Chapter 4 #6
I don’t know what was going through my head.
I guess I thought that maybe I could contain that anger somehow if I just held Kane tight enough.
So I did. I burrowed my face against his bicep, my arms wrapped tightly around him.
He managed to jerk free an arm, still fighting how he truly felt, not letting himself feel his loss.
Rafe took the punches without so much as a flinch, and after the sixth, a hard shout of pain finally left Kane.
He collapsed forward into Rafe, my eyes burning as he yelled into Rafe’s shoulder.
Rafe brought his arms up around mine, the two of us bracing Kane between us when he broke utterly and completely.
He screamed and sobbed and begged, my tears joining his at his words—“Less than eight minutes. Eight fucking minutes. One fucking bullet! I don’t—I don’t understand.
It doesn’t make sense. I spent the last eight years trying to die so why am I still here and he isn’t?
WHY? Please give him back. Please. What death is worthy enough to see him again?
I’ll do it. All of it. A hundred times. Just—please.
Give my baby brother back. I can’t do this anymore.
I-I can’t. I don’t deserve to be free. Why did you set me free? I’m fucking guilty, Arden!”
I hadn’t realized he was talking to me until then. I tugged back, my eyes wide. “Kane…”
“No!” he yelled at me. “I killed them. Don’t you get that?
And her. I still want to kill her. I’m fucked in the head.
I don’t have a Rafe anymore, Arden. You have each other, but I had Thorne, and without him, I’m a fucking miserable human being.
I can’t breathe; I can’t think—all I know is this fucking thing in my chest that’s killing me without killing me.
” He beat his fist over his chest, tears dripping from his chin.
“I’m a killer that can’t be killed, and I should be locked up, for everyone’s sake. ”
“You weren’t yourself,” I said hoarsely, not completely understanding but knowing without a doubt that he was wrong.
“None of us were that day. You’re a man who made a mistake, a really bad one, but you don’t have to let that define you, Kane.
Give yourself the chance to redeem yourself.
Do right by those lives by protecting others. ”
“Give myself a chance? Arden, I don’t deserve a chance.
I massacred an entire room of people, and the sickening part is that a piece of me knew they were innocent, no matter how far I’d dissociated.
It keeps coming back in flashes—how they screamed and pleaded with me.
Grandparents and mothers and fathers.” He shoved Rafe and I off him and took several steps back, shaking his head.
Go. Get out of here, he signed. He ripped his phone from his pocket and threw it at us.
Rafe caught it, a pained sound leaving him as he shoved a finger down to end an on-going call.
911.
I whipped around at the sound of approaching sirens before I crossed to Kane and grabbed his and Rafe’s wrists, dragging them toward the car, but Kane wouldn’t fucking budge. My chin trembled, and Rafe was distraught too.
“I can’t,” Kane said again firmly. He wiped his eyes before he pressed a hand over his heart and looked between us desperately.
“I’m…They’re coming for me, and they’ll take me, and that’s okay.
I’ll be where I belong. I can’t control it like I used to, alright?
At least in prison, the only thing I hurt was myself. ”
“Kane, get in the fucking car,” I argued through angry tears.
His own chin trembled before he closed the distance and grasped my head. He pressed a firm kiss to my forehead, then turned to Rafe and clasped a hand around the back of his neck, touching his forehead to Rafe’s. Then he signed with finality, Get her out of here, man. Now.
Rafe tugged on me.
“No!” I shouted, even as the sirens got closer. Rafe swept an arm around me and plucked me from the asphalt. I struggled against him. “Kane, please.”
But he had his back to us. It was the last time I’d see Kane Creed making a choice for himself for a really long time—him dropping to his knees in that rest stop, lighting up a final cigarette and sticking it between his lips as Rafe drove us at full speed away.
Kane lifted his hands, red and blue flashing around the bend, his green eyes infinitely cold, smoke twining around his angry face in the moonlight.
I sobbed as we drove away, Rafe gripping the wheel, his own eyes red-rimmed.
A few hours later at a gas station, we caught sight of the news.
“Today marks the day that at least one of our fugitives in the on-going manhunt is on his way back to prison. Kane Creed has been officially put back under arrest, seeming to have given himself up willingly at a rest stop in Virginia…Oh. We have breaking news. This has just happened. One second. We’re getting reports that the caravan escorting Kane Creed was attacked.
Production, let’s get that footage up,” reported the station.
Rafe and I were frozen in an aisle of snacks, his hand snaking into mine as I dropped the bag of chips I’d picked up.
On the screen was live footage from what had to be a news helicopter.
It zoomed in on the wreckage of multiple police vehicles, including a toppled over van.
My heart thundered when several blacked out vehicles circled the wreck, soldiers in full black gear, their faces covered by balaclavas and their hands bracing guns, circled the van.
One of them pried open the dented back doors with a crowbar, while another trained a gun on the interior.
There was a blur of motion, of blond hair and tattoos, a fist taking hold of the gun barrel and Kane butting into their head.
But whoever they were…there were so many.
They grabbed Kane in mere seconds, pinning him down before his body went completely limp like they’d dosed him with something.
My grip on Rafe was iron as I watched Kane be dragged into one of those tinted vehicles. They sped off, tires screeching just before a wave of emergency vehicles arrived to the scene. It was maybe a minute of footage, and Kane was gone.
The phone Kane gave us buzzed in the pocket of my leather jacket, and I ripped it out, bringing it to my ear, already knowing who was calling. “Tell me that was the Ravens,” I begged.
“I’m sorry, Arden,” Mick answered. “We think it was S.I.N. We’re tracking their vehicles, and I’ve got good news and bad.”
I tugged my lighter free and skimmed my thumb over it.
“I’ve got coordinates for Viktor Shaw too. They’re all heading to the same place. A warehouse.”
“Send it to me,” I said, every wall inside me locking down.
“I’m not letting you go without backup. The Ravens are coming.”
“No.”
“Arden, we’ve had eyes on this warehouse. It’s a main hub of their operation. Under no circumstances would Creed survive that place. They have more security than even Halden’s compound.”
I tugged on Rafe, leading him out of the gas station and striding toward our car. “This is a suicide mission then. Nothing new. The Ravens stay put.”
“All you have is Rafe. That’s not enough!” Mickey shouted.
“It’s more than enough.” I climbed into the passenger side, and Rafe took the wheel, the two of us exchanging a hard look. “Send the location.”