Page 159 of Soul So Dark

“Would that be an imaginary one with Dallas, or that other dumb-fuck girl who thinks you’re such a heartthrob?”

His silence earns him another slice beneath the first one.

As his blood seeps beneath my fingertips, I glance up to see Dallas illuminated by the string lights on the patio.So goddamn beautiful.My dick twitches at the juxtaposition of Bowen’s wails against the glow of her stunning complexion and it just makes me want to bleed him more.

He continues jerking around in agony, but I’m not through with him yet.

“Come on, Bo. Out with it. Why are you here?”

“Dallas asked me to come here,” he barks.

“Dallas asked you to come here,” I echo. “Now, why thefuckwould she ask you to do that?” I ask more so out of morbid curiosity than anything.

“Ran into her a few weeks ago,” he replies through haggard breaths, “she said she worked here.”

“Mmm,” I hum, reaching for my phone. “That seems to happen a lot.”

Seconds later, I show him a video. He stares at the image of his twin sister, Hildy, wandering through the store while sipping some sugary coffee drink, utterly oblivious to being recorded.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I say in the video after bumping into her.

“It’s OK,” Hildy replies with a hitch in her voice as soon as she sees me.

“You look familiar,” I say with feigned ignorance. “Did you go to school around here?”

She doesn’t know me from any other stranger, but the flirty change in her demeanor is unmistakable as she smiles more and inches slightly closer as she speaks.

“It’s very simple,” I say as he watches me offer to buy Hildy another coffee, and her immediately accept. “You stay away from my woman, and I won’t take one of yours as payment.”

“Bullshit,” he grunts through clenched teeth.

“You know as well as I do that there are a lot of people who’d like to get their hands onyoursister. People with grudges…axes to grind.”

“Try it,” Bowen snarls. “You’ll be dead where you stand.”

“I’ve been sitting in your truck since you walked through those doors. You think I can’t get past Jay with his busted knee and broken heart?” I chuckle over my shoulder. “I’m sure I could make an even better deal withhim, anyway.”

A heavy silence lingers between us while he mulls it over.

“I should’ve put my knife in you and bled you out back then,” I continue. “So, the next time you decide to mess with things that aren’t yours, I’m taking the whole thing—and then some.”

I nick the side of his bloody dick one more time, eliciting another guttural wail before I climb over Bowen’s twisted body and exit the vehicle.

“Stay,” I clip before slamming the door.

I snake through the sidewalks and alleyways for a good 10 minutes, making sure no one is following me before I arrive at one of the historic neighborhoods where my truck is nestled among the flower boxes and SUVs with private school decals splashed across their back windows.

As soon as I start my truck, I reel back and bring down my fist on top of the wheel, making it shudder. We fucked up.Ifucked up. I asked Aiden to keep an eye on Dallas, but he can’t have eyes on her all the time. She’s not his responsibility, and it’s my fault Bowen was able to get this close to her—hanging out at her fucking job.

But after tonight, he never will again, because my mission is to find and root out every threat lurking in the shadows so I can dispatch them in any way I see fit. And I’m starting tonight by trawling Dallas’s entire electronic life to find anyone hiding in the ether. But first thing’s first.

I have other plans to attend to.

It feels like an eternity by the time I arrive home and stalk back up to my apartment. As though the universe heard my shouting and cursing all the way here, my phone vibrates with a text that the last of my packages have arrived and are secured down in the office. I’ll have them brought up immediately, because I won’t sleep tonight until I finish what I started before I even set foot back on US soil.

Less than 30 minutes later, I’m standing in the closet—sorry,boudoir—facing the tower of boxes that have accumulated over the last few days. I need to focus on the task at hand. Who knows, maybe this will calm me down.

I flip open my black metal knife and slam my fist down on the box, stabbing the blade through the cardboard. But as soon as I see the butterfly logo stamped in the corner of the box, I clench my jaw and jerk my arm back, slicing through the packing tape.