Tore Up (Mississippi Smoke Series Book 1)
Tore Up: Chapter 17

I stood outside the bathroom door, waiting on Halo to finish. Linc stepped out of the office, and his eyes met mine.

“That’s enough for today,” I told him. I knew he had more he was going to tell her, but it would have to wait.

“Better to get it out there so she can move on,” he began.

“No,” I said. “No more.”

Linc looked like he was going to veto my decision, but he hesitated, then nodded. “Fine. But we are telling her the rest of it. We aren’t keeping it from her. She needs to know.”

My molars ached from the clenching I’d been doing all fucking day. Ares being strung up underground, still breathing, was making it hard for me to remain calm. The more I learned about the sick bastard, the more I wanted to slice his throat. Take him out of this world.

I nodded my head once.

Linc glanced at the closed bathroom door. “She might be better off at the ranch. With your mom.”

“No,” I snapped. “Mom isn’t ready for that.”

Linc cocked an eyebrow at me. “All right. Your call. We need to finish it up underground.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. I was tired of looking at the bastard strung up down there.

I heard the toilet flush, and Linc turned to leave. Relief that he was gone and we weren’t doing any more of this shit today was immediate. Stress wasn’t good for the baby. I’d read about it online. I wasn’t allowing anything to happen to all we had left of Crosby. Protecting Halo was the only way to make sure the baby was safe. I’d do whatever I fucking had to, including going against Linc, if it came down to it.

She turned off the water, and I stepped back as she opened the door. The vomiting thing was supposed to have stopped by now. I’d read that, too, but she was doing an awful lot of it. Had she mentioned that to the doctor?

Her eyes were glassy as she stared up at me.

“You said you had an ultrasound.”

She nodded.

“Don’t you get pictures of that?”

She nodded again.

I paused before asking, “Can I see them?”

The surprise in her expression shouldn’t have insulted me, but it did.

“Yeah, uh, my purse is in that room,” she said, looking in the direction of the room like that was the last place she ever wanted to go.

“Linc is gone for today,” I told her.

She inhaled a shaky breath. “Okay.” But she remained rooted in her spot.

That had been a lot to dump on her. Hell, when we’d pulled the shit off the sick bastard’s phone once we had him, it had been a fucking lot for me. He had all the calls on his sister’s phone recorded and sent to his phone. Guessed the fucker hadn’t thought about the calls that he’d made to her phone. We had all that too. Not just the ones between Crosby and Halo.

I hadn’t listened to all of them, but after hearing the few conversations between Crosby and Halo that Linc had forced me to listen to, I couldn’t deny that my brother had loved the girl.

“I’ll get your purse,” I said when it was clear she wasn’t going to go in there.

She let out a sigh so small that I would have missed it if I hadn’t been so close to her.

I went to get her purse and paused when I picked it up, then shook my head. My mother couldn’t buy a normal purse. She’d had to buy one that cost a few grand. I doubted Halo had any clue how much this thing had cost.

I went back out into the hallway and handed it to her.

She opened it, then pulled out several photos. “I have these, but your mom has the video on her phone. I didn’t have anything they could send the video to, so I don’t have that. Your mom had them do a 4D Ultraasound.”

I took the pictures. My hand shook as I stared down at the first color photo. For some reason, I’d thought ultrasounds were black and white, and it was difficult to figure out what the baby’s body parts were. These were so fucking clear that I could see my brother’s nose and the exact shape of his mouth. I moved to the next one, and there were perfect tiny feet with ten toes. She was just fourteen weeks, and this was already looking like a human being. One that my brother had helped create.

Moving to the next one, I stilled as I read the words typed at the top. I’d have been able to make that out without being told, but reading it was still hitting me hard. I swallowed and took a deep breath in through my nose. Fuck, this hurt like a bitch. There was no hiding the way my hand trembled as I held it.

“It’s a boy,” I said, my voice sounding thick.

“Yeah,” she replied softly. “He kicks a lot too. On the video, he was very active. When he’s big enough for me to feel him, it’s going to be interesting.”

I handed the photos to her, trying to hold myself together.

She took one and gave it back to me. “You can have this,” she said simply.

I reached out and took it quickly in case she changed her mind.

Watching as she tucked the others into her designer purse, I realized I was no longer bitter about my mother spending money on her. I was surprised my mom hadn’t bought her a fucking car after seeing this.

I needed to be alone. Without another word, I stalked off, leaving her behind. I couldn’t allow those emotions in. Not with a job to finish. That kind of emotion made a man weak. I would never be that.

The concrete cell under the ground in the dense, wooded area on the farthest point of my father’s two hundred acres was concealed beneath a hidden trap door. Reaching into the brush, I placed my palm flat on the smooth metal underneath. The security feature read my palm, and a small click followed. Grabbing the handle, I pulled the door up, and the light from inside spilled out, illuminating the darkness.

The damp smell of earth, tinged with that of blood, met me as I walked down into the area where Ares Talley had been hanging for the past forty-eight hours. Lowering the door over my head, I went deeper inside.

His wails of agony had faded to moans since he’d been brought down here. I’d stayed away since then because I hadn’t trusted myself not to kill him too quickly. That was too good for him. I would live the rest of my life with the endless ache inside my soul from the loss of my brother. The bastard’s last days on earth should be a living hell, just in case there wasn’t an actual one for him to burn in.

Linc stood, leaning against the wall, with his arms crossed over his chest, observing Ares, while Oz sat on a stool, sharpening a knife. The sound was one that I found satisfying. He glanced up as I walked into the cell. The chains that held Ares up by his wrists rattled as he used what strength he had left to try and move back away from me. I smirked at the image he made. I’d snapped the last time I was here and enjoyed breaking his bones while he screamed out in pain. Oz had taken the knife from me, knowing I would regret it if I sliced his throat too soon.

“Our guest seems excited to see you,” Oz replied. “He’s been quieter since I threatened to slice out his tongue.”

My chuckle was anything but amused. It was sinister, even to my own ears. I moved closer to him as his eyes darted from my hands to my face with panic clear on his swollen, bruised face.

“I’m not a doc, but my guess is, he’s more than likely got some internal bleeding. It’s only a trickle, but you need to go on and move this along while you have him alive,” Linc told me.

The beating I’d given him before I snapped several of his bones had been the kind meant to do permanent damage. Linc had a point. I wanted my face to be what he saw as he drowned on his own blood. He needed to go to hell, remembering who had sent him there. I hoped there was one.

“Why?” His voice was a strangled rasp.

I’d tracked him down, taken him, then beaten him unconscious, never once telling him why. The beauty of him hanging here, suffering, starving, dehydrating, with no idea why was something that Crosby would have appreciated.

“You killed my brother,” I told him.

There was an immediate flicker of realization in his eyes. I held my hand out, palm up, toward Oz. The freshly sharpened blade was warm as he placed it in my hand.

“I didn’t,” he gasped.

The mocking grin on my lips didn’t meet my eyes. “I should warn you, for every lie, I’ll slice off one of your fingers.”

If his face wasn’t covered in shades of blue and purple, I was sure it would be pale. He said nothing.

“This is vengeance,” I told him.

“He raped my sister.” His words had more force this time than before.

Rage that I’d kept just beneath the surface began burning inside my veins. I wrapped my fingers around his wrist and sliced off his thumb. He retched while crying out. I released him and stepped out of the way.

“Hard lesson to learn,” Oz said to him as he put an unlit cigarette in his mouth. “Let me guess … you didn’t do well in school.”

“She’s pregnant. Not a lie!” he sobbed.

I wiped the blade clean on his shirt. “I’m aware. She had her ultrasound today,” I told him, then patted the back pocket of my jeans. “I have the photo she gave me in my wallet.”

The darkening in his gaze glinted with hate. He didn’t like knowing I had seen her or spoken to her. I’d use that to torture him further.

“She’s in my house, you know. Sleeping under my roof. I can see why my brother wanted her.” I glanced over at Oz. “Gorgeous, isn’t she?” Although Oz hadn’t actually met her yet.

Oz nodded. “Smoking hot.”

Ares was breathing faster.

I smiled as I said, “Those freckles over her nose? I think that’s my favorite thing. Damn adorable.”

He tried to move again, as if he could break free.

“But back to my brother. She willingly spread her legs for him,” I said, enjoying the way his body trembled at my words.

He didn’t want to hear this, which meant that was exactly what he was going to be taunted with while I cut him up into pieces.

“The spy gear you had on your sister’s phone was incredibly helpful. All the phone calls between those two? Well, you know; you heard them. Just how much she liked my brother. How she wanted to be with him.”

He tried to growl, but it came out more like a gurgle.

“She was innocent and naive,” he spat out. “I made sure to keep guys away from her. It was me who kept her safe. She needed me. She needs me now.”

With a sardonic curl of my lips, I shook my head. “That’s just what you told yourself. The sick obsession you have with her. Living in the same house. Growing up together. You were her brother, but you wanted her. Watched her shower. Beat off to her naked body. All the while, she was clueless.”

His eyes were watery—either from the pain or perhaps the understanding that he was going to die down here. “I took care of her. They used her and gave her no attention. She had to clean and …” He struggled to speak. His voice came and went. “They treated her like an unwanted burden. I understand her. She’s starved for affection. It’s why she was so easy.”

I’d heard the phone calls and the cruel things the other sister had said about Halo. But I hadn’t been sure that her father and stepmother were equally as cold. It seemed that they were.

“So, you’re saying she has daddy issues,” I drawled, knowing it would infuriate him.

His jerk against the chains this time was harder. Almost impressive for someone who had blood running down their arm the way he did.

“She needs me,” he choked out.

I leaned close to him, giving him a piercing look. Making sure he heard me correctly. “No. She hates you. She’s disgusted by what she heard on those phone calls between you and Carina. When she found out you’d watched her in the shower, she ran to the toilet and threw up. Heaving over and over.”

He loathed me and every word I spoke. I reveled in it. Perhaps this was part of his hell. Dying with that image in his head.

“Since she found out you had shot and killed the father of her child, she’s started having nightmares. She screams at night in horror. Often calling out my brother’s name.” I ran the tip of the knife down the side of his face, making sure to slice the skin as I did so. “But don’t worry. I go take care of her. Soothe her.”

“No!” he snarled out.

The torment of me touching her was making him insane.

“Does that anger you?” I taunted. “That I can touch her whenever I want? That she lives in my house and I take care of her? I make sure she is fed properly. Has everything she needs.”

“She’s mine.” His words were ragged.

I chuckled. “She doesn’t want you. But even if she did, she can’t belong to a dead man. That’s why you killed my brother, isn’t it? So she couldn’t be with him. Just as I’m going to kill you, and she will never be yours.”

“Please,” he whimpered.

I looked over at Oz. “Ah, and now, he begs,” I said.

“That’s always my favorite,” he replied.

My eyes met Linc’s as he stood there, silently watching me.

I turned back to Ares.

The sound of someone else coming down into the cellar made me pause and wait. I knew Than was coming, and I didn’t want to do too much until he was here. He had his own vengeance to seek.

Than walked into the room, and he barely glanced at the other two before he looked from me to Ares. His face hardened as he glared at the man. I held out the knife to him, and he stalked forward, taking it. He only studied Ares for a moment before deciding where he wanted to begin. The blade’s swift swing sent an ear falling to the floor as the man’s yells tore from his chest.

“I held his head, you motherfucker,” Than hissed as he stuck his hand into Ares’s mouth and pulled his tongue before cutting it out. “He was my best friend, and I couldn’t do anything to save him. I had to just sit there and tell him it would be okay when it wasn’t going to be!”

Reaching up, Than took a hand and began to take off one finger at a time, while letting out an animalistic roar as each one fell to the ground.

Blood poured from Ares’s mouth, and without his tongue, he could only babble.

When Than stepped back, his chest was heaving, and blood covered his hands. I took the knife from him and enjoyed the image that Ares made. Only four fingers were left on the hand where I’d taken his thumb. Blood coated most of his body. His loud noises as he jerked and shook grew weaker.

His beady eyes stared back at me, and I wanted him to soak in the view. Take this face with him for all eternity.

“She would have never been yours. You know that, don’t you? Even if my brother hadn’t come along, someone else would have. With a face and body like hers, she was always gonna be out of your reach,” I told him, stepping up and thrusting the knife into his flaccid dick, then slicing down and through his balls.

“He’s fading,” Linc warned. “If you want him to choke on his own blood, then you’d better slice his throat now.”

I saw his life barely hanging on. Raising the blade, I looked him in the eye and spit in his face. “You’re gonna die, never knowing just how sweet her pussy is,” I told him, then slashed across the arteries I’d been trained to hit the year I turned eighteen.

We stood in silence while blood squirted from his throat as he spasmed. The choking sound that came didn’t soothe my pain or give me my brother back. But it did take the sick bastard from this world. My nephew would never know his name or that he had once existed.