Body Tox (The Bodies duet #1)

Prologue

B lood…

Such an interesting anomaly to me. The crimson pools of ecstasy it created. I wanted it. I needed it. I craved it with every drop that pumped through my veins.

Oh, to spill the blood of another—to see the droplets well and run down human papery skin…

The human body was a ‘fickle bitch.’ It wasn’t an impenetrable wall from death, as society implied, but it wasn’t as fragile as mythical creatures created in fantasies were, either. Those were illusions conjured up for campfire stories to scare little children and those gullible enough to believe all that shit.

No, in fact, the human body was quite malleable. For example, the bones jutting out from the male’s fingers in front of me now had bamboo shoots tucked neatly into his nail beds.

“Too easy,” I sighed, watching my beautiful victim’s veins pump wildly in his neck.

I knew I couldn’t spill his blood even though my mouth watered at the thought. But giving in to my addiction would make me lose control, and I had a job to do.

Get the information, and get the girl—simplicity at its finest.

I liked it when things were simple. It made it easy to get paid, and this newest contract would be the easiest paycheck I had ever gotten.

I didn’t have much information on the hit. I was just supposed to show proof when it was complete. That part was going to be annoying. In order to get proof, I couldn’t just use my sniper rifle to shoot the female from afar. No, I had to be up close and personal.

That was why I now found myself inside an abandoned arcade. The stench of this place reeked of old stale weed and musty sex. It made sense. There were used condoms, food wrappers, and god knows what kind of liquid swarming all over the place.

I snapped on my gloves, knowing I could not touch the heat of the blood. This moron had gone and busted a blood vessel, and now his nose was dripping.

Fucking hell….

I closed my eyes, trying to block out the sweet metallic tang in the air. My mouth watered for just a single taste.

Get the information, and get the girl.

Shaking my head, I tried to break the spell that the man’s blood dripping on the ceramic tile was causing.

What a fucking waste.

“Pl-please! I don’t know what you want. Please, I will give you anything. Just stop torturing me!”

Sadly for this poor sack of meat, all I wanted from him was the little trinket around his neck—well, that and his unfortunate disappearance.

“Sorry, Victor,” I said, the lie drifting on my tongue. “But what I need from you is not something you can provide for me.”

The middle-aged man looked puzzled, genuinely struggling to comprehend what I could possibly want from him. His beady eyes told me plenty, but the light from the blinking arcade games allowed him to see me. I wasn’t sure if that was a plus or not.

“I require your silence,” I said.

Victor rocked his duct-taped form back-and-forth in the chair. His gut spilled out from under his ruined guard’s shirt, causing the blood dripping from his nose to stain the white material. The droplets fell with a plop, plop, plop , like water from a faucet, making a delicious sound as they soaked into the fabric.

The blood…my prey… No, don’t pull away from me.

“Just…a taste,” I said, that river of red splashing onto my gloved hand.

“What? Man…you are insane! Help! Somebody help!”

The blubbering windbag’s whining, I ignored and watched the delicious red liquid slide down my nylon glove. I trailed its movements, tracking the droplet with each daring glide it made.

“Just a taste,” I repeated, completely dazed with the dangerous dance as I opened my mouth, leaning over him, ready for that electric shock to tantalize my tongue.

Bang!

Jolted, I stood upright as if a bolt of lightning had zapped me.

Brain matter and blood splattered across my face and body, coating me like a second skin. Turning, I gaped at the shotgun-sized hole that went right through what used to be Victor’s face.

Following the echo of the sound, there, at the door, stood the Debt Collector. He was shrouded in the street’s cover of darkness, the end of his old-fashioned shotgun still smoking.

“This was your first lesson in changing your... interesting ways, Asher,” he said, his hat covering his face. He paused and used his handkerchief to wipe off the blood spray that reached him.

Victor’s head looked like someone popped a balloon with spaghetti sauce. Red dripped from the archaic old games, the ceiling, and the glass counter with abandoned trinkets.

Everywhere. Red. So. Much . Blood .

“Don’t give in to temptation. You have an addiction, boy…and until you get over that, you aren’t gonna be of use to me. Before you can do this job, I need you to prove you can overcome your drug of choice.”

I growled, my body shaking with the restraint to keep my fingers from my mouth. I wanted to lick the fucking floor.

“You are unhinged Asher. You are a monster, and if you want to look normal in the eyes of society and hide the beast inside you, then I suggest you walk away.”

“Why would you do that?” I said, frustrated with the obvious exasperation in my tone.

The Debt Collector chuckled and lit a match on the tip of his pipe, flicking it behind me.

“Choose, my boy.” He smirked as the flames began to spread. “You choose your addiction now, and you burn in the trap you created for yourself. Or you leave it here and never again succumb to it. You rise above it and become what I need.”

I growled, the heat of the flames biting at my ankles. I wanted so badly to lick the floor clean, and I didn’t want the delicious blood to go up in flames. I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to give up my addiction.

My addiction was me.

I was my addiction.

I couldn’t just give it up.

Blood…or life?