My Maddie (Hades Hangmen #8)(53)

I stretched my hand up to the side of the cabin, trying to lift myself up. But then I saw Slash. He was in the trees, watching, always fucking watching me. I watched as Diego moved behind him, Slash dropping to the ground as Diego fired and he took a bullet for me. His eyes frosted over with death. Then I saw Flame tied to the tree, so fucking out of his mind that he didn’t even recognize his own wife. And Maddie, right now, crying beside Flame, who might never come back to her and their unborn kid.

I couldn’t do it. I had nothing left inside me to give. There was fuck all light, just a black hole that destroyed any joy or happiness I might have tasted. Apparently, it wasn’t in the cards for me—happiness. In no fucking part of my life could the joy and happiness stay without being wiped away by darkness and pain.

Lights suddenly flooded the clearing that contained the cabins. I heard a truck’s engine cut out and the distinctive sound of AK and Phebe’s voices. Saffie would be there too, silently walking behind her mama. I couldn’t see her, but I thought of her blond hair, her perfect fucking face and her eyes that saw too much every time she looked at me. Like she was the one person who had found the hidden entrance into my mind, into whatever remained of my fucked up heart.

But I wouldn’t drag her down with me. I saw the bitch in the cage in my mind and felt sick. I knew Saffie had had a similar life. The thought of anyone doing that to her, made me wanna slit throats and rip out hearts. She was good. Like Flame had believed Isaiah to be. Sapphira Deyes was pure goodness. She didn’t belong in this fucked up world. She should be living with the goddesses in Greece we got told about in school. Fuck, she looked like half the fucking murals that used to be painted on our walls in the clubhouse, before it burned down. The only wall that remained was the one of Hades and his wife. The one Styx had stared at after the fire for endless minutes, signing fuck all, breathing as if in sheer relief.

“Ash?” AK called my name. I wiped my face and forced myself to my feet. “Ash?” It sounded like his voice was coming from inside the cabin. Pushing my fucking numb limbs to move, I ran into the forest. I ran until I hit the path that brought me out at the barn, which Styx and the Hangmen had used to use for torturing our enemies in the past. Right now, it was our temporary bar.

Fuck, I needed a drink. I didn’t give a shit if Styx never wanted me as a prospect again, I still needed a motherfucking drink. Stopping by a tree, I wiped at my face and blocked out all the shit that was trying to possess the last of sanity. Lighting another smoke, I walked to the barn and threw open the door. The fucking place went silent as I entered.

I looked up and all the brothers were watching me. AK was back at the cabin, and Viking wasn’t in the barn either. They both wouldn’t leave Flame. It meant I wouldn’t have them on my back as I drank until I passed the fuck out.

“Fuck, baby Flame. You got any skin left?” Rudge asked. He walked over to me and handed me his bottle of Jack. “Shit, mate, I think you need this more than me.” I took the Jack from him and caught Zane’s eye behind the makeshift bar. I walked over to him, downing as many mouthfuls of whiskey as I could in one go. He came around the bar.

“Ash, fuck,” he said, relieved, and hooked his hand around my neck. I gritted my teeth when his arm pressed on a snake bite. “Shit. I’m sorry,” he said. He moved aside and pulled out a barstool. “Sit the fuck down. You look like you’re gonna fall over.” I slid on to the stool. Zane sat beside me.

Beau slapped Zane on the back. “I got the bar. Stay with your brother.”

“Thanks,” Zane said. Beau met my eyes, nodding once, before getting Tanner a shot. Beau never talked much, but he was fitting in just fine.

“AK told me what happened,” Zane said. I drank more whiskey, feeling the heat flood into my chest. “Flame…” he trailed off. I looked down at the dirt floor. “AK mentioned they aren’t sure he’s gonna be okay.” I breathed deep. I wanted to speak, but I fucking couldn’t. Zane must have realized it, because he didn’t push. Instead, he changed subject. “You’re my fucking brother, Ash. You know that, right?” That fucking tightness was back in my throat again, including the stinging in my eyes. The gulps of whiskey I kept knocking back just making it bearable.

“Yeah,” I rasped. “You’re mine too.”

Zane nodded, and his elbows hit the table in front of us. He pushed his hands through his dark hair. “We got no parents,” he started. I worked hard not to picture my mama’s hanged body in my mind… again. “You’ve got Flame and I’ve got AK. But they got their own families. They’ve got their own shit to deal with. You’re my fucking best friend, Ash. You and Slash both were. The first real friends I ever had. The only thing close to brothers I ever had.” Zane looked me square in the eye. “Now there’s only you and me.” Zane looked at my stomach, which was full of wounds. “Don’t you get fucking killed too.” Zane glanced to the door, staring at nothing. “I won’t lose you too. Yeah?”

I swigged a mouthful of whiskey, and then gave it to Zane. He exhaled in relief, knowing it was my silent promise to him that I was going nowhere. He handed me back the bottle. “You’re staying with us? At AK and Phebe’s?”

“Looks that way,” I replied. I picked at the label on the Jack. I thought of Flame on the bed, Maddie waiting for him to wake up… then we’d all know whether he had crossed into Madness County once and for all. “He fucking broke,” I whispered, not taking my eyes off the Jack’s label, keeping my voice low enough so that no one else heard. “He fucking broke, Zane. Fell to the ground, thinking he was hanging with his dead brother and our poppa.” I shook my head. “I saw his fucking eyes. I saw that Flame was disappearing and whoever the fuck he turned into was taking over.”