Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 129001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
Not that I was interested.
Just that it might be a long story.
And that would give Bohannan time.
I jumped as he lifted a long-fingered hand and tapped the side of his head.
“You were right. Small minds. That was Tony’s headfuck. He’s bi, like me, and swings two ways another way too, and you can’t be an ace army sniper and one of the guys if you like a big dick moving up your ass. You can’t be a real man and like to be tied up and have your cock whipped. For a long time, he made do with getting the other side of that, lots of pussy who’d beg him to fuck them harder and make it hurt. But a man needs what a man needs. All he needs.”
Those sea blue eyes held mine.
“I gave him what he needed. He’d do anything for me.”
Pause.
“Anything.”
I had a feeling Tony proved that in spades.
He shook his head, looked off into the distance, then back to me.
“I didn’t like him fucking Betty, you know. That messed with my head. He was mine. But no one gave that first shit about her. She was just some guy’s wife. I’m not sure anybody even knew her name until they found out she got herself addicted to Tony. She was perfect. The cops didn’t pay her a lick of attention, even when she was being interviewed. She didn’t matter. She was just another mom. She was nobody.”
She had been treated that way.
Like nobody.
And as the ladies had a habit of doing in Misted Pines, Betty sure proved that was a mistake.
“He obviously wasn’t supposed to get caught,” he bit out. “Eventually, once I had her primed, I was gonna introduce him to Shelly, and it would be my boy, my baby and me. But for some fucked-up reason, Bohannan took you and his daughter up to where the FBI was hanging. He wasn’t supposed to be there. You weren’t supposed to be there. Tony saw Bohannan’s SUV, but we had a plan, and Tony’s good with carrying out orders and thinking on the fly if there’s adjustments that need to be made. He even thought you all being there would be a bonus. He called me, told me what was up, and we agreed. He took his shots, and those three tore off out of there. He didn’t expect Bohannan to come out the back, though. Tony had to veer the wrong way. His escape route impeded, he couldn’t adjust quick enough and get away without being seen.”
“You-you had him…do all the killing?”
He shook his head. “Not Alice. He was up in Canada. I snatched her. Funny thing, the government trains these guys to be killers. Straight-up, dead-set killers. Trains ’em, and then sends them out and orders them to kill. Put their eye to the sight, get a bead, pull the trigger. Dead. Then they come home and what? What are they good for? You kill somebody, it doesn’t matter who, you could hate ’em, it’ll still fuck you up.”
He blew out a sigh, upset about this, though he was right in what he said, and it was upsetting.
“It fucked him up. I told him what we needed to do with Alice, he told me he couldn’t do it. First time he refused me anything. Only time. But I got it. You had to draw the line somewhere. That was his line. And I gave that to him.”
Which meant he killed Alice.
Inept, Bohannan had said.
And gruesome.
He scooched closer to me.
I fought vomiting.
“It was genius, the setup he had. Like I said, he liked it a lot of ways. So he starts that business in Wyoming, all guys all the time. These big corporate players who walk around thinking they’re swinging their big dicks, snap your fingers, they’ll drop to their hands and knees. He was free, making up for lost time. He was fucking so much ass and sucking so much cock, he was up to his neck in that shit. Obviously, I heard of this guy who takes you out and shows you a good time, Brokeback Mountain with guns and good hunting, I had to see it for myself. And he was perfect.”
His voice dropped, a new expression hit his face.
“Fucking perfect.”
Good God.
He loved him.
He’d loved Tony.
And if I was reading it right, he also loved Shelly.
“He was so lost,” Ray told me. “She was so lost. In me, they were found.”
Yes, he loved Tony and Shelly.
And yes, he thought he was god.
Because when he said that last, I could swear, he felt like light was shining from him as the savior of the fucked-up-by-life souls.
“Was gonna find a new one,” he shared. “Marry Shelly and tie her to me forever, and we’d find a new one we both liked. But I need time. It’s gonna take time to get over Tony.”