“We’ll figure this out,” he insists, flying through the side streets to reach our house, a meager amount of distress mixed in with his leftover triumphant glee and a whole lot of compassion. “We will not fucking lose her, Tytan. Do. Not. Go there. She fits. She’s ours. We just have to be strategic.”
Gage, Wells, and Liam are the only ones who could truly relate to this terror. Celeste and Ivy have experienced loss, but the guys and I have spent much of our lives in Hell. So, Gage and I both sense eternal damnation coming for us. I could stomach that.I’ve been immersed inside and survived the scorching blaze for as long as I can remember. But it’s clearer than ever that I’ve sentenced Rena to join me in the hellfire and there’s no way to free her.
“My time is up,” I mumble, knowing there’s only one way around this. And that, too, is a ticket into the depths of Hades.
“Yep,” he replies, catching my meaning. “I’ll call this into the Murphy line, so the Chief can get ahead of it.”
He’s referring to Well’s emergency line. Like Murphy’s Law—whatever can go wrong will go wrong. This certainly applies.
“You get our girl.” He pats my back in a gesture of reassurance, but my weary bones and muscles are too numb to heed it.
If her brothers weren’t already going to want to kill me, they will after what I’m about to do.
RENA
The irate din of the shower drones, rousing me from my sleep. You’d think that would be an odd way to describe water, but trauma and heightened emotions have a way of bleeding into the atmosphere, infiltrating everything in their wake.
Inanimate objects absorb the torment.
Walls whisper.
Water croons a woeful hymn.
I’m not sure how I know it or why the very molecules of the air are agitated, the atoms in a frenzy. It’s like Ty’s nightmare. I woke before he started stirring, as though my bones ached for him, my skin itching with his discomfort before he even expressed it.
It was the way the room felt the night my parents died. Even the log walls harbored shock and grief. They pulsated with anticipation, withering from the heat of the blaze. The charred memories. Miles away, and smog billowed around us. Hazy.
And when we got the call about Mercy being beaten and left for dead, the floor and ceiling palpitated as the phone trilled, alertingus that life was about to be upended. There was a buzzing from the fluorescent bulbs in the hospital as the doctor said it would be touch and go for the first twenty-four hours. And everything about the dingy tiles and drab colors and framed, painted flowers cried out that she was leaning toward thegoscenario.
Even when she pulled through and Ryker’s shoulders garnered a brief reprieve from convulsing in grief, the world was an apocalyptic gray.
That same supernatural caution happened when Ivy wentmissing, and no one would tell me anything. But it was there, lurking in the silence. In the lack of answers. Remaining even when she showed up at our door and reverberating in the empty space she left behind until we were notified that her father passed away.
Sometimes, I miss the signs, or the world is simply too flippant or fickle to share for certain occasions. The afternoon that Celeste and Ivy were abducted from the dress shop by the Skulls, I didn’t sense a thing. We were laughing when that bomb crashed through our glee.
Oblivious.
But that’s not the case here.
So, yeah, the water slapping against the marble tiles screams agony. Which is why I roll out of bed and promptly pad across the floor to the en suite, ignoring the hole in the plaster, like we did all day. Because we both know I fucking pushed, and that was wrong. Except if I hadn’t, I might not feel so entitled to ogle the tawny-brown god before me.
Inked. And chiseled. And downright delicious.
Beads of water shrewdly cling to him. They’re no fools. Angry maybe, but still gripping the goods—his taut, corded back muscles, thick thighs, and the round globes of his ass.
His eyes slice to mine over his shoulder, and in his gaze, I see the most unfiltered Ty I’ve ever glimpsed.
Broken and devastated. Shaken and guilty.
My heart rattles in my chest. “What happened? Is Gage okay?”
“He’s fine.” His answer fills the steamy bathroom with stern finality, a gravelly rumble echoing off the solid surfaces, but I swear he’s cloaked in failure.
“Did you not … were you able …” I’m not sure how to phrase my inquiry. I’ve been privy to how my brothers conduct business matters with those who wronged us, but we don’t talk about it. Never. We talk around it.
“Neutralized.” It’s one curt word, leaving me more confused than ever. Baffled as to why he’s so despondent if he accomplished what he’d set out to do.
He twists the faucet knob, and when the water retreats, he slicks the scattered and trickling beads off his skin. His flattened hands glide over his arms, then his pecs and torso, and finally, he lifts each leg to swipe at the droplets. It’s weird. Does everyone do that? Am I missing a step? All I ever do is grab a towel. I don’t think my shower rituals are what’s important tonight though.
