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I did it, Sam! I killed him! Sam looked at Cade’s hands. He didn’t remember seeing blood on them. But he remembered seeing the blood, thick and brilliant, staining his own.
He stilled the tremor that wanted to wash over his body. He was exhausted, drained emotionally and physically, the aggression that had raged through his body relayed through his lust and his need for Heather.
He met Cade’s penetrating look and gave his brother the crooked smile he knew Cade needed. He was good at that, he thought bitterly. Allaying the fears of his brothers, easing their consciences, their own demons.
Cade flicked a look at Heather. “She’s a hard one to figure.” He nodded at her. “She put a gun under my chin tonight, Sam. I wouldn’t want to piss her off too often.”
Sam grunted and looked around. He found the gun beside her shoulder and lifted it gingerly.
“Son of a bitch,” he breathed out softly as he thumbed the safety over. “She had it cocked and ready, too. She had the damned thing under my chin about the same time she was working her cunt on me.” He shook his head and laid the gun carefully out of the way.
Cade’s face reflected his own surprise, then he shook his head, his lips tilting in a grin. “She said only an August would have a hard-on with a gun under his chin. Maybe she was right.”
“Yeah.” Sam tried to laugh, he wanted to, but the laughter wouldn’t come.
He watched Cade closely, seeing the strain on his brother’s face, the worry in his eyes.
“Sam?” Cade questioned him softly.
Sam bit back an oath. His brothers had spent twelve years trying to protect him, to ease the pain, the horror of what had happened to them all in that dirty basement. His own memories of it were distant, as though it had been a dream, but lately, lately they had been clearer, returning with a vengeance and magnified by the scent of death.
“What happened that night? The night he died.” He hadn’t meant to say the words but they rumbled from his chest as his body tightened at the injustice of reminding Cade of those horrific days.
He watched Cade draw within himself. His eyes iced, growing cold, his expression emotionless.
“It’s better forgotten, Sam,” he bit out. “I told you that.”
Sam laid his head back against the hay, watching Cade, his heart breaking for them all.
“But it’s not forgotten,” he said softly. “We still wake up shaking from the nightmares, and we never talk about them. We punish the women who love us enough to tolerate our perversions, and still, we never talk about it. Neither of you have even asked me why the bastard hated me so much. Or why he punished you along with me.”
“There’s no sense in discussing it,” Cade growled, moving restlessly to his feet. “Let it go, Sam.”
“No, Cade.” He stood as well, facing his brother over the helpless, naked form of the lover he had just taken. The lover he would eventually share. The need was there, rising within him, to see Heather between the three of them, screaming in pleasure, begging for them. For all of them. “We have to discuss it. I’m remembering things…”
“Forget it.” Cade shook his head desperately. “Whatever you’re trying to remember Sam, forget it. It’s over.”
The tone of voice was well remembered. It brooked no refusal, no argument. But Sam wasn’t a kid anymore, and Cade was no longer the final word in any of their lives. In a flash he realized how he and Brock had given Cade what he needed at that time. Control. They followed his lead, did as he said, and let him guide them through the horrific days after the death of the monster. He had killed for them, hadn’t he? He had, with his bare fists, defended himself against the knife-wielding psychopath who had held them helpless. But Cade’s hands weren’t scarred. Cade’s weren’t, but Sam’s were.
“It’s not over, Cade.” He stared his brother in the eye, seeing the pain, the shame that seared the other man’s soul. “It’s not over, because we still haven’t accepted it.”
“Wrong.” Cade’s voice was harsh, tempered with steel, hot with fury. “You’re wrong, Sam. The bastard is dead and we’re still alive, so it’s over.”
“And some fucking maniac is trying to destroy it all again.” Sam’s voice rose with his own anger, his own pain. “Every fucking bit of it, Cade. He’ll take it all away from us if he can, and if he’s caught, he’ll tell the world. He’ll tell them how we were held, how we were raped and how we were forced to fuck each other, goddammit. We can’t hide from it anymore.”
He watched Cade’s face pale as fury blackened his gaze. Cade’s fists clenched at his as sides and he snarled with a violence Sam hadn’t seen in him in years.
“Then I’ll fucking kill him when he’s caught,” he bit out furiously. “Because I’ll be damned if I’ll see us destroyed any further.”
Shock held Sam speechless for long moments as he stared into Cade’s eyes and saw the violence, the commitment to protecting all they had fought so hard to build within their lives.
“Why?” Sam asked him softly, unable to shake the feeling that there was more, so much more to what Cade was protecting. “It was in self defense. It’s been twelve years, and it would be a crazy man’s word against ours. Why kill him? Why not face it ourselves, Cade, and deal with it?”
“Because it’s fucking over. Forget it, Sam. I killed him. I killed the dirty bastard, and he’ll never take another breath again. Forget it.”
Forget it, Sam, as he wiped his hands over Sam’s, smearing the blood from them to his own and showing it to Sam. I killed him, Sam. I did it. Forget it. Just forget it, Sam.
Sam shook his head as the image snapped in front of his eyes. There, then gone, but not forgotten. He blinked. He thought he had remembered. Cade with his hands wrapped around the bastard’s throat as he sliced at them with the scalpel, but it wasn’t Cade, suddenly it was Sam. Then Cade. Then Sam.
