Page 6 of Ripple Effect, Vol. 2

For nearly a week, I’ve watched her, cleaned her every time she’s soiled herself or thrown up, kept her hydrated, sat beside her while she soaked in the tub, and ignored her screams of pain. She’s finally reached the point of sleeping longer than before. Whatever hallucinations she’s suffered in between have dulled by the stretches of silence while she rests and her body heals. Now it’s just a piss poor attempt on her part to get loose, to seek out what she craves. In her case, it’s the drug, but I understand this part of addiction. The nagging urge. The demon that won’t stop its relentless desire to take over.

The beautiful arch of her body makes her look possessed, as if the demons inside of her are waging war. She’d undoubtedly do anything for the pills in my palm. Would let me fuck her a million different ways, and in her state of euphoria, would probably even convince herself that she enjoyed it.

There’s no fun in fucking junkies, though. I like my conquests clean. Lucid. Conflicted and guilt-ridden.

Still, I can’t deny there’s something incredibly sexy about watching her want something so badly. Her body mirrors the urges burning inside my head, and even if hers is a yearning for the pills, it still speaks to the bastard inside of me that writhes with the craving to fuck her.

I tip back the drink, drop the pills into drawer beside me, and grab hold of my straining cock sticking up from my half-yanked jeans. Her moans of agony are like music, and I tip my head back, squeezing my erection until the first strike of pain clenches my teeth. Gaze locked on the screen, I stroke myself, imagining those sounds in my ear as I slam into her.

Feels good. Real good, but it’s not enough. It’s one thing she and I have in common—I know exactly how it feels to be numb.

Setting the glass of liquor on the desktop, I trade my drink for the blade beside it. Inhaling deeply, I slow my strokes to an agonizing pace and stare down at the weapon with a frown, the same as I would an old enemy.

Only through pain will you know pleasure.

I clamp my eyes shut at the words from my past, surfacing like a bloated carcass.

The burning hits my palm as my fingers clamp around the cold metal and the breach of my skin slams through my veins, pumping a warning to my heart. Deeper. Cut deeper.

The pain. The fucking pain is flames on my skin, tamped down with each long stroke of my dick. Feels good. Feels so goddamn good purging myself.

I squeeze the blade harder and pump my cock faster. Pain and pleasure clash together, my brain scrambling to cling to one of them. With every bite of the unforgiving metal, a rush of ecstasy washes over me, pulsing through my dick in waves of agonizing delirium. I want to ravish the fuck out of something.

My eyes lock on the girl who fights against her binds. Jaw clenching, I bite back the urge to come, staring at her long, slender legs sliding across the sheets.

The sting at my left palm intensifies, muscles trembling.

That’s it. That’s good. So good.

The pressure builds, flames rising low in my stomach, muscles stiff as bullets of pleasure shoot through my veins.

Jolts of lightning strike the back of my head in a thunder crash of pain and ecstasy. I open my eyes to the girl arching off the bed as the peak of my orgasm explodes in my palm. I grunt with the final strokes that eject the last of my load, imagining it spurting all over her stomach and tits. My heart slows, muscles soften, and I raise my hand where blood coats my fist and the end of the blade. I follow the drops of blood that land on my thigh where they streak down my leg, mingling with my cum. Setting the blade on the table, I open my hand to the thin gashes on the heel of my palm and across all four fingers. Not too deep but I’ll probably need to glue them shut, like the last time.

My gaze trails back to the girl onscreen. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt that particular urge, as if she’s awakened something inside of me.

Something that will soon require more than a sharp blade.

* * *

Chicago nightlife passes by in a blur as I speed down I-90 toward Spades. I need a drink, something to get my head back in the game, to sort through all the bullshit that’s been clogging my brain the last week. Shit’s taking its toll more in the last few years. Maybe I’m getting too old. Burned out.

Few years back, I bought a house on the east coast—a little fishing community my mom used to take my sister and me on the occasions she could save up enough money to get away. Don’t even know why I bought it. The plan was to lie low for a bit then get the fuck out with enough cash to keep me afloat until I’m dead.

Every job, I tell myself is the last. Last time I do this shit.

But triple the cash to take out Marchetti’s advisor, Alasdair MacGregor, is a little too tempting for me. Even if I’m double dipping, working behind Dorian’s back for the Agency, it’s more money in the pot.

Two birds. One bullet.

That’s the beauty of my job. Dangerous, yes, but most times, on the occasions I’m hired to act as a hitman, it’s a landslide of cash.

Helps to be skilled at what I do—most criminals are willing to pay good money to eliminate competition, and often the competition is my target anyway, or the Agency’s target, as it were, which is who I work for, first and foremost.

In this case, I’ve had to keep my eyes open for a rat—a traitor in Dorian’s camp who’s been getting friendly with the enemy.

The enemy being Marchetti.

Killing Alasdair won’t come without its consequences, though, which is why he’s worth so much more than Marchetti’s little soldiers, Matteo and Accardi. I did as Dorian requested, had my fun, took my time with them for putting Lucien in a coma. Alasdair is nothing but a strategy, though, a positioning kill.