I enter my room in the birdcage and lay her on the bed. I’ve been dying to bring her in here to be with me. She should have been here all this time. “You’re okay, Ashtyn.” She’s shaking, her eyes wide, and I pull her into me.
I recognized the guy the moment Kash removed the mask. I had seen him before when I was watching her. Benny was one of her clients who came into Glass. She had been sleeping with him. I watched her one night meet up with him at a hotel.
It was one of the most excruciating things I had to witness. Watching my wife please other men. But I had to wait. I had a plan in place and couldn’t deviate from it. Now I wish I would have rushed in and killed him right then and there. Not given a fuck about the plan and just taken her for myself.
Her cries fill the room, and I rock her back and forth until they subside and her body relaxes in my arms.
Kashton and I are sitting in the office when the door opens, and Tyson enters with his four men. Jenks drops something on the desk.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“We took the phone that Benny had, and I crossed it with Ashtyn’s phone you gave me. I was able to make a match.”
“We knew that would happen,” Tyson says.
“Yeah, but I also found a connection to a number that she had in her phone.”
“Who?” I rub my forehead. It hasn’t even been ten hours since I found out my brother betrayed me, and my wife had been pregnant when she left me.
“Whitney.”
My head snaps up to see Haidyn now standing in the office when he answers me. I get to my feet and glare at him.
He is unfazed. “Benny said that he had a friend of Ashtyn’s drug her. When they came to grab her, they traded her with Whitney. She was the only one who could put him in Ashtyn’s house the night he raped her.” He crosses his arms over his chest. “Her mother was dead, Laura was here…”
“Why didn’t he touch Laura?” Colton asks. “He had the perfect opportunity.”
“Because Laura was always on his side from the beginning,” Haidyn answers. “If it wasn’t for her, he wouldn’t have known she was pregnant. She was his inside contact.”
A part of me wonders if that’s why Laura tried so hard to get my father to get rid of Ashtyn. She knew all along that she was raped and that I cheated at the ritual. She kept my secret because she knew I kept hers. I wasn’t aware that her mother had anything to do with it, though. Benny said her mother planned it, but on the video, the masked man—being Benny—had called Laura and said it was done. It was her voice I heard on the other side of the phone.
I couldn’t touch her, though. That’s why when Sin came to me and we realized who we had inside of Carnage, I knew I’d give Sin whatever he fucking wanted in exchange for Laura. Even if that meant I had to take him in and torture him first. I’d kill a million Lords if it meant saving my wife. I was betting everything that Elli’s father would bring her mother in. He spent too much time here to not want revenge.
Just then the door opens, and Adam enters. He’s another one on my shit list. They are both tied at the top.
Kashton gets up and walks over to him, giving him a handshake hug. “Does this mean you’re back?” Kash asks.
He shakes his head. “No. I don’t belong here.” Looking over the office, he turns to Haidyn, and they hug. “But I’ll keep in touch.” He looks at me, and I stay where I’m at.
If you ask me, he abandoned Ashtyn when she needed him the most. And to stay gone all this time. Why? What was the point of coming back now? How long has Haidyn been in touch with him? Did they have this all set up? So many questions that I refuse to ask because I’ll look like I care, and I no longer do. I wrote him off a long time ago.
“How many did you collect?” Haidyn asks him.
“We’ve got eight loaded and ready to move,” he answers.
Adam’s referring to the prisoners we had here at Carnage. After Ashtyn fell asleep in my arms in our bed, I got back to work. I couldn’t have her here unless I knew it was safe. We had moved everyone to the morgue and needed to get some back to the hospital. The buildings needed to be checked and cleared.
There were no more bombs. Just the one that went off. Benny had planted it when he had brought Ashtyn and Haidyn back here and killed Whitney. It was in the cell she had been occupying and just happened to kill one of the guys who brought Ashtyn back when Benny let her go. When Benny was here with Ashtyn, he had went to see Luke and filled him with shit knowing I’d go to him asking questions. He wanted Luke to throw me off and send me on a wild goose chase. There never were four bombs.
We did, however, keep the other two guys who brought my wife back. They will spend the rest of their lives here until I get tired of looking at them and put them out of their misery.
“Did he tell you anything?” Tyson asks Adam, referring to Benny.
Adam didn’t ask if he could take him. I think he knows I wouldn’t let him go. He deserves to be here, naked and chained to a wall with conjugal visits from others. The man likes to fuck, so I’ll give him what he wants.
“No.” He shakes his head. “I’d give him a few more days before he decides he wants to talk.”
ASHTYN
I stand out on Saint’s balcony overlooking the courtyard. I woke up an hour ago by myself in a room I’ve never been in before. I knew it was Saint’s immediately, but I was alone. I’ve stayed in here knowing that he’ll be back and we’ll have a lot to discuss. I’m not sure I’m ready to go over the last four years of our lives, but it’s time to lay it all out.
The wedding ring on my finger is a constant reminder that I messed up. I vowed to be his, but didn’t trust him to protect me. I doubted him. And I shouldn’t have.
The sound of his bedroom door opening has me turning around, and my heart races at the sight of my brother. Four years doesn’t seem all that long ago but somehow seems like forever at the same time.
“Hey,” he speaks, entering the room and letting the door shut behind him.
I step off the balcony and into the room. “Hey,” I say softly.
Looking around the room, he runs his hand through his hair nervously. “Ashtyn, I’m sorry—”
“It’s fine.” I interrupt him. We all fucked up.
“No. it’s not.” He walks over to me, and I look up at him. “I was going to come back for you. Please believe me.”
I nod, biting my bottom lip.
“I…I was too late.” He looks over my head and sighs. “Then Haidyn—” He stops himself from finishing that sentence. “I found out you escaped here.” Reaching out, he takes my hands in his, and it feels off. We were never close, and I have a feeling that’s not going to change. This is a goodbye speech. That I’m sure of. “Just know, I’ve known where you’ve been. And I wish I could have changed the outcome.”
I pull my hands from him, stepping back, and he nods to himself, understanding that this is where I belong. I know that now. It took me four years of making stupid choices I won’t make again to realize that. The world is a crazy place and so is Carnage. But I’d rather be here with the Spade brothers than out in the world with strangers.
Silence falls over the room, and after a second, he turns and exits the bedroom, leaving the door open. I walk over to close it but pause as my eyes catch Haidyn’s. I go over to it and knock.
Seconds later, it opens, and he stands there. His blue eyes hard and sharp jaw clenched. He’s got his nose ring in and has his black leather riding jacket on but unzipped. “What do you want, Ash?” he asks, giving me his back and walking over to his bed.
I enter and walk over to his bed sitting on the side. “Going for a ride?”
“Something like that.” He zips up a backpack.
“Why did you have to pretend to die?” I ask.
“They wanted me dead, so I had to give them that,” he says simply. “The only way was to let them think they had the Spade brothers outnumbered. One down and two to go was pretty good odds for them.”
I nod in understanding. A silence lingers, and I feel the lump in my throat, my emotions still all over the place. That fear of losing him was terrifying. Then Saint hitting him so soon after his surgery. They’re fighting. But I know it’ll be temporary. They’re brothers, and that’s what brothers do. “Haidyn—”
“I don’t regret it,” he says, interrupting me, and I swallow nervously. Walking over to me, he cups my face in his warm hands. “I stand by what I said, Ash. You deserved better, and I’m sorry I couldn’t help you.”
“You did,” I whisper. He helped me more than he could ever know. Leaving Carnage was hard, but losing the baby was harder. I wanted a chance to be better than my mother, than my life. But it just wasn’t meant to be.
“Are you leaving?” I ask, my stinging eyes searching his. “Please, Haidyn…don’t.” My voice cracks, begging him to stay when he doesn’t answer.
He gives me a sad smile and leans down, his lips gently giving me a forehead kiss. Pulling back, he whispers. “Be good, baby girl.” With that, he grabs his backpack, throws it over his shoulder, and exits his room.
I sit on the edge of his bed, staring at the wall, my chest tight and heart heavy. How did everything fall apart so fast? Things had just started to feel normal, and now it’s all fucked again.
Getting up, I walk over to his balcony, opening the doors. I hear his bike before I see him ride out of the garage and out of the gates. The black crotch rocket stops, and his helmet moves, and I feel his eyes on mine. My hands curl around the railing as he revs his engine and takes off, disappearing into the night. And I hate that last time I was here, I was the one to leave and now he’s leaving me.
Why did it have to be like this? I love my husband, but that doesn’t mean I don’t care about his brothers. That they don’t mean something to me too.
I blink the tears from my eyes and turn around to leave but come to a stop when I see Saint standing in Haidyn’s room. His eyes search mine, and I blink fresh tears that blur my vision. “He left,” I say, my throat tightening. “It’s my fault.”
“No, it’s not, Ash.” He steps out onto the balcony with me. “Nothing that happened was your fault.”
“Why did you let him leave?” I ask, my bottom lip trembling.
“He’ll be back,” he assures me, pushing hair behind my ear.
“How do you know that?” I ask. This was my fear years ago. That our fathers would use me to push them apart. They’re dead, and it still happened but only it was me that did it.
Saint smiles at me. “Because Carnage is his home,” he answers. Taking my hand, he pulls me from the balcony and out into the hallway. He closes Haidyn’s door, and I can’t help but look over my shoulder at it as Saint pulls me into his.
I let him pull me into the bathroom, and he turns to face me. The air feels thicker in here, harder to breathe.
“Did Haidyn hurt you?” he asks, checking my wrists.
I don’t miss the fact that he didn’t ask about Benny hurting me while I was gone for four days. That’s because he knows what happened while I was away. “No,” I growl. “I offered to help him.” I don’t want him mad at Haidyn. “You know…” I lick my lips. “He was helping you too,” I say, referring to Haidyn helping me get away.
“Ashtyn,” he sighs, not wanting to have the conversation.
“Laura told me that you cheated when you made me bleed. How did you do that?”
He lets out a long breath. “The morning of, I cut myself and bled into a capsule. When I had you bent over the altar at the vow ceremony, I put the capsule inside of you and broke it.”
My wide eyes are on his, and I wait for him to give me the punch line. “Saint…how could you do that? Why would you do that? Take that chance? You could have been stripped of your title. Or worse, sentenced to Carnage…”
He chuckles darkly as if what I said was a joke. “I was willing to take that risk to make sure you remained mine. I wasn’t going to let you go.”
“She could have turned you in.” My mother may have set it up, but Laura knew about it as well. They were both in on it.
Shaking his head, he adds, “She would have had to explain how she knew. She was too involved.”
“Why are you so mad at Haidyn, but not me?” I ask, trying to figure it all out. “I shot you,” I remind him as if he could ever forget.
“I expected more from Haidyn,” he answers. “He knew I could have handled it…fixed it somehow. Instead, he gave you an out.”
“He gave me a chance,” I whisper.
Reaching out, he places his hand on my flat stomach, and my chest tightens. His eyes meet mine, and I see the questions in his green eyes. What happened to the baby? But he doesn’t ask. Instead, he says, “You know I would have raised him as mine, right?”
My eyes begin to sting, and my bottom lip trembles.
He cups my face, and I sniff. “It would have changed nothing, sweetheart,” he whispers. “I loved you then. I love you now. You’ve always been it for me, Ashtyn.”
My eyes close, and the first tear falls. I feel his lips on mine tenderly kissing me. “Come on, let’s get you cleaned off and go to bed.”
His hands fall to the hem of the scrubs I wear, and I lift my one good arm. My silent request for him to undress me. I spent four days with a man who whipped and raped me. Right now, I need a man who loves me. And I know Saint is that.
He lifts it up over my head, being extra careful with my shoulder before tossing it to the side and lowering my bottoms. He helps me step out of them. I stand naked in front of him, and he runs his tatted knuckles down my heaving chest. His thumb slowly and softly follows the welts and cuts from Benny’s belt.
Looking down, I see whore written on my skin, and my breath comes quicker. Saint places his fingers under my chin, forcing my head up. “Eyes on me, sweetheart.” He tries to distract me. “How’s your shoulder?”
“Fine.” It hurts since the pain pills have long worn off, but it’s bearable. I’m tired of feeling foggy.
He turns and opens the glass door to the shower and turns it on. Then he offers me his hand to help me in. I wait under the warm sprayer as he gets undressed to join me.
