Page 20 of The Price of Mercy
“I’m not running,” I tell Zane, finally turning onto the road that winds around the city towards Mercy’s house. “And I’m notletting Mercy get fucked over by some twat trying to control his son.” I never thought I’d call Sam a rebel, but the day is full of surprises. “We need to get Mercy away from Sam.” How we do that when the man is practically glued to her at the hip is… well. Surprisingly simple. Glancing at Zane, I study his face to gauge his reaction. “We have to kill him.”
Zane sighs. The weight of it drags his body down until he slumps in his seat. “We can’t kill him. That’s like throwing gasoline on a dumpster fire. We’d never get away with it.”
The prospect of prison doesn’t scare me like it scares Zane. I’m not sure if it’s the criminal record part or the tough guys behind bars part that gets to him, but either way, he’s never liked the idea of either of us getting locked up. It’s hard for him to make friends, but his skillset would be invaluable to a prison gang. I know it would work out if we had no other option. But I don’t think that’s what’s tying him in knots right now. “You still think we’re gonna die.”
I feel like I’m bashing my head against the wall. The caffeine I chugged this morning is hitting a nerve and giving me a headache. No matter what happens, Zane only sees one outcome: our deaths. It’s like the Grim Reaper is following him around, hiding in his shadow, taunting him before the grand finale.
Fuck that.
“I’m not dying.” I jab my finger at him. “You’re not dying. Mercy’s not dying.” I leave Sam out, because killing him isn’t off the table for me. As for Mercy… A frown tugs at my lips. Watching her life slip away is only fun if I’m the one stealing it. And even then, I?—
I’m not sure if that’s what I want anymore.
Shaking my head, I tune out the seed of uncertainty in the back of my mind and focus on what Idoknow. Mercy’s in danger. Zane’s in danger. Shit, we might all die if Zane’s gloomyprediction is right. He might want to run away and live on borrowed time while the enemy hunts us down, but that’s not my style. I’d rather live free, fight hard, and fuck even harder.
We might as well make the most of what time we have left.
Chapter 8
Zane
“This is a bad idea.”I watch as Kane hauls Mercy’s duffel bag into the back of Sam’s pickup truck. A dried mud puddle stuck in the grooves of the truck bed flakes onto her bag, staining the dark fabric a lighter maroon color. My nose crinkles. What an eyesore. Just like the rest of the rundown rust bucket. Why a millionaire’s son is driving around this piece of junk is the question of the year.
No, actually—Kane’s obsession with Mercy,that’sthe question of the goddamn year. Because we wouldn’t be hauling her broken ass to a cabin retreat if Kane wasn’t losing his mind. We’re on Wright Senior’s hit list. The last thing we should be doing is taking an expedited two-week holiday. We should be running as fast and far away from this fucked-up situation as we can get. Not “camping out,” as Kane cheerily puts it.
“This was your idea,” he reminds me for the fifth time, sliding his hand inside my front pocket and tugging me closer.
Yeah,beforeour world went to shit. I bite my tongue, though, because he’s right. I invited Mercy to the cabin. I just didn’t expect to see her so soon after last night—if at all. Truthfully, I’d hoped that she would become a thing of the past.
Maybe then she’ll stop haunting me every waking hour.
“Relax. We’re going off the grid. Wright won’t be able to find us.”
I can tell that Kane isn’t fully convinced, but he’s sure as hell pretending that he is. As for me, I’m trying equally as hard not to panic. Even with Kane pressing our bodies together, I can’t stop fidgeting. Drumming my fingers on my thigh or against Kane’s wrist, tapping my foot until I kick up gravel dust, ignoring the urge to scratch the prickly itch trailing down my arms. If it’s not bad enough that a power-hungry sadist is plotting our deaths, I also have to face Mercy sooner than I thought.
Last night while I paced the apartment, I imagined what the morning might be like. I thought I’d be happy, smiling to myself as I cook eggs and bacon, sneaking glances at Kane while he dozes on the couch after his night out, the two of us waiting for a sob story text message from Mercy about how she’d been broken in mind, body, and spirit—or something like that. The details don’t really matter. The most important part is that she’d be out of my hair and out of my life, once and for all, once she was no longer a shiny new toy for Kane to play with.
None of my predictions came true, though. I’m not at home making breakfast for my boyfriend. Kane is physically with me, sure, but I can tell that something’s off. His mind keeps wandering to places that I can’t follow. The worst part of all, however, has nothing to do with Kane and everything to do with Mercy. I thought I’d be eager to witness the carnage from last night—not the frat house, I don’t give a shit about that—but the tears. The heartbreak. The ruin. I was going to drink in Mercy’s misery like a fine wine, savoring every last drop. But now that we’re here, I’m?—
I draw in a breath and fight the bile rising to the back of my throat. I’m not elated like I thought I would be. My stomach churns as the version of Mercy in my head—a sad, broken girl peering up at me from beneath tear-soaked lashes—morphs intoa raging hellcat trying to claw my eyes out. I don’t know which I prefer: her anguish or her fury. Neither sounds appealing, if I’m being honest with myself. But that could be the anxiety talking. It ripples across my skin like the invisible threads of a spider’s web I’ve been trapped in my entire life. I clench and unclench my shaking hands to fight the nervous tingles shooting through my fingers.
Calm down, I tell myself, repeating Kane’s words in my head. Mercy doesn’t know that I was involved in anything that happened last night. I was home all night. Scrolling on my phone, minding my own business, definitelynotpicturing a bullish bastard bending Mercy in half and slamming her tiny body onto his dick. No, not at all. Not even once. I also never imagined Kane burying his cock inside of her bleeding pussy, baring his fangs like a wolf claiming his mate under a full moon.
Nope, I never thought of that, either.
Clenching my eyes shut, I take a deep breath and hold it, counting down from ten. The problem isn’t that Kane and Mercy are horrible together. It’s that they’renot.Polar opposites on the surface—him, golden and glowing; her, dark and dreary—but twisted inside. They both have that tortured artist thing going for them.
What do I have going for me?
I blow out a breath and try not to fall down that bottomless rabbit hole. Comparing myself to any of Kane’s lovers, deceased or otherwise, drives me crazy. Lately, picturing Mercy in any capacity does the same. It doesn’t matter if I’m remembering the silver glow of moonlight on her porcelain skin that night I crawled through her bedroom window or if I’m imagining a sharp-tipped blade kissing her pale thighs—if she’s in my daydreams, I feel the knot inside my chest winding tighter.
Today, the coil of nerves in my body is wound unbearably tight. The lack of sleep makes things worse. I scrub my handdown my face and take another quick breath, knowing that it’s too shallow but unable to take a deeper one. Fuck. Get a grip. This might be the worst day of my life, but it can easily drop even lower. I’m actually surprised that Kane hasn’t lashed out about what allegedly happened to Mercy last night,unlesswhoever he killed took the brunt of his anger and saved me from it. I have a feeling that the body our little trio of misfits burned in the Morningstar crematorium is the guy that the fraternity president convinced to play Reaper for the night, and if so, that’s the man that Kane killed. He hasn’t told me as much, but it’s the only plausible explanation for the random murder on his rap sheet.
Kane doesn’t normally lash out like that because we keep to a schedule.Myschedule. I’ve meticulously crafted it over the years, refining it as Kane’s tastes evolve. Mercy’s emergence as target forty-four, although annoying, isn’t entirely unexpected. Just unfortunate. I’d hoped for a larger gap in between murders once we buried forty-three, Alejandro Carerra, but… it wouldn’t have been a problem if we’d buried her with him.
Dragging a hand through my hair, I wonder how different our lives would be if Mercy hadn’t stumbled upon us in the graveyard on Halloween. Where we’d be standing right this very instant. Not here, that’s for sure. I can feel the protective streak radiating off of Kane as he eagerly stares at her front door, waiting for her to appear. It’s reminiscent of Sam, really. The hero complex. Funny how one bad decision can fuck things up so astronomically. If Kane hadn’t gone to the party and found Mercy in a compromising situation with another man, he would have never transitioned from someone craving her pain to someone saving her from it.
In the end, I guess I’m the one who fucked everything up. I meddled in their relationship. I’ve never done that with Kaneand his targets before. Not like this. Not so directly. Not so personally.
