from wrist to elbow. He thrashes, but the ties hold.
“And this is for planning to trade me to a stranger after Julian had done your dirty work. Like I was a stock option. Like I was a goddamn chicken.”
The next cut is savage, across the front of his thigh, deep enough that the blood soaks his pants. He screams, a choked animal sound, then goes limp.
For a second, I worry she’ll cave. Instead, she straightens, wipes the blade on the hem of her dress and steps back.
The clearing is quiet, except for the shuddering breaths of the men tied to the posts who haven’t died yet. Even Bam falls silent, watching her with something like reverence.
I am hard, so hard it aches, and there’s not a trace of shame in it.
Amara stands, head thrown back, blood running down her arms and legs, the white dress now pink and clinging. She’s shaking, but it’s not weakness—it’s the aftershock of violence, the way a bell trembles after it’s been struck.
She turns to me.
I have to move, have to touch her. I cross to her, ignoring the mud and the blood, and cup her face in my hands. She blinks, eyelashes sticking together, but she doesn’t pull away.
“Perfect,” I whisper, so only she can hear it. “So fucking perfect.”
Behind us, Dahlia whoops and drives her knife into Steele’s side.
He screams, and she grins, white teeth flashing behind a veil of blood.
She leans in close and whispers something, then draws the blade back and lets him bleed.
She stabs again, this time twisting, savoring the slow-motion collapse of his composure.
Colton is still working on Mr. Harrington. “How does it feel to be seconds from death, sir? How does it feel to be reduced to what you are?”
Bam paces. His target is long past screaming, body a sack of broken bones and gasps.
Bam crouches, looks the man in the eye through the tears and snot, and says, “Man, the human body can really take a beating, can’t it?
” Then he spits in the man’s face and stands back, arms folded, like an executioner taking a break.
I drag Amara with me to the boulder. The knives are lined up still, immaculate despite the carnage around us. I pick the one that matches her—the stiletto, slim and perfect, a blade meant for exacting pain, not messy violence.
The ceremonial one with the white handle.
“Take it,” I say, and she does. It is made for her hand. She turns it, admiring the balance, and she smiles.
She steps back to her father. He’s awake, barely, blood mixing with tears and saliva. His eyes are wild. He tries to speak, but his mouth is packed with cloth and tape.
She peels back the tape, slow, then rips it free. He howls, raw and guttural.
She kneels at his feet, so close he could kick her if he had the strength. She looks up, and the coldness is gone. There’s nothing there now but exhaustion and angst.
“Why,” she says, and it’s the only question she’s ever really cared about.
He gasps, sucks air, blood bubbling at the corners of his mouth. “For you,” he says. “All of this was for you.”
She cocks her head. “Bullshit.”
He tries again, the words thick with pain. “The line. The legacy. If I didn’t—”
She cuts him off with a flick of the blade, just a nick across the knee, but it’s enough to make him yelp.
“No more legacies,” she says. “No more lines.”
She plunges the blade into his thigh again, buries it to the hilt, and twists.
The scream is short, then ends in a whimper.
She pulls the knife free and stands, “You always towered over me, wanting me a puddle at your feet. That will never happen again.” Then she pushes the blade through his shirt and into his heart before howling at the full moon and throwing the blade into the dirt.
She wipes the spray of blood across her face and steps back, leaving him to bleed out on the post.
They’re all breaking, whoever is left. The screams are more animal than human now. The woods are alive with the sound of men who thought themselves untouchable discovering they are, in fact, prey.
Eve has Mr. Ellis pants down, his cock in her hand as she makes neat slices around the shaft before fileting it open like a fish and tossing it aside. She giggles and then slides the blade down both inner thighs, admiring how the skin splits and blood pours.
Bam is quiet now, his work done. He leans against a tree, eyes closed, breathing deep. He’s never looked so at peace.
I feel Amara beside me, her hand in mine, slick and warm. Pulling her into me, I kiss her forehead, then the line of blood on her jaw, and finally her lips. The taste is metallic, but I don’t care. She opens for me, hungry and helpless, and I want to fuck her right here, right now, in the dirt.
But there is still work to do.
There’s only one left.
The sack over his head is sucking in and out rapidly. His hands are tied around the pole, zip ties cutting into the vascular bulge. The veins are blue, skin red. He hasn’t pissed himself, yet, but the air stinks of sweat and expensive cologne.
He senses me. I know because his back straightens, his chest expands, and he raises his head like a prize steer about to be paraded through a ring. Even with his sight gone, he plays for an audience.
I step into his orbit. Every molecule of me vibrates with the thrill of this moment.
The others fall away. Amara is a shadow behind me, her own war won. The rest watch from a distance, content to let me perform the final act alone.
I reach for the sack and peel it back.
He blinks, then narrows his eyes. The skin around his mouth is raw, lips split from hours of tension.
I want him to see me. I want him to see what I’ve become.
I grip the tape over his mouth and tug, slow and incremental, savoring the way each millimeter tears from his face. He grunts, then glares. I remove the tape with the same patience he used to break me, one inch at a time.
The moment it’s off, he spits in my face.
The glob lands on my cheek, hot and viscous. I wipe it with my thumb, never breaking eye contact.
“You pathetic little shit,” he hisses, voice barely above a whisper. “You think this makes you a man?”
I smile, the way I was trained. “Not at all. I think it makes you a corpse.”
He tries to lunge, but the bindings hold. He grinds his teeth, lips pulled back in a snarl. There’s blood at the edge of his gums.
“You’ve never been worthy of the name,” he says. “You could have been a governor. Instead, you’re a fucking hood ornament.”
He sneers, expecting it to hurt. Maybe it does, in some hidden, ruined corner of me. But I’ve hollowed out that part and filled it with cement.
I pull out my knife. The blade is six inches of Damascus steel, the handle wrapped in custom black leather, the Westpoint crest set in mother of pearl on the pommel.
I flick the tip in the fire light, letting it catch his attention.
“You always did love to see me smile, Father,” I say.
He bares his teeth. “Try it without the binds on me, Julian. See what happens. You think this display shows how powerful you are? It’s just a fucking mask for how pathetic you really are.”
I sigh. “Masks are for people who still care what’s underneath. No, dear old dad, this really is who I am. A killer. A cold-blooded asshole who only gives a shit about one other heart beating and unfortunately for you, it’s not yours.”
I lean in close, my breath hot on his cheek. I press the tip of the knife to the corner of his mouth.
He doesn’t flinch. Of course he doesn’t. To the last, he will play the role.
“Let me show you a real smile,” I whisper.
With a twist of my wrist, I slice from the edge of his mouth up to the earlobe. The blade is so sharp it barely resists. A fan of blood pours out, painting his jaw red. He chokes, tries to scream, but I’m already cutting the other side.
The Glasgow smile is perfect, symmetrical. A wonderful addition to his usual glower.