Lady Killer (Dead Girls Club #2)

40. Alister

Chapter forty

Alister

A gob of spit hit my cheek.

It was a mistake on the part of our prisoner. But I could see how one could make it.

It was easy to lose sight of me in the spectacle that was the Blackwells.

Locke was domineering and vain, utterly unable to resist a situation that might highlight his superiority.

Lucian was the head of the family, his authority palpable in every breath he took.

Nixon was just as likely to charm your pants off as he was to set you on fire.

And Everest was . . . Everest.

I was known for being quiet and analytical. The thinker of the group. So, yes, I could see how one could come to such a conclusion.

It was still a foolish mistake.

“Pace yourself, Alister.” Lucian stood behind me, at the other end of the room. Spine straight, hands thrust in pockets. Not an ounce of emotion could be read on him as we observed Michael Gerald Schultz, who was currently hanging from chains in front of us. “Locke won’t be here until this evening. You know he’ll need the subject in good enough condition that he can get answers out of him.”

Luz had passed out too quickly for us to ask what happened, but given that we found the bastard passed out, choking her to death while wearing one of those fucking masks, he was far from innocent.

The question was whether he was the killer or simply another sheep.

“I understand,” I said, staring down at the prisoner.

“Nixon’s not picking up,” Lucian added.

He was trying to distract me, worried I would kill the man before Locke managed to get what we needed from him .

It wouldn’t work.

In spite of all his bullshit, Nixon would keep Luz safe. If not for me, then for himself.

Three of the four walls in the space were covered with the tools of our trade. Knives, guns, blowtorches, everything one man could need to harm another. Should these options fail to suffice, there was another entire chamber full of more . . . obscure devices of torture, not to mention the hall with some ancient large-scale pieces passed down through the family.

Slowly, I walked the length of the wall before selecting my tool of choice.

A club hammer. Capable of demolition work, much like a sledgehammer, but lightweight enough to be wielded single-handedly. Beautiful in its simple brutality.

I turned to face the sheep that had attacked my woman.

He scoffed when he saw what I had in my hands.

“Let me guess, you’re going to break every bone in my body if I don’t tell you what you want to know.”

My grip on the hammer flexed.

Then I laughed. Full bent-over belly laughed.

When I caught my breath, I stood up and wiped a single tear from my eye before one last chuckle escaped me.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he said. His heart rate had picked up, and he’d lost a degree of his certainty .

This was only the beginning.

I swung the hammer up to meet my palm with a loud smack as I approached him.

“It’s funny,” I said, defaulting to my usual affect.

“What? What the hell are you talking about?”

“It’s funny that you think I give a shit what you have to say,” I said dully before swinging the hammer and bringing it down as hard as I could on his collarbone, shattering it on impact.

The screaming started.

Stepping back, I cracked my neck.

“Breaking every bone in your body would be a waste of my time,” I said, putting the hammer down before striding over to grab the simple wooden chair sitting in the corner. After dragging it under the blubbering sheep, I loosened his chains just enough so that he could sit on it . . .

Were he a threat, I would have secured him to the chair. But given that he was still crying over one broken bone, it was obvious he was an amateur.

Picking the hammer up again, I came down to squat in front of him. I forced his chin up using the cold steel head.

“I don’t want any information from you,” I said, as I gripped his thigh tightly to brace his leg as he began to cry.

The hammer swung again.

His femur snapped in half .

The screams became louder.

“I only want to make you suffer.”

There were 206 bones in an adult human body.

Michael passed out after I broke less than 4 percent of them.

When I broke his second femur, he said he’d tell me anything I wanted to know.

After I smashed his left wrist, he sobbed that he had never hurt anyone, that he just helped to bring in the girls.

When I smashed the right one, he vomited and told me what a horrible mistake this all had been. Two broken ribs later, he lost consciousness.

“You didn’t even try to get him to admit if he was the killer or not,” Lucian said dryly.

“That man is not the Virgin Sacrifice Killer,” I said, shaking off the excess blood from my hands

“No,” he said, leaning against the doorframe, “that seems unlikely. But I would have thought you would have at least wanted a name, if only to protect your girlfriend.”

I dropped the hammer into the sink and turned on the water, washing the worst of the mess from my hands. “Protect her from who, Lucian? You or the killer? ”

He didn’t answer, and I turned my attention to cleaning up the mess I had made.

“Find whoever is behind all this—the killings, the drugs—and you won’t have to worry about either of us,” Lucian finally said.

Blood and bone washed off, I pulled out a shammy and began to dry and buff the steel head. He didn’t understand.

“If you kill her, you will lose Ever.”

I didn’t have to look at Lucian to hear the intake of his breath.

One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . five . . .

He turned and walked out of the room.

I stayed behind, finishing cleaning up the hammer, and placing it back on the wall.

Luz was changing all of us, including my big brother.

I just hoped he realized it before it was too late.