Savages

by Natalie Bennett

  “Damn, Grimm, I feel your emotions so strongly,” Cobra joked.

  I knew why he was really asking us that question, and didn’t bother answering it. Cali was not Tiffany. I didn’t need to use her to that extreme, and I sure as fuck would never share her. The thought of another motherfucker touching her was enough to make me see red.

  A soft ping had us all looking towards the stairs, watching Cali make her way down them. She was freshly showered and dressed in an over-sized white tank and black lacy knee highs she tied together with a fitted leather jacket and the same pair of black boots from earlier.

  She definitely had a certain way she liked to dress; pulling it off with a box of dead people’s clothing was impressive but I’d rather she have whatever she wanted at easy disposal.

  With a smile and wave, she made her way into the kitchenette where the three of us were, giving Arlen a quick once over.

  She impaled me with her blue gems and smiled a little bigger. I felt that shit in my gut.

  I did a lot of sick shit. I killed without remorse and ruthlessly took whatever I wanted. I didn’t believe in any of that love at first sight bullshit—I didn’t even know what the fuck love was—but I was fucking positive Cali was my soul mate.

  “Hey ya’ll.” She greeted all of us but came straight to me.

  If any other chick tried this with me, she would have been drop kicked to the other side of the room. I didn’t do clingy, emotional, or needy. I did Cali.

  Pushing a few stray strands of blonde hair out of her face, I gripped the back of her neck and pulled her into me, sealing my mouth over hers. She placed her dainty hands on my chest and sighed, parting her soft lips and twining her tongue around mine.

  I loved the way she smelled because she smelled like me—like she was mine.

  I felt like a goddamn Neanderthal as much as I kept repeating that word in my head.

  My dick was constantly engorged since I’d met her. Fucking had never been a must on my to-do list and now it was at the top of it. Cali was a pain slut and I was more than happy to give her what she needed. Everything about this woman made me feel more insane than I already was.

  “When you two finish mouth fucking, the chili is done,” Cobra drawled.

  “I’ll wake the brat up,” Grimm volunteered, giving Cali an appraising look as he turned away.

  “You need to eat.” Breaking away from her, I took the bowl from Cobra’s hands and nudged her towards the table. She eyed the ram-head centerpiece but didn’t comment on it.

  “You could have done that a lot gentler, you shithead,” Arlen snapped as she took a seat beside Cali and glared at Grimm, who was holding her shoulder.

  He gave her a rare smile and placed another bowl in front of her.

  “This is really, really good,” Cali enthused, licking her spoon and giving me all kinds of visuals.

  “Compliments to the chef, who also happens to be a pretty badass redheaded dude.” Cobra grinned and Cali beamed back at him.

  I reached into my back pocket and pulled out a weathered picture that was creased and wrinkled from how many times I had folded and unfolded it.

  While it would be ideal to stay buried in Cali’s pussy all day and eat chili all night, that wasn’t realistic. I still had shit to do and the clock hadn’t stopped ticking.

  As soon as she took her last bite, I placed the picture in front of her. “How many of these people do you remember?”

  Her reaction was instant. An onslaught of emotions flashed across her face and I knew every one of them intimately, starting with anger, shame, and disgust before the pain was masked with indifference.

  “All of them,” she answered in a flat tone.

  “Which one hurt you?” Grimm interjected, asking the question I had never planned to ask but was going to.

  Her blue hues darted around the room. Before she could have another episode like she did in my playroom, I brought her focus solely to me.

  I gripped her jaw and turned her face towards me, blocking everyone else from view.

  “Who was it?”

  “All of them,” she whispered.

  I refused to make eye contact with him after I answered. Grimm making a sound in his throat gave me the perfect excuse to look away.

  No wonder he knew my name; he had to know I was David’s daughter, too.

  The last thing I expected him to do was pull out a photo of David and his most trusted followers—me being amongst them.

  I’m sure we looked every bit like a happy father and daughter from an outside perspective with the smile he had painted on his face and arm wrapped around my waist. No one but him and a few of his friends knew he was forced to hold me up so the picture could be taken because I had been ass-fucked the entire night before.

  “Even the women?” Cobra asked. “Never mind; don’t answer that,” he backpedaled when Romero and Grimm both glared at him.

  “It’s…okay.” I shrugged, trying not to think about it as I answered him. “The woman who raised me taught me how to give blow jobs and eat pussy.”

  “All those fuckers deserve death,” Arlen spat. Her angry response was the only sound in the room for a good five minutes.

  My face flushed and I looked down, using my hair as a curtain.

  “She’s right.” Romero stroked the top of my head and expelled a deep breath. “How did you watch your uncle’s meets without getting caught?” he asked, steering the conversation in a better direction.

  “They keep extra habits in one of the old confessional booths. I just wore one of those and hid inside it until he was done, and waited for one of the sisters to walk past alone.”

  “That was really fucking stupid of you. If he’d known you were right under his nose, what do you think he would’ve done?”

  “Stop calling me stupid!”

  “Then don’t do stupid shit. What time does he do his meets and how far is it from here?”

  “He meets every night at eleven, and I don’t know how far the church is from here because I don’t know where I am.”

  “He meets in a church?” Grimm laughed darkly. “Does it have a lake behind it?”

  I furrowed my brows, eyeing him suspiciously. “Yeah…how did you—”

  “We can make it there if we head out now. There are robes and habits in the storage room.”

  I let out an annoyed breath. They kept cutting me off. “Alright, so we’re going to church. Let’s hope it doesn’t burst into flames the second we all walk through the door.”

  “Do I have to go?” Arlen piped up, drawing everyone’s attention to her.

  “Fuck yes, you have to go. You’re not Cali; you don’t get a deal. You need to ask yourself, do you really want to be in? Because this is how you start earning that right.

  “And be careful how you answer, cause if you say no, then we have a problem we need to immediately rectify,” Cobra stated.

  “I’m not leaving Cali and you sure as hell ain’t killin me so yes, I want to be in,” she snapped back at him. “And before we go runnin off to some church, where is everyone else?”

  “We are everyone,” Romero swiftly responded, pulling out my chair.

  “There’s only…three of you?” she asked, her voice full of skepticism.

  “Strength is in unity, brat, not numbers,” Grimm answered.

  “Only five people live in this house,” Romero cut in with a hard tone, ending the discussion.

  Arlen and I glanced at each other with the same knowing expression—he had just majorly deflected the question.

  He was hiding something.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The ride was uneventful.

  Arlen and Cali sat in the back on either side of Grimm, and I drove with Cobra riding shotgun. Every time I looked in the rearview mirror, Cali’s eyes met mine.

  She had on a habit and hood with her cross necklace tucked in. She looked pure as ever, tempting the strongest man to wanna sin.

  I parked the Jeep hillside, parti
ally obscured and still able to see the lone church that sat center field.

  “You got this?” I asked Cali and Arlen at ten till eleven.

  “I can do this,” Cali answered with heady determination.

  “That’s my fuckin girl.”

  She beamed at me and climbed out of the car, blowing a kiss before shutting the door.

  “What about you?”

  “I got her back,” Arlen retorted, climbing out and circling around to walk in step with Cali. We watched them fall in line with the rest of the nuns rushing towards the church in the mirrors. The bright light made them all look like scurrying black dots.

  “Did you bring it?”

  “It’s right here,” Cobra said, pulling a utility bag from beneath his seat with an excited grin.

  “You’re such a child, Bow-bow,” Grimm taunted from the backseat, using the nickname we’d given him when we were kids.

  Cobra dramatically gasped and turned in his seat. “Is that a compliment from the reaper? Thanks man. I got love for you too.”

  Ignoring their banter, I kept my eyes trained on the rearview mirror.

  Patience was never my strongest virtue to begin with but where Cali was concerned, the shit didn’t exist at all. I knew she could do this—she’d done it multiple times before I entered the picture—but that didn’t make me feel any better about her safety.

  Exactly on time, a figure dressed in all black appeared at the back of the church. I was more relieved than I was willing to admit.

  “Let’s go.”

  I was out the car before the last word finished coming out of my mouth, jogging towards the door. Cobra and Grimm fell in step beside me.

  As people began filing out the front of the church, thanks to Arlen we were able to slip in the back. She held a finger to her lips to silence us and took the lead back the way she came.

  The building went peacefully silent after the large doors slammed shut.

  The moon shone through the stained glass windows and served as the only light in the hall.

  “You look cute, brat, like a school girl.” She glanced over her shoulder and shook her head, flipping Grimm the bird as she walked.

  At the end of the hall, she paused and put an arm out to stop us, pointing around a corner.

  Peering around her, I searched the pews for Cali, spotting her kneeling in front of the altar. Father Azel—her uncle—was making his way towards her.

  We filed into the room just as he reached her and touched the back of her head. Like a jack-in-the-box, she sprang up and turned around with a shit eating grin on her face.

  “Hello, Father. Did you miss me?”

  Her sweet voice echoed across the room. Azel faltered, visibly surprised. Cali stepped forward and shoved him so hard he fell back and tripped, landing on a pew.

  “Lock the doors,” I directed Arlen as we moved past her.

  Hearing my voice, Azel whipped his head around. His wide eyes took us all in and he blanched, hopping up and attempting to run.

  “Hey!” Cali yelled, sticking a foot out to trip him. He fell into the aisle, landing at Grimm’s feet.

  “You’re aging like shit,” Grimm told him, bending down and lifting him up by the head with one hand covering his mouth.

  Cobra bypassed all of us, giving Cali a high-five. He went to the altar and began unloading his utility bag.

  “Come here, baby.” I held my hand out. She took it and linked our fingers together as I draped my arm over her shoulder.

  “Doors are locked; coast is clear,” Arlen announced, pulling her hood off.

  “Where do you want him?”

  “You’re letting me choose?”

  “This is your show. We’re just the muscle.” Her eyes lit up like saucers and she did an excited shimmy.

  Slipping out from beneath my arm, she spun around like a ringmaster and pointed to a large silver cross leaning against the wall.

  “Can you use that to cross him up?” She looked at me and laughed at her own joke. “With those,” she clarified, pointing to the long metal chain Cobra had placed on the altar.

  “We can make that work.” Grimm answered before I could, dragging a struggling Azel towards the altar.

  I went and retrieved the cross. I carried it to the altar and I propped it up.

  “Lift, strip, tie.” I pointed to each of us and grabbed the chain. Cobra cut Azel’s robes off and partially assisted Grimm holding him up as I secured his left and then his right arm on the bars of the cross.

  “God, we’re all going straight to hell,” Arlen groaned.

  Cobra paused and looked at her with a mischievous grin.

  “Take a good look around you, sweetheart, cause you’re already there. This world is hell and that psychopathic asshole is the devil.” He pointed to me with the tip of his knife.

  “So what does that make the rest of us?” she scoffed.

  “Well, I’m clearly his most trusted, loyal, advisor,” he hyped, tearing the last piece of robe from the now constrained Azel.

  “Grimm is self explanatory. He kills shit without discrimination, takes no bribes, and never fails to get the job done.”

  “That’s actually pretty accurate,” Grimm approved, pulling Azel’s drawers down to his ankles.

  “Cali is his beautifully insane, dark, maleficent queen.” He sighed dramatically and looked to the ceiling. “Even the devil needs love.”

  I shook my head and looked at Cali. She stared back at me with an unreadable expression on her angelic face.

  His spot-on definition did crazy shit to my head.

  She just didn’t know how serious he was.

  “That’s sickeningly sweet, but ya’ll aren’t that bad.”

  “Of course, you would say that, Arlen, because you don’t know us…yet. But you’re more than likely dead anyway so tough shit for you.”

  “Ya’ll don’t know us—”

  “I know Cali.” I cut her off and put an end to the discussion. No one said anything; Grimm and Cobra didn’t even attempt to act surprised by my words.

  Did I know what her favorite color or her favorite food was? Fuck no. Did I know every sordid detail of her past? Also fuck no. Did I give a shit about any of that? Again: fuck no.

  I knew she was so broken she didn’t even realize it. I knew what she saw when she looked in the mirror was nothing but confusion.

  I knew she was drowning inside herself and struggling to figure out who she was while the demons screamed at her to let them out.

  I knew all of that because once upon a very shitty, unfortunate time, that was me.

  I was her.

  I knew her.

  We reflected off one another.

  She was my beautifully dark motherfucking queen.

  She was mine. I wasn’t letting her go even when it was all said and done and she hated my fucking guts—because she would. That was inevitable. I destroyed everything good that I touched. She’d just have to hate me with her pussy sitting on my face.

  “Why…did you tie him that way?” she asked, breaking the silence and staring at Azel’s shabby, pale ass.

  “We’re going to make him suffer until we get some answers.”

  She nodded and approached me, holding on to Arlen’s arm to move forward.

  “Calista, sweet girl––”

  I was behind him, slamming his face into the cross before he could finish. “You don’t get to address her! The only time you get to open your mouth is to answer questions or fucking scream.”

  “He’s pissin on himself.” Cobra pointed to the stream of urine running down Azel’s pale leg.

  “Typical.” I stepped away from him with a look of disgust. “Pick a tool, Pixie.”

  Without a word, she studied the altar and hummed beneath her breath, selecting the yellow drill. She clicked the button and smiled at me when it whirred.

  A shocked cry had all of us turning our heads to see a nun had come around the corner. She screamed and took off for the door.
>
  “Fuck, I got it,” Grimm grumbled.

  He hopped down the small step and took off after her.

  Just before she reached the door, he lifted her up by the waist and flung her through the air. She bounced off a pew with a resounding boom and cried out when her body smacked the marble floor.

  Grimm being Grimm wasted no time picking her up by the neck and squeezing the life from her body. She wildly swung her arms at him, gasping and kicking her legs. It took thirteen seconds for her to pass out and another two to kill her. She died so fast, if it wasn’t for him carelessly tossing her body over the back of a pew, it would be easy to believe it never happened.

  “You have three strikes to tell me where David is, starting now.” My impatience was starting to kick in and I was tired of being inside the church.

  “I don’t know—”

  “Strike one—just because I know you’re about to bullshit me.”

  Cali stepped up beside me with the drill in her hand and looked to me for instruction.

  “Make it hurt.”

  “Make it hurt,” she repeated. Her eyes travelled over every inch of him, landing on his hands. She stepped closer and raised the drill to the back of his left one and held the button down.

  The drill bit spun around, only twisting his skin at first, gradually drilling into his flesh.

  “Stop! Please just stop!” he screamed in agony.

  I gently pulled Cali’s hand away, revealing the tiny hole she had started to make on the back of his hand.

  “Stop crying and pull your shit together. We haven’t even hurt you yet.” I sighed and patted the top of his head. “What kind of man pisses himself and cries because of a little good old-fashioned torture?”

  “Same question, Azel—where is David?”

  “I haven’t seen him in months,” he whined.

  “But you’ve talked to him. You always talk to each other on the phone. You know where he is; I know you do!” Cali interjected, yelling in his face.

  “I’m telling you truth. Why would I lie?”

  “Because you’re a sorry sack of shit.”