Page 23 of A Lady's Handbook of Espionage
She’d betrayed Favreau. Betrayed the Syndicate. Committed the unforgivable sin of killing his men, escaping Hong Kong, and sending him on a chase for six months. Now, the devil was on his way to collect his due.
She’d be damned if she made it easy for him.
Isabel pushed her wrist out of the rope by another degree.
“Oh, I’m certain Favreau would love nothing more than to put me in the ground at the right moment.” She leaned forward as much as her bonds allowed until the blade kissed her cheek. “But since you bound me to this chair in one piece, I assume he wants me breathing.”
“Breathing don’t mean I can’t make you sing,” he said softly. Dangerously. “Reckon the famous Spectre screams just as pretty as any dumb pigeon when she’s getting bits sliced off.”
A rough scrape of his thumbnail along her jaw. She breathed through her nose, willing herself still. She’d endured worse at the hands of better.
She pushed the rope down her wrist again, holding back a flinch as it rubbed her raw skin.
“You’re right,” she mused. “It has been a while since I had a proper scream. Better men than you have tried and failed to inspire one. Although not for lack of trying.”
He moved suddenly, the edge of his weapon pressing to her jugular. Old terror rose. The helpless animal part of her remembered every hand pinning her down. Every violation written on her skin.
“Shut it,” the Butcher hissed. “Keep that tongue behind your teeth, girl, or I’ll carve it out and feed it to you.”
Isabel’s smile never wavered. “You’re welcome to try if you’re that eager for a gelding.”
The Butcher went still. She tracked the ripple of rage, the clenching of that brutal jaw – a fracture in his control. And with it came a warning of a hundred other women he’d killed. The ones who’d screamed and begged. The ones who hadn’t been able to keep their skin intact.
Isabel had no intention of joining their ranks.
“Go ahead,” she purred, tilting her head to expose her throat. “Slice me open and let me bleed. See how loudly you squeal when Favreau puts you on your knees for it.”
Isabel’s heart slammed against her ribs. Silence stretched. And then—
The bright, blooming sting of parting flesh. But she never flinched. Never shied from the blade, even when a thin trail of blood slid down her chest.
She’d die before she’d scream for him. The pain at her wrist as she wrenched the rope down the heel of her hand grounded her. Blood pooled in her palm.
“Women who don’t know when to shut their mouths get cut,” he said, almost gently. The flat of his blade scraped her skin, smearing blood in its wake. “Final warning, dove. Keep that” – a flick of steel towards her lips – “quiet, or I’ll take my chances with Favreau’s temper.”
“I don’t think so,monsieur. Because you’re not just a killer; you’re a dog. And dogs don’t bite the hand holding their lead.”
Then she burst from her bonds in an explosion of movement. She threw herself at him, her hands clamped to either side of his head.
And she sank her thumbs into his eyes.
The Butcher bellowed, trying to fling her off. His blade clattered to the floor as he reared back.
It wasn’t enough. She smashed her forehead into his nose, satisfaction surging through her veins at the sharp crunch.
Ah, there it was.Histurn to scream. And it was every bit as pathetic as she’d expected from a man who only ever took lives. Who thought that gave him power.
“Where are your threats now?” She dug her fingers harder into his eye sockets. “Where’s that swagger?”
Isabel drove her knee into his groin. The Butcher crashed to the floor, and she followed him down. Merciless. Her thighs clamped around his neck as she cut off his air. Squeezed andsqueezeduntil he scrabbled weakly at her hips, her waist. Trying to pry her loose as she choked the life from him.
“I’ve made men more dangerous than you piss themselves and beg for their mums,” she hissed. “Men who can take pain, who don’t flinch easy. And do you know what I did to them?”
He made a wheezing sound, and she tightened her thighs around his neck.
“I broke them. Took them apart an inch at a time until there was nothing left. But you? You aren’t worth the effort it would take to make you scream.”
Then she rolled off him, grabbed his knife, and slit his throat.
