Chapter 27 The Vigilante #2
Having burned every bridge that connected him with his family, it would probably fall to the state to see fit with what to do with him.
He’d go in an unnamed category just like any other inmate whose family didn’t want them anymore.
The sooner they did away with his corpse, the better.
There was no evidence leading back to me; they wouldn’t test for drugs in his system, and I made sure to strangle him with the sheet at the same angle he was hung by.
I just wanted his existence to be completely wiped away from all living memory so that his traumatized family could begin to heal without worrying he was going to make a reappearance in their lives.
My eyes kept flicking to the clock hanging on the wall opposite my desk, unable to keep from counting down the time until her session started.
I wanted to go down early to get her. I wanted to see if she felt like she had found a perfect dancing partner, like I had, if she felt the same emotional connection to me like I did to her.
I wanted to take my cock and shove it so far down her throat until she gagged and lost her ability to breathe.
I had a feeling she’d let me do it too, she’d let me do whatever I wanted with her, and she’d come crawling back while begging for more.
Putting my carefully curated outward persona back in place, I left at the appropriate time to retrieve my patient from the behavioral wing. My boots echoed against the concrete walls of the stairway as I forcibly slowed my pace to one that was unhurried and unbothered.
Jessica would have kept the group on as much of a routine as possible with the monkey wrench thrown into their day, which meant they would be back in their wing having completed their lunchtime. I couldn’t have given two shits about the rest of them; I just needed to see her.
The hallways were quiet in the behavioral wing, the usual chatter and occasional laughter absent in light of this morning's tragedy. I took the time to peek in both Kendi’s room and her room, half expecting the two of them to be locked away together. Both rooms sat void of anyone inhabiting them.
Instead, they were both sitting in the lounge with the remaining members of their group.
Collins was sitting behind the nurses’ station in their wing, within eyesight of the group.
His lanky body was folded into one of the office chairs, his legs crossed beneath him.
Collins was one of the older nurses who worked the behavioral wing, with a youthfully deceptive appearance.
Closer to the age of forty than what most people assumed was twenty.
Somewhere along the way, he must have made a deal with the devil to maintain such a babyface with not a wrinkle in sight.
I didn’t bother knocking on the doorframe as I entered the lounge.
A comedy movie played on the television, though none of them seemed to be paying much attention to it.
Kendi and Raelynn both held books in their lap; neither seemed to actually be reading them, as the pages remained unturned in their hands.
“Raelynn, are you ready?” I asked, dragging her gaze away from the pages. I could have sworn she was biting the inside corner of her lips to keep herself from grinning.
“Sure,” she said demurely as she closed her book and placed it on the cushion beside Kendi.
I found myself standing aside and letting her lead the way as she brushed past me, her shoulder gently grazing my chest as she walked by.
Watching her sway her hips down the hall, whether intentionally or not, had my blood rushing straight to my cock.
Business first, I reminded myself, trying not to act like a horny teenage boy that just discovered sex.
She knew the way back to my office well enough, and like every time before, we made the trip in silence. If the walls could hear what I had hoped was about to happen in my office, the whole place would finally have something interesting to talk about instead of everyone's daily mundane issues.
I let her take her usual seat on the couch, noticing the way she didn’t grab one of the throw pillows this time to try to hide behind, showing that she was more comfortable with me.
Her eyes, the soft smile she was trying so hard to hide, her personality, everything was addictive.
I wanted nothing more than to grab her and pull her to my lap, let her take me as roughly as I took her last night, but business first.
Clearing my throat, I tried my best to regain my composure. No woman had ever made me as unsure of myself as she did—none had even come close.
“How are you handling the events of this morning?” I asked, leaning back and making myself comfortable in my chair, nervously waiting for her to share her thoughts—a far cry from the arrogance I usually felt. She held our future like fragile glass in her hands, and she didn’t even know it.
“Are you talking about the murder or when we fucked?” She didn’t bat an eye as she pinned me with her gaze, her confidence high today.
“Both, actually. You can pick whichever one we start with.”
“I think we should go chronologically.”
“So the murder then?”
“Yes, I’d really like to discuss the murder first.”
“Which part interested you the most?”
“That wasn’t the first person you killed, was it?” There was no point hiding from her. If she had chosen, she could have easily already turned me in for the crime. She wouldn’t though. I knew deep down she wanted to see not just what I was capable of but what she could find in herself as well.
“No, that was far from the first time I had killed someone.”
“How many?”
“Brandon made number four.”
“So the rumors are true?”
“What rumors?” That piqued my interest. I hadn’t heard any rumors about myself around the hospital.
“Just the high rate of suicides in the clinic. Some of the other patients were talking about it this morning.”
“I wouldn’t say it’s a high rate. The hospital works with the mentally unwell and unstable; it’s a high-risk environment for such illnesses. Here I was hoping they would think a ghost or serial killer was killing patients.”
She laughed, “At four that wouldn’t be a far off guess now would it be?”
“No, I suppose it wouldn’t. Did it bother you seeing him dead?”
She didn’t answer right away, chewing on her bottom lip as she mulled over her words before saying them out loud.
“Seeing him dead didn’t bother me, he’s not the first dead body I’ve seen anyway.”
“You were the one who found your parents weren’t you?
” I was finding it easier to slip into the role of therapist when a topic came up that I could help her process the events.
The last thing I wanted was for something to go unsaid and her to be unable to get through it and fearfully put a distance between us.
“Yes, I found them after school. Their death, though, was different from his. I cared about my parents even if they were shitty most of the time, I still loved them.”
“So you grieved for your parents. How did seeing Brandon dead make you feel?”
She looked at me like she didn’t want to answer. I could see her trying to place her walls back in place, trying to close off what I had worked so hard at opening up. I wasn’t about to let her shut down on me again just because she was afraid of facing her feelings.
“Be honest with me, Rae,” I encouraged, coaxing her back out of her shell, “there’s nothing that you can tell me that I’d judge you for. How did seeing Brandon’s body as I fucked the shit out of you against that mirror make you feel?”
“It felt good, okay, fucking amazing, and knowing you were the one who killed him and why you did it made me horny as shit. I’m sure—being as observant as you are—that you already figured that part out.
” She was starting to get an attitude with me.
I’d let it slide for now before I took it upon myself to fit it.
“I did figure that part out. If I operated solely on assumptions, it would kind of defeat the purpose of talk therapy, now wouldn’t it?”
“You’re a cocky asshole, you know that?”
“I’ve been called worse. What about seeing what happened last night made you feel the most alive?”
“Seeing someone who hurt someone else, especially a child, is no longer free to do it again. Seeing you being the one to take matters into your own hands, I’ve never experienced something like it.
” Her voice was quieter, almost husky, as she spoke, and the way she maintained eye contact and didn’t shy away from me made my cock strain against my jeans.
This beautiful, creative, intelligent woman who sat across from me was far from afraid of what she saw in me.
“So the revenge part is what appealed to you?”
“If I had to pick one main point, then yes, I’ve always wanted to be able to get revenge.”
“You’ve written about it a lot, so that doesn’t surprise me. You’ve never acted on it, though.”
“No. When I used to write about that stuff, the crimes I was seeking justice for usually weren’t bad enough to actually warrant a death sentence. Most of that was just fantasy.”
“Would you get revenge if you could?”
“Against who?” She asked innocently, her doe-like eyes not fooling me for one second.
“Against the person who has wronged you the most.”
“Oh him,” she said confidently, “yes, if I could do it and get away with it, I’d do it in a heartbeat without hesitation.”
“So what’s stopping you?”
“I’ve been arrested before, because of him, it’s not an experience I’d wish to repeat anytime soon, no matter how much he deserves it,” she trailed off on the last thing she said.
“What if I helped you?” She pinned me with a glare at that, daring me to admit I was joking or that I was far from serious. I wouldn’t lie to her like that. “What if the opportunity presented itself and you were to have help?”
“Are you saying you want to plan a murder with me?”