The place was a shambles. Devi Sloane surveyed the damage with a frosty gaze. What did it matter to her? Hauling herself upright, she wiped blood from the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand, stepping over the defeated body that still lay on the wet floor among the shattered glass and broken furniture.

Making a feeble attempt at adjusting her ragged clothing and pushing disheveled jet-black hair from her face, she swaggered to the bar on one broken sandal heel.

"Hell, Devi, what got into you?" the man on her left asked, moving back a step.

She fixed him with a killing glare.

"Uh, Hon," another voice offered up timidly. "I think Sam's hurt."

It was true. Samara Grey lay prone, bleeding and whimpering in the center of the barroom floor. She didn't look like she was going to be getting up anytime soon, which suited Devi just fine.

"Forget the bitch," she snarled, turning her eyes back to the astonished man behind the bar. "Gimme a drink."

"You gonna call the cops, Charlie?" a drunk voice slurred out.

"No," Charlie Wells laughed, pouring three fingers of his best Kentucky sipping whiskey. "That's a fight I'd've paid good money to see. Damn, girl, you pack a hell of a wallop. I didn't know you had it in you. Feel better?"

Devi accepted the glass, staring into the amber liquid within. Did she feel better?

"Not yet," she said, taking a gulp of the fiery liquid. "But I'm working on it."

Snatching at the broken strap that hung out of one large tear in her blouse, Devi pulled up on the bra cup that threatened to expose too much of her flesh. Voices around her began to buzz the way they do when something anomalous occurs.

"I always thought she was such a sweet, shy thing," a woman said.

"I always thought she wouldn't say 'shit' if she had a mouthful," someone else tossed in.

Devi knew what everyone always thought about her. Sweet, timid, defenseless, a real pushover — but they had no idea the emotions that always boiled beneath the surface or how she'd been trained all her life to control them. Not once, since her earliest childhood, had she given vent to the rage of which she was capable. Not until now.

As good as it felt to smash that woman's nose all over her face, Devi still felt the shame of letting go. Her gram would have been so disappointed in her. Raising the glass to her lips again, she shot back the rest of its contents before slamming it back down on the bar.

"Gimme another."

Still chuckling, Charlie poured a liberal amount of bourbon in the glass.

"Better go easy on that," he said. "You're not a drinker."

"I'm thinking of taking it up as a hobby," she snapped, grabbing the drink.

Taking another swig, she allowed the liquor to linger in her mouth, killing the taste of blood before swallowing. The whiskey burned in her empty stomach, adding to the fire of rage she felt in her chest. How had this mess started?

Staring into her glass again, she thought back over the years of her marriage. Gram had tried to warn her, but she just wouldn't listen.

"Any man named Philander is nothing but trouble," Gram had said.

My grandma was right, she thought. Phil had proved that within weeks of their wedding vows. That's when she'd found out about his first affair. To be honest, it was a one-night stand, but that reality only made the event all the more painful. He'd gone out and fucked some woman just because he could. There was no emotion behind it, just the lust for a skirt that he met in passing.

There had been others, too. Oh, he'd promised, after she found out about the first one, that he'd never do it again, but she always knew when he'd been off shoving his dick into some willing skank. She'd kept her shame to herself, not telling another soul. It would've been too painful to admit she'd made a mistake. It was that stubborn pride that forced her to hold her head high and turn a blind eye to Phil's unfaithfulness, even when it was the talk of the town.

That is, until Samara.

Sam had been her best friend since first grade. It had been Sam that held her hand in the long nights of mourning after Devi's parents had died in the fire that had burned their home to the ground. It had been Sam with whom she had shared all the giggles and tears of a girl's life. In a way, Sam's betrayal was far worse than what Phil had done.

Phil had started showing his tells, those little unconscious signs that he was messing around again. It had been just four weeks ago when she'd realized that he was fucking around yet again, and this time it wasn't just a quick fling.

At first, she had tried to ignore it, hoping it would pass quickly as all the others had done. Soon it became apparent that Phil was involved on some emotional level. When she had finally tried to confront him about it, he'd become combative, even cruel. He had accused her of going off the deep end, imagining things that weren't really happening.

Again she'd tried to ignore it, but the whispers of the people around her had taken on a new ugliness. When Devi couldn't stand it any longer, she had taken to spying on him. She followed him when he left at night, showed up at his office unannounced and scanned his cell phone for suspicious numbers. He'd covered his tracks well.

Her nerves shattered, she had accepted an invitation from her aunt to spend the weekend at the lake house with her family. As always, Samara had been invited, too.It was the first time Sam had ever turned down a chance to wallow in the water and work on her tan in front of Devi's hot cousins.

That should've been my first clue.

Taking another sip from her glass, she glanced at her reflection in the mirror behind the bar. Her mouth was swollen from the one good lick that Sam had gotten in and one side of her face bore angry, red scratches.

What was left of her blouse was hanging open, revealing the torn lace of her bra and the gouge marks made by Sam's fingernails. Her normally well-groomed hair was a mess that no amount of combing was going to fix. It tumbled in dirty waves over her shoulders and down her back.

Plucking a matted clump of her own hair from her blouse, Devi dropped it on the floor in disgust. That's when she noticed that the once-white, ankle-length skirt she wore was torn from hem to waist along one thigh. She shrugged and turned back to her drink.

A movement in the mirror caught her attention. Someone was helping Sam from the floor, setting her in a chair. Draining her glass, Devi turned around to face her former best friend.

"You broke my nose, you bitch!" the woman screamed from across the room.

Devi smiled at her, a chilly grimace belying the burning hatred that had settled in her soul. She had wanted to break more than Sam's nose.

She had come home earlier than expected from her weekend at the lake. It had rained all night, and was still raining this morning when she'd made the decision to return home. It was early afternoon when she had pulled into the drive to find Sam's car in her parking spot.

Devi's blood had run cold the minute she'd seen it. Shock had taken over her senses, freezing her butt to the seat of her vehicle, her fingers to the steering wheel. The world had seemed to turn in slow motion when she had finally managed to extricate herself from the vehicle.

She didn't remember processing any thoughts when she'd found herself tiptoeing across the yard to her own bedroom window. The rain had stopped, but the ground was soft and wet, sucking the little kitten heels of her sandals into the mud. The soggy, uncut grass had clung to her ankles as she'd approached, soaking the hem of her skirt; that much she remembered clearly.

The sight that was waiting for her on the other side of the glass had been enough to ripple through her belly like an earthquake.

Samara had her naked ass in the air, her lips wrapped around Phil's cock. He was grinning, reaching for her. He threw the woman onto her back, jerking her legs apart. His mouth descended on Sam's shaved pussy, devouring her in a way he'd never used on Devi.

With the window open a crack, Devi could hear Sam's screams. Her best friend was enjoying her husband thoroughly.

Phil stopped eating, hovering over a mewling Sam, laughing riotously as the blond beneath him cursed vehemently. Then he reared back, clutching his cock in his large fist, aiming at her open pussy.

From her vantage point, Devi could see everything, from the way her oldest friend's back arched, and the expression on her face as she begged for more, to the leer on her own husband's profile. She could see the head of his cock strumming along the hairless folds of flesh between Sam's thighs and the tension in his muscles when he prepared to slam himself home.

He thrust into her hard, burying himself to the hilt, throwing his head back in a crude growl. The sound was unlike anything that Devi had ever heard from him during their tepid couplings. He'd never shown the passion for her that he was showing the woman Devi had most trusted in her life.

That realization alone was enough to bring the rage to the surface, but she'd held it in check. The scene inside the bedroom was like a train wreck, fascinating in its horror. It held her enthralled, forcing her to stare at its depravity.

Phil thrust deeper, harder, pounding furiously at the woman on the bed. Sam moaned out in response, her nails digging into his back, leaving bloody trails on his skin. He pulled out suddenly, snatching her legs up. He wrenched them farther apart, shoving her knees to her tits. He told her to hold them there, going into detail about how he would punish her if she let go. She obeyed, giggling, while he slid two of his fingers into her pussy. She moaned eagerly when he inserted first one wet finger and then the other into her anus, prying it open.

Then he shoved his wet cock in, laughing when she screamed in pain and pleasure. Reaching up, he took hold of one of her nipples, pulling on it, twisting it roughly until she moaned again.

"I'll bet Devi never let you do this," Sam had giggled.

"She wouldn't make a pimple on your ass, Baby," Phil had growled in response. "She's as much fun in the sack as a dead fish."

They laughed together, grunting as Phil pulled out and thrust back in. He was fucking Sam's ass as if his very life depended on it, sweating like the pig he was.

Those words, that laughter, had hurt as much as the betrayal. That's when the rage had come to the surface. That's when Devi had allowed the anger to take control.

She'd gone to the garage behind the house, had taken a can from the shelves inside. Then she went to work on Sam's brand new silver Camaro. After spray-painting the words "slut" and "whore" on the sides, hood and windshield of the car, she had used a hammer from Phil's coveted tool box to shatter the headlights.

Following that, she'd gotten into her own car and driven aimlessly for a few hours, seething with the hot temper that still boiled inside. She had always been the good girl, had always done what was expected of her.

Even the clothing she wore was prim and proper. A glance in the rearview mirror revealed the pretty white ribbon that held her raven hair back from her face. She grabbed at it in disgust, ripping it from her head, letting the black hair spill forward over her shoulders and down her front. The ribbon landed on the seat in a small pile of shimmering satin.

Her wandering path had taken her past Charlie's Tap where she saw an angry Samara stomping in through the door. It was pure impulse that had Devi cranking the wheel over, slamming on the brakes to slide sideways into the parking lot.

She'd practically torn the key from the ignition, tossing it in the seat, when she had parked next to Samara's slut-mobile. Standing outside her vehicle, she had raged inwardly as she stared at the building.

It was pure impulse that had made her snatch her ribbon from the seat again, using it to tie her long hair back in a ponytail to get it out of the way. Then she had stalked through the same entry that Sam had taken. Slamming the tavern's door behind her, she had drawn the attention of the small crowd inside.

"You fucking bitch!" Sam had shrieked when she'd seen Devi standing there, glaring in her sinister fury. "You're going to pay for the damage you did to my car."

"What price, Samara?" Devi had asked quietly, tossing her ponytail back, walking slowly to her new enemy. "What price should we hang on the head of a two-faced friend who would fuck my husband? What price for soiling the sheets of my bed with my man? What would you pay for the destruction of a marriage?"

Samara, her face flaming red, looked at the amused, curious stares of the quiet people around her. She began to sidle toward the door, giving Devi a wide berth, working her way to the middle of the room.

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about. I went there to talk to Phil because he's worried about you. That's all. He thinks you're going crazy and I'm beginning to believe him."

Undaunted, Devi continued her slow approach, keeping herself between her husband's slut and the door.

"That's a good one, Sam. Maybe next time you fuck someone else's husband, you'll remember to draw the shades. I saw the whole thing, right down to how you like to take it up the ass."

Devi glanced over her shoulder to the grinning patrons at the bar.

"How many of you here didn't know that this whore likes to get fucked in the ass?" she asked loud enough for everyone to hear. "If you haven't already done it, give it a try. From what I saw, my husband was having a damn good time."

There was a collective gasp from the men and women who surrounded the bar, followed by vulgar chuckles and taunts directed at Sam.

"How dare you," Sam hissed unconvincingly. "I... I should sue you for slander."

"Kinda hard to prove slander when the whole town knows I'm telling the truth, slut. They've been talking about it for weeks. Stupid me, I didn't want to believe it. I just thought they were being mean. I mean, after all, my best friend would never do anything like that to me. But then I saw it for myself. Skank."

"Devi, you stay away from me," Sam murmured, taking a step back.

"Oh, no. You're gonna take your punishment like a big girl, Sweetie. I'm going to beat you to a bloody pulp."

With those words, Devi had launched herself at her old friend, snatching her by the front of her cropped tee shirt, connecting her right fist with Sam's eye. The woman reeled, staggering backwards, screaming for help. No one at the bar stirred. The few people that had occupied the tables had gotten up to join the others at the counter to view the spectacle.

"No one's going to help you, Sam."

Samara had the grace to look truly scared for the first time. She glanced around, but her only avenue of escape had been cut off by Devi. The humiliation of what was happening, in front of the entire bar, was almost more than she could bear.

"Hey," she countered, curling her mouth into a sneer. "It's not my fault that you can't keep your husband satisfied. Maybe if you'd stop trying to be such a good girl all the time, he'd've been home fucking you instead of me, bitch."