Chapter 59: Glass-Embedded Vengeance
The coppery warmth of Brenda’s blood was still on Ingrid’s tongue, a metallic victory that tasted like survival. She spat again, a red globule hitting the concrete near Brenda’s head. The older woman was shrieking, a high-pitched, animal sound of pure shock and agony, both hands clamped over the ruin of her left breast.
“Tell her to pay upfront next time,” Ingrid rasped, the words scraping her raw throat.
She pushed herself off Brenda, glass shards tinkling from her back and thighs. Every movement was fire. The deep, internal tear from Violet’s assault was a fresh inferno, and now Brenda’s violation had reopened it, a raw, screaming hollowity that threatened to buckle her knees. She could feel a hot, steady seepage down her leg, a morbid tide marking her path.
Brenda rolled onto her side, curling around her injury. “You bitch!” she wailed, her voice cracking. “You crazy bitch!”
“You started it,” Ingrid muttered, more to herself than to Brenda. She took a staggering step towards the center of the warehouse, her gladiator sandals crunching on the debris. The rusted chains hanging from the exposed beams swayed gently, as if stirred by the violence.
The crowd was a muffled roar beyond the makeshift ring, a circle of hungry faces pressed against the flickering industrial lights. They’d gotten more than they paid for. They’d gotten a blood sacrament.
Ingrid’s vision pulsed with a nauseating rhythm. She focused on a chain, its links thick with grime, hanging just within reach. A plan, hazy and pain-fogged, began to form. She couldn’t out-muscle Brenda, not in this state. Not with the oil making every grip slippery, every foothold suspect. But she could out-suffer her.
Brenda was getting up. The initial shock was hardening into a colder, more focused rage. She left a smear of blood on the concrete as she pushed to her feet, her face a contorted mask. Her spiky grey hair was matted with sweat and filth.
“Violet said you were stubborn,” Brenda growled, stalking forward. Her cheap rubber sandals made soft, sticky sounds on the floor. “She didn’t say you were a feral animal.”
“There’s a difference?” Ingrid shot back, her body tensing. She took a half-step back, luring Brenda closer to the swinging chains.
Brenda lunged, not for a grapple, but a sweeping kick aimed at Ingrid’s already compromised legs. The oiled sole skidded off Ingrid’s thigh, but the force was enough to make her stagger. Ingrid let herself fall with the momentum, twisting as she went down. Her hand shot out and wrapped around the cold, rough links of the nearest chain.
Brenda was on her in an instant, a knee driving into Ingrid’s back, forcing the air from her lungs. “Gonna finish what Violet started,” Brenda hissed, her breath hot and foul in Ingrid’s ear. One oily hand tangled in Ingrid’s ice-blonde hair, yanking her head back. The other hand sought a purchase on her leather corset.
Ingrid didn’t fight the hold. She embraced the pain, used it to fuel the last of her strength. With a guttural cry that tore from the very depths of her burning womb, she planted her feet and pulled.
The chain went taut. She wasn’t just pulling herself up; she was using it as a lever, heaving her entire body and Brenda’s weight with it. For a terrifying second, nothing happened. Then, with a groan of protesting metal, the beam above shifted.
A shower of rust and dust rained down. Brenda looked up, her eyes widening just as the chain, and the heavy beam it was bolted to, gave way.
It wasn’t a catastrophic collapse. It was a controlled, brutal descent. The end of the chain whipped down, the heavy beam following like a pendulum. It caught Brenda across the shoulders, driving her face-first into the concrete with a sickening crunch.
The weight vanished from Ingrid’s back. She collapsed, the chain slipping from her numb fingers. She lay on her side, breathing in the dust-filled air, watching Brenda.
Brenda wasn’t moving. A pool of dark blood was spreading from her face. One of her oiled sandals had come off, revealing a surprisingly pale, calloused foot.
Silence, for a moment, then the crowd erupted.
Ingrid pushed herself onto her elbows. The world swam. She looked from Brenda’s still form to the wreckage of the beam, then towards the crowd where she knew, with a cold certainty, Violet would be watching.
She coughed, a ragged, painful sound, and managed to push herself to her knees. She looked directly into the seething mass of faces, her steely blue eyes searching for one pair of piercing green ones.
“Your turn’s coming, Violet,” she whispered, the words lost in the roar. “I’m not done yet.”