Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Aven
Icuddle the girl against me, needing her support. She doesn’t know it, but I’ve never spoken of this to anyone. Only my da knows, and it’s why we’ve not spoken in the twenty years I’ve been in America. But if I want the lass to choose me, to really choose me, she has to know it all.
“As the tale goes, a massive dragon once terrorized the cities of Scotland. The great winged beast left destruction wherever he went. Farms were razed, herds of livestock slaughtered and devoured, and in his greed, the dragon only wanted more. Nothing could sate the creature.”
“Shit, maybe you should be the writer,” she says.
I smile and hold her closer. “When he finally landed to rest, so great was his exhaustion and so full was his belly that he never rose again. The earth grew around him and formed Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh.”
“And you admire that?”
“Aye, I do. Because he stopped, lass. Because he knew when enough was enough, and he stopped.”
“That’s not how I see it.”
“Tell me how it looks through those bonnie green eyes, then.”
“It wasn’t a choice. He stopped because his actions had consequences. If he hadn’t been so bogged down with a belly full of sheep and cows, he might have had the energy to keep fucking shit up. It’s a lesson in knowing when to stop, but you’ve gotten the ending all mixed up.”
“Yeah? Well, here’s another tale for you.
Let’s see what you make of this one.” I run my hands through her golden hair and take a deep breath.
“There was a dragon of another sort in Scotland. Just like the last, he was a mean one. Brandishing a fiery ax, he raised hell from one side of the land to the other. Aside from his ma and da, he cared for no one.”
“Did this dragon kill the livestock and set the town on fire?”
I close my eyes. “Aye, in a way. He was hungry, and he fed himself until he was full. But it wasn’t enough. He wanted more and more, and when he eventually looked behind him, nothing was left.”
“I don’t know how your mother died, Aven, but it wasn’t your fault.”
The lass is smarter than she realizes. Maybe she’d make a good writer after all. She certainly has this plot figured out.
“I’m not like the others, Quinn. I’m not content with killing hostages. I want to hunt, and I’m not particular about my prey.” I close my eyes. “I almost wish I had your scruples. Then I wouldn’t have been cast out of my homeland.”
Quinn sighs and straddles my waist, which forces me to open my eyes. I don’t want to miss a second of her on top of me. “What makes you think I have scruples?” she asks.
“I just assumed, I guess. Then again, you didn’t exactly waste any time when you killed the woman in the log flume.
” I smile when I recall the way she strangled her.
“You knew she’d hurt animals, but you didn’t have much more than the color of her jumpsuit.
Most women struggle to make the kill without the inciting rage. Cat and Frankie did, anyway.”
“Well, I’m not Cat and Frankie. And let’s not forget who my father is.”
I haven’t forgotten, though I’ve tried not to think of it. The allergy discrepancy still eats away at me.
“So it doesn’t bother you that I kill indiscriminately, and it doesn’t bother me that you want to be a cam girl.” I run my hands up her sides. “Sounds to me like we’ve gotten it all sorted.”
“Not quite,” she says, and a knowing look softens her face. “What happened to your mother, Aven?”
Memories flood my chest until I can’t breathe. I look up at the ceiling, unable to hold Quinn’s green gaze for a moment longer. Sensing my unease, the lass lies on my chest and strokes my hair. She doesn’t push. She just waits for me to continue.
So I do.
“I started young, pretty much at puberty. My mother caught on quickly, and she did her best to steer me to greener fields, but as I said, I was hungry. The risks I took were increasingly ridiculous, but I thought I was untouchable. I can’t even look fondly on the kills of my youth because I’m so ashamed.
Not of the killing, but of the disregard for someone I cared for deeply. ”
“Your mother may not have been pleased to learn her kid was a serial killer, but I’m sure she still loved you. And I know she knew how much you loved her.” Quinn sits up on her elbows so that she can look me in the eye. “You don’t doubt that, do you?”
I shake my head and manage a smile. “No, lass, I don’t doubt my ma’s love for a second.
It was that love that cost her in the end, though.
I didn’t escape capture for all those years because I was careful.
I escaped because, unbeknownst to me, my mother was shuffling behind me with a mop and bucket to clean up all the messes I’d made.
Before long, most of our town knew the truth, that she was harboring a sicko, but no one could prove a damn thing. ”
“What did your father think?”
“I can’t be sure. He was a man of few words before her death, but when he lost her, he refused to speak to me again. He blamed me, and he was right to. It still hurt when he called me a bastard, fatherless child, as if he could just erase me by denying his part in my creation.”
“I still don’t understand how it was your fault.” Quinn drops down against my chest again. “You’re leaving something out.”
Aye, I am. The hardest part is usually the easiest to leave out.
Part of it is the fear of what she’ll think of me. If my own flesh and blood couldn’t stomach the sight of me after all was said and done, how can I expect the lass to stick around? But the only way out is through, and the decision is for Quinn to make.
As she relaxes against me again, I find the strength to tell the last of it.
“One night, she asked me to stop. Point blank, just like that. ‘Give it up, Aven,’ she’d begged, but I wouldn’t.
I went out that very night, snatched up the first bloke I spotted on an evening walk, and brought him back to an abandoned mill near Grudie.
Fields stretched out on all sides, and a herd of cattle often grazed in the distance.
I could hear them lowing at night. It was one of my favorite places to kill. ”
“Because of the seclusion?”
“That, but the acoustics in the old mill were heavenly. The screams, lass.” I hug her against my chest. “Ach, you had to be there.”
“Maybe you could take me there one day,” she says, and my heart shatters.
“I would if I could, but I cannae go back. You see, lass, I wasn’t the only dragon in Scotland. There are many, all lurking in the shadows. And one night, I happened upon one on his evening walk, and I made a grave mistake.”
“Oh shit,” she breathes. “Was he a mafia boss or something? I’ve read about those.”
I almost chuckle at her comparison, but the weight of the situation won’t allow it. That heaviness presses down on my lungs, refusing to allow laughter to escape. You think I’d be used to it after living with it well into my late thirties, but no. That weight just presses down.
“Something similar,” I say. “The head of an underground organization, so, close enough. I didn’t care.
Even when he told me what his people would do, that they’d avenge him in the most final way, I just laughed in his face and kept cutting off fingers to hear him scream.
The bastard was ancient, but he put up a fight.
Lasted for ten rounds with my ax before he finally shit his pants and died. ”
Quinn’s arms tighten their hold around me. “And his people made good on his promise.”
“They burned the pub to the ground while my mother was inside. She was identified via dental records. The fate I’d bestowed on so many other grieving families had become my own.”
“So why can’t you go back?” She sits up again. “The pieces of shit got their pound of flesh. Isn’t it settled?”
“Not even close. The man had a son, and he wasn’t satisfied with simply killing my ma.
He demanded I leave Scotland immediately and said I wasn’t to return until I had the money to make good on what I’d taken from him.
If I come back before I’ve paid him off, he’ll kill my da and make it so that I can’t so much as scratch my balls without the local government hearing about it. ”
“So why not take him out?”
Now I do laugh. “This isn’t a romance novel, lass. I don’t have a magic gun that grants a satisfying conclusion to any of this. For starters, I don’t know anything about him. All communications were done via letters attached to burning rocks thrown through my bedroom window.”
“Then how are you supposed to pay him?”
“He’s moved to email now. I get one each year around Christmas.”
“What a jolly fucking asshole,” she mutters. “So how much do you need? I don’t have much in savings, but once Jim pays me—”
“Absolutely fucking not!” I sit up on my elbows, but Quinn pushes my back to the mattress with one finger.
“Why not? You’ve been protecting me for weeks, and I’ve lost count of how many orgasms you’ve given me. You deserve a little compensation. And I want to help you.”
I pull her face closer so that I can kiss her. The lass is an angel, but I won’t accept her money.
“No, and that’s final. Besides, Jim’s paying me well after this, so I might have enough to make a dent in what I owe. Maybe I can take you to see Scotland eventually.”
That earns a smile as I ease her off my lap.
“Now, I want you to get dressed,” I say. “I’ve got a surprise waiting for you in the park.”
I pat her ass as she hurries off to the closet. But instead of feeling relieved that I’ve told her everything, I can’t help but feel the loss of my mother all over again. Maybe what I have planned for Quinn can brighten my mood.