for this.”
“I think you got this all wrong. You’re the one building up debt, attacking helpless women when your beef is with us.”
Blake spat on the ground. “She tasted like shit.”
That rage that was becoming so familiar flared up inside my gut. I stepped forward and slapped him across the face, leaving behind four deep scratch marks. My claws had unsheathed of their own accord, and I’d carved him up like a turkey. He hissed in pain.
“You don’t mess with my family.” I grabbed his face in my hand and squeezed hard. “Maybe I’ll finish what my sister started.” I pressed the tip of a long sharp claw to the corner of his eye.
Blake tried to pull away, but I held him steady, slowly increasing the pressure against his lower eyelid. His chest started pumping as his breathing became agitated.
I felt his fear like a puddle of urine spreading underfoot. My nose twitched recognizing its acrid smell for what it was. Like when he’d thought he was dying from that poisoned bullet, Blake’s cowardice poured out of him like sickening pus from a wound.
“You’re pathetic,” I said, as my claw pierced his skin and a bead of blood welled up beneath his eye.
“Don’t do it,” he begged. “I’ll be blind.”
So Lucia had succeeded in removing his other eyeball, and there was nothing under that swollen mess. Good.
“It would be no less than you deserve.” I increased the pressure, the scent of his blood piercing my nostrils as a small streak slid down his cheek.
Jake took a step closer, moving into my field of vision. I cut a glance in his direction and sensed his disapproval. The note of surprise in his eyes gave me pause. Taken aback, I released Blake and pulled away. Suddenly feeling dirty, I wiped my hands off on my jeans, getting rid of Blake’s foul stench.
Blake slumped forward, sinking to his knees with relief. Jake nodded, also looking relieved. I pressed my fist to my mouth, my heart pounding in my chest, the scent of blood stirring my anger. Images of Blake’s mutilated face flashed before my eyes as I imagined what I could do to him.
No! That’s not me.
I wasn’t the kind of person that plucked people’s eyeballs out. What was happening to me?
I thought it must be Red, but I had started to feel so intertwined with my wolf that it was getting difficult to tell where one began and the other one ended.
“She’s pissed at you, and it’s her right to be,” Jake said. “I don’t want her to get her hands dirty with the likes of you, but I don’t have any qualms about my own hands touching filth. So how about you start talking and tell us who saved you at the warehouse?”
Blake’s lone eye swiveled to contemptuously peer up at Jake. He pressed his mouth into a thin line and said nothing.
“That’s big posturing for a big coward like you.” Jake cracked his knuckles, then, without warning, delivered a right hook to Blake’s jaw.
His head snapped to one side, the crack of bone against bone resonating in the cave, sending images of the man I’d seen Blake kill in the warehouse flickering before my eyes. The horror of what I’d witnessed washed over me all over again. Without thinking, I laid a hand on Jake's shoulder as he prepared to deliver another punch.
“Stop,” I said.
“Maybe you should wait outside.” He nodded towards the cave’s entrance.
“I don’t want you getting your hands dirty either.”
Jake opened his mouth to argue, but I pulled him by the arm and dragged him outside, well out of Blake’s earshot. The thought of making Blake pay hadn’t seemed so unpalatable until his stink had transferred to us. If we killed him, we would become just like him. Nothing could be worse.
“We should turn him in,” I said.
The wind blew, rustling the leaves above us. A shiver ran up my spine, reminding me of Jake’s warm embrace, making me crave for it.
“This is our chance to find out who else is behind all of this,” he argued. “If we turn him in to the police, they’ll probably let him go, just like they let Jenson Boyle go.”
He wasn’t wrong about that, but it had just occurred to me that maybe pretending not to know gave us an advantage. “I think I already know who Blake works for.”
Jake frowned. “How?”
“While he was twisting in pain at the warehouse after I shot him with the wolfsbane, he called out