My Maddie (Hades Hangmen #8) - Tillie Cole Page 0,74

a mouthful of whiskey, and then gave it to Zane. He exhaled in relief, knowing it was my silent promise to him that I was going nowhere. He handed me back the bottle. “You’re staying with us? At AK and Phebe’s?”

“Looks that way,” I replied. I picked at the label on the Jack. I thought of Flame on the bed, Maddie waiting for him to wake up… then we’d all know whether he had crossed into Madness County once and for all. “He fucking broke,” I whispered, not taking my eyes off the Jack’s label, keeping my voice low enough so that no one else heard. “He fucking broke, Zane. Fell to the ground, thinking he was hanging with his dead brother and our poppa.” I shook my head. “I saw his fucking eyes. I saw that Flame was disappearing and whoever the fuck he turned into was taking over.”

It was several minutes before Zane spoke. “I’ve heard some about last time. About when Maddie managed to save him when he broke down before.” I had too. I’d never seen Flame break before. They’d found me when he’d been better. I’d heard rumors about it. Of course, Flame never spoke about it and I never asked Maddie. I thought It was in the past. I couldn’t have been more wrong. “He’d asked AK to kill him. His head had become so bad he’d asked Uncle AK to kill him. And he was going to, AK had promised Flame years before that if he ever broke, fully mentally broke…” Zane trailed off. I knew why. This could be that time. This could be the time Flame had gone to a place in his mind that he couldn’t return from.

This might be the time I lose my brother.

The room began to spin faster, the more whiskey I drank. Zane got a bottle too. I handed him a smoke. Took another bottle of Jack for me. “Saff has been having panic attacks,” Zane confessed about an hour. Every part of me froze.

“Why?”

“School,” he replied. I must have frowned. After that first day, she’d barely been there. Kept calling in sick, calling AK to come and get her after only a couple of periods. She fucking hid in the bleachers, skipping classes, Zane finding her curled up on the ground, crying. Shit. She’d been there less than me and that was saying something. “She ain’t ready yet,” he explained. “Being out in the world, being away from home… it’s fucking her up. I hear her sometimes. I hear her break in the middle of the night. She screams. She fucking can’t breathe. Phebe has to calm her down. She has to restrain her.” Zane drank more whiskey. I knew he spoke to Saffie at their cabin. They were like brother and sister. I knew he was protective of her.

“Then why the fuck is she still enrolled in school?” I asked. I hadn’t been there for her like I’d promised. I hadn’t been there to protect her. I was dropping out. I was never fucking going back.

Zane kept his head down, until he looked up at me and met my eyes. I felt my stomach fucking plummet. I knew, of course. Or I’d guessed it was because of me. Zane didn’t have to say fuck all about it. He knew that, deep down, I’d known. “She doesn’t trust anyone. Go near anyone. Talks to hardly anyone…”

But me.

My heart fucking raced. I had to push the image of her panicking from my mind, of her being fucking restrained by Phebe for her own safety. I just couldn’t see that shit right now. I couldn’t deal with any of this shit. Why was everyone so fucked up? Why had everything gone to shit?

Clearing my throat, I said, “Well she ain’t got to worry about it anymore. I’m not going back.” I felt Zane’s eyes boring into me. I turned to him. “I’m gonna apprentice with Tank, at the bike shop. He already agreed.” I was so fucking over school. What was the point of even going? Surrounded by a bunch of rich pricks, who knew nothing of living a hard fucking life. A bunch of cunts, who judged us on belonging to Hades. They could all eat shit. I didn’t even have enough credits to graduate at this point and I wasn’t repeating the year. Not a fucking chance. “She’ll be better at home. Tell her she never has to go back. I’m fucking out.” Before Zane