Chapter 199
Once again the prisoner attempted to eke out some sort of noise out, but that wasn’t happening. Not now. If the others came in to the office to check on him or peered through the windows, they might be able to attempt a rescue, but Christian would incapacitate all three of them as well, and anyone else stupid enough to interfere.
“Did you order Brandy’s death?” Christian asked, spinning the man around in the chair and staring him in the eye.
He couldn’t verbally answer, but then he didn’t have to. Christian saw the answer in his eyes. He had. Granger had had her killed. Because of him. He swallowed back his anger and then rammed his knee down hard between Granger’s legs. This time, a groan did manage to escape from his throat. Sweat dotted his forehead and his face turned bright red. Christian wanted to pull his blade from his pocket already, not to shove it into his chest. That would come later. But to saw his manhood off while he sat there and watched.
He didn’t do it, though. He had questions, and he wanted answers. “What about her brother?” This time, Granger’s eyes told him something else. Confusion. Could it be true that Brandy had made up a little brother in an effort to convince herself that she had to do what Granger said? Had she decided killing Christian was the only way she could live, so she’d had to make up a convincing story to ease his pain and make herself feel better?
It didn’t matter. He forgave her. He’d forgiven her the moment he’d looked into her eyes. Now that she was gone, it was all the more easy for him to do so. It was also time to end this man once and for all.
Knowing that Jess was at the ready, he gestured for the Hunter to come in. The window didn’t open yet, though, and a few seconds after he’d made his move, Christian heard footsteps outside. He spun Granger around so it looked like he was still hard at work to the unobservant eye, and then stepped back out of view of the windows. Lyle kept walking, and eventually the footsteps faded. A moment later, the window flew open, and Jess was there.
Once again, Christian turned the chair. When Granger recognized there was a Hunter present, tears formed in his eyes. He shook his head, and the noises coming from his mouth seemed to be the word, “Please.”
“It’s too late for all that,” Christian said. He drew the knife from his pocket. “I want you to feel exactly the same sensation I felt when I was stabbed to death, Bossman. Only, instead of being stabbed by the one person in the world you love more than anyone else, you’ll be taken out by two people who could’ve worked for you for many years, two people you could’ve won over if you’d shown any sort of leadership skills whatsoever, you selfish bastard.”
The blade wasn’t quite as long as the one Brandy had used, but it would do. Jess wrapped his hand around the hilt, and the two of them thrust the knife forward together, plunging it into Granger’s chest near the spot where Christian had been stabbed.
The man couldn’t scream because his mouth was full of horse shit and bandana, but he whimpered, a gurgling noise forming in his throat as tears filled his eyes and then began to pour out. A crimson spot began to form on his dark suit jacket, spreading almost as slowly as the tears that ran down his face.
Christian took a step back and folded his arms while Jess turned around, not wanting to watch. The Guardian couldn’t get enough of the scene before him, though. Just as he’d taken in every curve of Brandy’s body, every movement, every twitch of her lips, his eyes were glued on Hal Granger now. He wanted to watch each drop of blood pour out of the bastard, staining the expensive oriental rug beneath his chair.
It didn’t take long. That was too bad. Christian had hoped to have the satisfaction of watching Granger die for several minutes, maybe even an hour, but it only took five or ten minutes for his head to droop to the side. A few minutes after that, Christian stepped forward and felt for a pulse. Finding none, he decided his work here was done. It was time to tell the others.
He didn’t get a chance to walk out of the office and let the three piss poor security guards know their boss was dead. Before he had a chance to move toward the window, the door to Granger’s office flew open and another Hunter came rushing in.
Wess Lackland took in the scene quickly and immediately opened fire on Christian, expecting to take the Guardian down with his bullets the same way a human would fall. He was a Hunter, after all, and he should be capable of killing a Guardian with no problem. The bullets stung as they made contact with Christian’s skin, but they did not sink in. Instead, they bounced off, the same way the bullet Wess was spraying Jess with bounced away because a Hunter could not kill another Hunter.
“What the hell?” Wess asked, looking at his gun and then at Christian. “I thought you was already dead.”
“You thought wrong,” Christian said, coming around the table and closing the distance between them so quickly Wess had no time to react.
Christian pulled the gun from the Hunter’s hand and smacked him upside the head with it, hard. Blood streamed down the side of Wess’s face, and his hat fell to the floor. “That’s for being an asshole,” he said, tossing the gun at him. “Now, Granger’s dead. You can either decide to keep being an asshole, or get up off of the ground and start doing your job, which is supposed to be to help people. Did you take Brandy down to the Vampires or was that some other shit head?”
Wess held a hand to the side of his face, blood spurting through his fingers. “No, that was Granger himself. Said he wanted to be the one to watch her die and know he did that.”
Christian swallowed hard, not sure if he could believe him. Jess was there now, his hand on his shoulder. “Let it go, Christian. Come on. We need to go.”
Deciding his friend was right, it would be best if he left all of this behind, Christian nodded. “I need to get my belongings from my room.”
“I got the picture of your family, the letters from your mom, and your books already. You got something else?” Jess asked, not letting go of him.
Deciding that was all there was to fetch from the room in the attic, Christian shook his head. The memories he’d made there, those were ingrained in his mind so deep, he’d never lose those. No one could take those from him, not even Granger.
With nothing more for him in San Francisco, Christian decided it was time to head back east. He needed to find Jordan Findley and let the Guardian Leader know he was at his service, no matter what that entailed. That man, from what he understood, was a leader, a good man, someone who cared about the people who worked for him, even if he hadn’t seen Christian’s value yet. Christian should’ve never come here to begin with, but if he hadn’t, he never would’ve met Brandy, and meeting her had been worth it--even if it had killed him.
