Page 115 of One More Chance
"Jeremy," I said quietly, like greeting someone I'd passed in church.
His eyes screamed when his mouth couldn't. I grabbed his hair, forcing him to face the pit below. The concrete rose, slow and steady.
"You hurt someone I love," I told him, voice flat. "You sold children like objects. You built a market for monsters."
My heart beat against my throat like a steady reminder of what I must do. "And one day, you tried to take mine."
He shook his head violently, sobbing into the tape.
"But you found me instead of her," I continued, tightening my grip. "I saved her. And now I'm going to bury you."
Panic seized him as he twisted uselessly, but I was far stronger.
Ah fuck it.
I stood and stomped repeatedly where his balls should be, ensuring I used enough force to crush at least one. He convulsed, screaming into the tape. The smell of piss leaked from his tarp-wrapped body.
That's just the start of what you deserve, mother fucker.
I lifted and tossed him into the pit where he landed with a wet thud. He barely missed being impaled by a piece of rebar.
Pity.
I watched him writhe hopelessly, concrete already halfway up his chest. He screamed into the duct tape, the noise smothered by the mixer's drone.
Hmm, good thing we are far out from anyone.I looked back at the mixer.The extra quicklime I added should mask any smell.
No one would question me out here. Not my family, not the neighbors nearly a mile away behind trees I hadn't cut down, yet. I'd worked enough late nights to make this unremarkable. I flipped the mixer to high speed, watching as thick pour slowly engulfed the man below.
I didn't look away; not even as his eyes disappeared beneath gray. I watched until movement ceased, until breath stopped, until sound died. Only wet silence settling into finality. Into stone.
I should feel something. Remorse? Guilt? But all I feel is a satiated relief.
I stood for awhile afterward with my lit cigar, watching it dry, hardening like my resolve. The stars overhead seemed farther than usual, indifferent, as the air stilled after the mixer went silent.
No turning back from this now… not that I even want to.
Sloane had begged me to do things the right way with Angie; made me promise not to hurt her. But for this?
Fuck, I didn't flinch.
I thought of Violet from my previous life. Of my endless questions from years of not knowing. Of how desolate and empty I'd been after her disappearance.
Then I remembered the images on this monster's laptop and what he'd planned to do to her had I not intervened.
You're goddamn right you didn't flinch.
The cigar burned out in my hand, last embers dying as I tossed it aside. Night stretched into morning, and I heard the rumble of distant thunder before I walked the mile back toward the house.
That morning, rain fell heavy around the warehouse and nearby woods, as the forecast said it would. It would have been more than enough to wash out my tire tracks and render any of my footprintsillegible. Thankfully, at the house we barely got a drizzle; not enough to prevent my new cement foundation from drying just fine.
Almost like Mother Nature herself is helping me bury that monster.
Weeks later, the town paper ran a short piece about an abandoned car near an old warehouse. Inside, a laptop left open, contents disturbing enough for police to request information.
I knew what they'd find. A catalogue of horror and digital confession of Jeremy Rogers. Thousands of videos. Each one was someone's son or daughter. Each one was someone's Violet.
I read it over coffee while Sloane hummed in the kitchen, her voice soft as she baked cookies. The kids tore through like wildfire, trailing laughter.
