Skulduggery swayed away from one punch and blocked the next, but couldn’t stop the third. Tesseract grabbed him and pulled his head down to meet his knee, then hooked two fingers into his left eye socket and stepped back, swinging him around the room. Skulduggery hit the couch and went over. Tesseract picked him up and slammed him head first into the wall. He did it twice more, until he was sure the detective was dazed, and then he dropped him.
He heard the rumble of the parting wall, and left the living room. The Torment emerged from the bedroom, looked up and his old eyes widened for a moment.
“I see,” he said. “There’s no point in arguing with you, is there?”
“None,” Tesseract admitted. “You tried to kill me, and you didn’t pay me. I can’t have that.”
“I should have cut your throat.”
“You should have.”
Tesseract pressed his hand against the Torment’s forehead and splintered his skull. The old man’s body dropped, and Tesseract stepped over it. He could hear Skulduggery, on his feet again, no doubt with his gun back in his hand. Tesseract hurried into the bedroom and ran through the gap in the wall, into the tunnel beyond. A few moments later, he heard Skulduggery sprinting after him.