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EIGHT

Dante

Everyone has their breaking point. Some break earlier than others, but it’s all the same. Part of them becomes irreparable. How the person moves from that can be beautiful or a disaster. I saw the moment she broke. When I pulled her out of the water, the person she was when we’d first met disappeared. The way she curled up in the boat was familiar. I’ve been there before. This is the stuff that gets true serial killers off. Some of them love to snuff the light out of someone's eyes long before they kill them.

Doing so doesn’t get me off, but it was necessary for her. She needed to be deeply rooted in reality. This is the hard part. We’re staying off grid for at least a month. Father needs to sweat. I need him to feel the terror parents feel when their children disappear into thin air. Yes, he’s done that to many parents with sex trafficking, but that’s not why I’m doing this. That’s just a bonus. If he were here right now, I’d cut his precious child into pieces and hand them to him one by one, then slit his throat while he cries.

For the past week, she has sat in the same place, staring out at the ocean and barely remembering to eat, then she’ll randomly curl up into the fetal position on the floor and go to sleep. She barely talks unless I address her and sometimes it takes her a moment to realize I said anything at all.

It’s not a complaint or even a concern; it’s fascinating. Most predators stalk their prey to gather information of the best time to strike, but we’re past that. This is an open study of an unraveling human. One of the amusing side effects of her departure is the open honesty that falls out of her mouth.

I just finished grilling some fish I caught when I passed her. She’s still staring, but her sniffles grab my attention.

“Still crying, I see.”

She doesn’t respond for a while, making me think she didn’t hear me. Continuing with my plans, I move from the concept of conversation since it’s not anything I seek anyway.

“Yes, but not for you. You don’t care about my tears.”

True. I stop and stare at her face, watching them trickle down her cheeks to see if they move me. Nothing.

“You’re right. Are you eating today?”

“You should at least tell me what he did to you.”

I pause, because that’s the first direct thing she’s said about why she’s here. “I don’t owe you anything.”

“But I owe you my life because you’re upset with a man I hardly know?” She’s caught up. She gets why she’s here. I'm no longer "upset" with him, but his suffering and death are necessary. He still grossly betrayed me and must pay for it. “The other people, I get it. They assisted him while doing heinous things, but I’m just a product of his DNA.”

“And therefore, the only thing he cares about.”

She snorts. “Okay. What’s the charge? What am I paying for?”

Interesting. Most people beg for their lives or mercy, but she wants to know why.

“Shut up and eat,” I tell her to close the conversation. She grabs a filet, shoves it in her mouth, then disappears inside the bungalow. She needs to be happy there aren’t any bones, because I would’ve let her choke. “And sleep in the bed. You’re not a dog.”

This bungalow is small and great for one person who wants to be isolated. The bathroom is the only room with a door. Everything else is open concept. It's one of the places I go to disappear. Finding squatters pissed me off. After I killed them and cleaned my place back to my liking, I collected the dummy from the beach. We'd have to share the bed, but that should be the least concerning part for her.

I take my time eating because there's no schedule for now. Sometimes not plotting everything down to the minute is hard, but there's something about my island that allows me to relax off grid. I allow the slight breeze to toy with my overgrown hair as I eat my food.

One of the drawbacks and benefits of my training is my sensitivity to changes in the environment. Not outside conditions; the social environment. After cleaning my area, I move inside cautiously because she’s too quiet. We all make noise, even while sleeping. Some are just less noticeable than others. I inch into the bungalow, mentally preparing for every outcome. My body is tense and ready to fight in case she’s lost the rest of her mind. The open concept gives me the advantage because there aren’t many places she can hide.

My fighter instincts relax when I find her sitting in the middle of the bed, but my inner tension rises. She has my lighter and she’s staring at the flame. We’re both aware of the other’s nearness. I can tell by the slight rise of her shoulders, she’s not completely relaxed.

She drops the lid back to distinguish the flames. “Orejón.”

Hearing my last time makes me feel like small droplets of acid are gnawing at my skin. I shake my head once and pretend that she didn’t say it.

“Orejón, Orejón, Orejón,” she repeats. She’s not looking at me but staring into space again. “I used to hear it all the time. I thought it was a rare last name. I didn’t hear it unless my dad was saying it. ‘Orejón will fix it. He’s my best worker. Orejón wouldn’t fuck up like that,” she mimics, then snorts with a smile that displays no mirth. “I used to think you were an employee, but that last statement, Orejón wouldn’t fuck up like that , was said before I saw him shoot someone. Right before I ran, the last thing he said was, “‘Find Dante…’”

Hearing my first name is worse than hearing my last. He only used it when he asked for “special tasks.” Things other people wouldn’t do.

“Shut up,” I order her, although it’s not as authoritative as usual. My mind is already being pulled back into that angry but hopeless place of my childhood.

“He talked about you so much that I got curious and looked you up one day.” She looks up at me, her eyes still the blank slates they’ve been since her dip in the ocean. “So much tragedy for a child.”

The six-year-old in me rages. My emotions feel exposed, ripped open and displayed to the world, except it’s not going to manifest in any way that’s good for her. I move too quickly for her to react and grab her by the neck, pulling her off the bed.

“Shut the fuck up!” Dragging her to one of the few walls in the room, I cuff her to one of the installed hooks. “You’re snooping like you have a death wish. I’ve allowed you to roam freely, but you’ve broken that privilege.”

“I don’t have a death wish; you marked me for death,” she points out.

There’s no inflection in her voice. It’s not a challenge; it’s her interpretation of the truth. I’ve never forgotten my name but have gotten some peace from not hearing it for years. It irked me when Andrea said it, but he only used it once. The live wire she almost unearthed still needs to be appeased. Images of my slain parents flash in my head, reminding me of the biggest lie I’ve believed until a little over a month ago. They didn’t abandon me. No, he viciously killed them. He made me hate the only people who loved me.

I’m mad at myself for not seeking out the truth as soon as I had the ability, but he’d already thoroughly brainwashed me and bent me to his will. Had I known, I could have killed him so many times over in the years I’ve been out from under his thumb. All I had to do was look.

The news only reported my parents as murdered. A cold case, but I found the photos of their mutilated bodies that Father kept in a file on his computer like a fucked-up trophy. He will know how it feels to witness what I saw. If his parents were still alive, I’d return the favor but there’s only her.

The need to electrify her nervous system and expose her hurt to match mine tears at my skin. Someone needs to feel my pain. My heart pounds in ways exertion and killing don’t produce. It’s a rhythm reserved for bleeding old wounds and new, deep hurt. I grab a nearby gallon of water and start pouring it over her. She blows out and shakes her head to avoid the flow. Dropping the empty container, I bend in front of her.

“How about a slow death from electric shock?”

She turns her head to wipe her face against her arm as she shivers from the cool water. The wet shirt makes her nudity underneath apparent, but I’m not interested in her nakedness. After licking some water off her lips, she takes a deep breath and responds since she’s a fan of answering rhetorical questions.

“You’re too detailed and calculating...too methodical to kill me now. I'm alive for a reason. You need me for your perfect plan.”

I know she feels like she’s checked out and is ready for death, but that’s not completely true. Lucky for her, I don’t mind reminding her. Picking up my stun gun, I press it to her side. She yelps from the initial pain, but the current shuts her up. Her eyes grow from the shock, and I deliver another current for the hell of it.

She's partially correct. My plan requires her to live for at least two more weeks. I want him to lose hope so I can rebuild it and take it away. Feeding her is easier than maintaining a dead body on an island. Switching to my knife, I press it to her neck, and she looks up at me with fear and curiosity. Her breath comes out in small huffs as she pants from the adrenaline spike from being shocked. I ignore the interesting arrangement of brown in her irises as I speak.

"No, Gatita . I need your body. A corpse can do. Final warning."

My knife is so sharp that a slight movement from her breaks skin and makes her bleed a little. I take a step back and leave her there. It’s a surface wound so she won’t bleed out or scar. I need to get away from her before she says anything else to make me lose my cool more than I already have.

I’m stripped down to my swim briefs by the time I reach the ocean. The cold of the water is a deep contrast with my hot skin. It shocks my mind back into alignment, easing the urge to yell until my lungs give out. I stop swimming to tread water. The waves crash into me until my muscles scream. My brain continues to attack me with my past, pushing me into memories I don’t want. It somehow intensifies my already strong desire to bury Father. No, rip off his jaw with my bare hands, and then bury him. I don’t know how long I stayed in the water but I’m shivering so hard my teeth chatter. With my body aching, I almost push myself to exhaustion before reaching the shore.

Collapsing in the sand, I heave for breath as I recalibrate and add more salve to my mental and emotional wounds. She caught me off guard and that’s happening one time and one time only.