Page 143 of Jayson
A full-body shudder. Shoulders curled inward like a dog who knows the belt is coming.
“She wasn’t supposed to die,” he breathes.
The men go still, every breath held.
Scar flicks his cigarette to the floor, crushes it beneath his boot. Mason lowers his gun. Even Kanyan stops breathing for half a second.
I lean in. Voice low. Dangerous.
“Talk.”
Maddox doesn’t lift his head. Just speaks into the blood and spit on his shirt.
“Riley was… a mistake.”
He swallows. His voice shakes.
“Bishop and I—we were… bored. We did things. It was supposed to be harmless. Easy. They never would have known.Never.”
My stomach turns. But I don’t stop him.Riley Kincaid was just a kid. Fourteen years old. As was Keira. They didn’t deserve to have their lives shattered the way they were.
I step back. Not because I’m done. But because if I stay any closer, I’ll kill him.
As though sensing the inferno that rages through me, Kanyan steps forward and puts a steady hand on my arm, telling me he’ll finish what I so visibly can’t.
Maddox hangs in the rusted ferris wheel cage, soaked, shivering, lips blue around every lie he hasn’t told yet. His wrists are raw from the zip ties. Blood trickles from his temple. But none of that stops him from talking once Kanyan asks Maddox to tell him more.
Men like him never stop talking. Not until someone makes them choke on their own tongue.
“We’ve known each other since boarding school,” he starts, his voice hoarse, thick with phlegm and fear. “Legacy kids. Old money.”
He coughs, spits. Looks right at me as he speaks, as though he’s hoping to stick the knife in deeper.
“We liked control. And girls like Riley and Keira?” His lips twitch. “They were too trusting. Too easy.”
My fingers curl into my palms until my knuckles split. Blood beads on skin that doesn’t register pain anymore.
Kanyan goes still.
Mason shifts beside me, ready to hold me back should the need arise.
Scar exhales slowly, the way men do when they’re about to do something unspeakable.
“We’d spike their drinks,” Maddox says, like he’s telling a bedtime story. “Tea. Juice. Whatever they’d take. They’d laugh at first. Then go quiet. Eyes glassy. Heads heavy. That’s when we’d…”
He trails off, eyes flicking toward my face, maybe hoping for mercy. Maybe testing the edge.
“Spare me the details,” I snap. My voice cuts through the yard like a blade. “What happened to Riley?”
Maddox hesitates. That little flicker of doubt, of guilt trying to fight its way through his sociopathic calm—but it doesn’t win.
“The night it happened… we had people over. Friends. Too many. We spiked their drinks. Someone grabbed Riley. I don’t know who. The rohypnol didn’t work like it was supposed to and she woke up unexpectedly. She started panicking. Screaming. Bishop put his hand over her mouth. He didn’t let go.”
He looks at me now. Dead eyes. Hollow.
“She stopped moving,” Maddox says.
Just like that. Like it was nothing.
