Chapter 26
CHAPTER 26
DOMINO
“ I s it done?”
“Yeah, Boss. The paperwork’s finalized. Upon Brielle Cain’s passing, Hollow Pines Care Home is legally Remi’s. Arthur Doyle will be instated as manager. He’ll oversee everything.”
Ghost chuckled down the line, low and knowing. “I’m surprised you let her live this long…”
“It was Remi’s decision.” My jaw ticked, fingers tightening around the phone. “He wanted her there as long as his mom was alive. But now that she’s gone, it’s time for Brielle to pay.”
“She won’t be missed,” Ghost scoffed. “Hell, he’s not the only one glad that bitch is dead. She was a fucking nightmare?—”
“She was.” I cut him off before his rant could gain momentum. “Make sure Arti is notified and prepared. I want this transition to be seamless. Remi doesn’t need to concern himself with any of it.”
“Boss.”
“Federico?”
“Still nothing,” Ghost muttered, irritation thick in his voice. Then, with a sharp inhale, his tone shifted—smug, almost entertained. “Have you seen the news?”
“No.”
“The casino suffered a gas leak last night. Went up in flames and was razed to the ground. Three fire crews are still fighting to get the blaze under control.”
“Good.”
That place was Federico’s pride and joy. I wish I could’ve seen his face when he turned on the news this morning. Everything was falling into place.
One more move. One final checkmate, and I would gut my father. Make him suffer the way he made me suffer for years, until he broke me. Turned me into what I am today.
The distant murmur of a reporter’s voice drifted from the TV down the phone line, detailing the catastrophe that had rocked Marlow Heights to its core. I leaned against the counter, letting my lips curl in satisfaction.
They called it a tragedy.
I called it foreplay.
“One last thing,” I muttered. “Remi’s trust fund?”
“Taken care of. He gets everything on his twenty-first birthday.”
“Good.”
He wouldn’t have to lift a goddamn finger for the rest of his life if he didn’t want to. I hung up before Ghost could say anything else. I had better things to do.
The scent of coffee filled the air as I poured two cups, carrying them back into the bedroom.
Remi lay exactly where I left him.
Not quite awake, not quite asleep. Trapped somewhere in the in-between. That hollow, broken place I’d pulled him from the night I followed him into his own hell in the cemetery. That night, I told him three words I’d never truly understood.
I love you.
Did I even know what love was?
All I knew was that I had killed for him. Would burn the world down if he asked me to. Would slit my own throat and let him bathe in my blood.
And if that wasn’t love—then I didn’t want to know what was.
I set the cups on the nightstand and reached into the drawer, fingers brushing against the small black velvet bag. A strange sensation twisted in my gut—something like nerves, like hunger. Razor-winged wasps, beating against the inside of my ribs.
I slipped under the covers, molding myself to his back, pulling him into the cage of my arms. Mine.
Remi stirred with a slow inhale, voice thick with sleep. “What time is it?”
“A little after ten.” I combed my fingers through the black-and-white strands of his hair, my touch dragging the tension from his body. “I have something for you.”
He turned to face me, and at this close distance, I could see the silver flecks in his ice-blue eyes. They shimmered like shattered glass in the morning light.
“What is it?” His lips twitched, fingers curling against my chest. He vibrated with barely contained anticipation.
I toyed with the bone hanging around his neck, drawing his attention to where it rested between his pecs. A memento from his first kill. My gaze was transfixed by the bruises in shades of black and blue that bloomed under his skin, fading too quickly into a yellowed green. I wondered if I could tattoo my marks onto him—add a sense of permanence. My teeth. My hand. My name.
I sat up, pulling him into my lap. He straddled me, wrapping his legs around my hips. Warmth radiated from him into my chilled skin, but it was the temptation of his ass grinding against my quickly hardening cock that had me gritting my teeth hard enough to crack them.
My hand wrapped around his throat, collaring him with a tight squeeze. “Behave, piccolo agnello, or you won’t get to see what’s inside.”
Remi rolled his eyes, huffing in frustration—but that little shit still circled his hips, teasing, testing. His pupils blew wide, dark and dangerous, as he felt how hard I was beneath him.
“Behave,” I warned, tightening my grip. His pulse fluttered against my palm, a beautiful, delicate thing.
His breath hitched, his lips parting slightly. “I will,” he whispered, eyes flicking down to the bag in my hand. “Can I see it?”
I adjusted his position before passing him the bag, watching as an unfettered smile illuminated his face.
He didn’t smile often.
None of us did. We weren’t wired that way. But when he did, it was devastating.
“Open it.”
Remi carefully untied the drawstring and tipped the contents into his hand. His fingers traced each carpal bone with quiet reverence, the way he always did when he studied something he found beautiful.
His tongue flicked out, wetting his lips. “Who?”
He liked to know. He needed to know. Like the bone around his neck, this was from one of his kills. These bones belonged to the last man who tried to jump him. Federico was growing desperate, sending low-level street rats to attack us.
He sucked in a sharp breath, his chest rising and falling in shallow, erratic movements. “Oh.”
The bracelet’s bones were set between silver I’d had shaped like barbed wire. The same way the man had died. Remi wrapped a length of barbed wire around his throat and tightened it until the steel cut through his skin.
Asphyxiation. Blood loss. Who knew which killed him first?
A single tear slipped down his cheek, catching on his lip. His voice was raw when he whispered, “It’s beautiful. Put it on me?”
I obeyed, slipping the bracelet over his left wrist, watching the way he flexed his fingers, admiring the weight of it.
“It’s perfect.”
His breathy reply filled my lungs as his lips brushed against mine. He wrapped his arms around my neck. Then he was on me. No hesitation. No warning. Just collision. Devastation. Possession. His tongue forced its way into my mouth, tasting, claiming. Warring with mine as hunger seared through my veins.
I threaded my fingers through his hair and took control, swallowing him whole, my grip tightening, my other hand branding itself against his bare back.
He was mine.
He had always been mine.
And now—the whole fucking world would know it.
Brielle was running.
She knew what was coming. They always did. And yet, like every doomed thing staring into the abyss, rather than stand and face her reckoning, she ran. As if that would make a difference.
As if that would change the inevitable.
Death came for us all.
Most people liked to believe it was a gentle thing, a quiet hand that came in the night when they were old and gray, their lives full and lived.
But death wasn’t gentle. Death was power. Death was control. And we wielded it.
Remi and I. Together.
We embraced it. Lived it. Breathed it.
I loved the hunt. The chase. Watching fear seep into the bones of the hunted, twisting them into something unrecognizable. Paranoia did most of the work for me, unraveling them thread by thread before I ever laid a hand on them.
And Brielle? She was my favorite kind of prey.
Remi had shattered her mind. Together, we had crushed her soul and stripped her of the only thing that had ever mattered—her son.
Her suffering became his inspiration. The art he created in its wake was something raw, violent—a language I could barely understand, even when he tried to explain it. The jagged edges and brutal lines spoke of madness, emotion—a chaotic symphony of destruction given form. Beautiful in its brutality.
I had Ghost shadow her, feeding me updates—how she barely slept, how she changed locations every few hours, how she flinched at shadows and avoided cameras like they were landmines.
None of it mattered.
There was no escaping us. No escaping Remi.
We had been tracking her for a week. Seven days of her spiraling into desperation.
Seven days of Remi pacing like a caged animal, retribution burning in his veins, his rage an all-consuming thing.
She had already been his from the moment he decided she was. All she was doing now was making it worse for herself.
And fuck—I reveled in it.
But for Remi? This was personal.
She had manipulated him, convinced him to bring his mother to Hollow Pines. She had left scars on him—ones I could never erase, no matter how much blood I painted over them.
And she would answer for it.
We followed the scent of her fear, tracking her through the rot and filth of Marlow Heights, through cheap motels and back-alley hideaways.
And finally, we found her an hour away from the city.
The neon vacancy sign flickered in the darkness, humming against the still air. The motel reeked of sweat, despair, and the kind of desperation that clung to people who had nowhere left to go and rented rooms by the hour, turning cheap tricks.
I dragged the tip of my switchblade across my palm, letting the sharp sting center me. Remi stood beside me, still and silent, his ice-blue eyes fixed on the room number Ghost had given us.
His fingers twitched. His breathing slowed. He was vibrating. Starving. I reached out and brushed my thumb across his lower lip. It was split. He’d been biting it raw.
“Easy, piccolo agnello, ” I murmured, voice rough. “You’ll have your turn.”
His tongue flicked against my skin, gaze hooded, but there was nothing submissive about it. His patience had run out.
We moved as one.
The door wasn’t even locked.
Pathetic.
I pushed it open, stepping inside the dimly lit room. The stench of mildew, stale cigarettes, and something pungent clung to the air. The sheets on the bed were tangled, the lamp beside it shattered on the floor, flickering weakly.
A sound came from the bathroom—shallow, rapid breathing.
My top lip curled, exposing my teeth. Remi tilted his head, listening. His lips parted, his pupils swallowing the blue of his irises.
He could hear it, too.
The panic. The futility.
The breaking.
I let him go first.
He stalked forward, movements predatory, controlled. His fingers flexed once before curling into fists. He was savoring it.
I leaned against the desk, rolling my shoulders as I watched him push the bathroom door open. And there she was. Shaking. Shivering.
Brielle was curled in the corner tub, her arms wrapped around her knees, her face blotchy with tears and panic.
She had lost the polished, put-together exterior she’d worn like armor before Remi played god with her psyche. There was no power left in her. No control.
Just fear.
She looked up, eyes darting between us, her breath hitching on a silent sob. “P-please…” she whispered. “Please?—”
Remi knelt in front of her, tilted his head, and tutted. She flinched. Like a beaten dog. I snorted at her. Pathetic.
His fingers ghosted over her cheek, tracing the path of a tear. “You look awful, Brielle,” he murmured. His voice was soft. Almost affectionate.
I ached for him.
For this. For us.
I crouched beside him, letting my blade catch the flickering light. “You know,” I mused, my gaze boring into her. “I expected more from you.”
Her lip trembled as I dragged the tip of my knife down her cheek, tracing the tracks of her tears, slow and deliberate. She didn’t even move.
She knew. She fucking knew.
There was no running.
No escape.
Remi smiled and moved like lightning. His fist connected with her temple, knocking her out cold. She collapsed in a heap in the tub before the sound of the impact had even died.
With swift efficiency, we had her bound and in the trunk of the Escalade I’d picked up. We were heading to an abandoned papermill to send Brielle to her death.
“Wake up, bitch.”
The words left my mouth in a low growl as I upended the bucket of ice-cold water over her head. Brielle jolted violently, choking, gasping—eyes snapping open and darting around like a trapped animal. The color drained from her face the moment she took in her surroundings.
“P-please…” she whimpered, her swollen, bloodshot gaze locking onto Remi. A desperate, pleading whisper of his name— “R-Remi.”
Her body shook, limbs twitching as she tried to lift a trembling hand—only then realizing she was bound, wrists and ankles strapped to the chair sitting, in a growing pool of water.
“Fuck you,” Remi spat, his lip curling in disgust. “After what you did to Mom, you think I’d help you?”
“I-I never did anything…” she croaked, tears and snot mixing as they ran down her face.
Remi tilted his head, something sharp and dark twisting in his expression. He liked it when they lied. He liked the way they clung to denial as if it could save them.
“You never did anything?”
He circled her, measured, deliberate—his boots splashing through the filthy water, the steady rhythm of his steps echoing through the abandoned papermill. The birds nesting in the rafters startled and fluttered at the sound. In the dim light, his blade spun between his fingers, flashing silver as he weighed his options. How best to make her suffer. How best to make it last.
She didn’t deserve a quick death.
Brielle let out a strangled sob, her whole body quivering as she fought for breath. The chair wobbled under her, unsteady on the wet concrete.
In a blink, Remi was behind her.
One hand fisted in her hair, yanking her head back at a vicious angle, exposing the trembling column of her throat. The other pressed his blade to her skin, just enough to let her feel the cold kiss of steel.
When he spoke, his voice slithered down my spine, making the hairs on my arms stand on end.
“I think you wanted me and Mom here because you saw dollar signs.”
Not a question. A fact.
Her head jerked side to side, flinging spit and tears in wide arcs. “No. No, I-I?—”
Remi backhanded her so hard her head snapped sideways, blood staining her teeth. The imprint of his hand bloomed in scarlet against her sickly pale cheek. His breathing quickened, his shoulders rising and falling with barely contained rage.
“You knew about my trust fund, Brielle.”
She was unraveling, hyperventilating, mumbling nonsense, like a priest reciting a prayer before the slaughter.
Remi chuckled—a low, hollow sound—and crouched in front of her, ice-blue eyes alight with something near euphoric. “You knew about it. I saw the paperwork.”
Her whimpering grew more frantic. “No. No, I-I?—”
“You were the co-signer,” he murmured, tilting his head as if marveling at her audacity. “Don’t fucking lie to me.”
Fresh tears spilled down her face as if she thought she could weep her sins away. But only God could grant that mercy—and she wasn’t in the company of angels.
“I-It was… it was B-Brock’s idea,” she rasped, eyes flicking between us.
Remi’s face twisted in disgust. A lie. A pathetic, grasping lie.
“You’re a fucking waste of oxygen,” he sneered, pacing before her, kicking up dirty water that splashed against her trembling legs. “Mom never said why she cut you off, but I get it now.” He stopped, glaring down at her. “She saw what you were. The ugly under the cheap dye job and the caked-on makeup.”
“That’s not?—”
“I don’t want to hear it,” he snapped. “You don’t need a voice anymore.”
A grin split his face, maniacal, unhinged. His eyes burned with something primal, something ravenous.
This was his kill. His moment.
“Domino?”
I met his gaze and tipped my head, my pulse thrumming with the electric thrill of his madness. “Whatever you need, piccolo agnello. ”
His lips curled. “Hold her head. I’ve had enough of her voice.”
I stepped forward, wrapping an arm around Brielle’s skull, pressing the back of her head against my stomach. She squirmed, pathetically weak, her panicked breath fogging the air.
“Thank you.” Remi blew me a kiss. His expression was drenched in bloodlust. Pure. Unfiltered. Beautiful. “Now, pull her jaw down.”
A pleased hum rumbled in my chest. I loved it when his darkness broke free.
Hooking two fingers over her teeth, I wrenched her mouth open. She thrashed, her strangled scream cutting off into a garbled choke as Remi gripped her tongue and stretched it past her lips.
Slowly. Methodically.
He pressed the blade to the soft flesh.
And sliced.
She bucked against me, gurgling, blood pouring down her chin, soaking into her cream-colored blouse. The wet, slopping sounds of agony that wrenched from her throat were barely human. She was an animal now. Reduced to instinct. Drowning in suffering.
By the time Remi stepped back, holding the severed piece between his fingers, Brielle was already slumping, hovering on the verge of unconsciousness.
“Not yet,” he growled.
I smirked, warmth flooding my veins, and delivered a sharp slap across her cheek. Her head snapped to the side, eyes rolling back in her head. She gurgled, broken and barely breathing, but awake enough.
Blood slicked Remi’s fingers as he crouched before her, holding the mangled chunk of flesh like a prize. His other hand scooped up the rest of the butchered remnants he’d diced into small, jagged pieces.
He dangled one before her wide, terror-glazed eyes. “Open your mouth.”
Brielle pressed her lips shut, trembling.
With one look, I knew what he wanted. I wrenched her head back again, forcing her mouth open as Remi dropped the piece onto her tongue.
“Swallow,” he ordered, voice dark with amusement.
She shook her head violently.
Remi tsked. “I will make you if you don’t.” He tilted his head, letting her feel his breath ghost over her tear-streaked face. “If I have to force you, it’ll be one piece at a time. Over. And over. And over again.”
Brielle was weak.
And weakness always chose the coward’s way out.
For the next ten minutes, we repeated the same motions. Head wrenched back. Jaw pried open. Tongue forced down her throat.
Swallow.
Gag.
Vomit.
Repeat.
Every time she retched, Remi pinched her nose, forcing it back down. Every choked sob, every convulsion, every strangled attempt to resist only fed his hunger.
The air reeked of blood, bile, and fear. It was cruel. It was deranged. But it was exactly what a lying, thieving snake like her deserved.
Remi wrapped his arms around my waist, burying his head in my chest. My lips brushed the top of his head, inhaling his scent, imprinting it on my lungs. My gaze never left Brielle’s slumped form.
Broken whimpers filled the space, reverberating off the metal walls like a death knell.
“Have you decided how you want to end her?”
Remi tipped his head back, and all I saw in him was darkness—the same abyss that lived in me. A wicked grin ghosted his lips as his bloodied hands slid up my chest and curled around my neck, fingers toying with the short hairs at my nape. The sensation sent a shudder rippling through me. His touch wasn’t just physical; it reached into the tattered remnants of my soul, claiming what was already his.
“Yes,” he breathed against my lips before sealing his mouth over mine.
His tongue swept along my lower lip, and I opened for him willingly, tasting the metallic tang of blood as I deepened the kiss, licking into his mouth. My blood burned molten, pumping through me like liquid fire. He rolled his hips against mine, teasing, dragging against me with each slow, deliberate movement.
“Fuck, Remi,” I growled, nipping and sucking along his jaw, trailing my teeth to the sensitive skin at the base of his ear. “Tell me what deplorable things you’re going to do to her.”
Remi tipped his head back and groaned when I slid my thigh between his legs, my fingers digging into the firm curve of his ass. He was insatiable when his bloodlust took hold, and I wanted to feel every inch of it consume him. Every slice of flesh, every drop of blood—it was foreplay in its most exquisite form.
“I’m going to watch her burn,” he whispered, voice thick with promise. “I want to hear every soul-shredding scream.”
His words broke on a shuddering breath as I licked a slow path up the column of his throat, my tongue tracing the frantic rhythm of his pulse.
“Let’s make it happen.” I pressed a bruising kiss to his lips before reining myself back in, locking down the hunger clawing at my ribs. Remi groaned in frustration, his hands clenching at his sides.
“I’ll fuck you so hard once she’s dead…” My voice dripped with venomous devotion, my promise laced with poison. “I’ll bury my cock so deep inside you, I’ll be dripping out of you for a week. You’ll remember me every time you move. Feel me even when I’m not there.”
His breath hitched. We were carved from the same depraved mold, bound by something darker than love—an obsession that devoured and fed us in equal measure. Whether we survived was a question only the devil knew the answer to.
“Fine,” he ground out between clenched teeth.
His sharp gaze swept the dilapidated building, his thumb and forefinger tracing his chin as he pieced together his masterpiece.
“Alright.” He straightened, eyes gleaming with cruel delight. “See those broken cables?” He pointed to the frayed wires hanging from a rusted roof strut, their ends sparking like tiny, lethal fireflies. “Use those muscles of yours and pull them over here.”
I turned on my heel, ready to obey, when his voice froze me mid-step.
“Make sure you don’t touch the exposed ends.”
I scoffed, glancing over my shoulder. “What am I, an amateur?”
Remi chuckled, crouching to gather the rusted nails and jagged shards of corrugated iron that littered the ground.
Eyeing him suspiciously, I asked, “What are you doing?”
His lips curled into something dangerous. “I’m going to wake her up. Wouldn’t want her to miss her own execution.”
The devil and all his demons danced in the inferno of his eyes. They weren’t just reflections—they were living, breathing entities, whispering to him, urging him on.
My fingers wrapped around the plastic-coated cable, yanking it free of the tacks that anchored it to the support beam. The first tack gave way with a groan of metal.
A scream shattered the air.
I turned, my breath catching at the sight before me. Remi knelt beside Brielle, a rusted nail pressed to her thigh, his other hand wielding a brick as a hammer. With a single, decisive strike, he drove it deep into muscle. Blood welled around the jagged metal, spreading through her pale blue jeans in a slow, creeping stain of crimson.
Her cries were raw, barbed sobs torn straight from the depths of agony.
With the cables freed, I coiled them over my shoulder and stepped behind him. He worked with cruel precision, embedding nails, slivers of rusted metal—each one a conductor, a gateway to the torment we had planned. The cacophony of her screams was a symphony of suffering, a beautifully discordant melody that thrummed through my bones.
Federico’s would sound even sweeter once I had him under my tender, loving care.
“You done?” I asked, my pulse thrumming in anticipation.
Remi didn’t look up. “I’ve only just begun.”
His gaze flicked to the coiled cable over my shoulder, the live end held safely in my hands, his fingers twitching with barely contained excitement. The air crackled, static energy thickening the space between us.
Remi grasped the cable, carefully positioning the exposed wire end against the embedded nails and metal lodged in Brielle’s leg. The moment contact was made, the dim, dust-coated bulbs overhead flickered, their filaments screaming before shattering in bursts of dying light.
Brielle arched violently, her head snapping back as a hundred and twenty volts surged through her. Her body jerked, muscles contracting so brutally she nearly lifted from the chair. Her teeth were clenched, foam bubbling at her lips as she choked on her agony.
Remi watched, entranced, then threw the second cable into the stagnant puddle beneath her chair.
The sound of her torment was unholy. The air filled with the stench of searing flesh, the acrid smoke curling in thick, suffocating tendrils. Her skin blackened, blistering, peeling back in charred ribbons as electricity crashed through her, in wave after relentless wave.
We watched. We waited. When her blackened body finally stilled, her eyes were glassy and hollow, and we knew?—
She had accepted the inevitable.
She had burned.
And we had won.