"You are a good man. You have never done anything wrong in your entire existence." I told myself in the mirror.

Liar. My inner voice wailed maliciously. You are insane. You tried to hurt a beautiful young woman and you enjoyed it. The idea of her squirming, screaming for you to stop. You want it. You crave it. You have done it forty nine times and you never feel remorse.

Her skin, her whimpers, her...moans whispered at my ears.

No! You were not yourself. Another voice countered. You were simply intoxicated on dominance. You are a diagnosed sadist. The voice explained kindly.

As well as a Psychopath.
The word cut through the voices of my shadowy mind rendering them silent. Silence. Sinister silence.

"I should apologize." I decided aloud. My blue eyes kept shifting from distinct locations never being able to look at myself for extended periods.

You called her disgusting but truthfully it is you who is grotesque. You cannot even look at yourself.

"I will apologize!"

Hollow laughter slithered through the darkness of my mind. Abhorrence engulfed my form. I detested myself for what I did.

You already did. Twice. She did not reply. She doesn't want to speak to a monster. That is what you are.

But...I need her to give me
... absolution, to absolve my soul.

"No, you don't."  The man in the mirror spat immoraly with venom lacing his words.

I tilted my head to the side biting my lower lip.

What do you mean?

"You apologized. You have done your part. You are above this.
Now, move on."

My phone vibrated in my dark slacks. I pulled out the slick shadowy device.

Head meeting at 11:00. -Mist

I stared at the man in the dark full length mirror. Black dress shoes, black coat, white dress shirt and red scarf. Who was he?

_|_

"In addition, I wish for us to invest another million in the Brooklyn Center. It is not running at the rate it should be. We only have two dozen staff members and over a hundred patients. We need to accomodate these citizens the best we can. They deserve and need the same attention and resources as our other facilities." I clarified then took my seat.

" Is there anything else of professed ruminance?"  I asked the head executives of the centers.

Christopher Church, the Harvard prick, also entitled my principal operative of the finacial division, stood in his pricey suit.

This will be good. One of the voices mocked.

"Why should we invest in ths Brooklyn rehabilitation center in lower class regions? It is not worth the trouble. Our
Manhattan center makes over 50 million dollars a year with expense cuts. With such profit we can accommodate other facilities but the Brooklyn center is making less than 1% as much as the Manhattan center. If you raise the cost to 50, 000 a year then it can be sufficed."

I detest this man.

Why did you hire him again?

His superior demeanor is beyond aggravating.

"They cannot afford it." I said simply as I sat back in my seat.

"We are decreasing our profits instead of augmenting them." He retorted.

I sat up straight leaning on to my hands staring straight at the man until the point that he had to straighten his tie.

"I have more than enough profits from the other 13 facilities to allow this one to flourish. You are too selfish my friend."

"I apologize, Mr. Knight." Church says quickly as he takes a seat.

"It is truly very odd. You were raised by a New York Powerhouse and an UpperEast side socialite. Nevertheless,  you still crave more wealth, don't you?" I cocked my eyebrow with a grin cracking across my face.

"I-I...I do not. I only want...the best for our patients."

"Bygones."

"Thank you, Mr. Knight." He rejoiced.

The imbecile doesn't understand.

"I'm afraid that we will have to dislink.

"I beg your pardon?" Church demanded with wide blue eyes. An emotion was slick against his pupils, fear.

"All in favor of letting Mr. Church here go, say I." I grinned to my esteemed individuals. They all acceed, knowing not to speak out against me.

Church stood. His eyes now burning with wrath instead of fright. I gave everyone a beaming look.

"I believe it was unanimous, don't you?" I asked him, superficially.

"I will sue you for everything you have, Atlas! This is an unlawful force of resignation!" He shouted. I tilted my head to the side.

"I hadn't noticed."

Mr. Church marched out of the room on the phone with his lawyer I'm assuming.

"Now, back to business." I grinned.

_|_

Mist sat across from me as she ate her meal which consisted of fresh Sashimi from Kurumazushi . I enjoyed when she was in my presence due to the fact that the voices silenced themselves when she was around.

I scrolled through my contacts looking for Grey's number coming across, Butterfly.

My chest clenched and my fist twitched.

Her skin, her lips, her moans, her body. All at my mercy. I had begun craving it as soon as I extracted myself from her life.

Look at you.  The voice snickered through my mind. Thinking of her when she could not care less.

Do not listen, she does care. She is just frightened of what you are capable of.

"I believe you should stay away from her." Mist said timidly.

"I beg your pardon?" I questioned her looking up from my phone. She knew better than to speak of my pleasures.

"She isn't like the rest." She started softly." She isn't some socialite, or model or actress. She is a nurse, living her life, trying to make her place in the world." She said, not able to make eye contact with me.

"She helps people and because of this she won't be able to let you go. You must permanently extract yourself from her life."

"I've seen how she looks when she speaks of you.  She has grown attached to you in a short time. Like they all do. But, she unlike the rest won't have something to fall back on when you destroy her relationships, her emotions and her job."

She waited for my response.

"I-" She continued.

"I am going to stop you right there." I started standing to my full height. I walked over to her pulling her chair back and leaning into her.

"Mist...you exquisite little thing. " I leered deeply as I exami ed her face. "What I do with Amber is none of your business?"

"I know, S-sir. It is just that-"

I raised a hand to silence her.

"I hired you because you are a Brown graduate with many capabilities under your belt. But, if you encroach upon my life one more time I will have to fire you. This is your last warning. Rose was a mistake that I deeply regret. Nevertheless, that is in the past. She is in the past."

The look in her eyes was utter terror.

"And, I do not believe you would want to be as well?" I smiled then walked into my office.

"Enjoy your Sashimi!" I called back to her.

The rest of the day sliced by in a blur. Mist had not spoke to me after our confrontation. I drowned myself in work and Scotch.

What Mist had said sent the voices into a fast paced burn of vicious thoughts.

She is right. Let her go. It is for your own good. Look at what you are becoming.

No, she is not right. Amber is yours. You alone claimed her and you alone must break her.

You want to make her tick. And, the only way to do that is to get under that soft skin of hers, to slice away at her sanity until nothing is left, to exploit her darkest secrets and desires and make her crave them.

I took another drink of the scotch. I had almost finished the bottle.

I stared out the dark colossal window to my right, staring out to the skyscrapers across New York City and the trivial lights that shone across the dark masses.

I had a migraine building in my head and my hand kept twitching.

I checked my watch 12:35 A.M.

"I should get some rest." I told myself, standing. I walked toward the door catching my reflection, Mist had bandaged the graze on my neck.

A reminder.

A reminder of her hatred of you.

A reminder of how frightened she is of you.

A reminder of how sick you are.

I walked past Mist's desk and into the elevator. I tried to overlook the voices but they had gotten louder with the increase of alcohol. The shadows of the hall jumped out at me as I entered the elevator.

She hates you!

She wants to see you dead!

The sympathetic voice had been silenced much to my demise.

You should kill her.

The thought made my heart race.

No one will miss such an insignificant person.

Kill her and life will go back to normal.

Kill her aggravating friend as well, That despicable Dane. He never trusted you and fed her with lies about you.

You were competition to him.

He is probably fucking her right now.

Again and again.

Her moans and whimpers all belong to him now.

Her form quivering underneath him and not you.

"Shut up..." I said to myself.

I am in control. I repeated inwardly.

You are in control. You are the boss. You decide what happens to those below you and she is beneath you.

Kill her and have Grey take care of it. And, kill Dane just for fun. No one will ever know and you will have piece of mind.

Murder her.

My body was violently shaking. I couldn't stop the thoughts. I was beginning to see blood.

I clenched my shaking fists bringing them to my head. The pressure in my head began to augment tenfold.

"Shut up!" I shouted. A sharp pain began to build in my chest as my breathing became more restricted.

Why?

You shouldn't care if she's dead or alive.

"Shut up!" I cried out. I looked to my reflection in the mirror.

Why am I feeling so much?

I have always been detached and now...

"Why?" He retorted with a vicious leer. "It's because you are weak and you always have been since you were a child."

"No..."

"No one loved you then and little Atlas couldn't take that."

"No..."

"Or?" He smirked. "Better yet, you should kill yourself. No one will ever miss the big bad wolf that killed little Red." I smiled at myself.

Before I could think it over I slammed my fist into the mirror, fracturing its surface.

I continued, one blow after the other, ignoring as the glass dug and scraped into my skin.

I continued until the pain dissipated.

*****
Where would you rank this on the crazy scale ranging from 1-5?

Don't forget to vote and comment! I like literally live for those, as sad as it sounds. -BDX