Page 124

"You look tired, Sinclair,"he says,attempting a casual tone like we're old friends meeting for drinks instead of what we really are—predator and prey in the final moments of a hunt.

I tilt my head, studying him. The tremble in his hands he can't quite control. The shallow, rapid rise and fall of his chest. The sweat collecting at his collar despite the cold air slicing through the broken windows.

I'm not tired.

I'm more alive than I've been in years. Every sense heightened. Every nerve ending raw and electric.

I stare him dead in the eye and let him see exactly what's coming for him.

"You look dead."

He laughs—a thin, weak sound full of the kind of bravado men only affect when they've already lost everything.

"You came all this way just to bleed?" he asks, taking a small step backward despite his words.

"No," I reply, my voice flat and certain. "I came to collect."

I unclip the holster at my back and drop the gun at my feet. The sound of it hitting concrete echoes in the empty space.

His brow lifts, genuine confusion replacing his fear for a moment.

"No bullets?" he asks.

"I want you to feel it."

I draw the knife from my hip—the blade catching what little light filters through the broken windows, gleaming with anticipation.

He turns to run. It's instinct by now, the cornered animal's last desperate attempt at survival.

I let him get two steps.

Just two.

Then I slam into him from behind with enough force to send us both crashing to the ground.

He tries to fight, of course. Throws a wild punch that glances off my jaw. Grabs a metal pipe from the debris on the floor. Swings it like a man who's never had to earn his victories because they've always been handed to him on silver platters stained with others' blood.

I let him get one good hit in. Feel my lip split. Feel a rib crack under the impact.

And then?

I bury the knife in his thigh, driving it deep into the muscle with a single, vicious thrust.

He screams—a high, desperate sound that bounces off the warehouse walls.

"That's for her wrists," I growl, twisting the blade before yanking it free.

Blood fountains from the wound, soaking through his expensive slacks. I don't give him time to recover.

I drive the knife into his side next, angling it upward beneath his ribs, and twist.

"That's for her throat."

His body convulses as he tries to crawl away, one hand outstretched on the concrete. I grab it—his fingers still clawing for escape—and pin it to the floor.

The knife comes down through his palm, piercing flesh and bone and driving straight into the concrete beneath.

He howls, a broken animal sound that doesn't even sound human anymore.