Crux Untamed (Hades Hangmen 6)

A single pained laugh escaped my lips, before I straightened my shoulders. I refused to let these assholes see me break. The man walked out, shutting the door, leaving me all alone with Cowboy. I checked no one else was around.

“Cowboy,” I whispered, my hushed voice echoing around the square box of a room. “Tell me you’re okay . . .” I squeezed my eyes shut. “What have they done to you . . .” It wasn’t really a question. My beautiful Cowboy. They had hurt him, badly, all because he was with me.

Cowboy tried to speak but coughed up blood. I prayed it was from the inside of his mouth, not from something they’d done to him inside. “I’m good, cher,” he replied weakly; he tried to smile again. The skin on his bottom lip split when he did.

I tried to pull my hands loose from the ties that bound me, but I couldn’t. I looked at Cowboy, catching him watching me. “What will we do?” I asked. We weren’t naive; we’d been brought into this room for a reason. After the way I spoke to him, I wondered if he’d brought me to this building just to kill me. Juan Garcia was a man who never lost. I ran before he’d tired of me. In his eyes, it was the beginning of a cat-and-mouse game.

I was the mouse.

And I’d been caught.

I looked at the walls that surrounded us. Remnants of blood were ingrained into the rough-textured material. I fought for breath. This room had one purpose. To house those about to die.

“Sia,” Cowboy said, pulling back my attention. “Hush will get us out.” I didn’t dare let myself hope that was the case. Especially when the door opened again and yet another man walked through. A man who, I could tell instantly, belonged to the newest associates of Juan’s company, a shaven-headed man with white-power and Nazi tattoos adorning his skin. In his hand was a knife. He sauntered into the room, his eyes on both of us.

My heart kicked into a sprint as he circled us before stopping in front of me. “Get the fuck away from her,” Cowboy said. I had never heard his voice so venomous before. The Nazi looked at Cowboy over his shoulder.

“Just wanted to say hello,” he responded and then walked back the door. It opened, and the Nazi dragged someone else in. I could see a red dress, similar to mine. But then I sucked in a harsh breath when the girl’s face and body came into view. A noise of pure sympathy came from the back of my throat when I saw her flesh. Her eyes were downcast, but I wasn’t sure she could actually see. The Nazi abandoned the girl in the center of the floor, under the single lightbulb, and left the room.

Her body closed inwards, but then she lifted her head. I shuddered, my heart tearing in two when I saw her face. Every inch of her skin looked like my back.

Acid, I immediately thought. They’d poured acid on all of her skin. Even her head was damaged, hair all gone save for a single clump at the back. Her hair had been brown. One of her eyes was blinded, a cloudy milky hue smothering the iris. But the other appeared intact. Brown eyes. Kind eyes. Eyes similar in color to . . .

I choked, refusing to believe it was true. Refusing to believe my eyes. That this was—

“Sia?” The girl froze.

Even though they were tied, I felt my hands shake. My eyes widened as the girl shuffled toward us, her teeth gritting with the pain she was clearly in. When she arrived at my feet, I wanted to turn away. I couldn’t bear to see how she looked. How she could barely move, the skin all over her body damaged beyond repair.

What had he done . . .?

“Sia,” she repeated breathlessly, like it had just taken all her energy to lie by my feet.

“Mi-Michelle?” I managed to croak.

I heard Cowboy’s quick inhale. But I wouldn’t break my gaze from hers. I couldn’t . . . She had been my friend.

If my hands were free I would have laid a palm on her cheek and I would have promised that everything would be okay. But bound, all I could do was say, “What have they done to you?”

Michelle sniffed. I struggled to see the tear as it fell from her undamaged eye and traveled down her scarred cheek. “Over and over again . . .” she said. She looked at Cowboy and shied away, scurrying near my feet.

“He would never hurt you,” I assured her, but then I felt foolish. All she’d ever known were evil men. Why would she believe any promise? I looked at her red dress. I knew exactly which of those evil men was responsible for this.

“I tried to escape,” she continued, her fleshless lips trembling. I held still. “He caught me.” She flicked her eye up to me then back down to the ground. “Not long after you succeeded.”

I waited. Waited, heart in mouth. Michelle sucked in a sharp breath. “He made me dress like he dressed you.” She shook her head, evidently replaying those days in her mind. “But I wasn’t you. No matter what he did to me . . . everything he wanted, or did do, to you.” My face blanched. He raped her. Juan raped her, because I wasn’t there for him to fuck. “He started by pouring acid on my back. But it didn’t please him. So he kept going. Each month it would be something else, somewhere else on my body he would destroy.” I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to extract the mountain of guilt that was building in my body. “Until there was nothing else left of me to take.”

Michelle inhaled, wincing. She stretched out her hand. I sobbed when her rough fingers took hold of my hands and squeezed. “I never thought I’d see you again,” she said hoarsely. She looked up at me. “I want to go home, Sia. It all hurts so much.” I squeezed her fingers back, trying not to squeeze too hard, to cause her more pain.

“I’ll get you there,” I promised. She slowly lifted her head and tried to smile. The look of hopelessness on her face was the saddest thing I’d ever seen. “I will,” I pushed harder, trying to help her. To give her hope.

She closed her eyes. “I want to see green fields. There’s so much desert here. Too much darkness.”

My eyes lifted to meet Cowboy’s. His face was like stone as he listened to Michelle reminisce about home. “Michelle?” he said. Michelle turned her head to face him. Cowboy glanced at the door. “I have a knife in my boot,” he whispered, barely looking away from the door for whatever, and whoever, would come through next. He waggled one of his feet.

Michelle looked to me. “You can trust him,” I said. “He’s with me.” Michelle shuffled across the room and stopped at Cowboy’s feet.

“At the side

. It’s tucked into my sock.”

Michelle reached in, all the time casting wary glances back at me. I nodded my head, trying to give her encouragement. She pulled out the knife. I exhaled in relief, as did Cowboy. Cowboy moved his hands behind the chair. “Untie me,” he instructed, still watching the door.

But Michelle started backing away.

“Michelle?” I questioned as she looked at me. Her hands were shaking and her lips were trembling. “Michelle?” I said, panic in my voice. Tear after tear left Michelle’s eye . . . then she looked at Cowboy and whispered, “Thank you . . .”

My heart tore down the center at the final tone in those two words. I opened my mouth to say something, anything to try to lift her from her hopelessness, but I was beaten to it by two quick slashes of the sharp knife across her wrists.

“NO!” I screamed, the hoarseness of my voice causing my words to fade to nothing. Michelle dropped the knife to the ground, the metal clanging on the concrete. Her too-thin legs gave way, and she staggered back to the wall behind her. Blood dripped to the floor around her. She slumped down the wall, a smile playing on her lips. “Michelle,” I whispered, as the shell containing my best friend met my eyes, never moving her gaze from mine as the light in her eyes faded to nothing.

The tinny scent of blood infused the air. I stared and stared at Michelle on the floor, eyes open, yet gone. A loud cry ripped from my body. And then I screamed. I screamed so loud. So fucking loud at the asshole who could do this to another human being.

I hated him. I hated Juan Garcia with everything that I was. Everything he stood for and everything he did.

The door to the room opened, and the Nazi came in. Anger replaced the sorrow I was feeling. My hands shook on the seat. “Where is he?” I growled.

The Nazi’s eyes widened as he saw Michelle. “You fucked up,” he gloated. “Boss man had plans for her.” The pulse in my throat throbbed. He shrugged, and then looked at Cowboy. “It’ll just be you he uses.”