Page 33 of Traithorn

Celine’s smile grows, like a predator seizing up her prey. “So you decided you wanted her dead?”

“She left me no choice,” he hisses. “She pulled away. Startedlooking at me like I was a stranger. Like I wasn’t enough!” He clenches his fists. “But I was. I was the only one she had left, and she still turned on me.”

He’s panting by the end of his tirade, and I only stare at him. The more seconds that pass, the more I start to realize that there’s something wrong with him. Obsessive, cold, dangerous. A means to an end that needs to be obliterated, precisely like I thought when he visited us in jail one year ago.

“You’re violent. You already have blood on your hands. You killed your parents. I’m only giving you what you want. You can obliterate the entire Duskvik family and take over the wealth.”

He’s so out of it, he thinks we killed them to take over the family. I play along. “And what do you get out of it?”

“Like I said when I visited you, I will be free. I will move on. Rise in ranks, earn promotions without having to care about her stupid ass. The number of times she hasn’t even had food in her refrigerator! Coming to me, whining about food.” He nods to himself, as if it’s all making sense in his head. “Yes. I will be free.”

Rage filters deep in my veins, uncontrolled and lethal. The way he’s talking about Isolde makes me want to beat his fucking ass up. Daring to disrespect her like that.

“Well, everything is set in stone now, isn’t it?” Celine drawls, staring at her manicure like it’s more important than Casper. “You’ve freed us from suspicions. No one is coming after us.”

“Yes. And I managed to get her to the castle for you. Convinced her it’d be fun.”

I doubt he managed to do that, but I let him gloat. He won’t be doing much of that soon, anyway.

“Well played.”

I know he’s mad at us for taking matters into our own hands. We hunted down every bastard who ever wronged Isolde, one of them touching her the wrong way on the day when she foundthat dead body in the forest. One—the first victim when we got out whose tongue we nailed to the ground—called me a ‘bitch’ so I killed him. It wasn’t part of his plan, but it was always what we had planned.

We’re the king and queen over this gameboard.

“So it’s all set? You’ll kill her tonight?” Casper says.

I bite down the urge to laugh.

“Yes. She’s currently unconscious at the castle,” Celine says, barely containing the smirk twisting her lips.

After Isolde ignored our invitation to the castle for her birthday, we decided to pick her up instead. As soon as we had left off her sleeping form on the upper floor of the castle, by the fireplace so that she wouldn’t freeze to death before we returned, we went to the warehouse to meet with Casper.

Casper gives a curt nod, about to leave the warehouse, when Celine’s voice stops him.

“Casper, one more thing.” She makes a pause for added effect. “Do you really believe you’re some master puppeteer? Deciding who we can and can’t kill?”

He freezes in his spot, turning around to stare at us. Terrified out of his goddamn mind, evident in the way his eyes widen like saucers. “W-what?”

“Are you truly that pathetic?”

He blanches, a thin sheen of sweat clinging to his hairline. Legs pressed tightly together and shoulders hunched in defense, he looks as if he might piss himself.Gross.

Without Casper knowing, as he’s too nervous to look anywhere but at me, Celine grabs something from around the corner of the warehouse and approaches him. I see his Adam’s apple as he swallows harshly, fingers fidgeting while attempting to keep his calm.

Celine swings the baseball bat hard into Casper’s temple before he can react, knocking him out cold on the cementground.

“Fucker,” she spits at his limp, bloodied body.

“Good job, sis,” I drawl, and she gives me a leisurely smile.

—————

THAT CONSCIENCE THAT FITSinto the term of psychopathy? Nah. It doesn’t fit me either.

Conscience tugs at my edges, which is precisely why we have a living, breathing human in the back of our trunk.

“Wanna play?” Celine asks as she opens the trunk to reveal the imbecile who has been with our little traitor for the past three years.

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