Page 15 of King of Cruelty

The guy said himself he didn’t want me here. Madison took the bait and offered me up to Abraham, because the discovery of the trackers in our clothes made her useless. She thought she could score points by offering up a high-value hostage, and instead she scored a bullet in the face.

So now what? If he doesn’t think I’m useful to him and he can’t let me go, what option does that leave him, the insane fucker?My eyes fell on the gun comfortably tucked in his waistband.Only one.

“Only the woman who bore me gets to call me Genevieve, and unless you brought me out here to share some shocking news, that’s not you.”

Abraham chuckled. “Ah yes, your mother, the Adeline Redgrave. Everything comes back to her in the end.”

“I don’t think it does.” My tone was even. “But if you want a question, here’s one: why do you think everything comes back to her? My family doesn’t even know you. My mother doesn’t know you.”

“No, she doesn’t, and that’s the biggest insult,” he replied, a hard edge bleeding into his voice. “She ruined my life, and she doesn’t even know who the fuck I am.”

I rolled my eyes behind his back. Here it comes, I’d heard it all before. The boo-hoo sob story about how my mother spilling the ledger’s secrets, and getting his mommy or daddy locked up ruined his life and that was all Adeline’s fault. Because naturally,it wasn’t his parents’ fault for being a loathsome fucking criminal—oh no! As always the bullet of blame is aimed at the messenger.

“How did she ruin your life?” I asked, not even trying to tamp down my boredom. All of our enemies play at being big and bad, but at the end of the day, they’re basic.

“I’m sure you know the story.” Abraham looked straight ahead, adjusting his gait only once to step over a raised root. “I’m sure your parents told it over dinner every other night while you all laughed and applauded your mother, the great hero. The one who took down Corbin Dumont.”

I frowned, slowing a beat.Corbin Dumont?

“See?”

I snapped up to find Abraham staring at me.

“I knew you knew his name.”

I definitely knew Corbin Dumont. Decades ago, when my mom was still hiding her true badass self from my chef-abducting dads, she found herself in the middle of a child-trafficking auction. An auction run by Corbin Dumont.

She was only able to save one girl that night, and that girl grew up to be my equally badass aunt, Kaylee. Kaylee took over running the circus after my grandparents passed away, but whenever she rolled through town, we got drunk and risked our necks on the tightrope. I loved her. She was the epitome of the cool aunt, and whenever I think of how she came into the family, I wanted to dig Corbin fucking Dumont up and piss on his corpse.

He didn’t succeed in selling my aunt to a pedophile, but so many other children did suffer under his sociopathic greed to make money at all costs. Because of that, my parents had to capture and torture him before the fucker gave up the hotel where he was holding the other children.

They busted in there, rescued them, and Corbin thanked them by breaking out of his restraints, summoning the Kings,getting my mom captured and beaten, and then he sexually assaulted her before getting shot in the head by his boss.

That shitstain was vile from birth to death, but no, Mom didn’t laugh and crow about his demise over fucking pancakes. She told me the truth about Corbin, what he did to Kaylee, the other children, and to her while we curled up on the couch late one night. I asked her how she got into this life, and if she ever regretted it... and so she told me how.

She also told me she didn’t regret a thing. If she had it to do over, she’d choose to become a Merchant every time, and the Kaylees of the world were the reason why.

“The law moves slowly, my sweet girl,” Mom whispered as she wrapped me up in her cloud of cocoa butter, flour, and peach shampoo. “It’s all waiting, and warrants, and informants, and evidence, and not making a move unless it’ll hold up in court, and while they’re dotting their damn Is and crossing their Ts, little kids are crying alone in a dirty hotel room, praying for someone to save them.

“It’s the cops’ job to lock away the monsters. It’s ours to burn them and everything they touch to the ground, and I can promise you, the latter is much more satisfying.”

Resuming our creepy walk, I let Mom’s voice fade as I wiped away any expression. “Yeah, I know about Corbin Dumont. What about him?”

“A lot,Genny.” He spat my nickname like a curse. “There’s a lot about him you don’t know. Details left out over Sunday night dinner. You see? Your parents never told you that Corbin Dumont... was my father.”

Again I rolled my eyes. The guy dropped that information like it wasn’t fucking obvious where he was going with this. “Cool,” I dropped, voice flat. “And let me guess, you’re mad at my mom because Corbin’s old boss, Angelo, shot him in the head? Please tell me how—”

“That’s a lie.”

I frowned. “Excuse me?”

“That’s a lie. That’s a fucking lie!” he roared, whirling on me. “Angelo didn’t shoot him, your blessed fucking mother did. She shot him and left his body in an alley. An alley!” Bulging eyes blew away all appearance at calm. “Like trash!”

I edged around him, making him turn on the spot and face his back to the tree root. “Who told you that?”

“Who told me this?” Abraham barked a laugh. “Not Saint Adeline, of course. No, she never had the balls to face the innocent victims she’s destroyed in her reign of terror, and tell them the truth.”

“Hmm. Well, to be fair, she doesn’t have balls, so—”

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