Page 10 of Shrapnel

Jamie smiled at the rumble in his voice. His fingers carded through Jackson’s messy hair and tugged painfully, experimentally. Poking to see what reaction he would get.

Jackson jerked on the shackles and the entire chair shuddered.

“You know, I’m beginning to think you aren’t taking me seriously,” Jamie purred lazily as if he hadn’t just blown up a house and killed upwards of fifteen people in his quest to come to flirt with him.

“I’m not interested. Go find a boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend this. Love that. It’s all I hear,” he huffed petulantly. “I’m sick of it.”

Jackson sneered. “So, what do you want?”

Jamie’s eyes brightened. They sparkled with a chaos Jackson didn’t understand. His steady sniper hands traced over his eyebrows and then down to his lips. They teased at the scabs on his lower lip, jagged fingernails catching with his indulgent touches.

“I want tofeel, Jackie,” Jamie said in a hushed voice. A voice that was different from his usual whine. There was something uncomfortably raw in it. He rocked forward so that his groin pressed against Jackson’s. The pressure was uncomfortable, friction that came too dangerously close for his comfort.

That fake grin was gone. In its place, a feral sort of smirk had taken up residence on Jamie’s face.

“Find someone else—”

He leaned forward until his lips were scant inches from Jackson’s. Not a kiss but so close their breaths mingled. He grit his teeth and stared Jamie down, face still.

“Iknow.” Jamie breathed. His lips brushed against Jackson’s faintly, so close to touching but not quite.

He grabbed Jackson’s face and forced him to look into his manic eyes. “Iknowwhat happened in Detroit. Iknowwhy you don’t go to the Sunspot anymore, and Iknowwhy you leave the country so often.”

His words sent a chill down Jackson’s spine. He couldn’t know. There was no way some skinny kid with a gun knew. Not even Grant knew.

“You don’t know anything.” There was an embarrassing hitch in his voice, the words scraping against the anger building in his chest.

Jamie’s hand wandered down Jackson’s chest. His fingernails scraped through the dirt and grime, cutting across defined muscles until they came to rest splayed out over his lower abdomen. His palm pressed against Jackson’s navel—callouses from handling weapons scraping against the sensitive skin. His pinky snaked under the waistband of his black tactical pants. Sliding just under the stiff fabric, the digit just barely caressed the beginnings of his wiry pubic hair.

No one had touched him like this …in a very long time. No one had the audacity or the bravery to flounce into his lap and look him right in his killer eyes.

“I’ll let you fuck me.” Jamie’s hand pressed down, maddeningly close to the heat buried behind his zipper. “You can wrap your hand around my throat and shut me up yourself. Ride my ass until you cum so hard I’ll pass out.”

He hated how his body reacted. His cock didn’t seem to care that he was in pain, or that he would rather throw Jamie out a window than have anything to do with him. It pressed against his zipper, filling with a need Jackson couldn’t control.

Jackson bared his teeth. “Listen little asshole—"

“I’ll even call youbigbrother.”

The chair came apart like kindling. He didn’t even have to let the rage loose. It exploded forward before he even realized what was happening. The metal cuffs banged on his wrists as he surged up and grabbed Jamie by the throat. He tossed him like a rag doll against the wall, fingers digging into the soft flesh of his neck.

Jamie didn’t fight him. His eyes watered as he gasped around Jackson’s hand, that stupid grin still plastered to his face.

Jackson saw red. Faces overlapped in his mind and the only thing he felt was the rush of rage that persistently hummed under his skin. A hot boiling urge to snap the flimsy neck under his hands. It would be so easy. So, satisfying to watch the light leave those cackling eyes and let the body fall to the floor in a heap. No one would know. Just another pile of ashes to join the rest.

Tears fell from Jamie’s eyes. They dripped through the blood on his face. The tracks left behind looked like fingers pressed to his face.

Absolute glee shone in his wet eyes. A frenzied sort of joy that defied logic. Jamie gulped pitifully for air that could not pass Jackson’s fingers. The hands wrapped around Jackson’s wrists weren’t tugging or wrestling for freedom but were holding him in place. Pressing his hand against Jamie’s windpipe like an anchor.

This kid is insane.

He stumbled backward, dropping Jamie. He fell to the floor and heaved in huge breaths. Between his breaths, he laughed, a disjointed sort of chuckle that spiraled into full-blown hysteria. His head tossed back, and arms crossed over his belly as maniacal glee spilled from his lips.

Of all the people he had choked, he had never seen that look before. That desperate look he couldn’t describe.

His rage was snuffed out. It died as quickly as it flared to life, retreating to the dark recesses of his soul until it was needed again.