“I was sure Hill was falling over to that side, but seeing him here...I was sure he wouldn’t show...I haven’t figured out whether it’s for the business or the booty,” he moved from the dresser.
“You do know that whatever she’s promised, she won’t keep her word? She doesn’t share power.”
“Maybe. But she’s kept a few very good promises. One standing before me now, is the best so far. You’ll get the information when I get what she promised me. While everyone’s down there feeding their faces, you and I can conduct our business. No one has to know. I was assured we were all on...the same page about that. All these deaths around Eva...have her paranoid. She said she’d make up for her absence by sending me someone I’d find delicious for many reasons.
She went on and on about your medical expertise, only said a little about the delicious part. When she told me who you belonged to...my dick got hard just thinking about it. I can see why my cousin can’t seem to keep his hands off you. Did he tell you that we used to share? Mostly when we were kids-before he went away- a few times after. I think once was around the time he lost you,” he laughed then.
“My cousin...he did all kinds of things with all kinds of women to get over you. We never shared any as appealing as you, though.”
“And you aren’t about to now, you son of a bitch,” she’d retreated as he’d monologued. Rounding the bed, she made her way to the night table on the other side.
Pivoting suddenly, Persephone covered the last foot or so to the table and was wrenching open the drawer when Sondrio caught her. Hands smothering her hips, he took her off her feet. Handling her like she was a sack of laundry, he kept her tucked and squirming under one arm as he proceeded to investigate her sudden interest in the bedside drawer.
She continued to fight, her long legs kicking wildly as she angled her head to attempt biting. Her arms flailed, hands curved and ready to claw his face.
The scene took all of ten seconds. Sondrio found the knife she had stashed there, grunted a laugh and let Persephone fall to the bed. She rounded and caught him with a two piece punch to the cheek and beneath the jaw. Sondrio responded with a guttural wheeze. He followed her down and then attempted to pin her beneath him. Persephone freed an arm and rammed her elbow against his jaw, smiling when she drew his blood and heard an agonized grunt.
Sondrio wasn’t down by any means. Seamlessly, he shifted the knife in his grasp. Persephone’s focus turned on it for the split second he needed to turn the tables and lodge his forearm beneath her chin. He waved the knife before her eyes, smiling with predatory approval when her struggles ceased.
Satisfied, he moved his arm, replacing it with the blade beneath her chin then. He shushed her in a deceptively reassuring manner when the start of a scream curdled in her throat.
“I’m not quite ready to use this, Persephone-I hadn’t planned to make a mess of you-my cousin being psychotic about his possessions and all… Besides, I like most men, enjoy fucking beautiful women. So does my cousin. I sincerely doubt he’ll be so obsessed with touching you if this somehow found your face.” He pressed the knife a tad closer for emphasis.
“He’s not like you,” she breathed, her gaze radiating electric fire into her captor’s eyes.
“Oh he is,” Sondrio’s grin carried the same menacing gleam as his gaze. “He is and I think you know that. You saw how he was last night.”
“I saw him rescue me from a rapist.”
“Tsk, tsk...language doctor, I’m happy to say I’ve never resorted to such tactics before.”
“Good for you.”
“Oh Doc,” his nose nuzzled her ear and he inhaled. “God, you smell good. I’m gonna make this good for you too. I doubt I’ll even need your knife for long. I’ll have you moaning two seconds after my dick is inside you. Now don’t move, I’d hate for this,” he wagged the knife, “to slip.”
With his free hand, Sondrio moved to undo his trousers, then he hesitated and smiled. “You do the honors,” he whispered to Persephone. “Easy now,” he let the knife blade catch the light again.
Slowly, Persephone moved her hands, all the while praying he’d shift and she could free her leg to ram her knee into his balls.
“Easy…” his voice shook with anticipation while his eyes traced the lush swell of her bosom. He used his free hand to test their softness and licked his lips in satisfaction. Moments later, his hips were rocking in simulated thrusts.
Silently, Persephone cheered the act, hoping he would move enough so she could as well. She prayed that would happen before she vomited all over them both. Then again, she mused, that wouldn’t be a bad idea either.
The question of which plan would be enacted; as well as the overall threat itself, became moot issues less than five seconds later. First, there was a sound akin to something exploding. Later, Persephone would discover it was the heavy bedroom door being kicked into the wall. Next, the knife at her throat was hitting the carpet soundlessly.
The same couldn’t be said for Sondrio who
hit the wall with a thunderous shatter. The force of the collision
had him lodged dead center of a large, mounted plasma screen.
Persephone scrambled to her knees in time to see Hill tug Sondrio
free of the TV. A second later, he was sending his cousin’s head
through the dresser mirror beneath it.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
Persephone scooted to the side of the bed. “I was trying to get my leg free so I could-”
“Shut up,” Hill spared but a second to issue the order and jerked out of his dinner jacket.
Sondrio was whining and groaning. His head was a bloody mess. Glass shards and other fragments glistened in his hair and across the back of his dark shirt.
Hill tossed his dinner jacket in Persephone’s direction. The garment hit her chest and then slid to the tangled bed. “Put the fuckin’ thing on,” his voice was snarl.
Persephone obliged, her eyes ever-widening to larger silver saucers as she watched Hill free his cousin from the dresser mirror only to return him to it. Hands fisted at the scruff of Sondrio’s neck and the back of his trousers, Hill repeatedly rammed the man’s head into the mirror-or what remained of it. His face betrayed no emotion-his moves were exacting, deliberate and vengeful.
Persephone recalled what Sondrio had said about him and Hill being alike. He was wrong. There were no flowery speeches and grandstanding with Hill. There was only fury-only the effective doling out of pain until the adversary was done. Permanently.
There was no need to continue ramming Sondrio’s head through the glass then. There was no glass left. Hill let him fall to the floor. The man was conscious but barely.
Persephone watched Hill stare down at his cousin while he rolled up his shirt sleeves in a manner stating that he was prepared to administer more punishment. She thought of requesting that he work in time to question Sondrio before he took away the man’s ability to talk. The blow she’d given his jaw, was no love tap. She could tell by the amount of blood oozing from his mouth and head; due to Hill’s attention, that Sondrio Tesano would soon be incapable of speech.
“Son? You with me, man?” Hill was squatting over his cousin then, tapping the man’s injured jaw in a phony, solicitous manner. “Come on, Cuz, we’re not done yet. Son?”
Sondrio appeared unconscious. Still, eerily calm, Hill took the man’s arm, bracing the elbow snug against the bend of his own. With his hand folded midway between Son’s wrist and forearm, Hill forced the limb down.
Sondrio and Persephone both shrieked when a tell-tale crunch filled the air.
“There we are,” Hill cheered, reaching out to pat Sondrio’s cheek while the man writhed and whimpered in the throes of fresh agony.
Hill’s reassuring cheek pat was quickly followed by a backhanded fist and then another that sent blood gushing from the corner of Sondrio’s eye.
“Hill.” Persephone used the soft encouraging style she often gave the girls when they were in... trying moods.
Hill’s fist was poised for another blow when heard her. He acknowledged her call with a faint turn of his head. “He touched you, Sef, he would’ve...”
