Hush (Black Lotus #3)(2)

But there he stands, alive, with his dark hair tucked under his black beanie, and his hands shoved into his pants pockets with his inked arms showing. His eyes send love and strength before he nods his head over to Declan, and I follow his cue, knowing I’ll lose him when I do.

My throat swells in torment, painfully blistering as I sit here on my knees. It’s every dream come true; I just never knew the dream lived within an unimaginable nightmare. No matter all the anger I feel right now, one thing still remains: you can cut me deeply with lies, you can throw me into the flames of life’s evils, but I will never give up on what I’ve always yearned for.

With tears falling down my face in a steady stream of anguish, I painfully choke out the heartbreak of the little girl lost inside of me. “I want my dad.”

In two quick steps, Declan is on the floor with me, holding me, rocking me, soothing me, and vowing to do everything he can to find him.

Clinging to him, I take all the comfort he’s giving and attempt to steal more, gripping him tighter and pressing my fingers deeper into his skin. If I’m hurting him, he doesn’t show it, so I close my eyes and crawl onto his lap just as a child would.

When I open my eyes again, they sting against the fully risen sun, and my cheeks burn with the bite of salt. I’m still wrapped within Declan’s arms, and my body aches not only from being in this position for God knows how long, but also from the torture of the past couple days of being held captive.

“I hurt.”

Declan stands and scoops me off the floor before laying me on the bed. He hovers above me, looking over my battered face and body with eyes filled with rage and pity.

His expression irks me. “Don’t.”

“What?”

“Look at me like that. Like you feel sorry for me.”

“I’m worried about you. That’s all.” He then hands me a painkiller that I slip into my mouth.

“I don’t understand. I don’t understand any of this.”

“I don’t either. But you’ve been through a lot lately, so I don’t think your mind is capable of clarity. Mine isn’t either. So let’s focus on one thing at a time, okay?”

“All I can focus on is why my dad’s face is on that screen when it shouldn’t be. I don’t know if I should be happy or angry,” I tell him. “Why didn’t he want me?”

Declan doesn’t respond as he pulls me against him. I try to fight the haze from the pills that creeps in, but my eyes grow heavy when Declan whispers softly into my ear, lulling me with a comforting, “Shh, darling. I’ll take care of you. I’ll do what I can to find the answers.”

And as I hang on to his words, I give in, releasing a breath before drifting to sleep.





Elizabeth trembles in her sleep as I hold her. My mind is a goddamn labyrinth as I close my eyes and attempt to process the past forty-eight hours. It’s an impossible task as visions race with a hundred new revelations and a thousand new questions. The only thing I do know is that I’m terrified I won’t be able to keep Elizabeth from having a full-on mental collapse.

Her face is a canvas of bruises, welts, and lacerations that illustrate the rape and torture she’s been through. It pains me to know that I play a part, that some of those wounds were put there by my own hands and the others were put there because I couldn’t protect her from that *—Richard—the man I murdered.

I didn’t even hesitate when I put a bullet in his head after Elizabeth told me he killed my mum. The fact that I could kill so easily scares the shit out of me. It’s a grim feeling to be terrified of your own self. I now know I’m capable of anything. I’m a monster created by this woman, whose body is wrapped around mine.

I want an explanation, just as she. Who was Richard? How did he know my mum? Why did he kill her? What part does my father play in all of this? I want to know. I want to understand, but as out of control as I am, she is more volatile than I. She needs strength, so I have to set aside all that haunts me right now and focus on her.

When her breaths even out, I slip out of bed and allow her the rest her body desperately craves. I stop before I walk out of the room and look at Elizabeth lying in my bed as a swell of contentment and anger rushes in a tidal wave under my skin. She’s knocked my control off its axis, and I need to steady it back into place to keep her safe—to make sure nothing else happens without my say-so.





“CHRIST,” LACHLAN SAYS with a startle when I slam the double doors to the library, closing us off from the rest of the house.

With my back facing him, my hands grip tightly around the door handles in a lame attempt to control my turmoil. There’s rioting in my bones, rattling me into a cold sweat. Pulling back to open the doors slightly, I slam them once more, grunting, hammering my palm into the aged mahogany.

“What can I do?” Lachlan questions from across the room.

A string of answers fills my head and wraps around my neck in a tightening noose. I can’t talk as I think about Elizabeth upstairs in a drug-induced sleep. Visions from when I found her last night flash behind my eyes in vivid detail. Her naked and bloodied body, the bruising and lacerations between her legs from what that dickf*ck did to her, it brings up sour bile that I fight to swallow back.

All I wanted to give her when she woke this morning was as much peace as I could, but instead, I watched her world erupt into even more chaos. Chaos she doesn’t need. Chaos I’m worried she’s not stable enough to handle.