My Maddie (Hades Hangmen #8)(37)

I roared into the night. I couldn’t fucking stand the heat in my bones. I screamed as I pulled harder on the gas. My heart pounded in my chest like a drum. Then I heard the sound of someone behind me. I turned my head, seeing a bike catching me up.

“They’re mine!” I warned, accelerating. But the bike behind went faster too. I pulled out my knife, ready to kill, if someone attempted to stop me.

“Flame!” I heard a voice calling my name, the sound travelling on the wind. But my pulse was too fast, the blood in my ears was too fucking loud to find out who it was. “FLAME!” Roaring out in anger, I looked back. I recognized the bike. Ash, it was Ash. Clenching my jaw, I slammed on the brakes and spun the bike around. Ash stopped too, right in the middle of the road.

“Go home,” I ordered, and pointed my knife at his face. “Get the fuck home. You can’t stop me. I’m going to kill the bastards who hurt Maddie. No one can fucking stop me!”

“I know,” Ash said, and lowered my blade away from his face. I slashed the knife down my arm. My eyes closed as the blood spilled on my thighs. I gripped my cock under my leathers and squeezed until it hurt, until it made me bite my tongue so hard it bled. I drank the blood down. “I’m not here to stop you,” Ash said. My eyes snapped open. I had to move. I had to leave. Ash kicked his bike into fucking life. He pulled out his knife, moved his cut to the side and showed me his gun in a holster. “I’m coming with you.” Ash lifted the sleeve of his shirt and sliced along his arm. Blood ran down his arm, and to the ground. “I’m your fucking brother, Flame. Those cunts tried to take Maddie from us. Tried to take your kid.” Ash licked at the blade, blood covering his tongue. “I’m coming with you, to kill them. I swear, on this fucking blood, we’re gonna kill them and avenge Maddie.” Ash stared at me, keeping his knife in hand. “I’m not leaving, so don’t ask me to.” His head dropped slightly; eyes fixed on the road. “You’re my brother, Flame. You’re my blood. I ain’t letting you go in there alone. I’m coming. I’m a Cade. I can kill alongside you.”

Looking just like someone we both knew, brother… My head twitched as I remembered his words from the woods. He fucking hated me. Ash fucking hated me.

“Let me fight beside you, Flame. Let me…” His voice cut out and his eyes lifted. They shined with tears. I didn’t know why. He thought I was like our poppa. He thought I was evil. That I would hurt him like our poppa hurt us both. “Just let me come, okay?” His voice sounded different. Something broke through the anger and poison in my veins. A fucking ache in my chest—something I got with Maddie. I used to feel it with my mama and Isaiah. Now I felt it with Ash.

“We need to go, now” I said and slipped my knife back in my cut. I kicked-started the bike and my engine fucking roared. “We ain’t stopping ‘til we get there,” I pushed. Ash pulled beside me. I looked over at him. He had flame tattoos on his skin. We had the same black eyes and the same black hair.

Ash turned at me. “Let’s go kill these fuckers. Us two. Yeah? For Maddie.”

Then we set off. Death was coming to the devil-worshippers. The Cade brothers hell bent on delivering the fucking fatal blows.





Chapter Six


Maddie



I blinked my eyes open. The sound of the hospital machines beeped with a steady rhythm, the noise music to my ears. The rhythm told me we were alive. A nurse was at my side. “We’re removing all this today, darling. You’re going home. You and that little one are healthy and free of smoke. You’re very lucky.”

“Home,” I whispered, taking a deep, replenishing breath. I craved the comfort and safety of our cabin. I yearned for the warmth of our marital bed. And I needed to take Flame away from this place. I needed to remind him of who he was. I had to bring him back to me. Back to my heart where he belonged.

I turned my head, searching for my husband, who was sitting on the chair. I frowned when I saw he was not there. Not having him beside made me feel like I was missing a limb. For days I had to endure watching him slowly come undone, knife always in his hand, always pushing into his flesh. I felt my heart breaking, minute after minute, cracking in two, watching the man I loved beyond words rocking on the chair, eyes fixed on the floor. It was agony to witness him falling apart. No matter how hard I tried to console him, to hold him, to kiss away his fears, Flame held back. He stopped speaking. But his eyes betrayed his inner torment. His trembling lips gaoled the confession I so desperately needed him to confide in me.

And he would not touch me. I looked down at my offending hand. The one that he could not bring himself to hold. I closed my eyes and felt them fill with tears. I felt his rough hand around my fingers, ghost-like, an eerie echo of the walls he had brought down on our love. I cast my mind back to our cabin when I had locked myself inside, refusing to let AK do what Flame had begged of him. Kill Flame. Once and for all to destroy the flames that tortured my husband’s soul. To silence the venomous voice of his father who, when Flame was but a child, told his son that he was evil, that demons had possessed his body. A father who should have loved and protected Flame. Who should have held his son close when Flame’s fears were laid bare to his ears, when his testimony and confession needed to be met with love and understanding, not denial, certainly not the emotional lashes of eternal damnation and sin.