Nineteen
Canceled Killer fans began harassing the Chicago police, inundating their tip lines with false tips and leaving bad reviews of all police stations on Yelp, encouraging others to do the same.
Some even protested at Chicago police headquarters with signs demanding they stop investigating the murder cases.
—Crime Hive podcast
I dodged, but not completely, and he hit me so hard in the shoulder, I felt the impact reverberate up through my neck and to my jaw. It was a fearfully strong punch. The man could hit, and he wasn’t holding back.
He had full body weight behind each punch, which he executed with perfect form, and I failed to completely dodge his last one, which sent me staggering back a step. I scrambled to regain my footing. Meanwhile, Jude reached up with his tied hands and ripped the tape off his mouth.
“Watch out!” he shouted at me as Russo lunged.
The man was faster than he should have been given his size.
He connected a fist to my middle, as I doubled over, gasping for air.
And then he punched me in the chin. My vision flooded with stars.
I reached out to the butcher block and grabbed a knife, but Russo hit it out of my hand, sending it skittering across the kitchen floor, landing beneath Spider-Man Mateo’s feet as he watched his VR, completely oblivious.
I shook my head and staggered away as Russo closed in.
“Everybody has a plan until someone punches them in the face,” Russo said and grinned.
“You’re really quoting Mike Tyson at me right now?” I wheezed. I needed to get a handle on the pain and the fear or I was going to die. I scurried backward.
I knocked over a can of serving utensils on the counter, sending them clattering on the black-and-white tile in front of Russo. He kicked a spatula out of the way. Jude tried to reach for the knife, but couldn’t quite get it.
“You’re not trying very hard, kid,” Russo said. “That’s no way to win.”
He was right. I was on the defensive, not the attack. I didn’t want to hurt him. I couldn’t say the same for him. He was trying to hurt me.
“You played me. All this time.” I needed to get him talking more so he’d swing less.
“You were playing me, too, kid. Trying to get access to the case so you could get more downloads on your little show. But I don’t mind. You have a sweet ass. And now that ass belongs to me.”
He lunged and grabbed me, almost putting me in a chokehold, but Irene’s self-defense instruction kicked in. Slip, twist, palm to the face. Russo stumbled.
“How do you think we’re going to be a couple when you’re trying to kill me?”
“Kill you?” Russo scoffed. “I ain’t trying to kill you, kid. This is just good foreplay.”
He needed lessons from Mateo. This was not, actually, good foreplay at all.
I dodged one of Russo’s swings. Then I landed a jab straight to the cushy part of his obliques. He grunted as my knuckles connected with soft tissue.
“That’s my bad girl,” he growled with some measure of pride. Why did he seem to like it when I hit him? Maybe he wasn’t joking about the foreplay.
I managed a swift kick to his jaw, sending him reeling, and then another series of quick jabs to his solar plexus. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
Behind Russo, I watched as Jude frantically grabbed a small paring knife from the floor of scattered utensils and began sawing at the zip ties around his ankles. Russo followed my gaze and elbowed Jude in the face. He wheeled back, dropping the knife. It was like watching him kick a puppy.
“Don’t hurt him!” I said.
“You and your obsession with weak men,” Russo said, shaking his head. “I think you need Daddy to come home and punish you.”
“I. Am. Not. A. Submissive,” I shouted, fists flying, and making good contact. “I’m a dom—all day.” I connected a foot to his midriff, sending him flying backward to the kitchen cabinets.
He swung a meaty fist at me, but before he could connect, Jude broke through what was left of the zip ties on his feet and sprang up. Without even bothering to undo his wrists, he looped his arms around Russo’s head and yanked him back by the neck. Russo jabbed Jude hard in the ribs with his elbow.
“I’m going to make you regret that.” I aimed a kick straight for Russo’s face. Russo blocked the kick, and then threw off Jude, who bounced into Mateo, knocking off his VR visor. Mateo blinked fast.
“?Ay bendito!” he cried as I dodged Russo’s fists, slapped his hands away, and then sent a well-placed knee to his midsection. Full force this time. He doubled over and staggered backward, a look of shock crossing his face. Get used to it, bro.
Then Jude squared his shoulders and ran forward, hitting Russo in the back with what I could only imagine was some kind of move he learned in hand-to-hand combat in Fortune Fated.
Russo kicked Jude’s backside, pushing him into the sink.
His glasses clattered off. Russo grabbed him by the sweater and threw him hard into the ground.
Jude landed awkwardly on his shoulder and shouted in pain.
“Mateo!” I cried. “Hit the button at the door!”
Mateo’s eyes grew wide as he watched me skitter away from Russo, throwing down Jude’s now empty chair on the kitchen floor.
Russo went for the gun on the floor. I kicked it away. He swung and I dodged. Mateo headed to the keypad.
“?Dios mío! Which button?” he asked, looking at the number pad.
“The red one!” I cried as Jude found his footing again and came at Russo, but Russo easily shoved him back to the ground.
Russo swung. I ducked and kicked, my heel hitting his leg.
“?Se fue al garete!” Mateo said. “Something is wrong.” He was smashing all the buttons on the pad. Jude scrambled up, and Russo hit him again, sending him to the ground.
“I took out the battery,” Russo said with a sly grin as he came for me.
I slid past, jumped on the empty chair, and crawled on Russo’s back, sweeping my arm around his neck.
In seconds, I’d gotten him in a vise grip that, as I twisted, would cut off his air supply.
He swung back and forth, his hands clawing at my forearms. I let him. I wasn’t letting go.
“Now who goes ‘night night’?” I growled as I kept squeezing.
“Kid—” he managed to growl. His silly, patronizing tone still in place.
“Don’t…” I panted, “call… me…” I squeezed harder. “Kid!”
I could feel the air leaving his body. Could feel him trying to suck in more, but I wasn’t letting him.
He fell to one knee. Then another. I found my footing again and engaged all the muscles in my arms. They burned with effort, screaming at me to let go.
But I wouldn’t. We were both on the ground then, but I wasn’t letting go.
Russo kicked, and flailed his arm, trying to grab my hair or anything else.
His fingers failed to grasp anything but air, and he was getting weaker by the second. His body went limp, and I kept my hold.
A few more seconds and he’d never move again.
“Ella?” The voice sounded distant, like it was coming to me from the end of a bad connection in an underground tunnel. “Ella?”
Russo wasn’t moving. I wasn’t about to let go.
“Ella. He’s out. Let him go.” It was Jude. Voice of reason. Voice of fairness. Voice of moral clarity. It cut through my furious fog. “You don’t want to kill him.”
I did though. Karma’s power ran through my arms, demanding to be unleashed.
“Ella.” I looked up at Jude. Good, honest, law-abiding, rule-follower Jude. He was gingerly holding his own injured arm. His puppy-dog eyes held fear. I didn’t like that, making him afraid.
It uncoiled something in me.
I let Russo go.
He slumped to the ground, and I stood up, shaking my quivering arms. I didn’t bother to check for a pulse, but Jude scrambled down, pressing his fingers against the man’s neck.
And then Russo came to, or maybe he’d never been out in the first place, because he grabbed the knife near him on the floor and pressed it against Jude’s neck as he got slowly to his feet. Jude straightened up, too, arms raised in surrender.
I was ready to attack, but Russo’s voice stopped me cold.
“Back up, or I kill him,” Russo said, tone cold, as he pressed the blade against Jude’s throat. Jude kept very still. Russo got to his feet, tugging Jude closer.
I froze. Jude’s eyes grew wide in fear. Russo’s eyes were cold and emotionless.
A hard knock rapped against the door.
“Hello? I brought a hot dish!” came the voice of Tammy. I remembered belatedly that Ted told us she might be coming by. I didn’t realize it would be this late. Russo pulled Jude to him, but Jude’s foot knocked the chair, sending it clattering to the floor. “Ope! Everything all right in dere?”
I took the moment of distraction to grab Russo’s arm, pulling the knife downward. It clattered to the kitchen tiles.
“Tammy!” I shouted. “Get help! Call Oscar!”
I kicked the knife. It slid across the floor, handle first.
“Wait! I found a gun!” Mateo called and picked it up by the forefinger and thumb. “This is different from a prop gun,” he said, studying it.
“Toss it to me!” I begged.
Mateo threw it, and I watched in seeming slow motion as it sailed through the air. I reached for it, but just as I was about to catch it, Russo elbowed me hard in the stomach, sending me to my knees. He caught the gun with one hand and flipped it back toward me.
“Gotta learn to play dirty, kid,” Russo said as he stood above me, the barrel of the Glock pointed at my head. I had the wind knocked out of me and couldn’t speak. I heard sirens in the distance and almost wept with relief. Oscar was on the way.
Russo yanked me up by my collar. “Time to go.”