Page 64 of Stitch
Reacher had joined us after all, leaning against the compact kitchen counter.
“He’s looking to avenge his lady, and honestly, I think it’s a good thing. He’s more focused outside of himself and his health stuff than I’ve seen him in ages. That’s because of you, Cammy. You’re giving him a reason to fight this.”
“You mean his revenge is. Jesus, Reacher, will he kill him?”
The air felt thick with tension, as we all stayed silent, waiting for his response. Reacher rubbed at those studs in his eyebrow, his tell. His outward sign of the tension and intensity he held inside.
“What do you want me to say, Cammy? Of course he’ll fucking kill him. He made Ice tell him everything. He knows what you went through, or at least as much as your hospital records showed. You could have had the bastard locked up, but you never went that route. You let him drive you away from your whole life.”
I stood up, my fists clenched.
“I had no fucking life, Reacher. Do any of you even understand what it’s like to be in that situation? He drove everyone out of my life. Distanced me from every friend and family member I had. Put a fucking wall between them and me, so that I had nobody to turn to. No respite. No fucking refuge. That last time… I was in a coma for nearly a week. Someone called the right people, and I had help at last. Help to get out, and start again. It took me so long to get back on my feet again, to start to hope again.”
I was exhausted, because I was saying things I’d never said before. I was sharing things I’d never told a soul. Thank god he’d never raped me as part of his abuse. It had all been threats, and yelling, and manipulation, and breaking me down until I didn’t value myself at all.
He managed to erode every ounce of confidence and self-worth, until all that was left was a shell of a person. Broken, hopeless, and no longer fighting for anything more. The woman from the charity who broke me free, she was fearless and strong, and I wanted that so much. She helped me fake a new identity, same first name, but a new surname, new everything else. I’d always be thankful to her, for everything.
Stitch
The building they’d foundwas perfect. Abandoned, remote, unlikely to be happened upon by any unlucky fucker during the torture.
First, Torch threw him on the floor, and we all laid a boot in, kicking the fucker everywhere we could reach. He was trying to protect himself, curling up in a ball, and yelling for help, but none was coming. I couldn’t wait for that realisation to hit, and for him to realise just how fucking hopeless his situation was. How incredibly fucked he was.
“Back off.” The others listened and stepped back, leaving me standing over him.
“Ross, motherfucker, this is your day of reckoning. The day when you pay for what you did to her.”
He stared blearily up at me, blinking against the blood running from a head wound into his eye.
“Who… the fuck… are you people?”
I kicked him again, grinning at his grunt of pain, as my boot connected with his chest.
“I’m her fucking husband, asshole.”
He rubbed his no-longer pristine white shirt sleeve over his eyes, smearing blood everywhere.
“Who? What’s this… about?”
Ice returned, after taking the guy’s phone out to the prospect, who was going off to dump it in the sea, making tracking of this fucker damn near impossible. His stop here would show as nothing more than a brief pause, unlikely to lead any search teams to anything of any value.
“Camille.” Ross’ eyes widened, and he looked at each of us in turn.
“Whatever that cunt told you, it’s bullshit, man. She’s unhinged.” I crouched down, my hand grabbing his throat, and squeezing.
“Didyou miss the part where I said I’m her fucking husband? I know everything you did to her, asshole. How much of it do you want to feel before you die?”
There was the true fear I wanted to see. That realisation that he was going to die right here.
“Come on… I… she’s lying…” His words being choked out like that didn’t do anything to appease me. I was ready to make this fucker scream, but Ice grabbed my arm, and whispered something to me. Something that I really didn’t want to fucking consider.
“I can’t, man. I… Jesus.” I backed away from the fucker, and Ice nodded at Torch. They dragged him over to the wall, and hauled him to his feet. The first crunch of the nail gun led to an agonised scream, and by the time they’d finished nailing him to the wall, he was sobbing, begging, trying his best to stay on his feet, so he didn’t pull at the multiple nails holding his hands against the wall.
“Just answer the question, asshole, and we can make this stop. By the way, this is my friend, Torch. You wanna know why we call him that? Road names have meaning, man… Oh, yeah we’re bikers, but you didn’t know that because we didn’t want your worthless blood on our cuts.”
Ryder and Micro were letting Ice lead things, but I was done with letting him run the show. He’d answer the question, and he’d fucking tell me to my face. I strode forward again, shoving Ice aside, my hand closing around the asshole’s throat again.
“Answer. The. Fucking. Question, or we’ll let Torch flame-grill your fucking nads while you scream for help.” Ross shuddered, shooting a horrified look in Torch’s direction. Now Torch was starting to look pissed, because he’d left his fire tools behind and now he really wanted to do exactly what I’d suggested.
