LEROI
I lean against the wall of the truck with my arms folded across my chest. The space behind the apartment block is deserted six days out of seven, and the vehicle we’re in is completely sound-proofed. Seraphine can torture this man to her heart’s content without the risk of being disturbed.
The first instrument she snatches off the table is a paring knife, one of the few Anton recommends for precision work. Julio Catania stares with wide-eyed horror as she runs the flat of the blade up and down his flushed cheeks. He’s sweating and shaking under her scrutiny.
“You’re going to tell me what you know about my brother, or I’ll slice off your iris.”
He squeezes his eyes shut and sobs. “That night Frederic punished Evangeline, he sent out two pairs of guards to fetch the son and daughter—”
“Which guards?” she asks.
“It was five years ago,” he yells. “I don’t remember.”
“Try.”
She presses the tip of its blade into his eye socket, drawing out a bead of blood. As it runs down his cheek, my mind sinks back to the time she pinned me to the mattress and held me at knifepoint.
My cock stirs at the memory, and I groan. I’m not a masochist or in any way submissive, but I can’t help but marvel at the thought of her taking what she wants from me at knifepoint.
I close my eyes, pushing aside the thought of what else she might have taken that morning, and focus on the moment. The consequences will be dire for both of us if we don’t find Gabriel and Samson Capello.
Catania screams, and my eyes snap open. She’s carved a line from the corner of his lip to his cheekbone in a sick parody of a smile.
“You held her down and laughed as you choked out her life,” she says, her voice raw. “You all laughed.”
My breath quickens, as does my pulse. There’s nothing I despise more than a man who overpowers a woman and disregards her humanity.
Catania jerks his head away. “The guards he sent after the son were Ferrante and Rochas. The pair who were supposed to get the daughter came back ten minutes later to say she was gone.”
Seraphine’s gaze darts to mine, and I nod. Mike Ferrante and Paolo Rochas are already on the list of people we need to see, but I’ll bump them up to the top.
“What do you know about Samson?” she asks.
“He’s dead, along with the others.”
“I saw him yesterday.” She walks behind him and grabs his neck in a choke hold.
Catania shakes his head from side to side. “You’re wrong. When I got to the house the day after the shooting, there were twelve body bags. One of them was labeled Samson Capello.”
“Then someone lied.” She positions the knife at the other corner of his mouth and slices upward, completing the grotesque grin.
With blood streaming from the base of his eye socket like tears and both sides of his mouth smeared with blood, Catania looks like a broken clown.
Artistic.
I rub my chin. How many lies is he prepared to tell for his new boss? All clues point to Samson being alive, starting with the mystery client who wants me dead and ending with Seraphine seeing him outside the club. There’s no other explanation.
“Who identified the bodies?” she asks.
I nod. Whoever lied about Samson being among the corpses must have colluded with him to form the pretense that he was dead. I’m impressed that Seraphine is keeping a cool head during the interrogation, even if her methods are unconventional.
He coughs, spraying blood across the floor. “Rochas said he walked around and found the family murdered in their beds.”
Paolo Rochas moves to the very top of our list.
Seraphine asks a few more questions, mostly rephrasing her previous inquiries to see if Catania’s answers change, but they don’t. Eventually, she tilts her head. “Is that everything you know about Samson and Gabriel?”
“I swear it. On my daughter’s life.”
“Then I hope she’ll appreciate that I’m getting rid of one more rapist,” she says, her lip curling.
His eyes widen. “But I’ve told you all I know—”
“It’s time to pay for what you did to Evangeline.”
“She was a whore,” Catania yells. “Evangeline was fucking Raphael the entire time she was with Frederic. She only got was what coming—”
Seraphine plunges the knife into his gut, twisting his words into an anguished howl. “Now, you know what it feels like to be penetrated against your will.”
Blood spills down Catania’s belly and soaks into his pants. The vehicle’s walls tremble with his screams. She shoves the knife in and out of the same spot over and over in rhythmic thrusts.
A shiver runs down my spine and settles in my balls. If she wanted him dead, she would have chosen a longer knife or stabbed a vital organ. She’s showing him what it’s like to be violated.
“Stop,” he rasps. “I’ll tell you everything.”
Seraphine pauses, mid-thrust. “Go on.”
“Samson is alive,” he slurs, barely able to form the words through his pain. “I haven’t seen him since Frederic’s birthday party. He’s keeping a low profile until the people responsible for killing the family are dead.”
I turn my attention to Seraphine, who asks, “Where is he staying?”
“It was his fiancée’s house at first,” he says through panting breaths. “But after they got to her father, he moved somewhere else and didn’t say.”
What?
Miko and I didn’t pick up any signs of Samson at Joseph Di Marco’s house unless he was staying in the servant’s quarters or in a building on the grounds.
“Put down the knife,” Catania sobs. “I’ll do anything. I’ll even go back to them for you and spy.”
She returns the paring knife to the table, making me frown. Surely she doesn’t believe this asshole? Her fingers hover over the tools, pausing briefly at the spirit level before she picks up a claw hammer and the measuring tape.
“You like choking women while fucking them,” she says, her voice flat.
“What?” He shakes his head. “I-I don’t—”
She swings the claw hammer and connects it with Catania’s nose, eliciting a howl that spikes my pulse. Blood explodes from the wound and splatters across her beautiful face.
My balls tighten at her elegant display of violence, and my cock pushes painfully against my zipper. I can’t believe I ever criticized her methods. Seraphine is an artist.
Instead of swinging once more, she walks behind Catania and loops the measuring tape around his neck.
“This is what it feels like to be choked,” she snarls, her voice menacing.
As she tugs on the tape, Catania’s eyes widen. I step forward to get a closer look. I’ve seen garrotes made of wire or rope or even neckties, but never one fashioned out of something so mundane. She twists it around her hand, pulling it even higher around his neck.
Catania wheezes and gasps, his face turning a deep shade of red that matches the blood still weeping from his injuries. His breaths become labored, his eyes bulge, and he thrashes within his restraints.
“Take it, whore,” Seraphine yells over the sounds of his screams. “Take it all.”
With her free hand, she jams the hammer’s handle into his stab wound, making me groan. I have never seen someone so small and innocent commit such a violent act of justice.
Seraphine’s cheeks are flushed the way they were when we were in the fetish store. Without the contact lenses, her eyes are blue and bright, giving me glimpses of the insanity that dwells within her soul. It’s creative, spontaneous, and thrilling. My breath quickens, and I regret not being awake during her poker massacre.
She’s an avenging angel, bathed with righteousness and blood. An avenging angel I am aching to taste.
I’ve never been more aroused.
Catania’s gaze meets mine in a silent plea for mercy, but I’m so mesmerized by Seraphine’s ability to improvise that I can’t even muster up the words to tell him he brought this punishment onto himself.
Because he did.
He should have refused Capello’s depraved order, but he followed it out of a desire to degrade Evangeline. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d already harbored sick thoughts about Seraphine’s mother, and that moment was the culmination of his twisted dreams. Now, he’s being violated and strangled by a beautiful woman.
What a way to die.
Possessiveness overwhelms my thoughts at the sight of Seraphine violating another man. I want to be the one who makes her blood run hot, the one to take her to the brink of pleasure.
Catania falls limp. I can’t tell if he’s dead or just unconscious, but I don’t care.
I push off the wall and stalk toward Seraphine, who gazes up at me with defiance.
My cock throbs with the need to own her, claim her, make her mine, but I swore to myself that I wouldn’t get involved.
No kissing.
No penetrative sex.
That was our arrangement.
“I made another mess,” she says, her voice husky.
“You did.” I cup the side of her face.
She lowers her lashes, her breath coming in shallow pants as though she finds my touch electrifying. When she raises her gaze to meet mine again, her eyes spark with desire. They’re a silent plea for me to take control.
Shit.
I should send her back to the apartment, wait until my blood is cooled, or even walk away. I should distract her with the mention of Gabriel.
But I can’t.
I can’t focus on anything but Seraphine’s hunger.
There’s a darkness to her that draws me in so deeply that I lose all notions of good intentions.
My thumb brushes over her bottom lip, making her shiver. She takes another step closer until we’re breathing the same air. When she presses against me and brings her mouth closer to mine, my resolve not to get involved crumbles.
It’s just one kiss. Just one taste.
“Fuck it.”
I lean down and press my lips to hers, and instantly regret it. Kissing Seraphine is like finding home. As I pull back, she loops the tape measure around the back of my neck and holds me in place.
