“But you had to go and fucking die,” I snapped, angry that Preppy wasn’t there with me, and angry with myself for talking out loud to my dead best friend, and angry that I was angry at him for being fucking dead for Christ’s sake.
I loaded everything into a duffel bag that I rolled in a tarp. I carried it above my head as I waded back through the water, staying close to the edge so that I wouldn’t be spotted because even though it was dark out, the center of the open bay always looked as it were lit up, reflecting the light of the moon and stars.
I made my way back into the woods. I could see the light from the fire pit was almost as tall as the house. Bear’s scream once again tore through the air. When I finally had eyes on him, I found that what they were doing to him, was actually much, much worse than what I’d imagined.
Bear was tied up in sections. One rope kept his arms tucked into his sides. One kept his hands tied behind his back. One was tied around his head, tucked into his open mouth like a gag. Bear was biting down on it so hard his teeth were almost meeting in the middle of the thick rope. Tears of pain ran down the side of his face. He was on his stomach, laid out across several chairs. His pants pulled down around his ankles, his ass high up in the air. Eli’s men stood behind him and prodded at him with some sort of broken off handle. They laughed every time Bear screamed. One held Bear’s ass cheeks open as another forcefully rammed the object in and out of him.
Eli sat nearby in one of the folding chairs surrounding the pit that was usually occupied by bikers when I’d had parties. He was resting his head back against his interlocked hands. His legs were stretched out and resting on the ledge of the fire pit.
Eli was as if he was watching an opera, beholding something beautiful and wondrous, his eyes wide, as he intently watched the brutality taking place in front of him. I cracked my knuckles. As the assault continued, another guy, one with bright orange hair, found his amusement by sprinkling the glowing embers of the fire onto Bear’s backside.
A bold motherfucker, with a thick black swastika tattoo on his shaved head, pulled his cock from his pants and stepped up to Bear, whose head was now hanging down off the chair, his chin almost touching the grass. The man pulled the rope from Bear’s mouth and yanked on his hair, lifting his head up. The man grabbed the base of his cock and rubbed the tip of it across Bear’s lips. Bear must have lost consciousness because he didn’t even move. It wasn’t until the motherfucker forcefully shoved his cock into Bear’s mouth when I knew that Bear was not only conscious, but he was ready for a fucking fight. His eyes sprang open and the guy jumped back from Bear, holding onto his crotch and screaming, trying to hold back the blood that was pouring out between his fingers.
Bear spat out what was left of the man’s cock and smiled from ear to ear, blood dripping down his face, coating his teeth.
And he laughed.
It was now or never.
I unholstered my gun and pulled a grenade from the duffel bag. I took a deep breath and cleared my mind of everything except what I was about to do.
Crouching down as close as I could to the ground, I snaked my way over to the fire pit. I pulled the pin from the grenade with my teeth and tossed it into the fire.
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds.
BOOM
The fire pit exploded into a blinding wall of white light. An image of Pup sleeping peacefully in my bed, her limbs tangled with mine, flashed in my mind as I ran toward the chaos.
Toward Bear.
And directly toward the possibility, that come morning, I’d be in a place reserved just for me.
In hell.
Doe
It had been three weeks without a single word from King. I was starting to give up hope that he would ever come back for me.
Tanner’s mission to help me remember my life continued, fueled by the revelation that I remembered loving him when we were kids. I tried to explain to him that it was a memory, not a current feeling, but I knew that Tanner still looked at it as a step in putting back together what we’d had in the past.
“How are the meetings going with the specialist?” the senator asked, slicing into his rare steak, blood gushed from the meat, flooding the plate with red. He rubbed the piece on his fork through it before pulling it off the fork with his teeth.