We walk down the street together, Amelia slightly behind me. I can’t decide if I’m making the right decision bringing her out with me like this, but I need to stop holding back.

Nothing will be accomplished if I just keep her hanging around. She reacted incredibly well when I showed her my secondary kill room, and the memory of my cock deep down her throat keeps coming back to me. She’s so fucking sexy, so god damn gorgeous, and she’s giving me something I never thought I needed.

It’s a big risk bringing her into the city. She knows her way around here and can escape very easily if she wants to. I took off the ankle bracelet when we left my property, and all she needs to do is run up to the nearest cop and beg for his help. If she does that, I’m screwed.

This is the real test. Walking the street with Amelia is the real proof. If she doesn’t run, I can trust her. She must know how easy it would be to get away at this moment.

Part of me wants her to run. This life I have isn’t for the weak of heart, and I can’t decide if she’s strong enough to handle all of the darkness and difficulty. I don’t even know if she understands what it means when she agrees to come with me. She seems to like that I’m killing bad men, which is good, but she doesn’t yet know how much work goes into that.

Still, she’s with me, and she’s not running as we continue down the street. I want to show her the pedophile’s house, but that’s not the mission today.

We’re in the city to meet with Ryan. He’s been following that pedo fuck for me, since the bastard made me the other day. I hired a few more homeless people as well, and they’re all reporting back to Ryan. If anything has happened, he should know.

“That’s him,” I say to Amelia, pointing. Ryan is propped up against a wall, a change jar in his one hand. He’s begging half-heartedly, and really he’s just waiting for me to show up.

“How did you meet him?” she asks.

“I’ve hired many people like him over the years. Ryan just happens to be one of the best.”

She nods, watching him as we approach. “Don’t they know what you do?” she asks.

“Some of them have figured it out.” I shake my head. “Truthfully, I don’t think they care what happens to these guys. They’re bad people.”

“So they look the other way? How many informants do you have?”

“A lot,” I say. “Hard to count how many. It’s always changing. I pay them well and they need the money, so yeah, they tend not to ask questions.” We slow as we begin to approach Ryan.

He looks up and nods at me then quickly looks at Amelia, surprise evident on his face. He looks back at me as I crouch down next to him and Amelia stands a couple feet behind me.

“How’s it going?” I ask him.

“Can’t complain.” He nods at Amelia. “What’s with the girl?”

“She’s an associate.”

“Never seen her before. She don’t look homeless.”

“She’s not. She’s . . . “ I trail off, trying to find the words.

“I’m new,” she says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

I smile at her and she smiles back.

“Good to meet you too then.” Ryan shrugs and looks back at me. “Want your update?”

“Of course.”

“I had a guy following him last night, guy named Peter. He’s a drunk, but he seems solid.”

“Okay,” I say, cocking my head. Amelia crouches down, listening intently.

“Peter followed the sicko all night, says the guy walked all over the city. Like he knew he was being followed or something.” Ryan grins at me and I grunt, annoyed. “Anyway, eventually the sicko ends up in this weird building over on the west side of town, in a real sketchy neighborhood. Not the sort of place a nice white boy like him would usually go.”

“What did he do in there?”

“Peter wasn’t sure. He said he only got one glimpse of what was happening inside. He said he saw a line of girls, some of them pretty young, all waiting to greet him.”

I stare at Ryan, not sure if I believe what he’s saying.

“A whorehouse?” Amelia chimes in.

“That’s what it sounds like,” Ryan says.

“Can we trust what Peter says?” I ask.

“Maybe.” Ryan shrugs. “Like I said, he’s a drinker, but I don’t think he’d lie about something like that.”

“If it’s true, that means there’s an underground sex trade going on.”

Ryan nods again. “With some young girls, too.”

“Fuck,” I say softly. “Have you heard of this before?”

“Rumors,” Ryan admits. “Usually the kind of bullshit you always hear on the street. You know, that kind of shit about guys going missing and showing up with their kidneys missing or whatever.”

“Okay, Ryan,” I say, standing suddenly. “Thanks. This was a huge help.”

“Happy to. Want us to keep following?”

“No. I’ll handle it from here.”

“Whatever you want.”

I take a small roll of bills from my pocket and discreetly slip them into his jar. He nods at me gratefully. There’s three times the usual amount there which I hope he’ll spread out among his people a little, though I doubt he will.

“Get this guy soon,” Ryan says softly.

I stare at him for a minute then turn away and leave, not responding to that comment. I can’t risk admitting to him that I really do kill these guys, though we both know it.

Amelia hurries to catch up with me. “Is all that true?” she asks. “You’re after a pedophile and there’s a sex slave ring out there?”

“The sex slave part is unconfirmed, but yeah, I’m after a pedophile.”

She grabs my arm and stops me. “Noah,” she says.

I watch her calmly. “He’s going to die, Amelia.”

“Soon. You can’t let him hurt more people.”

I shake my head. “No. There’s a bigger target now.”

“The slaves?”

“That’s right. Our pedophile can bring us right to them if we’re patient.”

“Shit,” she says as I start walking. She catches up with me and we head back to my car in silence.

I suspect she can already sense my moral dilemma. I’m not a crusader for justice, and everything I do is ultimately designed to benefit me above all else. I kill because I want to, not because I want to save the city.

But this, it’s bigger than me. If I can help shed light on this sex slave ring, I can save people, maybe even little girls.

Mark Sheer is going to die. I’ve already decided. But first I need him to get hungry. When he gets hungry, he’ll bring me right to the little girls.

And then I’ll kill whoever is in charge of that sex slave operation as well.

The lights flicker on in my killing room as I descend down the stairs. I walk across the smooth surface and begin to assemble my tools: knives, syringes, serums, ropes, and more. I spread it all across the work benches and go through the methodical and important task of cleaning and sharpening every implement.

Everything must be perfect for a kill. It’s time to plan how Mark Sheer will die. I can take him at any time, and I will as soon as he gives me that whorehouse he visited. That place can quiet the screaming need for months if it ends up being as important as I think it is.

Eventually, my mind drifts back to Amelia. She was perfect today, asking the right questions as the right times, but sticking close to me. She didn’t even argue when I put her GPS device back on her ankle when we got back to the house. She smiled, thanked me, and then disappeared up into her room. I heard the shower running and so I came down here to do some work.

She seems sure. I can see it in her now, that resolve that comes before a serious decision. I didn’t think it would happen this quickly, but she did so good today. She had a million chances to escape, each of them better than the next, but she chose not to.

It never occurred to me that I could share this part of my life with someone. I assumed that anyone who saw this part of me would turn and run away. I’m a monster and I know it, but when Amelia looks at me, I don’t think she sees a killer. She doesn’t see a saint, either, and that’s okay with me.

I don’t need to be good. I just need to be respected and understood. I don’t know if she can even truly understand, but she comes closer than anyone has before.

I slowly lose myself in my work, so much so that I don’t hear the footsteps on the stairs. I dimly become aware of someone standing over near the entrance to the killing room, and I grab the closest knife before whirling around.

Amelia smiles at me. “Scared?”

I sigh, shaking my head. “It’s a bad idea to sneak up on me here.”

“I’m sorry. I said your name.”

“I guess I didn’t hear.”

“Lost in your work.” She cocks her head and walks toward me. “What are you doing?”

“Preparing.” I turn back toward my tools. “This is what I’ll need to take the pedophile.”

“Take him?”

“That’s right. I’m going to drug him and bring him here before killing him.”

“Why?” She looks at me, her eyes slightly wide.

“You know why.”

She watches me for a second before stepping up to my workbench. She picks up another one of my knives, this one with a long, hooked blade. She runs her finger over the edge again, but this time doesn’t cut herself.

“I used to be afraid of these things . . . “ She trails off then cocks her head at me. “What did you do?”

“Nothing,” I say softly.

“I guess it’s always been inside of me.”

“What’s inside of you, Amelia?” I step toward her, gently placing my knife back down on the table.

I’m at her mercy. I’m not sure if she even realizes it. But she’s armed and I’m not, and she can kill me at any moment. The thought sends my heart racing. She’s still an unknown. I still locked her in my basement. There has to be some level of hate still left inside of her.

Maybe this is her real test. Maybe I have to show her my throat before I know she’s mine.

She holds the knife lightly in her hand. “I’m not afraid, you know,” she says. “Out there on the street today, I wasn’t afraid. I was more excited.”

“How did that feel?” I ask softly.

“It felt good.” She seems surprised. “We were talking about a pedophile. About hunting him down and killing him. And it felt good.”

“That doesn’t scare you anymore?”

“Not at all.” She laughs lightly, almost as if she’s shocked to be saying all this out loud. “I think I like it, Noah.”

I stop inches away from her. The knife is between the two of us, its point against my chest. All she needs to do is press forward and the blade will do all the work. It’ll sink into my chest and pierce my heart, killing me quickly. Then she’ll be free.

All she needs to do is kill me. She looks at the knife then at me. A smile runs across her beautiful face and I want to reach out and touch her, but the tension is too thick.

Silence falls between us as she looks from the knife and back to me. I know she’s thinking about it, or at least she realizes what this moment means.

She could kill me, take everything I have. There’s a lot of money in this place. She could start over, have a new life. Put all of this killing behind us.

Part of me wants her to do it. If she’s going to betray me, I want her to do it now. I want her to sink the knife into my chest while looking into my eyes. I want her to be the one that finally kills me and turns the tables on me.

Do it, I want to say.

She slowly lowers the point of the knife from my chest.

I reach out and grab her wrist, hard. I squeeze and she lets out a surprised sound as she drops the knife. It clatters onto the ground as I pull her roughly against me, kissing her lips hard.

She melts into my kiss as passion flares up from inside of me.

She made her choice. That was the moment. She chose this, whatever it is, and now I’m going to take what I want. I’ve been patient, so damn patient. I didn’t push too hard. I let her come out of her shell and explore her new world.

Now I’m going to take her. I’m going to sink my cock in that tight, delicious little cunt until she sweats, bends, moans.

I’m going to bind her to me. After this, there will be nothing else, no getting away, no knife to my chest.

She’ll be mine, pure and simple.