Crux Untamed (Hades Hangmen 6)

Hush collapsed on top of me. “Fuck,” he whispered, his tongue tracking the side of my neck. I sank into my mattress, my eyes opening to stare at the dark ceiling. The moon filtered in through the window. The stars were a mass of diamonds in the blackened sky. Out here at my ranch, you’d always see the stars in full effect. No light pollution hiding what should be shining in the sky for all to see.

I lazily ran my hands over both Hush’s and Cowboy’s backs. Cowboy was the first to lift his head and kiss me. He explored my mouth before pulling his head back, only for Hush to take his place. My chest filled with so much happiness . . . so much contentedness that I was scared I wouldn’t be able to contain it all.

When I knew I liked them both, my biggest fear had been that I’d be drawn to one more than the other. Was my heart designed to allow only one in? But as I lay there, kissing both these men who’d so captured my soul, I realized that a heart is infinite. Love can expand and expand. My heart could hold as much as I was willing to let in.

Hush sighed and inched back. His blue eyes found mine. “Are you okay?” he croaked. I kept my legs wrapped tightly around him, not quite ready to let him go—let either of them go.

“Yes,” I replied and became boneless as he smiled that stunning smile again. I traced his stretched lips with my finger. “This is my favorite,” I said. Hush cocked his head to the side. “Your smile.” I ran my finger up to the side of his eyes. “That and your eyes. So pale, they look like ice.” I looked at Cowboy, whose head was perched on my shoulder. “And yours. Almost turquoise.” I shook my head. “Three sets of blue eyes, all different. All who have walked different paths . . .” My heart beat so fast at how we were all here together. “All who have seen the full spectrum of life—the good, the bad, and the ugly.”

Hush pressed his forehead to mine. Cowboy pressed his against my shoulder. We lay like that for many minutes, until Hush rolled off me. I stayed on my back, almost breaking down when two arms slid over my waist from left and right.

I breathed in the mix of scents. And I waited . . . I waited for the regret to kick in. For the accusation that I’d just slept with two men to fill me with dread and shame. But no matter how much I expected it, searched the depths of my heart for it, I couldn’t find any.

“I feel it,” I said, shattering the silence that had drifted over us all.

“What, cher?” Cowboy inquired.

I sighed. “Peace . . . I think.” Hush stilled beside me. When I looked at him, his eyes were fixed on me. I gave a watery smile. “I’ve never felt this . . . peaceful.” I shook my head. “There’s no other word I can use to describe it. Peace. I don’t believe, even as a child, I ever had this.”

“What does it feel like?” I tensed when Hush spoke after several quiet moments of reflection. His deep voice was racked with pain, the hoarse timbre causing my soul to cry out for the agony he was in.

I looked him in the eyes and wondered, for the millionth time, what haunted him so much. What it was that caused the marks on his skin. What earned him his road name. And what he couldn’t let go of to allow him to be happy.

I knew my eyes were glistening. My vision blurred enough to tell me that. I reached down and held both of my guys’ hands. Cowboy ran his thumb over the back of my hand. Hush was clutching onto me for dear life. Such a contrast, I thought. “Happy.” I knew it wasn’t the most profound thing that had ever come out of my mouth. But there was no other word. “Happy,” I repeated and, gazing at the ceiling, I brought Hush’s hand to my lips and kissed it gently.

“What did you find? In Mexico . . .” Cowboy’s question invaded that newly found happiness in a second. He nuzzled into my shoulder and pressed a single kiss on it. “To make you want to leave him? What did you find?”

I closed my eyes, and like it had only happened yesterday, I was instantly there. “Girls.” I shook my head, trying to erase their gaunt, blank faces from my mind. “Lots and lots of lost, tragic girls . . .”

“Maria?” I ran through the house, my feet tapping on the marble floors, to find the housekeeper. The sun was setting and Juan still hadn’t come home. I had been waiting for him. We had a date planned for tonight. I adjusted my bra strap under his shirt that I was wearing over my jean shorts. It still smelled like him. I’d been wearing it all day. I loved it.

“Sia?” I turned to see Maria coming through the hallway.

“Do you know where Juan is?”

She shook her head. “He is a busy man, señorita. He will be home when he is home.”

I pushed a breath out of my mouth. I was now officially sick of the way all Juan’s staff talked down to me. I was seventeen. Juan was twenty-five. I knew most of them thought I was too young to be with him. Hell, I’d heard most of them mutter it in Spanish, thinking I couldn’t understand. I wasn’t the most proficient in Spanish, but I knew enough to understand what they said behind my back. And the not-so-subtle ones called me Lolita. I wouldn’t even need to know a scrap of Spanish to get that damn reference.

I went back to the bedroom and waited for another hour. Sick and tired of waiting for Juan, I threw on my flip-flops and snuck out the front door. Just as I rounded the corner, I saw one of his men—Pablo—getting into the covered Jeep. Deciding in a split second that I could hitch a ride with him, I slithered into the back of the Jeep. I smiled as it roared out of the drive.

I knew Juan worked close by. I had never been to his office. He liked to keep his work life and his private life separate. I had been at his home for two months now. And not once had I been to his work. I got it. My poppa had never let me go to the club. Hell, Ky never even talked about the club when he came to see me. I was used to men being secretive.

But standing me up for the third time this month had made me snap.

About twenty minutes had passed when the Jeep came to a stop. I crouched low, making sure I was hidden by the khaki cloth of the Jeep. I heard talking. What sounded like a barrier being raised a few seconds later. The Jeep drove on only a couple of miles more before we stopped and the engine was turned off.

Pablo left the Jeep. I waited until there were no voices nearby and snuck out of the back. I looked around. I’d expected to find offices. What greeted me was a vast amount of land, agricultural land, which housed several buildings. A larger building sat at the end of a long drive. Where the other barn-like buildings were one story, the one at the end was two. I smiled, knowing that’s exactly where Juan would be.

I kept to the shadowy outskirts of the buildings, trying to keep out of sight as I made my way to where I thought Juan would be. There were men with guns patrolling the main drive. I had no idea why. Juan told me he was a trader. From what I knew that all happened via phone and computers.

I had just made it past one of the buildings when I heard a loud scream come from inside. My footing faltered when it sounded again. It was the voice of a woman. My heart kicked into a sprint.

I was rooted to the spot. Fear and dread ran up my spine. In my peripheral vision I saw a guard walking my way. Without thinking, I opened the door of the building and ducked inside. Grimacing at the putrid smell coming from further inside the building, I snuck along the wall until I came to a door. I heard the low murmur of voices, then I heard one that I knew.

Juan.

The Spanish was muted and rapid. I brushed my hair off my shoulders, opened the door, and stepped into the room.

What greeted me on the other side, I wouldn’t have expected in a million years. Girls. Row upon row of girls lying on small cot beds, IVs coming from their arms.

A shocked cry escaped my mouth. The men gathered in the middle of the room all turned to look at me. Juan, the man I had fallen head over heels for, looked my way.

“Sia,” he said, a dark edge to his voice. I pressed myself up against the door I had just entered through. “What the fuck are you doing here?” I wanted to speak. I wanted to tell him that I’d come to see him, but my eyes wouldn’t leave the girls in the beds. They flitted ov

er each one, all of different hair colors, ethnicities, and heights . . . until my eyes landed on one at the end of the room.

I didn’t even realize that I had hit the floor until Juan gripped my arm and yanked me to my feet. “Michelle . . .” I whispered, my voice cracking as I took in her brown hair, now limp and clumped in sweaty strands... and her body, naked and starved. “Michelle!” I screamed as I tried to run in her direction.

I was stopped in my tracks by a hand slicing across my face, knocking me to the floor. My palms slapped against the tiles. Juan dragged me to my feet and pulled me from the building and into his car waiting out front.

“Michelle!” I screamed, but before I could open the car and run to my best friend, something pricked my arm. I snapped my head to Juan. He was holding a syringe. “You’re a trafficker,” I accused. Dizziness took me over. My vision became blurred, my heartbeat slowing from whatever he had injected into me.

Juan spared me a glance before he pulled his car from this evil place. “I’m a trader, bella. The stock is merely . . . semantics.”

I could hear the tick-tocking of my bedroom clock. Tears cascaded down my cheeks. “He had your friend?” Cowboy’s voice was laced with a venom I’d never heard from him before.

“Still has her, maybe.” A sob ripped from my throat. “I have no idea if he sold her, if she’s still there . . . if she’s dead. When Ky and Styx came for me, we couldn’t get to her. There was no time. They were nearly killed getting me. And worse, they came without the permission of my poppa or the old prez.” I wiped my cheeks. “They risked their lives to rescue me.” I stared out the window. “It was all my fault. She could have been suffering all this time . . . and it’s all my fault.” I laughed without humor. “I believed she’d gone elsewhere. Maybe found someone to love too. The fact that she hadn’t called me in a while wasn’t strange behavior for Michelle.” I lowered my head. “I was a fucking idiot. Running around like I was the lady of his home while thinking my friend was off living her best life. When in fact I was just his possession, and she was in hell.”

Hush moved over me, his face staring down. “It isn’t your fault,” he said gently. Cowboy gave him a look. “It’s not the same,” Hush argued. “This really wasn’t her fault.” He turned back to me, leaving me lost as to what they were really talking about. “You both went to Mexico together, to travel. He preyed on you. It’s what the fucker does.”