Heart Recaptured (Hades Hangmen #2)(96)
AK met my eyes over her head, and I nodded, telling him not to kill her. Christ! I was becoming a * of late.
AK flicked off the safety of his 9mm and put his mouth to Phebe’s ear. “Listen, bitch, we’re gonna tie you up so you can’t go running back to Prophet Dumb-f*ck and tell him we were here. Yeah, you getting that through your f*cked-up little brain?”
Phebe’s eyes closed, and I could see her hands shaking, but she nodded. “Just… just please get her away and safe. Next time, the elders will not fail to kill her, truly.”
AK, casting a confused glance to me, marched the bitch toward a tree set off to the side of the pyre, halting when the bitch dug her heels in the dirt and politely asked, “Can I say good-bye to her?”
I jerked my chin at AK. He wrenched the redhead toward me, and I saw the tears falling down her pale cheeks. Slowly reaching out, she ran the back of her hand gently over Lilah’s face and said, “Her life has not been easy. I used to pray she had been taken to a better place, but we were always told stories of the Cursed and their schoolings. And when I saw her again, I knew her life had been one of misery and pain.” The bitch welled up with tears and hushed out, “Be at peace, my Rebekah. Be happy. We shall meet again someday, whether in this life or the next.”
As she dropped her hand, I said, “What did you call her?”
Phebe glanced back up at me and nervously said, “R-Rebekah. Her birth name was Rebekah. But they took her from me, from our home, as a young child and they renamed her Delilah, a temptress’s name, a name fit for a Cursed Woman of Eve.” The bitch’s eyes fell on Li and she said, “They said she was evil. They killed her mother by fire for joining with Satan and producing a child of sin with Hades himself. They gave her to the prophet to be schooled and saved… but even then, she was always my little Rebekah.
“I never saw her after that day until she was brought back here. And I could never bring myself to hate her as everyone else did. Although she was shunned and renounced by my mothers and father, I prayed for her to come back.” Phebe’s wary eyes met mine. “Even though you are a breathing demon, you seem to care for her, and maybe that is where she belongs, with the people of darkness… for she is sinful too. I ask you to give her true love. My Rebekah deserves to be loved.”
My eyes dropped to my beautifully broken woman, and I whispered, “Rebekah…” Her eyes fluttered at that name and a moan passed through her lips. The name suited her—blond-haired and blue-eyed Rebekah.
“We gotta go,” Smiler said from behind. “Like f*ckin’ yesterday. Next patrol is in thirty minutes, and I don’t know about you, but I don’t wanna take on an army of a f*ckin’ thousand jihadist cult guards when there’s only six of us Hangmen!”
As we set off at a run, the redhead’s gaze never left her sister clutched in my arms as AK hauled her away and attached her to a tree. I had a consuming need to get my woman back safe to the compound. I saw AK staring down at the redheaded bitch, and I knew he didn’t wanna leave her.
But there was no time for sympathies and good conscience in this outlaw life, sister or not. For all we knew, she could be lying, trying to fool us into thinking she cared… fooling Lilah too.
Lilah was my woman and everyone else could f*ck off. As a unit, a f*ckin’ brotherhood, we took off for the fence and never once looked back.
Seventy minutes later, we entered the gates of the compound and, holding Lilah’s limp body to my chest, I ran straight for my room. Smiler immediately went for the medical bag, just as Mae, clutching Maddie, Beauty, and Letti came barreling down the hallway. My mind worked enough to see that Maddie had actually f*ckin’ left the apartment.
Taking one look at my old lady, Mae and Maddie dropped to their knees, pained cries pouring from their mouths.
Laying Lilah on my bed, I felt relief that my bitch was back in my arms, my bed, but I knew when she woke, it weren’t gonna be good… Nothing about any of this messed-up witch torture shit was good.
This whole thing was a clusterf*ck…
A goddamn f*ckin’ clusterf*ck…
Chapter Twenty-One
Lilah
“Smiler said she’ll be good. Just gonna take time. Been patched up, fever’s broke.”
“And what of the men that did this to her? What of the men responsible?”
“We got two of ‘em, sent ‘em to Hades. Her f*ckin’ father was one of them, Mae.”
“And… and the prophet?”
“Nowhere in sight. She was on some witch trial stake, out on a hill in the middle of nowhere.”
“I cannot believe he would allow this to be done to her… the lashes of Christ, the crucifix burn—”
“Being f*ckin’ raped! Multiple raped!”
“Please… do not say it… I cannot bear it…”
“Yeah, well, that cunt ain’t the person you knew. He’s a deluded prick with a God complex that’s gonna die… real f*ckin’ soon.”
My throat was tight and dry, and I ached everywhere. Talking around me filtered in and out of my consciousness, but I could not make sense of what was being said.
Where am I?
My back felt as though it were on fire, my stomach too tight to move. Panic began building my chest, my heart thundering, my breathing coming in short, sharp pants.