Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 105506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Yes, he would get more and more famous with every murder.
Eventually, there would be some kind of documentary, a made for TV movie. There would be books. Everyone would know his name.
But mine? No.
You know Ted Bundy, Jeffery Dahmer, but can you name one of their victims? Can you recall their hopes, dreams, the lives they lived before a sick piece of shit stole everything from them?
Yeah, history was not written for the victims. I’d be another nameless girl. Another body. People would speak about my injuries, my torture, on their podcasts in a grim tone but unable to cover the sick high they got from this stuff.
Girls just like me would watch the videos while doing their makeup, while drinking wine, while curled up in bed, covered in a veil of safety that was total bullshit.
I thought about my parents.
I hadn’t spoken to them in years. Not since I screamed expletives at them while dragging my suitcase out of the door of my childhood home. They’d called. Written letters. But I’d ignored them until the calls and letters dwindled.
They’d get the news their daughter died at the hands of a serial killer who targeted whores. Would they be surprised? They’d grieve. They’d pray. They’d bury me in the cemetery of a church I’d denounced.
But eventually, I’d be forgotten.
HANSEN
I’d seen a lot of shit.
Both while I was deployed and when I was wearing the Sons of Templar patch. Horrific shit. Shit that followed you. Gave you nightmares. Hardened you. Made you just a little jaded to the horrors of the world. And if you somehow didn’t get jaded, living that horrific shit, it would eat you alive.
I’d turned some part of myself off. Had to. In order to survive. Many men who didn’t find good women would never find that switch, the one that would bring your humanity back, ensure you didn’t become ambivalent, cold and eventually turn into a monster.
I had a good woman.
Children.
I had a reason to keep my humanity.
But still, even then, I was hardened to the shit that would fuck up most people. Had to be. For my kids. My wife. Had to find a way to keep my distance so I didn’t bring blood back into my home. My bed.
I had thought nothing could shock me anymore until we made it to the warehouse where Sariah was being held.
But seeing her cut through every fucking inch of distance I’d created to keep my humanity intact. It shook me in a way even the atrocities of war didn’t.
Because this wasn’t war.
This was a fucking twenty-year-old girl. Chained. Bleeding. In a state that I couldn’t even comprehend for a handful of seconds.
Acid crawled up my throat, and it took everything I had to keep my lunch down.
Jagger paled beside me, the man who had seen worse shit than me, the man who literally let his family and the woman he loved think he was dead rather than let them see what war had turned him into.
One of the prospects turned and emptied his guts in the corner.
Hades, only fucking Hades, was the one not to stutter, to not fucking pause but step through, putting his boot in her blood—the fucking pools of her blood—and kneel down.
She scuttled away from him like a tortured animal. My stomach spasmed at the sight, swallowing bile once again.
I didn’t hear what Hades was saying, but the man spoke softly, softer than I’d ever fucking heard the motherfucker speak while addressing Sariah, coaxing her back to reality.
I turned to Jagger, trying to get my head straight.
“Where’s Colby?” I demanded. There were two structures on the property, Colby had gone to the first, along with Javier.
Jagger kept his eyes on Sariah, blank and horrified for a beat before he visibly shook himself and focused on me, game face on.
But the motherfucker was shaken. You could see it in his eyes. I’d wager a guess you could see it in mine too.
“Five minutes out,” Jagger replied. “Likely less.”
“He can’t see her like this,” I sighed, staring at Hades as he inspected the cuff on her ankle.
“Too fuckin’ late,” a voice said from behind us.
We both turned to Colby who was standing right behind us, staring at Sariah with a vacant expression. Though he was a deadly fucker in his own right, he was jovial. Young. Easy to smile. He’d already done shit most men wouldn’t in a lifetime. He’d seen blood. He’d drawn it. Yet somehow, it hadn’t yet seeped into him. Somehow, I’d always thought of him as a kid.
But, Jesus, if he looked like he’d aged a decade in a manner of seconds.
A gunshot ricocheted through the large area, echoing off the concrete walls.
We were all accustomed to gunshots and weren’t easily spooked, but each of us flinched at the sound.
I looked over my shoulder.