Inked Babies (Inked Brotherhood 6)

I’ve seen them. Round, pinkish marks lost in the riot of ink on Zane’s back. Cigarette burns. And long, thin scars on his lower back, as if done with a knife.

“They don’t mean anything.” Zane rubs his temple, as if fighting a headache. “Doesn’t mean I remember who gave me those scars. Could be the kids in any of the foster homes. See, I went… went to a shrink, years ago. When we were at school. What I remember could be a made-up memory.”

“The shrink said that?”

Zane nods. “God knows I can’t remember much from that time. It’s all distorted and twisted up in my head.”

“But you say you saw him,” Ash insists, spots of color on his pale cheekbones. “That man.”

“Dunno what the fuck I saw.” Zane lets his hands drop on his thighs. “I thought he was,” he swallows hard, “that he was standing on the street, I…”

“On the street, where?” Tyler asks, his voice sharp, and I turn to him, surprised. “When?”

“Dunno…”

“Were you heading somewhere specific? What was the guy doing?”

“Ty, what the hell’s your problem, man?” Ash hisses, shooting daggers at his brother. “Slow down.”

Tyler shrugs his broad shoulders. “Just asking.”

“He doesn’t believe I saw him, either,” Zane whispers. “He thinks it’s a dream.”

“You think that?” I ask Tyler, confused.

He doesn’t deny it. “I struggled for a long time to find the line between nightmares and real memories, and I wasn’t a kid when bad things happened to me. It’s normal not to be sure. Sometimes our mind makes up memories to fill in gaps. To explain the fear and the pain.”

“Something bad happened to him.” Ash jabs a finger at Tyler. “Same as it happened to you. I didn’t believe you when you told me what Dad did, how he carved you up, but now I do. How can you not believe what happened to Zane?”

Zane suddenly lurches to his feet and stumbles away from our little circle. He leaves the room, and Dakota scrambles after him.

A door slams inside the apartment.

Shit.

“Whatever happened to him,” Dylan says quietly, “involved people. Someone put those burns and scars on his back. And if he really saw those people walking around in this town…”

His words hang in the air between us. A chill rolls over my skin, raising goosebumps.

All gazes swing to Tyler who stares back, his face blank. I don’t like it. That blankness hides pain, and I don’t want him to be in pain—from remembering his own bloody past, from his worry for Zane.

“Fine, this I can work with,” he finally says. “Let’s assume that he really saw someone who hurt him. That even if his memory of the past isn’t good, he does remember the face of an abuser.”

Rafe works his jaw, then rubs it as if it hurts. “And if Zane really saw that abuser walking around in Madison…”

Tyler nods. “If Zane saw him, there’s the trigger for his nightmares and flashbacks.”

I shiver.

“It might have been someone similar,” Rafe says. “Not the man himself, but someone who reminded Zane of him.”

“We need to ask him what he dreams of,” Dylan says bleakly. “What happens in his memories, and where. So we can check, verify the facts, and make sure he’s never reminded of that time of his life again.”

I always believed Zane’s memories were real. I never thought they were only dreams, or made-up stories. But I also never knew the details.

Hearing those words from Dylan’s mouth, I feel ice driving into my bones. Something did happen to Zane, something bad enough that his mind may be shielding him from it, something that took place at a specific location, in a specific time of his life.

And we’re going to find out everything we can to get him back.