Page 197 of Creep

Of Lia, tied up on a railing, tears streaming down her face.

Fuck, but they had my girl, and I didn’t know where the fuck they had taken her.

* * *

I splashedcold water on Giovanni. He sputtered out a broken gasp of air as the water hit him, waking him up.

I watched his eyes move about, taking in his surroundings and making sense of the situation.

It was dire.

That was his situation.

He wasn’t going to get out of this alive. But whether or not he went quickly depended entirely on him.

“What the fuck? Let me go, Beckett!” he shouted, struggling against his restraints.

“You think making demands will help?” I asked calmly. I watched as water dripped down from his unsightly mustache, the drops dotting his shirt. Was this really the man who was able to form an entire organization from the ground up? It didn’t fucking make sense. The more I learned about him, the more the picture didn’t add up.

“What the fuck do you want?”

“Me? I want lots of things. For my girl to make it back home safe to me, to get married to her, get her to have my babies. Oh, and I want Leo Briggs’s head.”

“Leo? What the fuck does he have to do with this?”

I leaned forward, resting my hands on either side of him. He flinched when I got in his face.

“He has everything to do with this. And you’re going to tell me where the fucker is hiding, along with Luckas Whitlock.”

He shook his head. “I?—”

His screams pierced the air as I shoved my blade into his side. Not deep enough to kill him, but enough that it would hurt.

I tsked him. “Don’t lie to me. I know you’re hiding them. And now they have my girl, and I want to know where the fuck they are.”

“I really don’t know. I let them stay in my cabin up in the mountains the last time.”

I shook my head. I knew for a fact they weren’t fucking there.

I pulled out the cell phone, showing him the fucker’s message to me. “Don’t focus on the girl. Take a look at the surroundings and tell me where the fuck this is.”

His eyes looked around. I watched him carefully, trying to gauge if there was any recognition there.

His eyes flared for a moment before he forced his face back to how it was.

Bingo.

“Where?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know—fuck!”

I twisted the blade deep into his insides. “Try again. And remember this: You’re not the first fucker I tortured here. These walls have heard all sorts of screams and pleas. And I can keep you alive for days and have my fun with you.”

He laughed. “Are you sure the girl will last that long?”

I shook my head at him for bringing Lia into this. I reached to the table on the left for a pair of pliers. He swallowed noticeably when he saw them in my hand. I pinched one of his fingers between the jaws. “You thinkyoucan last that long?” I asked.

I tugged roughly on his finger, feeling a sense of satisfaction when I heard the bones dislodging. He let out a bloodcurdling scream, tears streaming down the side of his face. I moved on to the next finger and the next and the next, enjoying his screams with each bone I broke.

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