Page 94 of Where Angels Fall

What if it was her?

Something cold and nauseating settles into my gut, heavy as lead. Did my mum love him? The way she couldn’t ever love me?

Did she choose him too?

It should destroy me, should split me down the middle. But it doesn’t, because none of that matters now. Not really. Not when my angel is there, ropes cutting into her skin, her mouth bloodied, her eyes still fighting to stay open.

Only one thing matters.

She lifts her head again. Even through the pain, even through the fear, she finds the strength to hold herself upright. Blood glistens on her lips. Exhaustion clings to her like a second skin.

Her next words ruin me.

She loves me.

Not whispered in some soft, safe moment where it costs her nothing. Not murmured against my throat in the dark, not hidden behind a glance or touch. She says it out loud, to the camera. To my enemy. To me.

She says it knowing exactly what it might cost her.

She loves me. She loves me.

My knees buckle and the screen blurs. A sound I don’t recognise tears out of me.

She loves me.

And I wasn’t there.

Zeke moves; the camera shakes slightly as he closes the distance. His fist connects with her face with a sickening crack, and I watch the lights go out of her pretty, tired eyes.

The men in the room shift, waiting for the command, the reaction, the eruption. They’ve seen me violent. They’ve seen me ruthless.

I straighten slowly, my jaw locks.

I know what I need to do.

Chapter 31

Maddison

Arough groan passes through my lips. My head feels like it weighs a ton, hanging forward against the strain of the ropes around my neck. When my eyes finally peel open, part of my vision is skewed from my swollen eye.

The first thing I see is red.

My own blood soaking my leg and dripping onto the floor. It looks like too much blood. Dizziness and an aching throb war inside of me. Something isn’t right.

Lots of things aren’t right, right now.

A sob hitches in my chest when my eyes zero in on the man in front of me, still wearing the same impeccable suit. How can it still be so clean? After the blood he spilled on me and being in this disgusting room, he shouldn’t look the way he does right now. Maybe all of his rot is buried inside him.

“Good morning, darling,” he croons, glancing at me before going back to his phone. “Or good evening, who knows down here.”

Down here?

My vision comes in and out of focus as the ringtone of a phone infiltrates my mind. When I glance back at Kai, my heart breaks. He looks just as defeated as I do. His eyes are weary and narrowed on the man in front of us. His skin is pale, and the bags under his eyes show he has not slept since we arrived, if that was even possible while being strung up like a dog.

His eyes slide across to mine, and they soften just a fraction. Blink and you’d miss it. But when the call connects, we both turn towards Zeke.

Because I know the man who’s on the other end of the call, his voice fracturing my already broken heart.