I roared, remembering her laying limp in my arms. Her eyes were closed, her body wasn’t moving. She wasn’t breathing. She wasn’t looking at me. She wasn’t smiling at me or holding my hand. She was dead. My Maddie… she was dead. Someone had taken her from me. Someone had fucking touched me. My eyes blurred as I thought of Maddie. Agony twisted inside of me. Maddie was dead. She was gone… My Maddie was gone.
“Flame.” I heard someone call my name. But I couldn’t sit still. I couldn’t focus. Maddie was dead. Maddie… Maddie… Maddie was gone… “Flame! Brother. Focus.” I blinked away the water from my eyes. My body had turned numb. I couldn’t feel a fucking thing. I looked down at my hands. They were red and blistered. And they were empty. Maddie was no longer in them.
She had gone. My Maddie… she had gone, left me… I’d killed her too… the evil in my veins had killed her too. I choked on something clogging my throat. The baby... I had killed our baby. Maddie loved it so much.
I felt my body shutting down. I felt my muscles weakening and my bones starting to ache. “Flame. Keep it together. I need to speak to you.” But the voice didn’t get through to my brain. Instead, I let my body start to die too. I wouldn’t live without Maddie. She would get heaven. I would get hell. I didn’t care, I didn’t care if I burned for eternity…
“Flame. She’s alive.” I rocked back and forth, seeing her pale face in my head, her eyes that were closed as I’d held her. Her arms had fallen to her side when I tried to wake her up. “Fuck!” the voice said. Then someone touched me. “Vike! Don’t—”
The minute I felt a hand on my shoulder, an inferno blazed in my gut and I turned and gripped whoever it was by the throat. No one could fucking touch me. I killed everyone who ever tried. I was evil. Devil-created. Demons ran in my blood. I couldn’t fucking be touched!
“Flame! Let him go. Fucking focus and let him the fuck go!” A hand ripped mine from the throat I was holding. AK and Viking were in the driver’s and passenger seats of a truck. I was in the back of the cabin. I breathed heavily, trying to calm down, but the flames held me captive. Anger. All I was in that moment was anger. Maddie had gone and I just didn’t fucking care. Then I remembered them taking her from me. Of an arm wrapping around my throat and pulling me from her.
They took her away. They fucking took her away!
I’m sorry, brother, a voice had said as I fought to keep consciousness. I don’t wanna touch you, but they need to fucking help her. We have to let them save her and your kid.
The rage that surged through my veins made me jump forward and wrap my hands around Viking’s throat again. “You fucking took her from me. You touched me and let them fucking take her.” Viking didn’t fight back. He didn’t fucking fight. I wanted him to fight. I pressed my hands tighter around his throat and squeezed. His eyes turned red, but he didn’t fucking fight back. He’d let them take Maddie from me. He’d let them take her away.
“Flame! Let him go!” AK pulled the truck to a stop. He moved his face in front of mine.
“She’s dead!” I roared. “He touched me, and they took her from me. They took her away. She wasn’t allowed to leave me. She wasn’t allowed to fucking die!”
“She didn’t,” AK said. “She isn’t dead.” He was lying. I knew he was lying. I saw her dead in my arms. Both of them were dead. “They’re in hospital.” I kept on squeezing Vike’s throat. “We are at the hospital, brother. We’ve brought you to her. To them both.” My hands slackened with shock on Viking’s neck. He gasped for breath, but he didn’t push me off. He didn’t touch me. His hands were held up at either side of his head.
“You’re lying,” I hissed, flicking my eyes to AK. I didn’t want to believe Maddie was alive if she wasn’t. But he wouldn’t do that to me. Not AK.
“I’ve never lied to you, brother. I wouldn’t ever lie to you about Madds. You know it.” He leaned forward. My hands were trying to tighten on Viking’s neck again. The flames in my blood calling for someone’s death. For me to kill my brother. He had taken my Maddie away. They called for me to kill him in punishment. “I promise you, Flame. She’s fucking alive. And she’s up in that hospital in a bed waiting for you.”
My heart started beating faster. Faster and faster with the words that AK was saying. The flames told me he was lying. But in my head, I saw Maddie’s eyes open. I saw her smile and a choking noise fell from my mouth. My hands slipped off Viking’s neck. I stared at AK. “She’s alive. Brother. I swear to you, she’s alive.”
I fought against the urge to kill. I needed to feel pain. My blood sang for someone’s pain. I needed to calm the flames. Maddie calmed the flames, but she wasn’t here. She was in hospital. She was away from me.
I saw a knife on AK’s seat beside Viking. Stealing it, I quickly sliced the tip down my arm. In seconds, the flames escaped, and I could breathe. I could fucking breathe. I felt my blood run down my arm and drop to my thighs. My body cooled, not by much, but enough to look at Vike and AK. “You’re not lying?” I asked through gritted teeth. I looked down at the blade in my hand. It felt good there. I hadn’t cut my skin for so long. I liked it. I needed it. I fucking craved it.
“Brother, I promise. She’s up there,” AK said, pointing to the hospital. “She’s waiting for you.”
“I touched you, brother. I choked you out so she could be saved. Rider had to sedate you.” Viking sat up straighter in his seat. I stared down at the blood painting my skin. It was red. Like normal blood. But I knew there were flames hidden inside. “I had no other choice. You fucking need her. I had to let them save her, and I’d do it again if it had to.”
I breathed through my nose trying like fuck to keep from slitting his throat. It would be so easy. One swipe over his skin. “I need to see her. I need to fucking see her.” Don’t hurt him. Don’t hurt him, I told myself. He’s your best friend. I studied my bloodied skin. It was blackened with smoke. Smoke from the flames in the clubhouse. I hissed when I remembered Maddie on the floor of the clubhouse, flames all around her. I needed to see her. Everything would be better if I saw her. If she smiled.
“Listen,” AK said. My legs wouldn’t keep still. I needed to get in that fucking hospital, needed out of the truck and get to my wife. “Her sisters are with her. She’s not alone. They all had to come here too to be checked out for smoke inhalation. Phebe’s inside too, waiting for me. It was only Madds who was hurt badly enough that she needs to stay.” It was me. It was happening. I was finally killing her too. I’d known it would come eventually. Poppa and Pastor Hughes had told me I would hurt everyone. Maddie… the baby… my mama… Isaiah… “She’s stable.” AK said, but I could barely hear him over my Poppa’s voice. You’re a born sinner, boy. You’ll damn everyone you love. “Flame!” I lifted my head to listen to AK. “The baby is alive. Your kid is okay. They are monitoring them both.” My hands slipped into my hair. I held back a roar. The baby wasn’t dead. Maddie wasn’t dead. “Maddie hasn’t woken up yet. They’re keeping her under sedation while they treat her.”