Part 24 (1/2)

Riley screamed out. He'd cried out so much that he was losing his voice. He just thought of Kesha, now. The fact that if he was defeated-which it looked like he would be-then Kesha would be closer to Kane than she would be to him.

And that thought made him sick.

The thought of this monster, this beast, being close to Kesha was enough to make his entire body go cold with rage.

”You won't win,” Riley said, panting, struggling for breath. ”You-you might think you will, but you won't.”

Kane leaned towards Riley. ”Aw,” he said. ”Isn't that cute. Two fingers down and you still haven't got the message. Unluckily for you, I know exactly the way to make you remember the message.”

Kane dropped the pliers and grabbed a hot iron that had been warming in front of an open fire.

Before Riley could even protest, Kane jammed it against the torn stump of his finger.

He screamed again, then. He screamed higher than he'd screamed in his adult life.

And then he stopped himself. Despite every instinct in his body telling him to carry on crying out, he gritted his teeth together and he took it.

He took it, despite the white-hot agony.

He took it, despite being able to smell his own burning flesh.

He took it because he didn't want to die a screamer.

He wanted to go down fighting.

Kane pulled the iron away. ”There,” he said. ”That wasn't so bad now, was it? Oh. It was? Well, my apologies. I'll make the next one a whole lot cleaner.”

”You can torture me as much as you want,” Riley said. ”But one thing will never change.”

”And what's that?” Kane asked.

”You'll never amount to anything. You'll always be... you'll always be nothing more than a parasite. A parasite feeding on people who are tied down. Who are fearful. But you're not the monster you want to be. You're a weak f.u.c.k. A weak f.u.c.k who preys on the new world because it's easier to get away with things than it used to be. But you'll get what's coming to you. One day, you'll get what's coming to you. And I'll be around to see it.”

Kane went quiet, then. Riley had stunned him to silence, it seemed. He could see Kane's eyelids twitching as he tried to figure out what to say, how to respond. He didn't look best pleased.

But in the end, Kane just narrowed his eyes, a new look of seriousness on his face. He tried to crack a smile, but he couldn't. Riley had got to him. If he did die right now, at least he'd have something. ”Better get back to work.”

Riley did something that went against everything.

He started laughing.

Kane stopped again then. He was halted, right away.

”What's so funny?”

Riley's laughs became more manic, more delirious. ”You think you're stronger than me. You think you're the strongest f.u.c.ker in the world. But you're torturing a man who's pinned down.” He laughed some more. ”You're torturing someone tied down to a table.”

”Stop your laughing. You're distracting me.”

”f.u.c.k you,” Riley shouted. He spat right in Kane's face. ”f.u.c.k you, and f.u.c.k your bulls.h.i.+t. You might think you're immortal, but you're not. You're really not.”

Kane's face was red now. His eyes were bloodshot.

He took a sharp, deep inhalation and grabbed the pliers again.

Then, he reached into Riley's mouth and yanked out his tongue.

”I think we'll skip the fingers for now and get right to your tongue. See how that bleeds. How does that sound?”

He tightened the sharp pliers around the back of his tongue, so far back that Riley felt like he might gag.

He tasted blood dripping down into his throat as Kane brought those pliers together, and as he started to sever his tongue. But in a way, it didn't matter. In a way, Riley didn't care. Because he wasn't going to scream. He was going to prove his point about Kane. Prove that he was a nothing.

He felt a tear roll down the side of his face as the pliers got tighter, and he saw Jordanna, Chlo, and Anna looking over him, smiling.

”Hey, f.u.c.kwit?”

A voice. A voice over by the door.

Kane stopped tensing the pliers.

He turned around and looked.

Riley saw who was there, too.

Melissa was standing by the door.

She was holding a pistol.

”I made you a promise,” she said.

And before Kane could do a thing, she fired a bullet into his left kneecap, knocking him to the floor.

She walked towards him. Crouched opposite him.

Then she grabbed the back of his head and pulled him close.

”I'll-I'll kill you,” Kane said, gripping onto his bleeding leg. ”You f.u.c.king b.i.t.c.h. I'll kill you.”

Melissa smiled.

She pressed the gun to Kane's head. Right between his eyes.

”Remember what I said? Remember what I told you when you were tied up in that cell of ours? Can you remember?”

”b.i.t.c.h,” Kane said, frothing at the mouth with pain. ”b.i.t.c.h.”