“Do you know what I’m going to enjoy the most, Murphy?” The thickened Southern twang of the man’s voice brought Sionn’s head up. He’d heard a whisper of it on the edges before, but something dark and primal resurfaced in the blond’s eyes, wiping away any polish he might have lacquered over his manners. “I think I’m going to enjoy carving off pieces of you and feeding them to your boy. The thought of him dying from choking to death on a piece of your meat makes me a very happy man inside. A very happy man.”
The chair Sionn had flung at him was within reach of the blond’s hatchet, and he buried its head in the wooden back. Splinters flew when he jerked it loose, and the long plank split, the crack continuing down to its punctured seat. The knife lodged in the chair was gone, loosened in the fracas, but Sionn spotted its handle near Leigh’s feet. Making a face at her, he jerked his chin down, and she craned her neck, nodding frantically, then brought her foot down on the blade to hide it.
“Good girl,” Sionn muttered to himself. His leg wasn’t giving him an inch. It ached and pulled as he fought to get up. The wall’s rough brick surface dug into his hand, tearing at his skin, but he continued to drag himself up, hooking his fingers into the thin lines of grout for leverage. His nails scraped at the gritty mortar, tearing chunks of skin from his fingertips, but he kept himself focused on the man stalking him.
“You got a name, loser?” The knife was getting more slippery, and Sionn risked switching hands long enough to wipe his palms. “Or did they just call you son growing up? I hear people do that sometimes when they’ve given birth to a piece of shite like you.”
“Ya’ll fucking smug now, Murphy,” the blond sneered. “I was going to use a gun, you know? Thinking that maybe I should make it quick, but after playing Duck Hunt with you, I want this to hurt. And that shit-eating grin of yours is going to be the first thing I take off.”
From where Sionn stood, taking off his loafers wouldn’t do the man any good. The cleaning crew he’d hired seemed to have taken their job very seriously. The wood floor had enough wax on it that he could take a scraper to it and make candles from what he pulled up. Clad in trouser socks, the blond was having a hard time walking a straight line, his feet slipping out from underneath him after every step.
“Should I stand really still for you, boyo?” he tossed back. “Or do you want me to be turning around so you can sneak up on me like you did to Miki? Is that the kind of man you are? Going after the weak like Damie’s mother because you aren’t man enough to take me?”
Something in Sionn’s face must have infuriated the blond because his demeanor shifted, going cold and still. Straightening up, the blond drew himself up to his full height and looked down his craggy nose at Sionn, nostrils flaring with his ripening temper. Glancing down at the hatchet, the man’s upper lip curled derisively, and he tossed it aside, sending the axe head flying through one of the windows facing the sidewalk. The glass shattered, pebbling outward into a shower of sparkling bits, shards spewing out with the hatchet as it tumbled down to the busy street below.
“Man enough? I’ll be man enough for you, Murphy.” The blond’s footsteps shook the wood planking when he stomped carefully forward. His fists were enormous chunks of bone and sinew, meaty and drawn white over his knuckles when he worked his fingers to loosen them up. “I’m going to be man enough to tear you apart with my bare fucking hands.”
At some point in his life, the man once had speed. Enraged, his anger fueled a burst of power to rain down on Sionn like an unholy fire called up by a sadistic demon, because the blond suddenly broke loose, churning his legs in a powerful thrust.
Unable to straighten his leg, Sionn could only seat himself against the wall and angle the knife up, hoping he could get in a good hit before the man’s greater weight overpowered him. The light coming from the window illuminated the man’s wild features, bleaching out his pale flesh until it was nearly alabaster around his vividly bruised skin. Then the light turned to darkness as the man’s bulk swallowed up the sun pouring through the windows and he slammed into Sionn’s crouched-over body.
For a moment, Sionn thought the crack he heard was his own spine giving way beneath the man’s muscled form, but when he toppled, a length of hard wood was shoved up into his back, and some small part of his brain caught sight of a lion-footed table leg spinning up into the air. The blond got lucky, and his hands slipped under Sionn’s arms, locking down on Sionn’s windpipe before he could take a good stab.