Page 6 of The Madman's Nightmare
“Are you going to say anything?” I asked Bradon, and he shrugged.
“What do you want me to say?” he asked and stood from his seat. I glanced and saw Kendra watching her brother move closer to me as she stood off to the side with anger on her face. “You were honest with us from the beginning, so what can I say to change things?”
“You can tell him to go to hell,” Kendra yelled. “You can tell him he’s delusional to think that wounded little misfit could ever give him what I could.”
I saw red and turned on Kendra. Her eyes grew wide as I stormed across the room and gripped my hand into the tender flesh of her neck as I pushed her against the wall. Leaning in, I reeled my rage back as I warned, “I will not tolerate you speaking about her that way. If you say one more thing, I will choke you out.”
Feeling a hand on my shoulder, I glanced to see James behind me, giving me a warning look. He would take a lot of my bullshit, but he wouldn’t let me hurt a woman. Not without cause, and Kendra calling Elise names wasn’t cause in his book. It was in mine, but not my brother’s.
Reluctantly, I released Kendra, and she leaned over, coughing as she held onto her throat. I turned to see where Bradon was, and he was standing with his head tilted sideways as he observed me threatening his sister.
I took a step back and ran my hands through my hair. Looking at James, I shook my head and spoke to the room. “You have until tomorrow to get all your shit out of my house. Leave Portstill and do not return. This is my town, and you’re no longer welcome here.”
Turning to leave, I heard Kendra crying, “Devlin, don’t do this. Please.”
I looked at her then her brother before I warned, “Do not speak of what you know, or I’ll bury you where you fall.” Pausing, I added ominously, “And forget everything you know about Elise. She’s doesn’t exist to you.”
Without another word, I left the room as Kendra cried out my name. Walking out of the house, I inhaled deeply, needing some fresh air. I didn’t stick around to see how James handled getting them out of the house. It wasn’t my concern. That may sound crass and cold, but that was the only way I’d survived the years since my father sold me to a paranoid nutjob.
I’d been raised the second son of a man hell bent on running the largest underground society in the country. He pushed my older brother to be his second in command, and I became expendable. By selling me to Marco, my father rose in the ranks of the organization, gaining power and money.
As I traversed the streets of the Flats, I saw fear and respect from the people I passed, but it did little to quell my mind. I was worried about how Elise was getting on at school. This was the furthest I’d been away from her since I helped her out of that house of horrors, I mistakenly put her into when she was a child. When I discovered what kinds of horrible things they were doing to her, I killed her foster parents and made sure shewas with good people. Chuck and Blaire, loved her, understood her, and helped to make her whole while I remained in the shadows, keeping a close eye on her.
It was killing me to not know what she was doing, but she needed some space to spread her wings. The thought of pimple faced boys touching her, loving her, and breaking her heart was something I had to live with. She needed to become the woman she was destined to be, and she could achieve that if I was constantly monitoring her. Even if she wasn’t aware.
Because once I had myself in a position to claim her, I was going to make my move. And she would be mine forever.
The beeping of machines roused me from the dream I was in. Elise was tied to the bed as I lay between her spread legs. She was begging me for more and I was happy to oblige when I heard the noise. It drew me from the happy place I was in and back to the present. I didn’t understand what was going on as I blinked, trying to figure out where I was and what happened.
“I think he’s waking up,” I heard someone say and felt a hand touch mine.
It wasn’t Elise’s. I knew her touch anywhere and this wasn’t it. Where was I and where was Elise?
Fighting against the pull to go back to my dream, I managed to blink a few times, clearing my eyes. Looking around, I saw a worried James, my brother Lucian and our friend, Skid. My sisters Stella was holding my hand as our newly discovered sisters, Regan, and Hannah, were standing around the bed, all with worried looks on their faces.
I looked around the room and turned to James, “Where’s Elise?” He glanced at Lucian, then Skid before looking back at me. The worry on his face was clear as day and when he didn’t answer me, I asked again. “Where is my wife?”
“Devlin, what do you remember?” James asked with a guarded tone.
I tried to think and was coming up blank. Trying to remember how I ended up in this room, surrounded by family, was impossible. Gently shaking my head, I admitted, “I don’t know.”
Lucian stepped closer and I felt Stella rubbing the back of my hand where the IV was inserted as my older brother explained. “You and Elise were in the park and someone ambushed you.” He paused and lowered his eyes as he said. “Someone shot you and Elise is missing.”
“Missing?” I yelled and tried to sit up, only to fall back onto the pillow before I got to a sitting position. The room spun and I tried to stop from throwing up as I asked, “What happened?”
It was my brother James who answered, “The security guards said you and Elise went to the park for a picnic around seven and one of them heard a gunshot shortly after eight thirty. They came to investigate and found you on the ground and the only thing they found from Elise was her shoes.”
“Who . . . who took her?” I asked, feeling like my world was imploding.
I should have been able to keep her safe, but somehow, someone took her from me. She must be terrified and the thought of someone hurting her was almost too much to take. If she wasn’t okay, the boys and I wouldn’t survive. Elise was the glue that held our family together.
James turned his eyes to me and replied, “It’s time to fill everyone in, Devlin. We need all the help we can get.”
I didn’t want to tell my siblings how I had broken a young woman, causing her to splinter. How do you tell someone that you used another person for what you could get from them, and tossed them aside when they weren’t valuable to you anymore?
“I can’t,” I admitted and closed my eyes, trying to remember who took Elise so we could begin tracking them.
I listened as James filled everyone in on the threat we’d received from who we believed to be Kendra and Bradon. He explained how his sister, Aubrey, had been helping Skid look for the siblings, and how we kept coming up empty on every search. I saw disgust from my sisters and shock from Lucian.
