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But her opening that door had proved him wrong. He’d known deep down that he was wrong anyway. He knew that shit didn’t just fucking float away into oblivion. She wasn’t dead, and behind her cold eyes and blank stare, he saw the old Orion was in there too.
“Maddox,” she said, her tone dipped in annoyance, rigidity.
The way she said his name made him want to flinch. He half-thought that’s what she wanted. Her nose furrowed ever so slightly in what he could guess was irritation. Nothing else on her face betrayed an emotion. Betrayed their history. Then again, it was buried under years of torture and abuse.
Fuck, she was beautiful, but in a way that was really hard to look at. In a way that made him hate himself because he shouldn’t be thinking that shit right now. He came for a purpose, and that’s where his mind needed to be.
But he was thinking about her, and the hell she’d lived through, and he was thinking about the news he was about to drop on her. Whether the words would hurt her or help her, he didn’t know. She looked beautiful, the way the morning light lit her face, made her eyes come alive, if only for a moment.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded, her eyes darkening again. Her voice was soft, in volume at least. Everything else about it was a hard edge. Cutting at him. Scarring him.
He cleared his throat. “Can I come in?”
She moved closer to the door frame, pulling the door with her, physically barring him with her small body. It wasn’t as small as it had been before, he noted. Then he silently scolded himself for checking her out.
In the hospital bed, she’d been a slip of a woman, a ghost. She had been at least twenty pounds underweight, signs of malnourishment clinging to her like her skin to her bones.
She’d added weight now. Muscle. She was wearing a simple tank and leggings. Her face was slightly flushed, a thin sheen of sweat on her forehead and upper lip. She was barely breathing hard, but she was working hard. You only needed to look at the sculpted muscles of her arms to see that.
She’d been taking care of herself too. Her face was brighter, her skin looked healthier. Her hair looked full and vibrant.
Since he was not allowed to visit or keep in contact beyond what was required for the investigation, April had been filling him in on whether she was eating—fancy stuff that was really fricking good, according to April. Whether she was drinking too much—she wasn’t drinking enough, according to April. And finally, if she was showing any signs of significant clinical depression.
“Of course she’s showing signs of depression, dip shit!” April had snapped when he’d all but pounced on her walking in the door from yet another visit with Orion. He was jealous of those visits though he’d never tell her that. She’d been there nearly the entire night. It must’ve been progress. “She was held captive for ten fucking years, Maddox. She’s going to be fucked up for the foreseeable future. Most likely forever.”
Her words stung him in the way she had intended.
She must’ve seen it on his face because she went off the attack immediately and leaned in to grasp his hand. “She’s doing better than she should be,” she said softly. “Which is, she’s not swinging from the rafters, injecting herself with drugs, or painting the walls with her bodily fluids. She’s coping, Maddox. On her own. So, let her be.”
“Kind of like you are,” he had snapped back, but he turned and left before she could give him a dose of attitude in return.
He knew April was only half joking, her light tone to try to mask the hurt he knew she was feeling. Maddox fucking hated that, seeing his little sister in any kind of pain and not being able to protect her. Fuck, that was the reason he’d moved her into his apartment, because he was usually never there. His parents gave him the down payment—he paid the mortgage. April had a knack for trouble. Whether or not she might’ve chosen the path she was on if Orion hadn’t been taken wasn’t worth thinking about. Because she was taken. And there was no point in thinking about shit like that. Shit he couldn’t change. Had no power over.
What he did have power over was his job. This case.
He’d been working himself to the bone to find answers. To find justice. And, if he was honest, a little fucking vengeance. Or a lot. Maddox craved the blood of the men that had done this to Orion. To all of those girls.
They found remains of six girls in that backyard. Had to make calls to parents who had long thought their children had run off, forgotten about them.
