Chapter 3 RUNO
RUNO
I watched Slash chase Niles through the woods, my steps light as I trailed behind, keeping just enough distance to savor the show.
The trees blurred around us, but my eyes stayed locked on Slash's form, moving with that predatory grace I craved.
Finn and Daemon might enjoy this moment but the other two would just ridicule me for my choices. Even so, I kept them locked away.
This moment was just for me.
Giving them too much time in my head would ultimately push them forward to take over again and fuck if I’d be locked away a second time.
Niles continued to stumble up ahead and at this point, I wasn’t even sure why he was still running.
He wouldn’t get far and he kept angling himself away from the main street toward the nearest phone.
Slash closed in fast, his laughter mixing with Niles' panic, a twisted symphony in the dark.
Some part of me wanted to tape these sounds and add a melody to it so that I could listen to it while falling asleep.
Or while Slash fucked me unconscious.
I’d finally get to enjoy the bladed fun he gave to Daemon. Or maybe it was Finn.
A deviant smile spread across my lips as Slash lunged, pulling Niles to the ground.
This was nothing like his methodical kills, the measured steps, the precise slices.
All of that had been thrown away to unearth the best I knew existed beneath the surface.
My men thought they were killers in control of their demons. But they weren’t. Not in the slightest.
No, like me, they had learned to silence the darkest parts of themselves through practice and band aids to the issue. Hopefully, tonight would be the night Slash realized just how important I was to them. How I could help them remember who they truly were.
Returning my focus to Slash, I watched with excitement as Niles bucked and flailed around, trying to throw the man off but Slash was faster.
He flipped Niles onto his back and straddled his stomach, his knees planted firmly in the dirt.
And that’s when the true fun began, Slash pinning Nile’s hands above his head, his other hand brandishing the scalpel with ease.
I crept close to catch the pure terror running through Niles’ expression, the man frozen beneath The Skinner, himself. I had never had a front row seat like this. It was like producing a movie and then sitting back to watch the masterpiece.
Slash leaned in close, his voice full of irritation. "You thought you could run from me? After all those months of hounding me at the hospital, dragging me back like I owed you my life? You owned the place and thought that made you god. But look at you now—pissing yourself in the dirt."
My nose scrunched up as I let my gaze wander, the darkened spot at the crotch of Niles’ pants making me groan. He tried thrashing again, screams vibrating against the tape but it was no use. He was prey caught by a predator, one who had no intention of letting him go.
Slash was too far gone, his demon let loose, the darkness that he usually kept tampered down running free.
The muscles along his neck and shoulders tensed and flexed, the gorgeous veins in his hands bulging, calling out to me.
I needed to lick him. Taste him. Have him fuck me, right out here on the earth floor.
I had watched from the shadows for years, fragments of me chasing this thrill through the others, but now it was mine. All mine.
Finn: Slow down, Runo. This is getting out of hand. We need to talk. There’s something you need to know.
Daemon: He's right. You're pushing too far. What if this blows back on us?
Of course they’d be able to slip out and the first thing they would try was to ruin the moment. Finn and Daemon had been my shields once, fragments I created to cope, but now they felt like they were in the way.
And while the urgency in Finn’s voice told me that whatever he had to say was important, it would have to be later.
Somewhere else than here, at this moment.
Not while Slash was embodying everything I adored—raw, unfiltered violence.
The demon in him mirrored mine, and watching it unfold sent heat through my veins, straight to my dick.
No, I wouldn't let them spoil this. I shoved them down and locked them into that dark corner of my mind where their voices faded to whispers and then into nothingness again.
I refocused my attention on Slash, reaching down to cup my cock through my pants. A few strokes later and I was fully hard, my hips rocking forward to meet the sensation as I watched Slash.
Slash dragged the scalpel across Niles' cheek, the blade slicing clean through skin, parting it like paper. Blood welled up in a thin line and dripped down Niles' jaw as he jerked away from the blade, his body convulsing under Slash.
Slash pressed harder, twisting the blade just enough to deepen the cut, exposing the raw muscle beneath.
"All those calls, Niles. All that whining about my shifts, my attitude.
You thought you controlled me? Now you're just meat.
" A few months ago, Slash would have never let this kill extend this long. He didn’t play with his victims. He tortured them a little and then left them around Primrose to be found.
The thrill came from the kill itself but I knew him. They had all forgotten what it felt like when they were younger, discovering who they were, what they liked, what fed their demons.
And this? This was like an entire feast.
Slash continued as he sliced across Niles’ collarbone, each cut pressed deeper into the man’s flesh until there were several crimson rivers flowing onto the earth floor.
Another cut had blood spraying in a fine mist, soaking through what was left of Niles’ shirt, the metallic taste on my tongue dragging me forward.
Niles was barely conscious at this point, his muffled cries softening to mere whimpers.
"No one is going to save you," Slash purred. "Don’t you get that? You're alone out here, just like you left me feeling in that hospital. But this? This is better."
He plunged the scalpel into Niles' shoulder, twisting it slowly until the blade hit bone. Niles’ back arched off the ground, his entire body contorting as a blood-curdling scream ripped through the tape Slash had apparently slapped back on.
Slash ripped the scalpel out, growling at the gore clinging to it before slicing into Niles’ abdomen.
Over and over again until Niles was just a mass of blood and tendons and organs.
I had wanted to take the lungs to Aeron but at this point, I’m not sure he’d have much to work with.
Slash’s cackles echoed through the forest as he continued to tear into Niles’, this animalistic moment extending into something downright demonic. Niles let out one last dying gasp before he collapsed, his eyes still open as his head lolled to the side, his gaze now firmly connected with mine.
It was time to end this, though. Any further and I wouldn’t be able to contain Slash’s demons. I wanted him feral but not uncontainable.
However, he looked absolutely glorious like that, covered in blood, his eyes a darker shade than I had seen them in a long while.
My men didn’t truly know how much I understood about them or how much I had seen.
They thought it was Daemon or even Finn but that didn’t mean I didn’t remember those moments.
Or that I didn’t catch brief glimpses of who they truly were before it ever really registered.
Killian tried to bury it and Dark ignored it but that just meant I was stewing in it, enjoying it, craving more of it.
And now I had it right in front of me.
Gently, I reached forward to grab Slash’s chin and turn him toward me, my man drenched in Niles’ blood.
All of his kills had been so methodical up till this point.
They had been a release but this was a reckoning, a need, a desire.
He snarled at me before pushing me down onto the earth floor.
His lips attached to mine, hunger and passion spilling between us as I clung to him.
Dark: Yeah so, Slash has never lost himself in a kill like this. We should be worried right?
Daemon: Runo doesn’t seem to be.
Killian: Because he’s a fucking sicko.
Finn: Says the fucker who kept us all locked down so you could be the main.
I tore my lips from Slash and screamed out into the night, frustrated with all of them.
I had no idea how they escaped that little room again but it was pissing me off.
“Shut the fuck up. I’m trying to get fucked.
” My head went silent, Slash not completely registering what just happened.
Not that he was all there. Something about this chase, about this kill brought out the demon I first met over ten years ago.
“Going to fuck me, Doc? Or are you going to let me sink my cock into your ass? I’ve been thinking about it and…”
He cut off my words, a growl rumbling through his chest as he flipped me over, his birthday scalpel against the back of my neck. Adrenaline rushed through me as my cheek squished into the dirt, my eyes now firmly on Niles’ lifeless, fileted body. Jesus Christ, Slash had done a number on him.
And not a pretty number either.
I reached forward to swipe my fingers through the blood pooling at his side, a moan falling from my lips as Slash ripped my pants down past my ass.
A few seconds later, I caught the sound of a wrapper and then the sweet, cold, sensation of lube roughly being fucked into my hole with those elegant fingers of my killer.
He wasn’t being gentle about it and I didn’t need him to be, but damn, he was working with an urgency, like his demon needed an outlet. And as much as I liked this version of Slash, I was also a bit terrified that he wouldn’t see me and cut into me a little deeper than was necessary.
Trying to catch Slash off guard, I rolled us back over so that I was straddling his hips.
I slid down onto his cock, the stretch almost painful before grabbing the hand at my neck and slowly moving it to rest against Slash’s.
His blade nicked his skin, his eyes darkening further but this time with lust, his cock swelling inside of me as I began to move.
“You like that, Doc?” I purred. We hadn’t had sex since I had taken over and I had to say, this was everything, especially when his free hand dug into my waist. I knew he was letting me stay in control, Slash stronger and larger than I was but he wanted this. He needed this.
I continued fucking myself on his cock as I smeared Niles’ blood across his chest. When Slash wrapped a firm hand around my length, it was all over from there.
My eyes rolled into the back of my head as he took over, fucking up into me and jerking me off at the same time.
The blade was back against my neck in the next second, a howl of pleasure tearing from my throat as I fell apart in his hands.
“You’re fucking dangerous, Runo,” Slash purred as his eyes began to clear.
He didn’t stop moving, rolling us over again as he pounded into my ass.
He pulled out and flipped me over before thrusting back again, my face firmly planting in the dirt as I struggled to breathe.
“I haven’t given in like that in years. But I liked it,” he continued.
His blade sliced down my back as his tongue flicked across my ear.
“And I’m going to show you just how much. ”
That’s when I realized that I was no longer in charge of this game. Because Slash, just like my other men, loved continuing to fuck me, to make me fall apart more than once. And in this position, I was at the mercy of the man who had just slaughtered a coworker because Niles was irritating.
As if Slash could read my mind, he bit the edge of my ear, his teeth tugging on the lobe. “I won’t kill you. Not yet. You bleed too prettily and dead people don’t bleed.”
An hour ago, he was wary as fuck of me.
And now…
Finn: This is definitely not your finest moment, Runo.