Page 140 of Kade

I got there first, finding the door locked.

I didn’t have time to consider what I’d find on the other side. I reared back to kick the door down, but by that time, the others caught up. They saw what I was doing and all of them joined. I don’t know if they all hit the door, but it worked.

The door landed, and I had the equivalent of a heart attack. An intense pressure pushed down on me, making me fold under the weight of it. My knees buckled before I readied myself, forcing myself to take in what every parent’s nightmare is.

My child was standing in the middle of a giant pool of blood.

“Sabrina!” Steele’s voice was wrangled, hoarse, as he slid to where her body was crumpled in the pool. A letter opener had fallen to the side.

The blood was hers.

I blinked a few times, to make sure I was seeing that correctly.

Rushing to Maddy, I ran my eyes over her before padding her for any injuries. There was a haze in her eyes. She was here, but not totally here. I didn’t know what that meant.

“Yeah. There’s—uh, I don’t know what happened. There’s blood. A lot of blood. We need an ambulance.”

Beltraine was on the phone, running a shaking hand through his hair. He looked like he’d lost the blood. Axel too. Steele, I couldn’t see his face. He was holding onto his sister, his head bent over. He found the source of the blood, on the far right middle side of his sister’s stomach.

I leaned in closer, cursing under my breath. Let’s hope no organs were punctured.

I cupped Maddy’s face and rested my forehead to hers. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” She spoke calmly, no infraction. No tremor. “She tried to hurt herself when I came in. I tried to get out, but she locked the door. Then she was saying something about a life taken. An eye for an eye. Something like that. I’m not sure what it meant.”

My daughter was lying to me. Lying through her fucking teeth.

“What’s your address?” Beltraine shoved his phone in my hand.

I took it, reciting it quickly to the 911 operator. I handed it back and said to Axel, who stood back, taking everything in. Everyone was rattled. That amount of blood was bad, so fucking bad. “Axe—you’ll need to open the gate for them.”

He jerked his head in a nod and ran out.

“The first gate,” Steele choked out, lifting his head.

I reeled from the expression on his face. It wasn’t too far off from the same look Sam had an hour ago. The similarities were a punch to my gut. And he was a kid. No kid should have that stricken and anguished look on their face. No kid.

I cursed, reaching for my phone.

It was then when a new voice spoke up from behind us, “What the fuck?”

I spun, fucking glad to hear that voice because my brother was here. Logan stood in the doorway, stunned at what he was seeing. Then he switched, raking over Maddy quickly before moving onto me and he held.

I grimaced. “Shit’s gone down since we last talked.”

“I’m seeing that,” he said faintly, then zeroed in better on where Steele was holding his sister, who was now unconscious. That wasn’t good. “What happened?”

“She hurt herself.”

I waited a beat, then said over my daughter’s words, “Knife wound to the stomach. Call Taylor.”

Logan’s eyes pinned on us both, lingering, before he took in the bloodied letter opener on the ground. On the other side of Brinna. “Uh. Okay. That wound needs to be stopped now or she’ll bleed out before they get here.” He had his phone out and was talking into it within a flash. “Taylor, how do I cauterize a knife wound?”

Steele froze in place, riveted by Logan. He tracked his every movement.

Beltraine was on the phone and ran out of the room.

Shit. The front gate.

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