Page 17 of King of Cruelty

I happened to agree with that quote, and right then, Brother Dumbass Abraham was telling me he was a violent, ignorant psychopath that believed whatever suited his hatred, and ignored everything else.

There was nothing I could say to pry the false memory of his father that his mother planted in his head, so there was no point in continuing to try.

He gestured with his gun. “Keep moving.”

“Happily.” I picked up my feet, setting off in the direction we came.

“No, that way,” he barked. “Turn around.”

“Nope, I don’t think I will.”

“Hey!” He grabbed my arm and I sprung.

Twisting hard, I threw him off-balance. The bastard stumbled into the root and it swept his legs out from under him, dropping him flat on his back. I snatched the gun from his grip before he hit the floor.

“As I said,” I chirped, leveling the gun on his not-so-fucking-smug-anymore face. “I’m not going that way because I suspect you’re leading me somewhere specific, and you just confirmed it by freaking out when I changed directions.”

Abraham glared at me from the ground, his hands slowly moving up in surrender.

“Tell me what trap you deluded yourself into thinking I would skip right into.” I slowly moved the gun now to his crotch. “Now.”

Of all things... Abraham laughed. Among the dirt on his back and the grass in his hair, he laughed. “You’re not going to shoot me, girl. There’s no silencer on that weapon. The second my brothers hear a gunshot, they’ll either think you’ve killed me, or that you’ve done something so unforgivable, it forced me to kill you.

“Either way, the first thing they’ll do is make your precious biker bitches suffer in punishment.”

I shrugged. “Maybe they will, maybe they won’t, but it won’t make much difference to you since your dickless corpse will be rotting in the pile of manure you were born in. Last chance,” I sang. “Tell me where you were taking me, or I make you the eunuch you’re so desperate to be,BrotherAbraham.”

Blood vessels burst all over his face. His jaw clenched so hard I heard something crack. His desperation to empty his clip into my head screamed from every pore of his furious face, but the one holding the gun was me.

“A... mile in...” he forced out. “There’s an underground hatch. That’s where I put the miserable cunts who beg after you, and that’s where I’m puttingyou.”

“Hmm, no.”

“What?” He frowned. “No?”

“No,” I repeated. “You’re lying. And for that—”

Bang!

The gunshot ripped through the forest, its cry not nearly as loud as Abraham’s.

“Ahh!” he howled, curling on his side and clutching the foot I just kindly put a hole in.

“You’re not holding my friends underground,” I shouted over his noise. “You psychopaths delivered—no, threw Bugsy’s body at me. She was bruised and bloody, but she wasn’t pale, dirty, or reeking of her own fluids like she would’ve been if she’d been in a hole for over a week.

“Your generous use of the wordcunttells me you’re a misogynistic pig like the company you keep, but you’d better get it through your fucking head now. Just because I’m pretty, doesn’t mean I’m stupid.”

I kicked him between the legs. Abraham shot off the ground, balancing on one foot, his eyes half bugged out of his head and jaw cracked as he clutched his balls—back arched like a bowstring.

“Don’t lie to me again,” I growled. “If the next words out of your mouth aren’t the truth and nothing but the truth, I’ll put a bullet through your skull and see if your friends in the cabin aren’t more forthcoming.

“Where were you taking me!”

“To the hatch!” he bellowed, blood filling his shoe and dripping out onto the grass. “But your gang isn’t in there! That dirty stinkin’ hole is just for you, bitch!”

“Where are my girls?” I kicked him again. “Where are they!”

“In the cabin!” Abraham heaved hard, spittle flying and coating his chin. “This is... one of Luca’s hellholes! Specially constructed so that there are chains in all the bedrooms... and none of the doors open from the inside.”