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Over the next hour, his buddies come and go, stopping to visit and smoke a joint with him before moving on to another group. Everybody here knows him, and he knows them. It’s only now that it makes sense. This isn’t just a club. It’s a brotherhood. These guys are loyal to each other, and that’s why none of them even blinked twice the first day Madden hauled me in here. They trust him. In fact, I can safely say not one person in this place looks at him like he’s insane. So that only leaves me with one conclusion.
I must be.
Eden groans and murmurs something about going to the bathroom, and I nod as she walks away. But when I swing my gaze back to Madden, the hair on the back of my neck stirs. His buddies have disappeared, and now there’s an unfamiliar predator in my sights.
In slow-motion horror, I watch his gaze slip to me as the woman eases herself onto his lap and whispers in his ear. Bile crawls up my throat, and something primal takes over my body, activating a monster I didn’t even know existed inside me. Red clouds my vision, and my fists curl at my sides as a hot poker stabs at my vulnerability.
My emotions aren’t mine anymore. They’re coming from somewhere beneath a pile of rubble in my chest, dusting themselves off as an unmistakable feeling slices through me.
Betrayal.
Madden’s eyes stay locked on mine, but I can’t focus through the haze of fury slowly gaining steam. I’m not aware that I’m moving until I’m right in front of them. I’m not even certain it’s me who grabs her by the hair and wrenches her off him like a demon-spawn breathing fire from her lips. I only know that an unfamiliar chasm has split open inside me, spilling free a toxic sludge of pain and rage. The devil has taken the helm, and my body is her host. The bolts that have protected my caged heart rattle themselves loose, and I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.
I watch in a dissociated stupor as the woman screeches, and my hand unfurls from her hair, dropping her onto the floor. She scrambles for purchase, swiping at me with her claws while she bellows like a wounded animal. She hurls herself onto her knees, her nails slashing at my bare legs as a string of obscenities flies from her lips. But it isn’t her voice that captures my attention. It’s his.
“Bianca.”
My blood boils as that name hits me like a slap across the face. It burns me. It adds fuel to the fire raging within, and I scream at him in a voice I don’t even recognize. A voice not my own.
“Fuck you!”
He’s rising from his seat, and at the same time, the woman on the floor is wrapping her bony fingers around my legs. Before I can get to Madden, before I can inflict the damage the devil is begging for, the interloper shoves me back onto my ass and launches herself on top of me.
Adrenaline floods my veins as she backhands me across the face and then rakes her nails down my neck. Hatred bubbles up my throat, singeing the tip of my tongue as I prepare a visceral insult crafted for the thief who thought she could steal what isn’t hers to take. All the while, that voice in the back of my mind cheers me on, whispering for me to destroy her. That thought is front and center when I thrust my palm up into her face.
A sick satisfaction swells in me when horror washes over her features. But that pleasure is short-lived. At the fringes of my consciousness, I’m aware that chaos is breaking out around me. Madden’s voice is behind me, his fingers clamping around my arms as he tries to separate us. The split second of distraction makes me let down my guard, and the moment I do, the thief punches me square in the face, whipping my head to the side.
“You fucking psycho!” she screams. “Who the hell do you think you are?”
“Enough!” Madden grabs me by the waist and hauls me up, pinning me against his chest as he snarls at the other woman. “Nobody touches her like that. You’re done here. Get the fuck out and don’t ever come back.”
She stares up at him in disbelief, her lip wobbling as she pulls herself to her feet with the last shred of her dignity.
“Fuck you, asshole! That’s the last time I ever offer to suck your cock.”
Madden nods at two burly men in leather vests. “Take out the goddamn trash.”
They follow his orders, dragging Destiny out of the clubhouse as she cries and protests the entire way. I should be relieved, but I’m not. And when Madden turns me in his arms and skims his fingers over the bruise forming on my cheek, I can’t allow myself to give in to that warmth. The concern in his eyes feels genuine, and it would be so easy to get swept up in his comfort. But I can’t forget he’s the cause of my pain too.
