Page 69 of Penance

Her viper tongue spitting venom with the friendly words. She plucks her delicate fingers from inside him. Smearing the hot, thick crimson across his cheek, marking him with his own blood. She smiles up at him brightly, an animalistic glint in her wicked gaze.

“How d’you feel?” she asks gently, softly.

The sound of her teasing forcing my blood-soaked skin to break out in goosebumps. A comical pout, a clownlike frown on her angelic face as she hides her true smile. Her goading kicks my heart into overdrive, beating uncontrollably inside my chest. My monster claws at my insides. This is a game. And Kyla-Rose is almost a better player in it than I am.

Almost.

The broken man shakes his head furiously at her. The waves of danger rolling off her like an overwhelming series of tsunamis, permeating the room with her anger. Even dressed up in her best clothes. A pair of three-thousand quid shoes on her feet. Hair and makeup groomed to perfection -you’d never know she has three-dozen hickeys smattered across her neck and jaw- everyone within a ten-mile radius could sense the threat of her presence.

Feel it.

Kyla-Rose reaches up suddenly, her hand snapping out at such a speed it’s a blur. Her bloody fingers and thumb dig into his chubby cheeks. Squeezing so hard she forces his mouth open like a puckering fish, grunting at what she sees. Releasing her hold on him she pushes against his chest, sending him swinging back and forth on his hook. He rocks, his heavy weight putting even more pressure on his damaged body, he groans out in a chorus of anguished cries.

“Charl,” she rasps softly, a small patient sound from her, created just for me.

It’s what I need, her soft soothing tune to break through my darkness. A slender hand reaching inside my chest, caressing the half-living organ inside there, getting it to feel something.

She always knows how to speak to me.

We healed together, after all.

“Yeah?” I rasp.

“You’ve cut out his tongue,” she tells me gently, her bloody hand coming up to rest against my bare shoulder, her crimson stained fingers squeezing comfortingly.

“I have?” I ask her with an exceptionally slow blink of my tired eyes.

She nods at me with that tender, loving smile. I just stare blankly at her angelic features.

“Want me to finish him off? Then we can go upstairs and open that tin of chocolates that Violet insisted I can’t open without you,” she winks with a broad grin.

I find myself nodding absently as she turns away from me. Lala approaches the weaponry wall. It’s one long length of the room, various types of weapons hang there in different shapes and sizes. Everything clean, organised and immaculate. I spend a lot of time down here making sure all of my things are perfect and ready for use. I enjoy organising it and having control over the space. It’s all mine.

This is the house Dad bought when Mum disappeared. We grew into men in this house. Kyla-Rose moved in when we brought her home from juvie. Dad taught her everything she knows too.

She came back from that place different.

Twisted.

More likeme.

I was broken by bad men too.

Lala runs her ruby stained fingers over a long thin scythe, examining it carefully. Running the pad of her thumb over the edge of the blade, snagging the skin but not drawing blood. Extracting it from the wall, testing its weight in her hand. Looking up at me, she flashes me that wild grin. The one that promises carnage, that’s one thing people underestimate about Kyla-Rose, her violence is feral. Just because she dresses up like a demonic little barbie, doesn’t mean she’s afraid of getting her hands dirty.

She steps up behind the man, adjusting her body so she’s poised with the weapon that will end his life. As she draws it back, I stop her.

“Wait!”

Her brow furrows, her slightly upturned nose wrinkling in confusion. I push up, grabbing a well-worn leather apron from its hook beside my workbench. I move around behind her, placing it over her head, tying it at the waist. I untuck her long silver hair and step back, checking it’s covering every clothed part of her.

“Thanks, Charl,” she beams up at me before slashing through the man’s thick jugular.

With one swift flick of the wrist, blood arcs, splaying across my already saturated body and I close my aching eyes with a sigh of relief as she showers me in it.

Stepping around me, Kyla-Rose places the bloodied weapon down. Turning away from me so I can untie the heavy apron. Lifting it over her head, I lay it down beside the scythe.

“Can we please go and open those sweets now?” she whines like a petulant child, not the demonic hellion that just killed a man.

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