Page 38 of Dead Girls Don’t Forget

His eyes flashed gold.

I smiled. “I can see your wolf. He wants to take over. You’re just too fucking slow.”

Richard had always been slow to shift. He knew the half-shift would get him killed.

He roared and charged. I tried to circle, but the rage made him faster than I expected. We traded blows. I landed a solid cross to his body and he answered with a heavy hook that caught my shoulder and spun me. Another punch grazed my temple.

I was hurting now. Breathing hard. But so was he.

I waited for the next swing, stepped inside it, and hit him in sequence: cross to the body, hook to the temple, elbow to the jaw. His head snapped back. I planted my boot in his chest and drove him flat onto his back, then was on him before he could recover, driving another punch with the titanium gloves into his already ruined nose.

“You fucking whore,” he spat, blood bubbling on his lips. “I’m gonna break your fucking back.”

He tried to push up. I drove my fist into his kidney and he dropped back with a grunt.

“No. You’re not.” I looked down at him. “But I appreciate the confidence.”

He snarled, his wolf trying to surface again. I shut it down with two hard shots to the temple. He went slack, eyes unfocused, body heavy—exactly where I needed him.

I got up, grabbed my pack, and pulled out the one thing I’d brought for him: a compact cordless nail gun I’d tested in the woods for this exact night.

He was still disoriented when I crouched back beside him. I grabbed his left hand, slammed it hard against the floor, and fired twice. The sharp thunk-thunk of nails driving into hardwood cut through his scream. His right hand swung wildly. I leaned back and cracked him across the face with the gun, then pinned that hand down too. Six more nails, fast and methodical, spreading across both palms until he was locked to the floor.

He twisted violently onto his side, pinned in place, screaming.

I sat back on my heels and studied him.

“You remember me yet?” I asked.

“Who the fuck are you?” he gasped, tears and snot cutting through the blood on his face. “I don’t know you. I swear to God I don’t—”

I pulled the hunting knife from my bag and turned it slowly in the low light.

“You know,” I said. “The mind is a cruel thing. It keeps the wrong memories sharp. What you did to me. What you did to my sister. Every word. Every sound. I still carry it all perfectly.”

I let the silence stretch.

“But my mother’s laugh… my sister’s smile. Those are fading. The good things blur. The worst stay sharp forever.”

I met his eyes. “I thought you should know what you took from me.”

He stared at me, caught between pain and confusion. I watched him struggle with the math, a man attempting to match a face to a memory he had never bothered to keep, because why would he? I had been nobody to him. Just a girl on the floor.

"Who are you," he said again, quieter this time. Not the demand of before. Something closer to dread.

“Don’t worry, Richard.” I said his name the way he once said mine, with that same casual ownership. “I want you to enjoy this. It’ll feel good.” His own words, given back to him.

I drove the knife into his thigh, hilt deep.

The scream that followed stretched long. He finally understood this would not end quickly.

When he found breath again he really looked at me. The color drained from his face.

"No. It can't be. You're dead. You're supposed to be dead."

"You're not the first to say that," I said. "You won't be the last."

His eyes widened. "Colton. Jesus. It was you. You killed Colton."