Page 15 of Twisted Truths (The Sunburnt Hearts #4)

Chapter Eleven

HADLEY

M y hands shake as I listen to the sounds in Guardian Solomon’s house, mapping out in my mind where Gianna, Brielle, Samantha, and Ascendant Sierra are.

I know what I’m about to do is risky, especially after I almost got caught by Gabriel last week, but I also know I have no choice.

Now, more than ever, I have to make sure he’s safe.

I have to see with my own eyes that nothing has happened to him since Sunday.

All week, I have done everything within my power to avoid Gabriel.

Apparently, I was concerned for nothing.

This morning, Gianna told me she heard he’d gone to meet his parents in Sydney for a few days.

I’m hoping it’s true, because I can’t risk him showing up again like he did last week.

Now he knows I knew Zara, doing what I’m about to do is even more dangerous.

Swallowing down my fear, I hurry down the hall and slip through the door at the end. Tiptoeing across the room, I peer down at his sleeping form, a silent tear slipping down my cheek. He will never know his mother .

“I don’t know how,” I whisper. “But I will honour her last wish. I promise I’ll keep you safe.”

A warm body presses up against my back, and before I can scream, a hand clamps over my mouth. “Are you going to tell me how you knew Zara now?” Gabriel murmurs in my ear.

Tension vibrates through my body, and my mind races as fast as my heart. How am I going to talk my way out of this?

“If I release you, will you stay quiet?”

With no other choice, I nod, and while his hand disappears from my mouth, he doesn’t move away from me. Instead, he leans over my shoulder and looks down at the sleeping baby.

“His name is Franklin,” he says, running a gentle caress over the child’s dark hair. He stirs, and I hold my breath, but he doesn’t wake. Gabriel smiles tenderly. “Zara was adamant we name him that.”

A wave of emotion washes over me as I recall Zara telling me how she chose the name for its meaning. Freedom. All she wanted was for the two of them to be free. Now, she’s dead and her ten-week-old son will never know his maternal family.

My throat tightens at the thought of Nash—his intense brown eyes, his strong hands that steadied me, and the way my body tingled from his touch. Nash doesn’t even know his nephew exists.

As if reading my mind, he asks, “Did you tell Nash about him?”

Unable to speak, I simply shake my head.

“Why?”

“W-what?” I whisper, my breath hitching. Being this close to Gabriel is unnerving me.

“Why didn’t you tell him about Zara’s child?”

“It’s against the rules.”

“You are very well-versed on what is proper within the Circle,” he muses, his steel gaze drifting from Franklin’s sleeping form to meet mine. “Yet I find you in here.”

My pulse quickens as I realise how much trouble I’m in.

Somehow, it hasn’t gotten back to Seraphina that Gabriel switched my role last Sunday, or that he came to check on me after my fainting spell, but being found in the guardian nursery is so much worse than being caught talking to him.

I’m terrified I’ll be cast out with nowhere to go, that I will have let Zara down.

“What will happen to me?” I somehow manage to ask.

“Nothing.” Gabriel’s face remains impassive, which doesn’t reassure me in the slightest.

“N-nothing?”

“Nothing,” he repeats, stepping back slightly so I have room to turn and face him.

Despite the fear coursing through my veins, I force myself to meet his heavy gaze. “Why are you sparing me?”

“Who said I was sparing you?” He tilts his head to the side studying me. I shiver as his eyes travel over the length of my body before returning to my face.

“What do you want?”

Ignoring my question, he asks another of his own. “Why did you come here, Hadley?”

I glance down at Franklin, but Gabriel shakes his head.

“Not this room. Why did you come to the Circle? How did you even find us?”

Pain squeezes around my chest. “I was looking for Madeline.”

His huff of laughter is humourless. “She wouldn’t want this for you. Maddy didn’t want you here.”

“What would you know?” I demand, my surge of anger making me forget who I’m talking to and where we are .

Gabriel’s palm slaps over my mouth, his steel gaze darting to the door behind him. “Fuck. Do you have a death wish?”

Fear grips me as I realise what I’ve done. Fighting back the tears threatening to fall, I wrench out of his grasp and rush towards the door.

“You’re flirting with danger, Hadley.” he calls after me.

My thoughts swirl as I pass the bathroom, desperate to get as far away from Gabriel as possible. Ascendant Sierra calls after me, but I ignore her and Gianna, bursting through the front door and down the steps.

With no path in mind, I hurry away, not surprised in the least when I find myself dropping to my knees in front of my sister’s grave.

“I’m in trouble,” I whisper, tears streaming unchecked down my cheeks as I rub a smudge of dirt from the white cross with her name carved into it. “I’m in so much trouble, Maddy, and I don’t know what to do. I have nowhere to go.”

The reality hits me hard.

I have nowhere to go.

“What am I supposed to do?”

The sound of twigs snapping behind me causes me to scramble to my feet and dash into the bush, where I hide behind a tree.

I clamp a hand over my mouth, trying to calm my breathing.

Heavy footsteps crunch through the clearing, and I shrink further into my hiding spot.

There are a dozen graves besides Madeline’s and my unnamed niece, but I’ve never seen anyone else out here in my time at the commune.

I simply assumed the others had no family here.

Seraphina made it clear when she took me to visit Madeline that the focus of the Sunfire Circle is looking to the future and not reliving the past. It was why she wanted me to avoid Gabriel, and why she warned me about staying away from my sister’s grave.

Sometimes I wonder why she let me stay when she seemed so concerned about how he would react to my presence.

“Hey, firecracker.” The low timber of Gabriel’s voice catches me off-guard. “I hope you’re still causing havoc wherever you are. Give Annie a kiss for me.” He pauses, and when he speaks again, his voice cracks. “Tell her to take care of her mama.”

Pain lances through my chest. Annie was our mother’s name.

“I’m starting to realise fiery red heads run in your family.

” Gabriel chuckles, the sound foreign to my ears.

“I met Hadley. Believe it or not, I actually thought she was your ghost. Fuck, Maddy. I don’t know what to do.

Your sister has no sense of self-preservation, and it’s way too dangerous for her here.

Remember the local girl I told you about?

The one who came to me looking for refuge?

She’s dead. They killed her whole family and framed it to look like she did it.

Dad swears they had nothing to do with it, but I don’t know.

They didn’t like me going against our customs with Zara, just as they didn’t like when I went against them for you.

But I can’t keep being a pawn in their game.

I don’t want to be a pawn in their game. ”

My blood runs cold. What game? Who are ‘they’? Is he referring to his parents, or the commune as a whole?

A knot forms in my stomach as I piece together what little I know. Zara was always cryptic about why she didn’t feel safe here, and I thought it was because the rumours about Gabriel were true. Now, I’m not so sure.

“I promise, firecracker, I’ll do whatever it takes to keep Hadley safe. Even if it means bringing them down.”

His footsteps fade away, but I remain in my hiding spot long after he’s gone. It appears the Sunfire Circle is shrouded in secrets, and nothing is as it seems.

Not ready to face Ascendent Sierra to explain myself for running off, my feet carry me farther into the bush.

I follow the trail I used to walk with Zara until I come to the river.

I climb onto the large rock we used to sit and talk, tucking my legs up to my chest and resting my chin on my knees.

The way the midday sunlight filters through the trees and reflects off the water, I don’t notice that I have company until he moves.

Nash.

I blink, certain I’m hallucinating, but when my eyes open again, he’s still standing across the river watching me. I’m frozen to the spot, but he moves closer to the water’s edge.

With the practised ease of someone who has done it a million times before, he crosses the river using the large boulders that jut out like ancient stepping stones. His sneakers find each one without hesitation, and before I know it, he’s standing a few feet in front of me, a wry grin on his lips.

“And here I was, wondering if I’d ever see you again.”

My chest flutters at the gravelly quality of his voice. What is happening to me? I should not be entertaining these crazy feelings. Not with Zara’s brother. This is so wrong.

Casting a quick glance over my shoulder, half expecting to find Gabriel behind me, I turn back to Nash and ask, “What are you doing here?”

He shrugs, his hands buried in his pockets. “Looking for you.”

I ignore the heat rushing to my cheeks and focus on the warning sirens going off in my head. Being here with him is dangerous, and I’m terrified of the consequences if we’re caught. “You shouldn’t be,” I say, but my words lack conviction.

Nash tilts his head, studying me with those too-sharp eyes.

“Is that so?” His tone is light, but there’s an undercurrent in the meaning behind his words.

After a tension-filled beat, he expels a deep breath and runs one of his hands through his dark curls.

“I’m not trying to get you in trouble, Hadley. I only want to talk.”

“To me?”

“To you.”

“Why?”

“Because you knew Zara.”

Knew Zara.

Past tense.

Swallowing, I force myself to look away from him. “I told you, I don’t know?—”