: Chapter 1

I don’t always fuck a man before I kill him, but when I do, I find there’s one thing they all have in common.

They’re disappointing.

Exhibit number twelve. Tristan McCoy.

Even rolling his name through my mouth as I grit my way ever closer to a lackluster orgasm leaves a film on my tongue. I’m thinking about how much I would like to brush my teeth as he presses his hot palms to my breasts as though kneading thick batter. His hands are butter soft, no calluses from outdoor labor or rough sports. No, his Arnold Palmer golf gloves would never permit a callus on that skin.

Do you think it’s strange that I know his brand of golf gloves? It should be. Perhaps it’s nearly as strange as thinking about golf gloves while riding a stubby cock and purring out a name that fills me with loathing and excitement in equal measure. It likely doesn’t fit into the conventional box of ‘intimate’. But intimacy is defined as close familiarity.

Intimacy can be a touch between two lovers.

Or it can be the kiss of a spider’s fangs in the body of a fly.

“Jesus, Emma,” he hisses as I roll my hips. I smile as I run my fingers over his groomed chest. He doesn’t notice that I put minimal effort into my grin. His half-lidded eyes are only focused on my tits. “Where have you been all my life.”

Killing dickheads like you and dissolving their bodies in sodium hypochlorite. Keeps a girl busy.

“Waiting for you, baby.”

I need to scrub my brain with that toothbrush. My reply might have been a little heavy-handed, but at this point, it doesn’t matter. He eats it up.

My name’s not Emma, by the way. But nothing about me or this situation is as it seems. The impending orgasm isn’t very real, for one. I’ll have to fake it. His short dick isn’t going to get the job done, so I guess the disappointment will be more acute this time. This bedroom isn’t really just a bedroom, not with my hidden selection of weapons lying in wait. The bookshelf on the wall to the left isn’t even really a bookshelf. It’s a door to a secret room. A whole lair, in fact. Everything about me, about this place, about this intimate moment…it’s all a lie. The only truth is the web I’ve spun around us, the death that waits in the shadows.

“I’m coming,” Tristan says as he tilts his head back on the pillow and scrunches his eyes closed. His neck is thick with the pressure of a held breath. His veins pop from his flesh. In moments like this, Death takes my hand in skeletal fingers, whispering in my ear. Garrote.

Yes. Garrote.

“Oh Tristan, yes,” I say as I grind my pelvis over his. An orgasm sneaks its way through my midsection, clenching my sex around his short shaft. The release lasts about as long as a blink, though I pretend it goes on for much longer as he empties into his condom. My orgasm feels like water released through a valve in a dam. There’s a whole lake trapped behind an impenetrable wall of concrete that I can never manage to reach.

I slip off of Tristan, wrestling my disgust under a mask I call “Sweetheart Sex Kitten” as he pulls the condom off with a slick snap. He takes a tissue from the box next to the bed and wraps it up, then puts it on the nightstand. Not in the waste bin next to the nightstand, just…on the nightstand.

Garrote. Garrote. Garrote.

“That was great, baby,” I say sweetly as Tristan lies back, his chest still pumping heavy breaths. I fake the same breathlessness, but my heart has already returned to its normal rhythm.

“It was. You’re amazing, Emma.” His silky palm glides up and down my arm. He opens his mouth to say something, likely about leaving, having an early morning tomorrow, a work meeting, some bullshit. I don’t let him get the words out.

“Stay for a little while,” I purr, leaning in close to nibble his earlobe. It tastes like salt and Tom Ford cologne. “I’ll let you put it in my ass.”

Tristan chokes on a laugh. “Well, that’s an offer I can’t refuse.” He slaps my buttocks and I swallow a growl. I force myself away from his ear before I bite down on the spongy flesh and rip it off.

“I’ll get you something to drink, baby.”

I roll off the bed as I pull my lingerie back up from where he’d tugged it down to give me his best bakery moves, Tristan’s warm hand following me as though I’ll evaporate. I give him a wink over my shoulder, Sweetheart Sex Kitten mask firmly in place as I pad away to the kitchen. The mask falls from my face as soon as my back is turned.

The concrete floor is soothing on my bare feet. I don’t like the temperature of the bed with Tristan in it. It’s a tepid warmth. Sometimes I feel like I need to burn up, but that cleansing fire never comes. It’s just a slimy sort of heat in moments like this. I prefer the cool kiss of sealed stone composite on my skin.

I take a glass and fill it with water, scrutinizing the lilies in a vase on the island as I drink it down before placing it in the dishwasher. I don’t resent details like the flowers in the vase, or the clutter of a calendar and notes on my fridge, or the single loose thread on the throw of the slate-gray couch in the living room where my white cat, Kane, lies flicking his tail in the thin wedge of light from the kitchen. These are all part of my web. They are a shimmering illusion, carefully curated, each spun to present the image of normalcy. Of safety.

I take another two glasses from the shelf and press them against the dispenser in the door of the fridge to drop three ice cubes to the bottom of each. I pull some bourbon from the liquor cabinet and lemon juice from the fridge. And then I press my finger to the sensor of the hidden drawer in the cupboard next to the fridge. It slides down from the compartment Samuel built. It tilts to display the hidden vials of my own special concoction, a mixture of ketamine and chloral hydrate. I cast one glance over my shoulder, just to be sure Tristan hasn’t followed me in here, and then take a vial between my finger and thumb, rolling the crystals against the glass.

I make a whiskey sour and divide the cocktail between the two glasses, mixing the full vial of crystals into Tristan’s tumbler. The simple syrup will mask the taste of the bitter drugs. I give it a stir, add a straw to mine, and put everything back where it belongs before padding back to the bedroom, drinks in hand.

Tristan is lying uncovered on the bed, arms folded behind his head, his stubby, shrunken dick flopped to the side of his pelvis. It twitches as I approach. It takes a Herculean amount of strength to keep that Sweetheart Sex Kitten mask on my face and sashay my hips as I walk toward him. It helps that I have a glass full of hypnotic sedatives in my hand.

“Here you go, baby,” I say. I smile around my straw and hand Tristan his glass, taking just enough of a sip of my drink to coat my tongue with the burn of alcohol and no more.

“Whiskey sour, my favorite. How did you know?”

I give a coy little shrug. “Lucky guess.”

No, it’s not.

I’ve been watching Tristan for a while now. Of course I know it’s his drink of choice. I know what golf clubs are his favorite—Epic MAX Star Combo Set in black and gold, what porn he prefers—amateur double penetration on Pornhub, what protein powder he uses in his breakfast smoothie—Rocket whey powder in cookies and cream. I know what times he sets his three morning alarms for, what his Netflix password is, what brand of socks he buys.

And I know he handles investments for Lamb Health, one of Legio Agni’s subsidiary companies.

He makes them more money. He helps the elusive Caron Berger gain more power.

I pretend to take a sip of my drink and tip up the bottom of Tristan’s glass as he gulps down a long swig. Of course, once he’s gone, he will only be replaced by some other broker. But it’s still justice. He’s worked with Lamb Health for the last five years. He’s met in secret with Cynthia Nordstrom twice since November, according to the calendar that Samuel hacked. She’s the highest-ranking public member of Caron’s flock.

Tristan must know. He must. He knows what Legio Agni is. A cult that lures in broken women, desperate women, lonely women. Women who are just looking for someplace safe in this world. And then Caron Berger takes everything they have. Everything they are.

And for his role in Caron’s games, Tristan McCoy deserves to die.

My heart rate picks up. I feel it in my throat.

Garrote.

The release I’m really craving is creeping closer with every swallow.

“How’s the drink, baby? Would you like another?” I ask as Tristan takes a long sip. Only a quarter is left, which means he’s had more than enough of my little potion to start feeling the effects.

“Nah, this one is going straight to my head and I want to take you up on that offer,” he says, his gaze falling down my body. His lips pull back in a lecherous smirk, exposing his expensive veneers. “Where’s the bathroom?”

“Just over there,” I say, nodding my head at a door to our right. Tristan gets up and stretches, his dick dangling like a fat maggot. He catches me looking with my mask down. I don’t need to put in the effort anymore. Nor do I want to. There’s only clinical interest in my expression now, but I give him a wink and a voice that doesn’t match the detachment in my eyes. “Hurry back now, baby. Don’t keep my ass waiting.”

Tristan ignores my facial expression and takes my words the way he wants to, as an invitation. His grin widens and he stumbles toward the bathroom with his glass in hand, downing the rest of the drink as he goes.

When the door is closed behind him, I pad toward the headboard, feeling beneath the overhang at the back for the piece of loose wood that slides out. Another scan of my finger and the cover retracts from a hidden panel. I reach for the wire of the garrote and pull it off the hook, then close the compartment and wait.

And wait.

And wait.

There’s a thud and then a curse. I smile. I lay the garrote out beneath a pillow, then tiptoe over to the bathroom door and tap on it twice.

“You okay in there, baby?”

A groan sounds from the other side. A shadow moves slowly beneath the door. I turn the handle, then push the door open with my toes, savoring every delicious moment as Tristan’s crumpled, naked form comes into view.

“Oh, you poor thing. Why don’t you come lie down in the bed.” I grip Tristan’s arm and haul him to his unsteady feet.

“What…whaaaattt…”

“What happened? You’re just tired, that’s all,” I say, patting his chest as we stumble toward the bed. “You need to lie down. Sleep off the ketamine.”

“K…ketttt…”

“Yeah, that’s right, baby. Ketamine. You just need to sleep it off. Permanently.”

Tristan tries to swallow the saliva that dribbles from his lips. His pupils are blown beneath his hooded eyes. He garbles a word around his drool but trips and crashes face-first onto the mattress before anything more than a slurred hiss can come out.

“That’s better,” I coo, maneuvering him further up the bed before he loses consciousness. I climb his legs like a panther, straddling his back as he groans. My chest drapes across his warm skin. His erratic pulse begs me to bring silence to his heart.

I lean forward, letting my palms drift across the sheets and under the pillow that lies just above Tristan’s head. I grasp the two handles of the garrote and slide it down, the wire skimming across his face until it stops just below his jaw. I blow in his ear and his unfocused eye opens. “When you get to hell, tell Donald Soversky Jr. that Bria sent you.”

I press my knee to Tristan’s spine and pull the wire taut and smile, relishing his every musical plea for air like a vibration in my web.

I’m coming for you, Caron Berger.

I’m coming for you.