The Tyrant (Banker #3)(40)

“And the greatest thing that ever happened to me.” I subtly pulled the knife from my hair then while he breathed through the pleasure. Then I pressed the blade against his shaft and severed it from his body—like the cold-hearted bitch that I was. “That’s for Cato.” Blood squirted everywhere, and he let out a scream.

I covered his mouth with my hand and pushed him against the cot, doing my best to stifle his screams. With an injury like that, he wouldn’t last long before he died. It was a horrific way to go, but after seeing Cato beaten so badly that he was hardly recognizable, I felt no remorse.

I smashed his face into the cot while he got blood all over the bedding. His severed dick was somewhere on the floor, probably shriveled up and lifeless by now. I tuned out the sounds of his cries and used my strength to anchor the pillow over his face, to wait until the fight ended and he passed on to the next life—in hell.

Finally, his jerks slowed down, and he gave up. His lungs screamed for air they wouldn’t receive. His heart slowly stopped as blood no longer flowed. After a few seconds, he turned motionless, but he also became rigid, all the muscles in his body tightening at his moment of death.

Damien was gone.

Good fucking riddance.

I covered him with the blankets then put my clothes back on. Thankfully, the blood was on my skin so it was easy to hide underneath my shirt and pants. All I had was the small knife I’d just castrated him with, so I searched the room for a gun. Damien’s clothes had nothing useful inside of them, and since the cell was solid concrete, there wasn’t a place to hide a weapon anyway.

I could see all the blood from Cato’s body on the floor.

But I couldn’t think about that right now.

I knew he would be proud of me for what I’d just done, for taking my fate into my own hands. I got revenge for my father. I got revenge for Cato. And I got revenge for myself. Now all I had to do was sneak out of here.

I tucked the knife into my palm and moved down the hallway. I’d memorized the route during the walk, repeating the directions over and over in my mind so I wouldn’t forget them. But now I had to mirror those moves since I was going in the opposite direction—and completely flip them. I was starting at the end and going backward. But all I needed to do was get to the stairway with the hatch. The rest of the way would be easier.

Every time I came to a corner, I stopped and peered down the hallway to make sure no one was coming. I moved as quietly as possible down the hallways, and unfortunately, a lot of them looked identical.

That wasn’t good.

I stopped in front of a sign mounted on the wall and realized it was a map. It showed the location of the main stairwell out to the hatch.

Well, that worked out.

I kept walking, but I had to stop when a guard was about to cross my path. He moved down the hallway with a pistol sitting on his hip. Dressed in all black, he looked the same as the others guards I’d come across.

I wondered how long I had before someone discovered Damien’s body.

They would sound the alarm and lock the hatch. Then I would be stuck down here until they found me.

Micah would torture me until he killed me.

I waited for the guard to round the corner, and I thought about my little girl. I had to make it back to her no matter what. My daughter shouldn’t grow up without a mother. I’d lost my mother in adulthood, and I would never recover from it. She was the light of my life, my best friend. Martina needed me…and so did Cato.

I had to make it out of here.

A guard rounded the corner and reacted quickly when he noticed me. His eyebrows almost jumped off his face, he opened his mouth to yell, and he reached for his gun.

I punched him in the face, kicked him in the balls, and then stabbed him in the throat.

He crumpled to the ground—dead instantly.

There was nowhere for me to hide his body, so now I had to hurry. I took his pistol and moved faster, taking less caution at being noticed because I was running out of time. There were probably cameras around here, and now that the guard’s corpse lay in the middle of the hallway, I only had a few minutes to get out of there. The pistol wouldn’t be enough to keep me safe.

I finally made it to the big stairwell. It had taken us fifteen minutes to come down it earlier, so it would take me just as long to make it back to the surface. I put the pistol in the back of my jeans and started to run, knowing I was racing against the clock. There was probably a system override they could use to lock me inside. Then I would be trapped at the top of the stairwell with nowhere to run.

I ran as fast as I could, as quickly as my heart would allow. I’d been working out every day, but I was seriously out of shape. I gripped the rail to pull myself up as I moved, and within five minutes, I was panting hard and slick with sweat.

But I didn’t stop—because I had a little girl waiting for me.

I started to hear a commotion down below, an echo of voices that carried all the way to my position. “Shit.” I sprinted faster, running in spirals as I moved to the surface. I passed two lights at every interval, and I glanced up to see how close I was to the top. “Just a little more.” I kicked it into overdrive, knowing Cato would be furious with me if I got this close but didn’t cross the finish line.

I got to the keypad and stared at it blankly.

Shit, what was the password?

That ten-minute run had knocked me out, and I could barely think straight. Memorizing the path had been my priority, so I had shoved this to the back burner. I couldn’t randomly hit numbers because that would probably initiate a lockdown sequence.