Page 26 of Absolution (Favorite Malady Trilogy #3)

DANE

A small smile curves my lips as I drive through the open gates to enter Meadow’s family’s beachfront property. I can’t stop thinking about my beautiful, brave Abigail: how she stood up to her cruel mother last night.

And how stunning she was when she embraced her sexual needs in my ropes.

My queen, my wife.

The strongest woman I know.

Pride swells in my chest to an almost painful degree, pushing my ribcage to its limit. I welcome the slight discomfort.

After last night, I feel calmer than I have since the day I found Abigail running for her life through these woods.

I find the narrow hunting trail that branches off to the right of the road and park my car. The walk through the dense woods takes about twenty minutes, but I don’t rush to the shack.

The rundown wooden building with a rusty tin roof is barely discernible from the thick trees that surround it, but I’m familiar with it now.

I’m not sure if even Meadows knows that this ruined old cabin exists on the acres of wilderness owned by his family. It’s provided an ideal space for my needs.

The woods go quiet at my approach, falling silent in response to the presence of a predator. It’s so quiet that I wonder if I’ve waited too long to return.

I didn’t leave much water last time, and I haven’t bothered with food in days.

The aged door creaks when I push it open, and the sound of a low, broken groan assures me that my quarry is still alive.

Billy cowers in the corner, no longer fighting the chain that shackles him to the wall. It’s connected to a steel collar that I locked around his throat when I captured him over a week ago.

By the end of today, I’ll be able to tell Abigail that the threat to her life has been eliminated. Ever since her revelations about her uncle, she’s been processing enough without having to think about Billy’s attack.

And I’ve been dealing with so many dark, vicious emotions that having her assailant as my captive has provided a much-needed outlet for my rage.

She won’t let me kill her uncle. I had to purge my most savage impulses elsewhere.

Billy has had the misfortune of being the focus on those impulses.

“Please,” he whimpers through broken teeth. “Let me go. I’m sorry. I won’t touch her ever again. You have to believe me.”

“I believe you,” I assure him. “You will never breathe the same air as my wife.”

He goes rigid at my cold, unfeeling tone. It must be jarring after my feral mood every other time I’ve visited him in this shack over the last several days.

His promise not to touch her doesn’t mean much to me anyway. His right hand has been missing for some time now. I took it from him on the day I captured him—that hand grabbed my Abigail. It imprinted bruises on her creamy skin.

The amputation isn’t my neatest work; the axe I found outside the cabin lacked the precision of my surgeon’s scalpel. But I made sure to bandage and treat the wound to ensure he wouldn’t bleed out or die of an infection.

He had to suffer so much more.

He must sense the impending end, because he jerks against his restraints. All he manages is to reopen the lacerations where the collar has been digging into his throat. Blood wells around the steel, dripping down his collarbones.

“Fuck you,” he seethes in a show of bravado I haven’t seen since I cut off his hand. “And that cunt. I should’ve fucked the answers out of her. She’s the reason you killed my brother.”

I lift a brow at him. “Do you want to lose your dick too? I’m in a good mood, but if you say one more word about my wife, you will scream for me again.”

He seems to have lost his mind entirely, because he thrashes and snarls at me like a trapped beast.

“If you’re going to kill me, fucking do it already!

” he shouts. “Because I swear to god, if I get out of here, your bitch of a wife is going to be the one screaming. I will split her in two when I rape her.” His broken teeth flash in an insane grin.

“Do it, psycho. You’d better kill me, or I’ll wreck her cunt. ”

With each disgusting threat, the red haze at the edges of my vision grows thicker, blocking out everything expect for his battered face.

He wants a quick end.

Rage rides me hard, but my mind remains sharply calculating.

I keep my movements slow and controlled as I withdraw the hunting knife from its sheath at my belt. His eyes widen, and he shrinks back, despite his obvious desire to die.

“You shouldn’t have spoken about her like that.” My voice is coolly detached, almost as though the words are issuing from someone else’s lips.

I’m lost to my cruelest urges, and the imperative to protect Abigail hones my focus until its sharper than my knife.

My free hand shoots out, my fingers clamping around his jaw.

He screams in agony as the insides of his cheeks tear against his jagged teeth.

It’s easy to grab his tongue and yank it out of his mouth.

I sever the muscle with one quick swipe of my blade, and his wail of abject horror soothes my roiling emotions.

His hot blood courses over my hand in a cleansing stream.

I step back, and he clutches at his ruined mouth with his one remaining hand. He tries to babble for mercy and nearly chokes on his own blood.

I take a long minute to watch him, savoring the mortal panic that makes his pale blue eyes roll in their sockets.

He’ll never speak another threat against my wife. He’ll never touch her.

My righteous rage is satisfied, and calm settles over me.

The blade flashes silver through the darkness of the cramped shack, nicking his artery. Blood sprays my face, but the satisfaction that heats my chest is even hotter than the splatter.

Billy collapses onto the dirty floorboards, writhing and gasping as his life slips away. His feet drum against the wood in a desperate, useless attempt to flee the inevitable.

After a while, he goes still in the pool of his own blood, utterly silent.

The threat to Abigail is eliminated. She’s safe, and I’m at peace.

I’ll never tell her the gory details of what I’ve done to Billy, but she will accept his death as a necessity. She accepts me for all that I am, and she trusts in me to protect her. I will do all the dark things necessary to ensure that she’s blissfully content for the rest of her life.

I promised to give my wife the world, and she will want for nothing.