Chapter 15

“You can’t keep him here,” Kazimir argued, though he smartly kept his distance by remaining in the doorway.

“Watch me.” Madden tucked the comforter around Berga’s legs. Should he close the blinds now? His room at the Docks had a large window that greeted the sun first thing every morning. It was one of his favorite features, but Berga needed his rest, and if it woke him—

“Are you even listening to me, Madden?” Kaz growled. “He’s coming with me. He isn’t yours to keep.”

“He is,” he corrected.

“He’s Satellite.”

“This happened at my venue,” he stated. “My doctor checked him over, and he’s currently lying in my bed. He is mine, and if you keep pushing this issue, I’ll pick up that knife and make sure you leave here blinded after all.”

“Everyone calm down.” Nate grabbed Kaz’s arm and tugged him back another step into the hallway. “We’re all just worried. No one here wants anything bad to happen to Berga.”

“Exactly,” Kazimir agreed. “Which is why he can’t stay here with him. He’s Retinue. Berga and he barely even speak.”

“They’re dating,” Bay’s voice came from behind them, and both Nate and Kazimir turned to greet him.

“You’re here?” Nate hadn’t seemed to know.

“I meant to arrive for the race but got caught up with…something.” Bay cleared his throat and entered the room, concern written all over his face when he stared at the unconscious Berga laid out in the center of Madden’s bed. “What did the doctor say?”

“Three lacerations on his right hand,” Madden listed. “A busted lip and a bloodstream only mildly dosed with a tranquilizer. Considering the mental duress he was under, however, it’s likely he won’t wake up any time soon. I was told to call if he didn’t rouse by morning. ”

“The doctor was speaking to all of us,” Kazimir stated, only for Madden to glare.

“Where did he get the busted lip?” Bay frowned.

“Ask this jackass,” Madden motioned to Kaz.

Bay’s frown deepened until he turned and caught a glimpse of Nate’s face. “Oh.”

“He started it,” Kaz childishly gripped.

“I’m fine,” Nate reassured Bay. “I stopped someone else from getting too close, and this was the end result, that’s all.”

“Does it hurt?” Kazimir tentatively touched the side of Nate’s face, careful not to make contact with the bruise forming there and then glared over at Berga. “I should have hit him harder.”

“I would have shot you in the back of the skull,” Madden said, settling down on the edge of the bed at Berga’s side. He wrung his hands to keep himself from doing something rash but found himself adding darkly, “Still might.”

“Aren’t we all friends here?” Sunday pipped in from the corner where he’d been quietly sitting this entire time. The other racer had witnessed the whole debacle, and in Madden’s haste to secure Berga somewhere safely away from the crowd, he’d followed them.

“No,” Kazimir drawled. “And who the hell are you anyway?”

“Royal Sunday Ilya,” Madden introduced. “If he’d come here to meet with Baikal, you would have met with him upon arrival, as it were, he’s visiting at Kelevra’s behest.”

“His sister’s,” Sunday corrected, “actually.”

“Whatever,” Kaz dismissed him and glowered at Madden all over again. “Since when was Berga someone you’d start a war for? Dating?” He snorted. “Yeah right. You’re not his type.”

“What makes you say that?” Madden asked.

“I’ve seen the guys he’s hooked up with in the past. They look nothing like you. They’re soft and sweet, for one. You’re—”

“Majestic and amazing?” Madden ran a hand through his hair and winked.

“If you’re making jokes, you must not care about him as much as you’re trying to make it seem. Just hand him over before—Shit.” Kazimir swore at his multi-slate but took the incoming call. “Yeah? No, I’m still at the Docks.”

Madden could vaguely make out the sound of Baikal Void’s voice on the other end of the line, but Kazimir’s responses made the topic of their conversation obvious enough he didn’t have to actually hear anything the Dominus of the Brumal mafia was saying.

“Berga…might not be able to take a look at that any time soon,” Kazimir said. “Whose sister died?”

“He can’t see a dead female body at the moment,” Bay interrupted, shocking them all into momentary silence, but he held firm. “I’m serious. As his doctor and friend, unless you want what happened tonight to occur more frequently, he can’t be told or shown the body of someone’s dead sister.”

Kazimir frowned. “Did you get that?” He hummed when Baikal must have acknowledged he had. “Who do you want me to call in instead? Fern? Okay. I’ll meet them at the Bunker shortly.”

“You have to go?” Nate asked as soon as Kaz had ended the call.

“You all should,” Madden stated, seizing this opportunity to get rid of them. “Except you, Bay. If you could hang around a bit longer, I would appreciate it.”

“Of course,” Bay agreed.

“Let’s leave,” Nate tugged on Kazimir’s arm when the Underboss hesitated. “Berga will be fine.”

“You call what just happened fine?” Kazimir argued, but he gave in anyway and after sending one last warning look Madden’s way, allowed Nate to pull him toward the stairs.

“If I don’t leave now, I’ll miss my ship,” Sunday exclaimed, rising with a flourish. “As always, had a fantastic evening, Madden. You never disappoint in the entertainment department.”

“Are you saying watching my man have a breakdown in front of an audience is entertaining?” Madden saw red. “Because if so—”

“Look at the time.” Sunday slipped out of the room without so much as a backward glance.

Madden sighed. “The doctor’s report is on my tablet,” he told Bay once the two of them were alone. “You can have a look if you’d like.”

“I don’t think it would let me know anything more than you already have,” Bay said.

“Are you still not going to tell me what’s wrong with him?” He felt…helpless. And that sucked. Madden wasn’t used to feeling that way about anything. He’d been the golden child since birth, got whatever he wanted without having to ask for it, and coasted through life with a diamond spoon in his mouth.

If there was ever a problem, he solved it. Period. Hell, half the time, people were coming to him for aid—even the damn Satellite, despite how Kaz had made things sound.

“I told you—”

“You gave me a convoluted diagnosis,” Madden corrected, a bit more sharply than he’d meant to. It’d only just happened, but that panicked feeling in his chest still hadn’t abated. When he’d spotted Berga standing in the middle of the track, staring off at nothing, mumbling under his breath…It’d been so obvious something was horribly wrong. “He had the same look in his eye as that day at the Academy.”

Not to mention, he’d hit both Nate and Kazimir, who were friends of Berga’s.

“Berga is violent ,” Madden added, “but he doesn’t get physical with anybody.” Absently, he lifted a hand to the bandaged wound on his left shoulder. The knife had barely punctured him, and he hadn’t felt a thing at the time, too concerned over calming the Butcher down before things escalated past the point of return .

“If you’re worried about this affecting the races—”

“Fuck the races,” he snapped. “I don’t give a shit about that. If people stop coming then the Docks was never what I thought it was anyway.” Most of the crowd probably viewed it the same way Sunday had. As entertainment. With a growl, Madden tore his multi-slate off his wrist and lifted the device to his ear as soon as he found the contact he was after.

“What’s up?” Ledger’s voice came through, the sound of classical music drifting in along with it. He must be at his brother’s restaurant. “Have you enrolled my guy yet?”

“It’s processing,” Madden said. “Tell the others, if you hear a rumor going around about the Butcher and the Docks, nip it in the bud. Use threats if you have to, I’m not playing around with this.”

“You mean about how he was wasted?”

Word traveled quickly. “Is that what they’re saying?”

Ledger let out a low whistle. “I knew that seemed out of character for Berga. But yeah. People are talking, but that’s all they’re saying. He had too much to drink and beat up both a Satellite and Retinue member.”

Not exactly accurate either but…Better than it could have been.

“Push that narrative,” Madden ordered.

“Whatever you say. Can I go now? There’s a hottie here waiting tables and I—”

Madden hung up and tossed his multi-slate onto the built-in shelf next to the bed, which doubled as an end table.

“You like him that much?” Bay asked a moment later.

He grunted. “I don’t know. You tell me.”

“That’s not how psychology works.”

“But I am a criminal,” Madden forced a smirk, “and that is your specialty.”

“Name a single person who would dare report you for any crime,” Bay drawled before growing somber. “I thought for sure you were helping. You were the only new factor. No,” he thought it over, “actually, you still are helping. I heard Berga’s episode only lasted around ten minutes, is that true?”

“Yes,” he confirmed, “but the guy passed out from accidentally drugging himself, so that probably helped cut things short.”

“What was he doing just before that?”

“Nothing.”

“What do you mean nothing?”

“We were talking.”

“Talking?” Bay’s brow lifted. “Interesting.”

“You sound like him when you say stuff like that.”

“I have personal experience with detachment issues brought on by trauma,” Bay shared, but he was too caught up in his own head to seem to realize what he’d done. Or, maybe since Madden had gotten with his friend, he was trying to be closer for Berga’s benefit. Who knew. It didn’t much matter .

The only thing that did was getting to the bottom of this.

“I can’t be helpless the next time this happens,” Madden insisted. “You need to tell me everything you know. What’s the trigger?”

“A girl splitting her skull open from falling down the stairs was obvious,” Bay replied. “But…Perhaps someone got hurt in the crowd and he saw it?”

“Doesn’t he see injured people all the time?” He was the cause of most of those injuries, in fact.

“True.”

“So, you’re saying you don’t know what caused it this time?” Madden growled in frustration. “How often does it happen? Why haven’t I ever seen it before or heard any of the others talking about it?”

“Berga is fairly good at secluding himself away when he feels a delusion coming on,” Bay explained. “It’s easy enough for him since all he has to say is he’s working in his lab or studying.”

Right, no one would question that coming from the Butcher of the Brumal or a senior at Vail University.

“This is the second time he’s slipped up in front of you,” Bay said. “That’s never happened before. Even I haven’t seen him locked in psychosis since we were children. He insists on handling it all himself, but that can only last for so long without error. That’s why I’d hoped you could be good for him. Sometimes a drastic change is all it takes to shake something loose. ”

Madden had purposefully allowed those people at the race to get too close to him, sensing Berga’s gaze on him from the crowd. He’d wanted to test the waters, see if Berga was the type who would withdraw at the sight of potential competition to protect himself, or if he’d get jealous and speak up. It’d seemed like it was going the way of the latter, at least up until he’d started hallucinating.

“What does he see?” He’d been speaking to someone when Madden had rushed over, someone who wasn’t really there. “It’s a girl…” That was all he’d been able to gather. Someone who’d clearly caused Berga a lot of trauma.

Bay hesitated, glancing between him and the unconscious Butcher before coming to a decision. “It’s his sister.”

Madden couldn’t help but frown. He didn’t recall there being another child to Berga’s parents. But then again…The Obsidian family had only appeared on his radar when he’d been in middle school and considered old enough to attend formal functions. Bay had said before this all started when Berga was a young child.

“She died,” Bay said, clearly seeing Madden had come to that conclusion on his own already. “It was an accident, but his parents never quite got over the loss, and in the beginning, they blamed Berga because it was easier for them that way.”

“What?” He’d always thought highly of Ford and Vista Obsidian.

Not anymore .

“No one speaks about her,” Bay kept going. “At first, because his parents didn’t want to hear it, but later for worry it would set Berga off.”

“Does everyone in the Satellite know?”

“Probably to some degree. They’re all very close, even if they don’t always seem like it. But I don’t think he’s explained it in detail to anyone except for Flix and Baikal. Flix was there that day, so he saw everything take place after the accident himself. He was friends with the both of them, so he didn’t take the loss well either.”

Was that why they were so close? Had they bonded over that shared tragedy?

There was a shout from outside, but before Madden could fully rise from the bed, it was followed quickly by a massive explosion.

As if tonight couldn’t get any worse.