Make Them Pay (Pretty Deadly Things #6)

Prologue

SERAFINA

I walk the black-site corridor like I own every drop of blood drying on the concrete. The lights hum low and sickly yellow. The air tastes like bleach and sweat and the kind of fear that never quite washes off. My heels click in perfect rhythm. Every step is a reminder that I am still in control.

The fake hack sits in my pocket like a bad joke. I pull the tablet out one more time just to look at it. All those pretty progress bars. All those carefully layered dummy files. Poe Cameron thought he could feed me garbage and walk away clean. The entire Maddox crew thought they could play me.

They were wrong.

I stop at the first holding cell and nod once.

My men drag them out one by one. Zip ties bite deep into wrists.

Masks still cover half their faces because I like the theater of it.

Blood drips from Arrow’s split eyebrow. Gage’s left eye is already swelling shut.

Lark’s breathing is wet and wrong. Ozzy’s knuckles are raw from fighting back.

Poe looks the worst of them all. Orchid hangs between two guards like she’s made of glass and fury.

I line them up against the far wall. Six of them. They’re all mine. My trophies.

I smile.

“It always works. You people spent years thinking you were ghosts. Masked little heroes playing at justice while I built an empire. You stole from me. You burned my men. You made me look weak.”

I stop in front of Poe. He lifts his chin even though it costs him. Blood runs from the corner of his mouth. I tip his face up with one red fingernail.

“You were supposed to break the system for me, darling. Instead you gave me theater. Dummy code. Pretty lies. And now your sister’s out there somewhere with that quiet camera boy who thinks he’s clever. Render James. I know his name. I know what he looks like.”

Poe’s eyes go murderous. Good. I want him murderous. Murderous men make mistakes.

I step back and address the whole line.

“Here’s how this works now. You are going to soften. You are going to break. And when the world watches you bleed on a live feed, every other little vigilante out there will remember what happens when you touch what belongs to me.”

One of my men shifts behind me. I don’t look at him when I give the order.

“Soften them. Make them scream. I want the audio clean enough for a public release.”

I turn and walk the line again, slower this time. I stop in front of Orchid last. Her eyes are pure hatred. I lean in close enough that only she can hear.

“You almost had me, sweetheart. Almost. But almost is just another word for failure. And failure gets examples made of you.”

I straighten and clap my hands once. The sound echoes off the concrete like a gunshot.

“Move them. Separate cells. No food until I say. Water only if they beg pretty. And someone get me a live camera feed set up by morning. The public loves a good show.”

My men scatter. The crew is dragged away in different directions. Arrow tries to lunge and gets a rifle butt to the gut for his trouble. Poe spits blood and promises me a slow death. I laugh because it’s adorable when they still believe in hope.

I walk back down the corridor alone. The tablet is still warm in my hand. I open the file one last time and watch the fake progress bars load and load and load.

They thought this was a game.

They forgot I invented it.

Before I reach the heavy steel door that leads to the upper levels, I pause and pull out my phone.

The screen lights up with a single notification.

A new photo from the secure folder. My daughter sits at her desk in that quiet suburban school, dark hair falling across her face as she concentrates on her work.

She looks nothing like this place. Nothing like the blood on my hands.

She is the only soft thing I have left in this world, and no one will ever know she exists.

I slip the phone away and look back at the empty hallway. Somewhere out there Render is running with my leverage in the passenger seat. Somewhere out there he thinks he has already won.

He’s wrong.

I smile into the dark and start planning the exact order I am going to break them. Public. Loud. Permanent.

The clock is ticking.

And I never lose.