Page 93 of Depraved

Never.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

GRANITE

A river of crimson flowed across the floor, rounding my boot. It was beautiful, soothing, calming. Knowing it was Python blood freed me of my guilt for a few moments. I chose to savor those moments because soon the peace would be gone, replaced by the suffocating remorse.

The poor fuck screamed as Ink pressed the scorching hot blade against his cheek. I could hear the sizzle as his flesh seared and melted. When Ink pulled his knife away, the charred skin bubbled with blood and ooze.

We’d been pulling this man apart for the last two hours. It was easy to lure him here with a whore spitting promises of sucking his dick. But rather than finding pleasure, he strolled right into a fuck-load of pain waiting for him in an abandoned building far away from where anyone could hear him scream. Now he was hanging from the ceiling, wrists tied above his head with chains holding him in place.

Ink took the blowtorch and heated the knife again. Judging by the malice painted across his skin, Ink was far from done.

“Fuck it.” Ink tossed the knife aside and rounded to stand behind the Python, who had been weeping. With every tear that crossed his burned flesh, he screamed even harder. Nothing like salt on open wounds.

“Granite, you got another knife?”

I plucked one out of the side of my boot and handed it to him.

“What…please…” the SOB begged, but his voice was barely audible, exhausted as fuck.

I moved to stand behind Ink, wanting to watch what his evil mind was going to make him do now. It was entertaining as hell, watching his demons give him the strength to torture the shit out of this man. And by shit…I meant shit. He had pissed himself twice, and judging by the putrid smell that clung to the air in the small, confined space we were in, I’d say he shit himself as well.

Ink took my knife and tore through the guy’s shirt. The Python cried out, a streak of blood running down his spine. Ink didn’t exactly care whether he sliced the fucker’s skin while he tore through the fabric.

Ink lit the blowtorch, glanced over his shoulder, and winked at me. “Time to get extreme. I’d close my ears if I were you.”

“Nah. Make him scream me a melody.”

Ink laughed. “Got it, boss man.”

The Python tried to look over his shoulder. “Please…what are you—” And then he screamed. No, he fucking wailed and shrieked, the sound reaching a pitch it hadn’t before.

Ink moved the blowtorch—slowly, torturously—the flame burning the skin of the guy’s back.

On and on and on the screams went, an unending sonnet of pain and suffering. It was fucking beautiful. Mix those tormented sounds with the horrid stench of burning flesh, and we had ourselves a fucking party.

Ink laughed manically, consumed by rage and a hunger for torture.

Abruptly, the screams stopped, the Python’s head lolling to the front.

Ink looked at me. “Did the fucker pass out? Tell me the fucker didn’t pass out.”

“Yup. He passed out. Or he’s dead.”

“Seriously? This was just starting to get fun.” Ink threw the blowtorch down on the ground, annoyed that our little Python voodoo doll decided to check out.

I walked around, stared at the fucker’s mutilated face, one ear cleanly cut off, an eye shut and still bleeding from my thumb I had forced into his eye socket earlier. I placed a finger to his neck, not caring that he was covered in blood. My hands were already soaked with it.

“Yup. He’s dead.”

“Oh, come on!” Ink threw my knife across the room and against the wall. “I still have a list of shit I want to do to this motherfucker.”

Stepping back around, I stopped beside him and stared at the corpse’s back. “Nice,” I commented, admiring Ink’s handiwork—a giant, distorted K burned into the flesh. A cruel way of engraving our mark on the fucker’s flesh.

“Symbolic, right?” Ink grinned. “From now on, every one of these fuckers will have this burned into their flesh for what they did to her.”

“Yeah, I feel ya.” I leaned back against the wall and lit a cigarette, taking the time to soak it all in. Soon, the adrenaline would subside, and guilt would once again take its place, so I appreciated every goddamn second of relief this bloody scene brought me.