Page 47 of King of Cruelty

“Of course she did,” he said, gazing out of the window. “After the Sacred Heart church, school, and clinic were all burned to the ground, and their accounts raided and drained of every cent.”

My jaw dropped. “Excuse me? After it— After it was what?!”

“That’s right. It’s exactly what you’re thinking and it was done by exactly who you’re thinking,” he hissed. “Thatis how much the Brotherhood hates Adeline Redgrave, the Merchants, and everything they touch, and that’s why I’ll have nothing to do with them. The Brotherhood would’ve rather my aunt and her mom been broke, homeless, and feeding off hatred in a cardboard box on a street corner than having been helped and supported by the Merchants.

“They’d rather every single victim be as lost in hatred and revenge as they are instead of taking a hand-up and moving on with their lives, and instead of giving them a choice, they made the choice for them—by stealing from a charity and burning down three buildings with seven people inside.”

Eyes huge, I clapped my hand over my mouth—horror burning my bones. “How could they do that? What is wrong with these people! How could Vance join them?”

“I told you. The Brotherhood is looking for people filled with hate and vengeance, and that’s Vance. The only time I ever see the real him these days is when the name Adeleine Redgrave comes up.”

“What did he blame her for?”

“Revealing that his father was a vicious mutilator and serial killer named the Slasher,” Damien dropped without tone or inflection. “After killing him, of course.

“When it got out that the Slasher was his father, life got bad for Vance quick. People assume that evil is genetic, or at least they treated him like it was,” he said. “Vance’s mom picked up and moved the entire family out of Cinco, and my old friend Victor Pais became Vance Hollywell.”

“Only those who need to know know,” I whispered.

“Yes,” Damien agreed in the most civil conversation we’d had in years. “I knew if the Brotherhood ever found their way to Vance, they’d only have to ask him to join once. Or maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe he’s one of the founding family. I don’t know. It’s not a question you can just come right out and ask.” Damien shuddered. “Not to a man like him.”

“Wait,” I said, holding up a hand. “Family? Why did you say foundingfamilyand not founding members?”

“Because that’s what my aunt discovered when she went looking for the bastards who burned down the charity. The cops tracked down the arsonist and got him into an interrogation room, and it’s that tape that she dug up,” he said. “On it, the guy was ranting on and on about the just cause of the Brotherhood. He said Sacred Heart was evil. It was run by evil people, and it was up to the Brotherhood to free Cinco from the grip of theMerchants because the cops were too stupid and chickenshit to do it themselves.”

Damien scoffed. “They called a police psychiatrist in pretty quick to talk to the guy because he had zero remorse. Couldn’t give less of a shit that a priest, a nun, and three clinic nurses were among the ‘evil’ people he brutally murdered.

“The shrink came in and tried to determine if the guy understood right from wrong, and if it sunk in that he was about to get the death penalty for carrying out an act of domestic terrorism in the name of a fictional gang. He then replied, ‘There’s nothing fictional about my family, and you can bring on your fucking death penalty. I’ll happily die for Mom and Dad.’”

“Mom and Dad?” I seized. “Who? His mom and dad?”

“No, that’s just it. The guy was an orphan. His folks died when he was two, and then he bounced around from foster home to foster home. Bad ones,” Damien stressed. “Wasn’t very likely he built up an attachment to anyone in that parade of abusive, neglectful monsters.”

My mind raced. “Could he have been avenging his parents’ death? Did he blame the Merchants for losing them?”

Damien was shaking his head before I finished. “His folks died in a house fire. They got blackout drunk and passed out with the stove on. Not even the twistiest of mental gymnastics could’ve made that the Merchants’ fault. No,” he said firmly. “My aunt was sure Mom, Dad, and family all referred to the Brotherhood, and possibly the top leaders. Why? Because it’s genius. How in the world do you find someone who only goes by Dad?”

I snorted. “Good point. Very good point.”

Jeremiah started fussing—his face scrunching unhappily in sleep. Automatically, I started rocking him, gently murmuring to the baby until his forehead smoothed out and he settled.

“You’re good at that.”

“I had a lot of practice,” I told the father of my child. “Alone.”

Damien didn’t reply.

“So the police interview tapes,” I asked, veering away from that topic. “Was that all your aunt was able to dig up?”

“That’s all there was. That same night, Leonard Stevens was murdered in his cell.”

“Of course he was,” I gritted. “Didn’t matter that he was loyal to them—and insane. All that mattered is that he might talk. Who knows? Maybe just saying Mom and Dad was talk enough, and they killed him for it.”

“We’ll never know,” he confessed. “He was killed before he could give up anything helpful, and the search of his apartment and workplace turned up less than nothing. The cops closed the arson case, and as for the murder case, I’m pretty sure no one looked too hard for that bastard’s killer.”

“How do you know? Your aunt told you all of this?”

He tipped his head. “She did when I came to her my junior year, asking if she could help me get a scholarship from Sacred Heart too. Just like I heard her say all those years ago. But the minute their name came out of my mouth, she freaked.

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