Page 106 of The Wicked

“Allow me to get this straight,” he said. “You told me, just a few hours ago, to hurry up and do what I need to do, and now that I’m trying to do it, you want to stop me—”

“But I already apolo—”

“Shut up.”

“—gized. I’m not going to leave—”

“Shut up.”

“—you. This is fucking insane, Elio! You can’t expect me just to let you—”

“Shut up!” He took a step closer to me. “Shut up.” Another until he was standing right in front of me. “Shut the fuck up, Zahra!” he yelled in my face, and I inched back; his breathing was harsh, and so was mine. “Stop messing with my head. I am impressionable; words aren’t just words for me. They’re affirmations. You apologized—thank you for your apology, but it means absolutely fucking nothing to me.”

I gulped down.

“No matter what you say,” he continued, “or how much you apologize, I will never forget every word you said by that roadside. It’ll always be in my head. I’ll always hear you repeat it over and over again. When I see you, that’s all I’ll think about; when I hear you speak, it’s all I’ll hear because that’s how my brain works.”

I stepped closer to him. “But I didn’t mean it. I was angry because it has been a long fucking day,” I sighed. “No matter how much we don’t like each other, I would have never said that to you if I had known you would take it seriously.”

“Well, this is the situation I find myself in. Don’t feel guilty. This was my plan all along; I’m only making it quicker.”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Yes.”

“No,” I countered with a confused frown, stepping away from him. “That’s not how tonight’s gonna go.”

“Go back to the car, Zahra.”

I stretched my hand. “Give me the gun.”

His gaze slipped to my hand and back to my face with a stern glare. “Go back. To the car. Zahra,” he repeated, a warning in his voice, one filled with so much venom, so much hate and frustration, but I couldn’t leave him like this.

I stood straighter. “Give me the fucking gun.”

He shook his head slowly. “Don’t push me.”

“Just give me the gun, and then we can talk. Just—” I swallowed to ease the tightness in my chest. “You know I’m not gonna let you do this.”

It took a second. Just one second for his whole demeanor to change. The anger slipped from his eyes, his breathing calmed, and his eyes, completely vacant, were watching me in silence. It was like a switch had been turned off inside him, and I grew even more wary.

“Elio?”

“I love it,” he said, voice flat and unfeeling.

I frowned. “What… what are you talking about now?”

“The fear my presence compels in people.” He examined the gun in his hand. “The smell of blood, and death, and suffering, and tears.” He closed his eyes as if he could see and smell all he just listed. “It’s like heaven. Chaos, massacres.” He opened his eyes. “I crave it like oxygen. I fucking love it, Zahra, shooting that boy, it felt so fucking good.”

I locked my jaw. “You’re lying.”

He scanned my body from head to toe, slowly, tentatively, until his intense, vacant gaze locked with mine. Then he moved, closing the space between us enough for me to crane my neck, looking up at him, my breathing unsteady.

He raised the gun, trailing the barrel’s mouth from my forehead, past my brows, down my cheek, and to the surface of my bottom lip, where he stopped, and raised his gaze. “One thing you should never do, Zahra, is make a hero out of me. I have killed men, women,… people I care for. I have lost count of people who screamed my name before I ended their lives, Ihave taken and taken and taken more than I should, and I don’t regret any of it. The most beautiful thing is that the business is just a cover-up for how fucked up my head is, for how much I love what I do.” He pressed his forehead to mine, closing his eyes as he swallowed and said, “How much Ilongfor it.”

My throat worked. “You’re just saying that.”

“You don’t believe it? I’m not surprised. People love to underestimate me and make assumptions based on my actions.He’s kind sometimes; he’s calm. He doesn’t care; all he wants is power; he’s all talk and no action. Do you want to know why that is? It’s because the people who are supposed to confirm the action are either six feet under or fish food. The stories you hear about The Wicked are just a scratch in the surface of what I’m capable of.”