Page 111 of With Spite

I closed my eyes.

“You know, you look a lot like your mother,” Randel mused as Chan stopped so close that I could feel his body heat.

My breathing, miraculously, slowed. But my heart rate did not.

It skyrocketed as my mind started to run in every direction, wondering what was in store for me.

Did my mom fight?

Was she scared?

Why did I even care?

She was not a good mother. She was actually the worst part of my life, at least until this very instant. She’d ruined my childhood. Sent my big brother to prison. Laughed in my face when I confronted her, and told me “good riddance.”

I shouldn’t care about her fate.

Yet, I did.

“Y’all have the same eyes.” Chan ran his soft fingers over my face. “The same hair. The same build. But she screamed, a lot. She had a mouth on her.” A burning pain encircled my neck. Quick and fast, like lightning. The gasp that left my throat had me inhaling my own hair. “I slit her neck exactly like that. Only deeper. She bled out in a minute and thirty-seven seconds.”

I felt the blood start to drip down my throat, long rivulets leaving the cut he’d just sliced on my throat and stopping at the collar of my shirt.

“Chan,” Randel warned. “Calm yourself.”

“Calm myself?” Chan asked. “You taught me that revenge is necessary, sir. And this has been coming for a long time.”

“It has, yes,” Randel agreed. “But if you finish this early, I’m going to be angry with you.”

Chan actually looked sheepish, as if he’d let his anger get the best of him.

“I allowed you to take your anger out on those other women,” Randel continued his reprimand. “However, you’ve almost gotten us caught. You need to control yourself, or this isn’t going to go our way. We have a procedure for a reason. It’s what keeps us in business.”

My stomach sank.

Randel was very logical.

Chan was not.

But watching as Chan took a step back, a scalpel in his hand, I realized that Randel controlled everything. Chan wouldn’t make a move to do a thing unless Randel okayed it.

Randel read the confusion on my face and grinned. “I let Chan do the killing. I’m more of an ‘in death’ person.”

My stomach soured.

Chan did the killing, and Randel did the defiling after the person was dead.

Bile rose into my throat, and I tasted the hot acid at the back of my tongue.

He took Chan’s previous seat and asked, “Who helped you disappear?”

I didn’t comment.

“And was that your brother I saw the other day?” Randel’s eyes gleamed. “I’ll bet the world would love to know that your brother is actually alive. But who am I to judge a fellow criminal? I’ll let it slide. He’ll need the support after you pass.”

I glared.

He smiled.