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Y eah, I didn’t give a shit if anyone noticed my tits.

I just really needed to hit Neco again. How many times did I have to tell him that Mom’s life was on the line?

The Barons were famous for loopholes in their contracts.

I hadn’t found one when I read mine, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t make one up and I couldn’t do a damned thing about it.

Basselt caught the back of my shirt and yanked me back. I didn’t fight because I wasn’t mad at Basselt. He’d been nothing short of amazing and had risked everything for me. I appreciated that, and I was going to make damned sure no one found out his secret, even though mine was exposed.

“He did you a favor,” Basselt said.

“They don’t usually care about their bastards, but Folcard probably wants to punish this man himself.”

“Unless he doesn’t. These are bloodthirsty men who torture women.

They yearn for war. When you present this to Folcard, you are going to want the real narrative.

This man was butchering entire families to better his station.

If Neco didn’t kill him, he’d put his own spin on it and it might impress his father enough that he got exactly what he wanted,” Basselt said.

“He’s right,” Trevils said. “Folcard is a sniveling wretch who sends people to fight his battles for him, but thinks he would win if he fought them himself. He would probably put his heir aside and consider this man the more powerful choice because he would consider this ruthless and not completely insane.”

“I’d never do anything to hurt your mom,” Neco said softly.

“If we present this as one of his bastards who was taking out their half-siblings and had his sights set on Folcard’s heir, we control how the story gets told.

If I didn’t kill him, he could have said anything.

If Folcard decided to make him his heir, then you assaulted him.

It won’t matter he was about to slaughter an entire family and was going to kill you.

You struck one of them. I’m not letting them kill you for that. ”

Shit, I hadn’t even thought of that. My whole plan had been to get the Ghoul in front of everyone in Lower Cutwart and out him.

I was going to convince the crowd if we got street justice and no one said they saw anything, then they couldn’t punish anyone.

That was how it worked in Guttertown. Sometimes, the whole town needed to give someone a beat down, and no one saw shit after.

That all changed when he pulled a knife on me. We were going to salvage it by keeping him knocked out and carrying him to the barn. It changed again when he admitted he was one of Folcard’s bastards like I was.

“You hit him, too,” I pointed out.

“I was going to hit him again, but you stopped me. It’s different when you do it.”

“What if he kills you for this?”

I didn’t want Neco dead. He pissed me off all the time, but I’d miss him. It would destroy Theda and Rowena.

“He won’t because I did what he had me sign my name to a contract to do. I read your contract over your shoulder. It said to catch the Ghoul dead or alive. It’s not our problem he’s such a shit father he didn’t know it was one of his kids doing it.”

Just then, Ollie came out of the barn with the entire mob we were going to use to take out the Ghoul.

They were pissed, and they had pitchforks from the barn.

Some filled sacks with horseshoes to beat him with.

Yeah, they might think they were above Guttertown, but beating the shit out of someone with a sack full of stuff you stole from the blacksmith was such a Guttertown thing to do.

And they actually seemed pissed Neco had already done the deed. There were women out here. One of them marched over in the pouring rain.

“Is this the man whole slaughtered Elsbeth and her family?”

“It is,” Neco said.

She lifted her skirts, kicked his corpse, and then spat on him.

“You should have made it last longer when you killed him.”

“Ma’am, only psychopaths do that,” Neco said.

I blew out a sigh. This wasn’t the time for one of Neco’s long-winded speeches about how he was an assassin and not a serial killer and there was totally a difference.

I knew Neco, and the Ghoul weren’t even remotely the same. They could have been. They both decided they were going to kill someone and did it. The Ghoul enjoyed it and got addicted to it. He kept escalating. Neco thought it was just like stepping on a roach.

Trevils stepped forward. I didn’t much have a plan for after we got the crowd riled up, but now we had a pissed off mob with no target. I didn’t know what to do with that.

“Everyone is mad and you have every right to be. This man targeted your town and your friends. He was here to kill again, and he was stopped for good. You might not like how it was done, but he’s dead and he won’t be killing again.

What we aren’t going to do is desecrate a corpse.

That’s what he did. So, you’re going to go back to your party and we’re taking him. ”

Yeah, out of everyone here, Trevils would be the one people would listen to the most. He also had a lot more experience with calming angry mobs than us. Every single Guttertown resident here had spent time in the cells because we were the angry mob and just didn’t run fast enough.

Everyone grumbled, but they left. Trevils turned to us and he was all business.

“I’m going to move him somewhere until morning.

You need to be sorted before you go to your father.

I don’t particularly give a shit how you choose to present yourself, but Folcard is going to take it personally because he would have used you differently.

I don’t agree with any of it, but it is what it is.

Take her home and take care of her. Meet me at the same pub tomorrow and I’ll go with you because I have a lot more experience managing Folcard’s mood. ”

Yeah, I didn’t really think Trevils would give a shit I wasn’t a man. He didn’t ask why and he didn’t care. He may eventually, but right now, he was treating it like it wasn’t his business. I trusted him to keep my secret. Hopefully, he could make his men keep it, too.

I didn’t trust a damned soul in Lower Cutwart. They hated us in Guttertown and they didn’t have the same loyalty. They worked hard to marry out of their station, even if they knew they would be unhappier when they got there.

Hopefully, they were too distracted by the dead body to notice me.