“I had a stroke.”
Chad tugged himself from Romeo’s arms, and looked at him. “Are we dead, is this what heaven looks like?”
“Of course not. When we die, we won’t end up in the same place. This is now, we’re both alive, both here in this messed up room.”
“But your face? I didn’t think strokes did that.”
“Well, they thought I had one. In reality, I just got punched really hard in the face.”
“Jesus.” Chad gasped, shaking his head.
“Worth it to find you.”
Chad stiffened at the sound of an engine.
Romeo left him on the bed and peaked through the curtains. The outside lights had all come on, and the gate to the mansion made a whirling noise as it opened. There was another whirling noise, and the car disappeared inside one of the garage doors. Romeo hadn’t tried to hide the fact he was there, he’d left all the lights on downstairs, and he imagined the cameras fed directly to Marc’s phone.
Romeo turned back to Chad, then took a step back when he saw him curled over, hyperventilating.
“I promised you I’d not let anything happen to you.”
The front door opened. Romeo heard the crunch of broken glass. The dramatic slam of the door, then an amused shout.
“I hope you haven’t started without me!”
Romeo gritted his teeth. “Stay in here.”
He stepped out into the corridor and listened to Marc’s footsteps get louder on the stairs. Marc appeared at the other end of the corridor, smiling ear to ear. He wore a suit, his black hair was swept back. His eyes were wild, manic almost, like the inmates Romeo was marched past in the prison.
“I’ve been driving around nonstop since you escaped, hoping I’d find you.”
“Well, here I am.”
Marc pulled his phone from his pocket and wagged it pointedly. “Caught you on camera. Couldn’t believe my luck, you’d come to me. There’s so much I want to ask you.”
“Yeah?”
Marc smirked. “Yeah, like … why are you so afraid of magpies?”
“I’m not afraid.”
“Then why do you dream about them, call out in your sleep.”
“Like I’d tell you.”
“Don’t be like that. You went through all that trouble to escape just to meet me, right?”
“Kinda, yeah.”
“Well, I’m flattered Romeo. All those detectives running around like morons. Maybe it takes a killer to catch a killer.”
Romeo heard a thump behind him and flashed a look back to see Chad barely standing upright in the corridor.
“Unless you’re Chad of course. He knows how to catch a killer, but by the time that light bulb switches on in his head, the killer’s caught him.”
“You’re a fan of mine, right?” Romeo said, blocking Chad from view.
“I was, until I outdid you.”
“You’ve not outdone me.”
“I’m up to four,” he said, then reached inside his pocket. He took out what looked like a glasses case, and snapped it open, revealing the scalpel. “We’re like each other you and I, we both have our desires. You inspired me to live out my fantasy, and I’m almost done. We could do it together.”
“Do what?”
“Finally get the one that got away. Five was your target, right? I took after you, and chose five, and we both can conclude our countdowns, we can both succeed, and move on. Maybe start this all over again somewhere new.”
“You’re not touching Chad.”
Marc exhaled heavily through his nose. “I read Holly’s article on you.”
“I bet that stung, her taking over from you. Her throwing you out into the cold, never loving you the way you loved her.”
“She used me, betrayed me, and I was so angry with her, but despite wanting to, I couldn’t kill her, couldn’t hurt her.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t kill what I love.”
“Maybe we’re not so different.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. I love Holly, and in some ways, I’ve got to thank her for letting me hit rock bottom to set me free, but you … you’re ill.”
“Ill?
“Holly wrote about it in the article, Lima syndrome, Chad’s exploited your illness to feel powerful. He’s taking advantage of your condition.”
“That’s all love is—a condition people suffer from. The best definition I’ve heard for it, different symptoms for everyone, different intensities, different durations.”
“No. Chad poisoned your head, he’s a tumor, and he needs to be cut out for you to be free again.” Marc frowned in sympathy. “But I can only help you if you let me.”
“I don’t want your help.”
“We’re the same. You’re evil, on the bad side, and I’m right there beside you, but Chad’s a good guy, the opposition. The side we’re pitted against.”
“You’re right, he is a good guy.”
“And we’re bad ones. I can see it in your eyes, you know he has to die for you to be free. He’s weak, we won’t even have to drug him to do it.”
“We?”
Marc nodded, cutting the scalpel through the air. “We can take him out together. I’ll even let you strangle him before I slit his throat. I’ll make a pretty picture out of him.”
Romeo heard Chad backing off, down the corridor, knocking the picture frames off the wall as he went. Romeo turned just in time to see him retreat into the bedroom, eyes wide with fear.
“Come on,” Marc said getting closer. “Let’s do it.”
“No.”
“Chad’s gonna be my greatest piece of art.”
“He’s not gonna be your anything.”
“All those numbers I’ve carved into his flesh. Watching his big watering eyes while I did it and he was unable to move. Completely paralyzed, but he could feel every one of those cuts. I’m not finished. I’m gonna do his back, his face, his legs. Then cut out—not burn—the number one into his chest before slitting his throat.”
“As I keep saying, you’re not touching him.”
“It’ll be the scalpel that touches him. Cuts him up, peels back his skin like an orange. He’s going to look beautiful.”
Romeo couldn’t hide the disgust from his face. Marc’s gleeful smile dropped, and he stopped waving the scalpel. “I’ve got to say, I’m rather disappointed.”
“They say you should never meet your heroes.”
“Strangling your victims to death, where’s the art? Where’s the gore, and the blood that everyone reads about?”
“It isn’t about gore, or blood, or art.” Romeo growled, tapping his head. “It’s about silencing this, giving it what it wants.”
“People say they don’t like violence, it scares them, disgusts them, but you should see how many newspapers sell out. I helped to share your countdown, bring it to the masses. They wanted to read about it, they wanted to visualize it, and this time I’ll be the one to deliver it. No longer sitting behind my computer desk, but the monster in the article.”
He took a step closer, looking Romeo up and down. “The question is, whose side are you really on, Romeo? Are you the monster you claim to be?”
“Maybe I’m not a complete monster after all.”
“How disappointing.”
Marc rushed Romeo, swiping the blade through the air. He lifted his arm to cover his face, and the blade sliced through sprinkling the white wall with red. Romeo tried to grab Marc’s wrist, but he struggled with only one working eye, didn’t grab him cleanly, and Marc slipped away. The scalpel sliced into Romeo’s bad cheek, making him cry out, stumbling back.
“I’m gonna kill you, and then I’m gonna kill him. Nice and slow.”
“You’re not getting anywhere near him.”
Marc slammed him into a door, it swung open, and Romeo staggered back, losing his footing. He landed on a mattress, and Marc was on him, scalpel held in both hands, trying to slit Romeo’s throat. Romeo grabbed his wrists,
tried to pry his hands away, but Marc wasn’t giving up, Romeo could see the triumph in his face, the upturn of his lips, the snarl.
He was going to die at the hands of another killer, a killer he’d inspired. The blade cut into his throat, he battled for his life, to stop Marc from forcing the blade across, but his hands were slipping.
Then Chad was there, involved in the tussle. He hooked his arm around Marc’s neck, and yanked him back, cutting off Marc’s air supply. Chad tightened his grip until Marc’s eyes rolled into his head, he stopped fighting with Romeo, dropped the scalpel, then propelled himself backwards, knocking his head into Chad’s face. Chad hit the ground with a thud. Marc gasped, wheezed, then looked for the scalpel on the mattress.
Before he could reclaim it, Romeo was on him, hands around Marc’s neck. He was physically drained, but the monster ran on autopilot.
The monster needed to kill, more than ever.
He threw Marc down on the mattress, managed to straddle him, then throttled him with both hands.
Marc struggled, clawing at Romeo’s arms. Blood dripped from Romeo’s face onto Marc’s, splashing him red while he thrashed and jerked.
The dormant part of Romeo’s brain sparked into life, making his heart thump, his breathing come hard and fast, as if he was mocking the man beneath him. His senses sharpened, he could smell sweat, blood, could hear the pump of his heart, Chad breathing close by. It all added to the thrill in his head. The monster in him didn’t purr, it roared, encouraging him to put an end to Marc Wilson.
He watched the life seep from Marc’s eyes, it almost felt like it fed into him, made him feel almost supernatural. There was the feeling again, the dose of pleasure, of happiness. He’d not just won the league or the grand slam, it was the equivalent of winning everything, winning at life by taking it.
Romeo remembered he’d read somewhere that hearing was the last sense to go when you died. He leaned closer, till his lips were on Marc’s ears.
“My number one fan.”
Marc’s body stiffened, then started to relax into the mattress. The endorphins in Romeo’s head continued to flow, the neurons, the electrical signals—whatever they were in his head, all aligned after being skewed for so long, and gave him a high of sick satisfaction, a hit of something wrong and intoxicating, a rush of dark drugs. It felt good to kill, it had with the others, but Marc Wilson took it to another level. He was buzzing with it, floating, as if he could see the scene from a different perspective, as if he was above looking down on himself, grinning that he was grinning, happy that he was happy, experiencing double of everything. The last person he would allow himself to kill. He’d done it, he’d satisfied the monster within, given it what it wanted to be free of it, and even better than that, he’d made sure Marc could never hurt Chad again.
Because as much as he enjoyed the killing, Chad had to live.
Romeo didn’t let go of Marc until he was absolutely certain he was dead. He couldn’t feel anything but the fuzzy floaty sensation in his head, like he was drunk on power. He was the reaper, a dark force, he was who he was born to be.
He sensed Chad behind him, leaning closer, getting a good view, but when he turned to check he was all right, Chad was fleeing through the door.
Just like that, as if a switch flicked, the blissful buzz began to fade, he could feel the throbbing in his cheek, the stinging in his arm, the nick in his neck, the intense ache in his hands. He released Marc, then flexed his stiffened fingers. When he touched his cheek, and checked his fingers, the blood ran down them. It had relieved some of the pressure pressing his eyes shut. The scalpel had easily cut through Neil’s suit, catching his arm. Romeo prodded the wound. Fine, but deep.
He looked behind him at the door, hoping Chad had returned to him, but he wasn’t there. Chad had run, and Romeo didn’t blame him. He’d just killed someone right in front of him. It may’ve been the man that had tormented Chad for days, but it was still murder, something Chad had sworn against. Chad had finally seen the monster in action, could no longer separate Romeo from the countdown killer, and it scared him.
He closed his eyes, took several deep breaths, and waited for the sound of sirens. He’d go back to prison having finally concluded his countdown, but he’d lose Chad forever.
Chad wouldn’t want to visit him.
Romeo twitched his nose, he could smell something, something familiar, something that reminded him of his childhood home. It was the scent of his father’s cigars. He opened his eyes, turned his head, and saw Chad behind him, hand outstretched, offering Romeo the cigar to brand his last victim. Their eye-contact lingered, Chad’s eyes were wide, he was breathing heavily, then he nodded.
The blissful buzz returned to him, and when he took the cigar from Chad a shiver went up his spine. His hairs stood on end, and his scalp tingled with sensitivity.
Chad saw him, all of him and still he stayed.
Romeo ripped open Marc’s shirt, then ran his hand down his blemish free chest.
Chad watched him brand Marc with the number one. His eyes weren’t scared, or repulsed, they were intense, and focused. He didn’t shy away, not even when the smell of burned flesh hit the air. He was right there next to Romeo, so close he could feel the heat of his skin, hear his fast breathing.
Romeo admired the number one, and froze in the moment, in his victory.
They stayed there, no speaking, or moving until the cigar had almost burned out, then Romeo stubbed the end out on the bedside table. He slid off Marc, got to his feet, and approached Chad.
Both his nostrils were bloodied, his torso was red raw, and covered in sliced numbers, but Romeo didn’t focus on that. He looked into Chad’s eyes, no longer pained and tortured, but awed, relieved, with a spark of something different, something new. Chad leaned his body forward, and fidgeted his fingers at his sides, as if waiting for some kind of go ahead from Romeo.
Romeo gave it to him in the form of a kiss.
Chapter Eighteen
Romeo’s mind tugged in two different directions. He knew he should’ve ended the kiss, knew Chad was hurt, and needed help, but he couldn’t stop. Even though he tasted blood, and Chad holding onto his face hurt, he couldn’t stop kissing as they backed out of the room. He couldn’t work out the exact number of days, hours, minutes since he’d kissed Chad. All he knew for certain was it had been far too long.
Romeo didn’t know where to put his hands without causing Chad pain, and cautiously held onto his sides as they moved down the corridor. He saw glinting on the floor and looked down to see glass from when Chad had knocked the picture frames off. Romeo wore shoes, couldn’t feel it, but Chad, bare-footed, walked straight through it, no wince, no grunt, as if he was too far gone to feel it. He kept tugging Romeo’s hair, and kissing his lips, and grinding his pelvis into Romeo’s.
Romeo suspected shock, but every time he leaned away, wanting to see Chad’s face, Chad gripped the back of Romeo’s head and forced him forward to resume the kiss. It was too tempting not to, and when Chad pushed him into the first bedroom, he went, collapsing back on the bed. The bed Chad had been hurt in. The bed covered in his blood. The bed that smelled of sweat and fear.
“Hold on—
A kiss stopped him from saying more, and when Chad sucked on his tongue, he damn-near gave in, Chad was riding on adrenaline, shock and lust. He wanted to crack open Chad’s mind, unravel it, work out what was going on, what Chad was thinking, what he was feeling after he’d just seen Romeo kill a man.
“Let’s talk.”
“Let’s not.” Chad gasped.
He straddled Romeo, wiped his thumb across the slice on Romeo’s cheek, then leaned down to kiss it. The attention was addictive, Romeo had been so convinced Chad had run from him, but there he was, back again, kissing the shit out of him, demanding … sex? Romeo wasn’t quite sure what, but he wasn’t protesting.
He hadn’t scared Chad. When Chad rubbed his crotch against him Romeo felt his hardness. He wasn’t repulsed, but turned
on. It was all too easy to sink back into the kiss, and grab the back of Chad’s head, and force him impossibly closer. They were pressed so tightly together Romeo didn’t know which of their hearts he could feel, or whose chest was heaving, or who was moaning softly, or whose blood he could taste.
He knew he should stop, Chad was hurt, and using every inch of his willpower he managed it, tearing his mouth from Chad’s lips.
“Why?” Chad said, before nipping the edge of Romeo’s mouth. “Why stop?”
Romeo’s lips didn’t sting, they tingled. Chad kept using his teeth, addicting nibbles that made Romeo’s heart thump and his cock jolt. He was hard, he shouldn’t have been, but he was.
“Because we should.”
“Fuck should.”
“Chad…”
“I need you.”
Chad picked at the buttons of Romeo’s pants, then yanked them down, hard enough to bust the zip, and tear the expensive fabric. Romeo wasn’t wearing any underwear, and he looked down, hating his traitorous cock for bobbing with excitement, looking all sticky and eager, unconsciously lifting as if trying to get to Chad’s mouth, as if it could sense him nearby. Chad’s lips lifted, and a pleased gasp left them.
“Chad—”
Romeo’s reservations dissolved in the heat of a mouth. His eyes rolled up into his head, and he cursed at himself, at Chad, at how good it felt.
He was sucked, pumped, toyed with until rational thought vanished, and a need took over. A good person would’ve eased Chad’s head away, sat up, and pulled him into a hug, defused the heated situation.
He wasn’t a good person, and if Chad needed him, he’d let Chad have him, any way he wanted, and Chad went at it like he’d been starved. Teeth, and tongue, and lips.
Romeo’s senses zeroed down to sight and sensation. Chad’s dark eyes looking up at him, and the feel of his wet warm mouth, the sharp and soft weapons inside it, and then the suction that made his toes curl.
He reached down, threaded his fingers through the back of Chad’s hair, and helped him find a rhythm. A rhythm that made him pant to the ceiling, his heart go into overdrive, and his cock leak into Chad’s mouth.
Two for Joy Page 18
