Page 69 of His Favorite Color is Blood
A few inches lower, and Grim was slowly trailing kisses down Misha’s jaw, exhilarated by his closeness. “No. I want to always help you.”
Someone banged on their door. “Is that your wheelchair lying around?” Blitz. “Milk is goofing off in it in the lounge. Just so you know.”
Misha groaned and put his hands over his face. “Christ.”
Grim rolled his eyes. “Ah, we’re kinda busy right now. I’d appreciate it if you stored it somewhere safe for me.”
Blitz’s footsteps sounded as if he was stomping on purpose to let Grim know what he thought of that.
“Grim … Please get my wheelchair. It’s not a toy,” said Misha, making that irresistible sad-pout face.
Grim rested his face in the crook of Misha’s neck and groaned. “Fine,” he said in the end and pushed himself up.
“It’ll all be better tomorrow,” Misha offered with a kiss to the top of Grim’s head. He’d rather get a kiss to hiscockhead instead.
Grim petted Misha’s leg before getting to his feet. “Find something on TV? I’ll be right back.”
Misha smiled. “Don’t be too long. I’m out of sudoku.”
Chapter 22
Misha
Misha watched the pedophile’sliving room from his safe spot in the car across the street. Tonight, everything would go as planned—even if the thought of having to torture and murder the man turned Misha’s stomach. Grim had been restless since yesterday, probably upset about his own reactions to their target’s disability, and it made Misha realize that enough was enough. Grim couldn’t shoulder the weight of the world for him. It was Misha who had enticed Dennis, and it was Misha who got Zero back over their heads. He was also the one to burn that flash drive out of cowardice and slap Grim when all he’d been told was the truth. Amputee. Victim. Those words would not define him for the rest of his life, and he needed to show Grim he could be so much more. That hecouldtake action.
His breath caught in his throat when Grim’s dark figure loomed in the dim hallway at the back of their target’s living room. Tall and agile, he clung to the wall as he neared Tomas, whom Misha couldn’t see from where he was. His mouth was dry with stress. What had he gotten himself into? Grim had been so upset about having to kill a disabled guy that it seemed logical for Misha to propose doing it himself, but now that he slept on it, the perspective of ending someone’s life was curling around his chest and squeezing the air out of him. He would do it though. He needed to stop depending on Grim all the time.
The moment Grim stepped into the light, something moved, and he fell down like a log, stunning Misha out of breath.
Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. Was there another person inside? Misha heard no gunshots, so what could have hit Grim so hard?This couldn’t be happening. Misha looked to the backseat and the wheelchair stored in there. There was no time to get it out.
He opened the car door and put the gun he received from Grim into the front pocket of his hoodie. He cringed at the asphalt road in front of him but quickly slid down from the cab. He might be incapable of running, but with a gun in hand, he could at least hold someone at gunpoint or even shoot them in the worst-case scenario. But if he wanted to help Grim out, he needed to get to him in the first place.
The asphalt was rough against Misha’s bare skin, but he knew there was no choice and rushed on all fours, banging his knees against the hard surface with each movement. His body was yelling at him with the thought that he could simply get to his feet, that his feet were there to support him, but it was just a phantom feeling, and he gritted his teeth in fear. He could practically hear the clock ticking as it counted seconds that remained of Grim’s life.
Blood rushed into his head, and the unkept front yard of Tomas’s house couldn’t get closer quick enough. When Misha looked into the window in the hope of seeing the familiar face, all he noticed was the light that suddenly went out. His brain flooded with images of Grim shot, strangled, or stabbed, bleeding out on the floor of that Goddamn house, and he couldn’t care less about scraping his knees over a fucking gravel path. How could he have even suggested for Grim to be doing this on his behalf? Had they really reached the point of no return? Maybe Misha needed to disappear, make contact with Zero, and give himself up, before he managed to ruin Grim’s life.
He was almost at the door, and if Tomas were to escape, he would have to come out through here, as the back door was too small for a wheelchair. Unless he was still in the living room stabbing Grim time after time to make sure he was dead. A panicked sob left Misha’s throat, but he fought through the shivering in his limbs and pushed on, ignoring the gravel tearing into his skin.
He climbed up the wooden ramp at the side of the stairs to the porch and reached for the handle when a male voice tore into his brain from behind the door. It wasn’t Grim’s, but the sound was getting closer with each word that Misha had trouble comprehending with the buzz of stress at the forefront of his brain.
He backed off and pulled out his gun, quickly taking off the safety. If this fucker hurt Grim, he’d dienow. Not on a fucking video for sadistic perverts.
The door banged against the outer wall as it opened, and the black wheelchair rolled toward the ramp, but the moment Tomas’s bright eyes focused on the barrel of Misha’s gun, his face went tense, his body slumping, as if all hope drained from his body.
“Why are you doing this? I don’t have anything you might want. I’ve been through so much, let me go!”
When Misha looked into the middle-aged man’s glossy eyes and saw his panicked red face, his desire to kill Tomas for hurting Grim faltered, but his grip on the gun didn’t. Misha had met men with pleasant faces before. Men who looked a lot like the nice uncle who frequently visited Misha’s home when he was a kid. But somehow, those men were nothing like his uncle and had no mercy in pushing Misha face down and raping him.
“Stay put and shut up, or I will shoot you,” he said, surprising himself by how steady his voice was.
Tomas shuddered, squeezing his hands on the wheels, as if there was still hope for him.
The moan coming from inside the house had Misha longing to crawl inside and look for Grim right away, but when Grim spoke up, it became clear he wasn’t dead yet.
“Fucking hell. Get that fucker inside!”
“You heard him. Inside.” Misha pointed at the corridor with his head, never taking the barrel off his target. He didn’t care if Tomas cried. Tomas deserved to suffer for all he’d done to the kids who became his victims.
