Chapter 7
LILY
Barrett is good at what he does, and the information he dug up on Omar Bertini is spot on. In an oversized house in upper-class Hedgwick, Omar Bertini lives amongst families of professionals. Doctors. Lawyers. CEOs.
He is a professional himself. The CEO of the TAL Group. Transport and Logistics. A company that transports goods of all kinds across the country.
Fitting, really, since he’s a sex trafficking arsehole.
It would be easy to think that he might be the brains of the operation, given his position of power.
However, he’s nothing but a pawn, paid to do the grunt work by someone else.
I don’t know who that someone else is yet, but I do know that taking down the TAL Group for their part will put a big hole in the supply chain.
Whoever orchestrates the trafficking ring will have to arrange a new way of transporting the innocent girls across the United Kingdom.
Omar looks a little frazzled right now, his toupee hanging half off his head, kinda resembling a dead rodent which is clinging to a bleeding gash on the side of his head.
“Did you just piss yourself, Omar?” I cringe as I watch the yellow tinge soak through his white jocks, and I fake a gag. “Are you… scared?” I tilt my head, smirking at him, and his dark eyes dart around frantically as if he’s trying to figure out a way to escape.
I haven’t even touched him yet.
Okay, so that’s a lie.
I did knock him out with a frying pan while he was fucking one of his trafficking slaves, which is where the nasty gash came from.
The poor girl, who was his victim, kindly helped me pull up his jocks—because let’s be real, no one wants to see that—and helped me drag him to the chair he’s now zip-tied to.
Her name is Freya. She’s eighteen, and before she was kidnapped from the streets of London, she had been a virgin.
That knowledge alone nearly made me slit Omar’s throat right then and there, but his victims need him to suffer. They deserve that vengeance, and since the back room was packed with another seven girls, Freya helped me free them, insisting they will want to witness this.
I did warn her. Warn them. But they all agreed. They wanted to watch him suffer, so I wasn’t about to take that away from them.
Now, they all stand behind me, watching as Omar pisses his pants.
I grin.
This is going to be fun.
“I know who you are,” Omar states, his voice sounding calmer than I’d like.
“You do?” I grin, raising a single brow, and he nods.
“The Crimson Angel.”
A few gasps sound from behind me, but I pay the girls no attention as I nod at Omar.
I wasn’t the one to make up the name, the Crimson Angel.
The media did that part for me. It was derived from one of my earlier kills when I got a little too theatrical and painted angel wings and a halo in my victim’s blood on the wall.
A picture of my work of art was leaked to the media, and they often use the same shot when I make the headlines.
Oh, Uncle Ewan, if only you knew what your sweet little niece does. Maybe then you’d be scared of me.
Shrugging at Omar, I take a step forward, and he flinches back in the chair.
“So you know what’s about to happen to you, then?” I ask, and he swallows thickly.
“What do you want to know? I’ll tell you anything,” he pleads, his eyes flicking to the girls at the back, like they will somehow forgive him for violating them.
“Cool.” I flash my teeth in a wide grin and start pacing as I twirl my knife in my hand. “Start talking. Tell me the name of the man or woman responsible for paying you to traffic underage girls.”
“Men,” he corrects, and I stop pacing.
“Men? As in, more than one?”
He nods. “Yes. Yes. The MacKenzie brothers.”
I stand eerily still as I study Omar’s face. “The MacKenzie brothers?”
“Y-yes. Julian and Stuart MacKenzie.”
“Well, fuck me sideways, Omar. I wasn’t expecting you to say that.” I spin to the girls behind me. “Were you expecting him to say that?”
Their eyes widen at my question, and I’m sure they think I’m bat-shit crazy, which I suppose I can’t completely disagree with. I do get a little crazed when I’m dressed from head to toe in my black latex catsuit.
It covers my shoes, and a hood covers my fiery red hair, only revealing my face. The tattoo winding up my left arm is hidden, and my hands are too, covered in black gloves. All that can be seen is how the rubber suit hugs my curvy hips and narrow waist, and how it clings to my C cups.
With my face revealed, though, my blue eyes, dark lashes, copper brows, and porcelain skin could easily give me away, but I tried a mask once, and I felt like I was going to suffocate. Maybe I’m a little claustrophobic.
It doesn’t matter, though. The latex suit covers enough.
All of that alone must make me look like a superhero wannabe, but my twelve-inch blade, held tightly in my hand, probably makes me look more like a villain.
The girls don’t need to be scared of me, though. Omar, on the other hand…
I spin back to him. “Do you mean to tell me that Julian and Stuart MacKenzie, those twin do-gooders that flash their pretty boy faces all over the fucking TV ranting about world peace and women’s rights, are the brains behind this operation?”
Omar nods. “Y-yes. They are addicted to making money and found a gap in the trafficking market locally, so they decided to give it a go. Turns out it’s a more lucrative business than they thought.”
I throw my head back laughing, slapping my hand to my hip as I ride through the humour that isn’t at all that fucking funny. But it will be when I get my hands on the MacKenzie brothers.
When my giggling subsides, my face turns to stone as I step towards Omar.
“And you have been earning a pretty penny off selling these girls for the MacKenzie brothers, haven’t you?” I sneer, and even though he whimpers, he nods, too scared to lie to me right now. “You pay your men to steal these girls? Is that how it works?”
“They tricked us,” one of the girls behind me offers, and I nod.
“So your men lure them in? Groom them a little, gaining their trust. Then what?”
Omar opens his mouth to speak, but a different female voice comes from behind me this time.
“They drugged us,” she snarls with venom lacing her tone. “It knocked us out. When we woke up, we were chained inside the back of a moving truck.”
She has every right to be angry at this sick fuck. All the girls do.
“Is she right, Omar? Is that how it works?”
He drops his chin to his chest and nods like he’s ashamed. He’s not fucking ashamed, though. He’s scared. The useless oxygen thief thinks he’s going to get out of this alive.
“That doesn’t sound very nice, Omar,” I point out with raised brows. “So I guess you call sticking your stumpy dick inside teenage girls training?”
“I-I…” Omar shakes his head, but I’m in no mood to hear what pathetic excuse he thinks makes what he did justifiable.
“Or was that just you raping a defenceless girl?” I spit, my vision turning red as anger consumes me.
I give in then. To the beast inside me. To the Crimson Angel.
Leaping forward, I jam my blade into Omar’s leg, and his guttural scream overpowers the gasps of shock coming from the girls behind me.
“Wait! Stop! Please!” Omar begs through gritted teeth, his eyes darting from me to the blade protruding from his leg. “I told you everything.”
I laugh. And yes, it sounds a little manic, but that’s okay. It does its job, scaring this sick fucker even more.
“I never made a deal to spare your life, Omar. You gave that information up of your own free will, and now it’s time to have some fun.”
“What?” He shakes his head in disbelief, and I ignore him, wrapping my hand back around the hilt of my blade and reef it free.
He cries out again, and then I show his other leg the same courtesy, plunging my blade in deep as he screams like his balls have retreated.
“I want to do that!”
The request comes from behind me, and I turn slowly to see Freya stepping forward, her frantic eyes locked on my knife.
“You want to stab him?” I ask, and she nods.
“I want to make him hurt.”
I feel her words right to my core.
“Sure,” I say, bobbing my head in the direction of the kitchen. “Find yourself a knife and go for it.”
A sinister grin tugs at her cracked lips before she turns quickly, darting over to the kitchen.
Then, one by one, the other girls do the same.
Turning back to Omar, I shake my head.
“You know, pissing women off really isn’t a good idea.
We are brilliant at vengeance. Men like you may be the brawn, but women are the brains, and in the end, we will be victorious.
” I lean closer, like I’m about to share a secret with him.
“You should’ve thought about that before you went into business with the MacKenzie brothers. ”
A strangled sob lodges in his throat, and when his fear-filled eyes dart over my shoulder, I know the girls are returning with their weapons.
Turning, I see Freya has found the largest knife she could. It probably came from a knife block, while some of the others are gripping smaller versions, and a couple have simple steak knives with a serrated edge.
Ouch. That’s gonna hurt.
“Oh, Omar.” I smirk, glancing back at him. “You really shouldn’t have pissed them off.”
“No! Wait!” Omar cries, but I ignore him, stepping aside and gesturing to Omar as the girls inch forward.
“Have at him.”
Freya moves fast, lurching forward to slam her knife into his shoulder. He cries out, and the beast in me hums with joy.
Stab.
Another girl joins in.
Stab.
And another.
Stab.
Laughing, I dance around as his screams engulf the room, all the girls now surrounding him and attacking him from all directions.
It’s messy as hell, and I fucking love it.
I love the brutality of it, and I love that these girls are getting their revenge.
It’s theirs to take. Not mine. I won’t take that away from them.