Chapter 41
Sometimes, you just want to watch people burn.
Other times, you want to be the one doing the burning.
It’s always been the latter for me. I know it comes from a place of devotion, or love, or whatever the fuck Malik calls it, but I want to be the one doing the burning tonight.
I want to watch the smugness slide off their faces along with their skin.
I want them to think about the colossal mistakes they’ve made in their lives whilst staring into my eyes, knowing I’m the one with the power.
Ezra might hold the torch, but I’m the fucking flame.
It’s been half an hour since I told Malik what I wanted, and one of Ezra’s men disappeared, then came back holding large glass beakers in one hand and a cage in another.
“How soundproof is this place?” I ask Malik, taking the beakers from the man.
“The walls, ceiling, and floors are concrete. No one will hear a peep.”
Perfect for what I have planned.
“Take their shirts off,” I command the young men, each standing beside Benedict, my father, and Adrian. They follow, slicing the material from their bodies, their bare flesh now exposed.
Opening the medium cage, I place the small animal inside one beaker, holding my palm flat over the top so it can’t escape.
“Isla, what are you doing? How can you be involved with these guys?” Adrian asks in a hushed tone, fear masked with fury on his face.
“Thank you for volunteering to go first,” Malik says, taking the beaker from me and placing it on Adrian’s stomach. The loud screech of tape echoes throughout the room as he secures it around him, the rat moving around frantically, trying to find an escape.
“Give it to me,” I say to Emmett, taking the blowtorch from him.
“No, Isla, don’t.”
I don’t listen as I stand in front of him and lean down, holding the blow torch on the end of the beaker. As the blowtorch heats the glass, the rat becomes distressed. Adrian’s screams are piercing as it tears into the flesh on his stomach.
“Fuck! Don’t do this, please, I beg you, I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry,” he says in a panic, undiluted fear in his eyes.
“Don’t beg me,” I say, handing the torch to Malik. “Beg him.”
I stand back as the blue flame continues to blow onto the beaker.
“It was all your father! He wanted me to keep an eye on you. I said I didn’t want to, okay? I wanted to end it a long time ago, but he kept me close to you. He said if I didn’t…” He trails off, and I know exactly what he was about to say.
“What? He wouldn’t pay you?” I glance at my father, who has his eyes cast to Benedict. “Seems like all the money in the world won’t be enough to save you from this fate.”
“Okay! Okay! Fuck! I was asked to report back to your father if you started remembering things, and Gordon gave me three vials of Purileen to continue testing on you. But you just kept remembering. No matter how many times I stuck those needles into your veins when you were passed out drunk, it fucking did nothing. Please…please…please! It’s going to fucking eat through me! ”
Moving my focus to Benedict, I motion for one of the men to string him up. The chains clink on the floor, uncoiling as his arms rise above his head.
“More.”
They pull him higher until his feet are off the ground.
“My love,” I say, gaining Malik’s attention. “Would you please take those weights and chain them to his waist?”
Emmett takes the blowtorch from Malik, who does exactly as I ask. He rolls the weights over to Benedict, the two round plates each weighing twenty kilograms. Threading the chain through the hole in the middle, he loops it around Benedict’s waist and pulls, suspending them in the air along with him.
Benedict groans, the weights now pulling him down as he struggles. He can only hold on for so long before his body gives up and both his shoulders dislocate.
“Stop this. Stop this now!” My father raises his voice, wanting to be heard amongst Adrian’s screams for help.
“Why? Because karma is catching up to you? Because you’re finally about to get what you deserve?”
“I’ll give it all to you. The house, the legacy, the money, you can have all of it,” he pleads like the worthless piece of shit he is.
“That’s already the plan, Gordon,” I say, knowing my words are eating him up from within. “It’s all mine. Even your fucking title.”
Benedict roars, his screams deep and guttural. One or both of his shoulders have likely dislocated, but it doesn’t give me the satisfaction I’m craving.
Will it ever come?
Is this how Malik felt each time he wanted revenge?
Is this what this life moulds you into?
An insatiable, power hungry, bitter monster?
“I’ll have it all, and there is nothing you can do about it,” I lie.
I don’t want it. Any of it. I don’t want to be a judge or take anything from my father, but I want to watch him think he’ll lose everything he’s worked so hard for.
And it will all happen in one night.
Because of me.
I ask Malik to remove the weights from Benedict, but leave him strung up. I want him to feel what I felt, even if it is only a portion of my pain. Before he dies, I want to hear him choke on his own words.
“I’m part of the elite,” Benedict says through his panting.
Malik’s phone beeps, and he pulls it out of his pocket.
“Not anymore.” He holds the phone up to Benedict’s face, showing him his bank accounts, now depleted. “Trust funds, hedge funds…all drained.”
“How?” I ask Malik. He winks without answering my question and stuffs the phone back into his pocket. “It’s a KaTastrophe, isn’t it?” Sarcasm coats every word.
My stomach flips, the heat making its way up the back of my throat when I see the blood seeping down Adrian’s stomach and into his trousers. He’s barely awake now as the tail of the rat disappears through the gaping hole in his middle.
I cover my mouth and close my eyes to regain my composure, but it doesn’t work.
The sight is etched into my brain. One minute, I’m trying to hold back the involuntary spasms in my stomach, and the next, the vomit travels up and out of my mouth as I hurl the contents onto the floor.
It comes out fast, my body convulsing with the force of it, shoulders heaving, and eyes watering.
“Fuck!” Malik holds my hair back as another surge follows.
My vision blurs, and heat rises to my chest as I brace myself on the concrete wall.
Even when I’m done, and there’s nothing left, my stomach clenches.
I spit and cough, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand as the taste lingers in my mouth.
I want to crawl out of my own skin.
“Let me take you back upstairs,” Malik says, threading his arm around my waist and holding me upright.
I don’t argue because my body won’t let me. I feel useless, empty, and heavy. I lean into him and let him guide me into the elevator as he shouts back at Emmett, “Keep Benedict strung up. Get rid of Adrian’s body and create a cover story.”
“On it,” Emmett says from behind us.
Malik’s hold on me is firm around my waist as the doors close and the elevator begins to move. The ride feels like minutes instead of seconds, the light burning through my eyelids as I sway on my feet.
When the doors open, he leads me inside the warm, dim quietness, and it seems like a completely different world up here.
He guides me into the bathroom, and I sit on the toilet lid as he turns the shower on.
I ignore the mirror because I can’t bear to look at my reflection as he kneels before me with a washcloth in his hand.
It’s soaked in warm water, and he wipes my face with it slowly, carefully, like I’m made of porcelain and he’s afraid I might break.
“I’m—”
“You’d better not apologise right now.” His hands move to my arms, wiping away the vomit, then down to my shaking hands. He takes them in his and cleans each finger like they matter.
Like I matter.
Amongst everything, all I can think about is Beatrice and how my entire life I thought I had a sister but she was never mine.
We were never sisters.
The thought has me swallowing back a sob and forcing it back down my throat.
But the tears still appear. They’re silent at first, the warmth rolling down my cheeks without a sound.
I don’t know if he notices, but I don’t look to find out.
It comes over me like an avalanche, the tears and sobs I can’t hold back anymore, as I fall apart.
He pulls me into his hard chest, allowing me to feel everything I need to feel.
He lets me cry into his shirt without a word or question.
He doesn’t speak as he holds me to him.
“Everything is so messed up,” I sob, clinging onto his shirt like it’s my only lifeline. “I don’t know if I’m ever going to heal from this.”
He takes a deep breath as he grips the back of my head. “Then we’ll stay broken together.”