Page 66 of Psycho Obsession
“Jex,” she whispers, not taking her eyes off the pulse thrumming in Aris’s neck. “Hold the mic. I want the city to hear the sound of a god coming apart.”
I reach for the PA handset, my hand steady, my thumb hovering over the trigger. I lean back against the telemetry monitors, the steady beep-beep-beep of the Mayor’s heart rate providing the metronome for our final act.
“Go ahead, sweetheart,” I rasp. “The world is listening.”
I click the mic. The feedback hums through the external speakers, a low-frequency growl that vibrates the very floorboards of the bridge.
Hallow leans down, her lips brushing the shell of his ear, her voice a terrifyingly soft contrast to the madness of the night.
“You told me once that the truth is whatever the loudest man says it is,” she murmurs into the mic, her breath hitching in a way that sounds like a sob but feels like a serrated edge. “Well, I’m the loudest one now, Dad. And the truth is… you’re hollow. You’re just a bag of meat and lies held together by a tailored suit.”
She presses the tip of the scalpel into the soft skin just above his collarbone. A bead of bright, oxygenated blood wells up, a ruby against the sterile white of the sheets. He lets out a muffled, rhythmic whimper, his eyes darting toward the blade with a primal, suffocating fear.
“Does it hurt?” she asks, her voice rising, cracking into a jagged, beautiful insanity. “Does it hurt to feel theair touching the parts of you that were supposed to stay hidden? Because I remember the cold, Dad. I remember the way the air felt in the clinic when you walked out and closed the door. I remember the way the silence tasted like pennies and shame.”
She drags the blade—a slow, shallow line across his chest, tracing the trajectory of his ribs. It’s not a killing blow. It’s an edit. She’s rewriting the story he told the world.
“Look at him!” she screams suddenly, her voice exploding through the speakers, making the people huddled by their cars on the bridge jump in unison. “Look at the man who promised you safety! He couldn’t even keep his own daughter safe from himself! He’s a parasite! A leech that fed on the light until there was nothing left but the dark!”
I’m watching the way her muscles move, the way the tension in her back ripples with every sob-racked breath. I’m hard again, the sheer power of her breakdown-turned-execution turning my blood into liquid fire. I want to take her again, right here, in the middle of the blood and the humming monitors, but I don’t move. This is her altar. I’m just the acolyte.
Dad is thrashing now, a weak, pathetic struggle against the nylon straps. The heart monitor is screaming, a frantic, continuous tone as his vitals redline.
“Jex,” she gasps, turning to me, her face a mask of tears and triumph. “He’s trying to say something. He’s trying to apologise.”
I lean in, bringing the mic close to the Mayor’s mouth, my eyes locked on his pinned-open, bloodshot gaze.
“Say it,” I growl, the PA system amplifying the predatory weight of my voice. “Tell the city what you’re sorry for. Tell Hallow what her childhood was worth.”
He opens his mouth, his lips trembling, his breath smelling of copper and cowardice. He looks at Hallow, then at me, and for a second, I see the recognition of his own creation in his eyes. He didn’t just break us. He forged us.
“I… I…” he wheezes, the words whistling through the mask. “I did it… for the… for the family…”
Hallow lets out a sharp, barking laugh that turns into a wail. She brings the scalpel up, the light catching the blood on the tip, and she looks at me with a terrifying, beautiful clarity.
“He thinks he’s still a father, Jex,” she whispers.
I reach out, my hand covering hers on the handle of the blade, our fingers slick and tangled.
“Then let’s show him what happens when the family finally comes home,” I say, my thumb pressing down on hers.
We move together. The blade sinks deeper, a slow, punctuation mark at the end of a ten-year sentence. The heart monitor lets out one final, long, flatline scream, and the city goes silent.
Chapter
Twenty-Six
JEX
The flatline is the loudest sound I’ve ever heard. It’s a high, piercing funeral march that cuts through the bridge’s fog, announcing to every terrified soul outside that the Mayor of this godforsaken city is no longer breathing.
Hallow is slumped against me, the scalpel still clutched between our joined hands. Her forehead is resting against my collarbone, her body shaking with the kind of tremors that happen when the adrenaline leaves and only the cold remains.
“It’s over,” she whispers, the words vibrating against my skin. “Jex, it’s finally quiet.”
“Yeah,” I rasp, my eyes fixed on our father’s sightless, pinned-open stare. “It’s quiet.”
But it isn’t.
