Page 20 of Horror and Chill

“She wore hers like a bow. You wear yours like a confession.”

We take a photo. One quick shutter. Not to share. Not to gloat. Just to remember.

Then we press the blade under his ribs.

The tip bites into skin, and we feel the resistance of muscle underneath. He screams behind the tape, his body bucking against the chair, but we keep the motion steady. This isn’t for rage. It’s not for chaos. This is for clarity, for reckoning, and for balance.

We angle the blade upward. The resistance is different now, thicker, denser. The organs shift beneath the pressure, warm and slick. Blood rushes out in a heavy flow, hot and fast, soaking the waistband of his cheap shorts. His eyes widen. They don’tblink. They shine with terror that’s finally real, not projected from behind a keyboard. That’s where the truth always lives.

“She shared her pain with the world and owned every second of it. You used it. Mocked it. Spit on it. You tried to break her with a single line,” we whisper in his ear.

His head thrashes, but his strength is leaving him. The color drains from his face, sweat slicking his forehead, mouth stretched beneath the tape like he wants to beg for mercy. There is none coming. Not from us. Not tonight.

The knife cuts higher.

It finds his lung first. The wheezing that follows is heavy and ragged, a rattling gasp that sounds like a balloon deflating underwater. The panic in his body grows wild. His feet tap the floor like they might find traction. They won’t. His hands are bound tight behind the chair. There is nowhere to go. Nothing left to do but bleed.

There is a moment when the breath stops. Just a flicker of silence before the final snap. Then his spine arches once, sharp and violent, and he sags. The life leaves his eyes, the pupils fixed and empty. He slumps forward, chin to chest, mouth parted like he still wants to say something. The blood keeps coming, but slower now. It spills over his lap and onto the floor in thick, syrupy rivulets.

We step back and turn, walking back into the living room, where the laptop still lies open on the floor. Her video is paused, her eyes bright with power he never deserved to witness.

We carry it back into the room, set it gently on the table beside his slumped body, and angle the screen toward him. It feels right, making her the last thing he sees. Even in death, he should have to look at her.

She’s smiling in the video, unaware of how far we would go to protect that spark in her eyes. She doesn’t know yet that her strength inspires blood.

But she will.

8

Agatha

I’m still floatingwhen Kira finishes snapping the last picture. The air feels electric, like it could crackle against my skin. My thigh is burning and raw. I’ve done scenes like this before, a little star-shaped cluster, maybe five at most, but this? This was something else. This was mine.

She moves around the space, gathering wrappers and snapping the sharps container shut.

A wicked thought takes root.

“Hey, Kira,” I say, still stretched across the paper-covered vinyl. “I’ve got an out-there idea. You down?”

She laughs from the back room. “That depends. Are you about to say something illegal or just stupid?”

“Give me a piercing.”

A pause. Then she laughs again. “I just gave you over thirty.”

“No,” I say, sitting up slowly. “A permanent one.”

She steps back into the room, eyebrow arched, gloves off and balled in one fist. “Alright, what are we thinking? A septumwould look hot on you. Or a Monroe, maybe. Even your nipples. Your subs would lose their minds.”

I shake my head, a wild smile still curling at my lips. “They’d eat that up, sure. But I’ve got something better.”

She crosses her arms, smirking. “Hit me.”

“I want a VCH.”

Her brows lift. “Seriously?”

I nod once, slow and sure. “Dead serious.”