in midair and raised the weapon as high as she could and drove it downward hard as she could, right through the top of her attacker’s foot and out the bottom of his sneaker. He was literally pinned, bleeding out quickly, his neck veins popping in pain.
Agnes stood calmly and turned to face him.
“Sorry, I must have severed an artery,” she said calmly, watching the blood wash over her flats. She let her hair and dress fall to their natural length once again and bitch-slapped him, wiping his snot from her hand on his jacket. He was weakening and unable to defend himself.
“You like to pull hair,” she said seductively, slowly wrapping her locks around his neck and jerking him toward her. “Me too.” She leaned in close to him. Face-to-face, close enough to kiss under less confrontational circumstances, and tightened her grip on the nest of hair now encircling his throat. He saw the fire in her eyes and she watched the life leave his slowly, like a sun setting into the horizon, degree by degree. She pulled and kept pulling. Until his eyes popped and his tongue swelled past his lips. Until he was dead. She untangled him and let him drop.
The thug pulled Lucy down to the floor and covered her, his weight preventing her from moving. He tore at her blouse and made a juvenile effort to feel her up. “They’re real, despite what you might have heard.”
Lucy grabbed for his throat and dug in her nails, and he scraped at her eyes, trying to push them right through the back of her head. Lucy pulled at his wrist until she could get a piece of his hand in her mouth. She bit down and tore a piece of him off and spit it out on the floor beside her. He wailed in pain. She grabbed for the Legenda at her feet and pummeled the vandal on top of her with the heavy, leather-bound book. His forearm and ribs cracked easily under the force of her blows. He released her, but she wasn’t done. Lucy looked up at the windows, with their scenes of tortured saints, and found some inspiration. She dragged the nearly unconscious vandal onto the altar and scooped a few still-burning coals from the toppled urn. She tugged at his jaw until it opened and turned slack and dropped the hot charcoal into it and closed it back up with her heel. She held her foot there, kissing his lips with her sole. Soot and ash from his boiled and blistering lips soiling her shoe.
“You have a dirty mouth.”
He literally sizzled. Cooked from the inside out. His screams, a high-pitched whistle like nothing she’d ever heard, shot up from his eustachian tubes and out his ears. Steam poured from his nose, like a raging bull in his death throes.
“Payback’s a bitch. Even if it is a few thousand years late.”
Lucy brought the Legenda Aurea down on his face full force, killing him.
“Who says I’m not merciful.”
Ricky meanwhile had bum-rushed Cecilia, knocking her down hard. She was breathless and dazed momentarily and looked up at him, her vision fuzzy, knees and elbows scraped and bloody, as he removed his thick leather belt and folded it over, snapping it against his thigh. She’d seen him look like that before above her. With evil intent. Then, it was only her self-respect that was at stake. This time, it was her life. This time, she understood.
“Don’t,” she said, still defiant, struggling to her hands and knees. “You’ll turn me on.”
Ricky smiled.
“You’ve been a very bad girl.”
He grunted and struck her. Whipping her back, her arms, and her legs savagely. Kicking her butt like a disobedient dog. Over and over. Her skin flushed and welts appeared almost instantly. Tears of pain and humiliation rimmed her eyes.
“I have,” she confessed regretfully, taking the punishment almost to see how much she could stand.
With what strength she had, Cecilia crawled over to the votive stand and tried to scale it, lifting herself upright however which way she could as Ricky beat her incessantly. If she was going out now, she wanted it to be standing. She grabbed a votive cup in each hand and flung the boiling liquid at Ricky’s face with all her might. He dropped the strap and fell to his knees, clutching at his face, screaming, but more in anger than pain. While he was blinded momentarily, she ran toward him and kneed him in the head, pushing