Page 117 of Captive Ruin

He stares at me, sobbing. “Then… then… why should I tell you anything?”

“A good question,” I concede, dropping the bloody pliers onto the tray and picking up the corkscrew instead. “If you want an incentive, I hear a quick death is preferable to a slow one.”

“Get me the fuck down, or I swear I’ll break every bone in your body before I put a bullet in your skull.”

Vadim Sorokin is a tall, dangerous man. Less dangerous dangling from a girder with a chain around his neck and his hands bound.

“You recruited Serranto,” I say, using the tip of my karambit to remove a fleck of dried blood from beneath my nail. No matter how much I scrub, I always seem to miss bits, and I want to keep myself clean for Amelia. “You’re the brigadir he worked beneath.”

Sorokin scowls. “Since you know so much, you’ll know what happens to stupid fucks like you. I’ll find out where you live. I’ll find out who you work for. I’ll fucking rip—”

“Enough.” I hold my karambit before his face to emphasize the point.

“You don’t have the balls,” he sneers. “You wouldn’t dare touch me. I’m not going to tell you a goddamn thing, and your only choice will be to run.”

“Oh, do be quiet,” I say, bored. “Which one of us is chained up? Which one of us is bleeding? Now, we’re going to have a nice chat about Dmitri Koval, and you’re going to—”

“Don’t you know who I am?” Sorokin grinds out. “I’m not telling you shit. Your only option is to run.”

I sigh and shake my head. “I’m getting married in four days,” I tell him. “I don’t really want to be doing this right now. I’d much rather be spending the time with my beautiful fiancée.”

“You’re a dead man!” he yells, spit flying from his lips. “You’re fucking dead, you hear me? Not just you, but everyone you know!”

“Charming, but there are rules. Even scum like you have a sense of honor.”

“I don’t give a fuck about honor or rules! And now I know you have a fiancée.” His eyes narrow, boring into me. “My men will find her. They’re going to take turns with her. Are you still going to marry her when you come back home and find out what they’ve done? Or do you want to get me the fuck down!”

I grab his ear, pulling it away from the side of his head, and then cut it off. Cartilage is tough and even though my knife is sharp, it still takes a minute. I’m not careful, and the result isn’t a clean slice but a jagged tear. Sorokin curses in Russian the whole time, his voice going surprisingly high for such a big man.

I drop it on the floor and wait for him to stop gibbering. “Of all the things you could’ve said, threatening Amelia was the most foolish.”

He laughs through his pain, blood running down the side of his neck. “You shouldn’t have shared her name, you mudak. My men will enjoy your shlyukha—”

“I don’t speak Russian,” I say coldly, my rage building past the point of control.

“Whore-slut!” He spits at me. “That’s all she’ll be when we’re done with her! Married or not, we’re going to find her! We’ll leave her begging for more Russian cock, and—”

He gurgles, eyes going wide, staring down at his chest at the blood streaming down it. His throat gapes in a red crescent, like a macabre smile, but it’s not enough to sate my rage. I bury my blade in his eyeball, and keep going until the hilt jams against his socket.

He twitches in his chains, then goes still.

Only then does my fury abate.

Shit.

I step back, taking in a long, shuddering breath.

Sorokin is about as dead as it’s possible to be, and I didn’t get a single thing out of him.

It’s my own damn fault. I’m Lukas Van Wyk. I don’t lose control.

But the way he was talking about Amelia… the images he left in my mind.

I scowl at his corpse. I’d fucking kill him again if I could. Would Haynes consider me truly insane if I had him look into necromancy?

I sigh, and turn away. Now I have a body to clean up, traces to eliminate, blood to get out of my clothes. And for what?

I’m back to square one. All this effort wasted, because I couldn’t control my temper.