Page 66 of His Deadly Devotion
My father groans in the distance. I turn around and make my way back to him. Leaning over, I smile down at the man who raised me. When I hear the door close behind us, I breathe a sigh of relief. Patty will get Aurora out of here.
“You were right,” I tell my father.
“About what?” he rasps.
“About me. You raised me. You made me everything I am today. For that, I’m thankful to you, Da. You wanna know why?” I cock my head to one side as I watch him struggle to breathe.
“Why?” he asks me.
“Because it means I’m the kind of monster that can kill without remorse. It means I’ll be able to cut your heart from your chest without losing any sleep.” I skim a hand over his pant leg and find the knife I know he has strapped there. My father has always been a simple man: one knife, one gun. I’m sure that’s something he’s regretting now that I have both.
His eyes widen. “You don’t want to do that,” he says. “Killing me is one thing, Connor. You might get away with it. You’re my son, my heir. But cut out my heart and you know what that means for you.”
I know exactly what it means. Which is why I’m doing it. Cutting out the heart of the leader is a declaration of war. It tells everyone that I’m coming for them. I could easily kill my father and take his place. His men would all bow to me. But I don’t want these fuckers bowing. I want them afraid. I want them to know I won’t stop until I find every last one of them. From my father’s chief, down to his general. They’re all on my list. BecauseI know they’re the ones he uses for his sick fucking torture games. They’re the men who touched my fucking wife.
I will deliver each of their hearts on a silver platter to her. That’s a fucking promise I won’t break.
“You won’t win this war, Connor,” my father says.
“I’ll gladly die trying,” I tell him honestly as I hold up the knife.
The room is pitch black. If it weren’t for the night vision glasses, I wouldn’t be able to see shit. Aurora has been in here. In the dark. For fucking days. Being beat on. Having God knows what else done to her.
Grabbing a fistful of my father’s shirt, I slice down the fabric until I see his aging skin. I look him in the eye as I press the blade to his chest, carving into the man who ruled over my life with an iron fist. A fist covered in dirt and blood.
The knife feels heavy in my hand, the weight of what I’m doing not lost on me. I continue to cut away at his body, each jab of the blade a confession, a promise of what’s to come.
“Just remember, this is who you always wanted me to be,” I whisper, while knowing he can’t hear me anymore. “A monster like no other.”
It takes longer than I thought it would, but eventually I have an opening big enough to reach inside his chest. My hand wraps around my father’s heart, and I swear I can still feel it beating as I tug it free from his rib cage.
“Thanks for giving me the skills, Da,” I say to my father’s body before rising to my full height.
Aurora believed there was something wrong with her because she didn’t feel bad after taking a life. I told her she was perfect, and I stand by that. Especially now that I feel the same lack of empathy. I’ve just killed my own father and I feel nothing.
That’s a lie. I feel free. More free than I’ve felt in my entire life, even though freedom is the last thing I’ll have after this.
I walk out of the basement, my father’s heart clenched in my fist and blood dripping from my fingers onto the floor. I find Patty in the foyer. Aurora in one arm, the other pointing a gun at four men standing between him and the door. I stalk towards them, raising the lump of flesh in my hand high in the air.
“My father’s reign has ended tonight. I’m the new head of the family. You can choose to follow me, watch as our names are carved into history books under the rise of a new regime. This is a declaration. A warning that I will not stop until I have them all.” I drop my arm, pausing to look each of the four men in the eye. “Are you in or are you out?”
They know what I’m asking them:Follow me or your role in this organization ends tonight and so does your life.
It’s no surprise that each of them bows their head before the guy in the front says, “Boss, what would you like us to do?”
I pause. I hate it. I fucking detest the title. I’ll live with it, though, if it means keeping my wife safe. “Make it known to every man and woman that a new king has been born. Make it known that this woman is mine. Anyone who even so much as thinks about touching her will be laying in a shallow grave right next to my father.”
A gasp from my right has me turning my head. My mother covers her mouth with a hand. “What have you done?”
“What needed to be done,” I tell her. “Patty, let’s go.” I step in front of my best friend, dropping my father’s heart to the ground. I ignore my mother’s scream of anguish as I take Aurora back into my arms.
I walk towards the door and the four men step aside. One of them holding it open as I pass through.
“You want me to pull a car around, boss?” another soldier asks.
“No, Patty will drive us.”
“What do you want us to do?” someone else questions.