Chapter Three
Klarissa woke to softlight spilling across the infirmary.Her body ached, stitched and bruised, but her mind sharpened quickly.The first thing she saw made her pause.Rune was slumped in an armchair beside her bed, head tilted back, one hand dangling carelessly over the armrest.He wore jeans and a simple black t-shirt stretched over broad shoulders, his bare feet propped on the edge of her bed as if he had claimed the space as his own.
He was beautiful in a way that made her breath catch.His Southeast Asian heritage was etched into every line of him—smooth, darker skin, almond-shaped eyes even closed still showing their sharpness, and black hair cut short on the sides but longer on top, fallen in soft strands across his forehead.Klarissa found herself absurdly captivated by the sight of a man in jeans and bare feet, because somehow, impossibly, it was sexy.Powerful and ordinary all at once.
She knew, without a shred of doubt, that this was Rune and not Kamon.Instinct told her as much, the way her battered heart recognized him.Her gaze drifted around the room until it landed on Kamon.He lay stretched out on the couch against the far wall, one arm thrown over his head, his bare feet hanging over the end.A blanket had once covered him but now lay in a heap on the floor.Where Rune seemed carved from steady flame, Kamon radiated relaxed chaos.And still, they both pulled at something inside her that terrified her as much as it soothed.
Her chest tightened as memories shoved forward.Nashville.The stench of blood.Her father’s men falling one by one as she fought her way free.She had killed them.Had to.And the memory made her stomach roil, her body shudder.She shifted slightly, trying to push the images back, but pain erupted as stitches pulled across her side.A gasp tore free.
Instantly both men moved.Rune was on his feet, chair scraping, eyes sharp with concern.“Suuway—easy.”His voice was low, urgent.Kamon pushed off the couch at the same time, but his foot snagged on the discarded blanket.He stumbled forward with a curse.
Rune shot him a sharp grin even as he reached for Klarissa.“Smooth, brother.Real graceful.”
Kamon glared at him, but his focus swung immediately back to her.“Waan jai, let’s get you something to eat and some pain killers.We don’t like seeing you in pain.”
Klarissa blinked between them.“What do those words mean?Suuway?Waan jai?And what language is that?”
Rune’s expression softened, the corner of his mouth lifting.“They’re Thai.Suuwaymeans beautiful.”
Kamon crouched by her side, his hand hovering close but not touching where her stitches tugged.“Waan jaimeans sweetheart.They’re endearments.We have called you that since you drove that truly offensive old-as-fuck car onto the Pride’s front lawn, and we caught your scent.We call you that because you are beautiful, and you are our sweetheart, and you are most definitely ours.”
Emotion swelled in her chest, complicated and overwhelming.Although she liked—no, loved—hearing that from them, she struggled to understand why they would.And she still believed she was unworthy of it.Rather than address that, she clung to the portion of what Kamon had said that she felt comfortable talking about.
“Thailand,” she murmured.“I lived there once.Not in a village, but in Bangkok a few years ago.I—worked—there for about eighteen months.The noise, the food stalls, the colors...I loved it all.The temples, the floating markets, the way the air smelled like spice and rain.”
Rune brushed a hand gently over hers.“We were raised in the north.A smaller village of shifters, and we lived a simpler life.Tigers ran in the blood of our family, and those of our village.”
Kamon smiled faintly.“But Bangkok was where we went to train when the ESE called us.You’d have liked the chaos there too.”
Klarissa’s lips curved faintly.“Yes, I liked the chaos.Maybe because it was the opposite of my work—where everything had to be ordered and structured, every variable controlled.The streets of Bangkok were unpredictable, wild, and alive.It was freedom, in its own way.”
She shifted the conversation, watching them closely.“What exactly is the ESE?How does that call even happen?”
Rune leaned forward, his dark eyes intent.“The Elite Shifter Enforcers don’t recruit lightly.Tiger shifters have certain traits—stealth, patience, precision.We’re trackers, hunters.No one can hide from us for long.That’s why we were chosen.To be the ones who could slip into shadows and find what others couldn’t.”
Kamon nodded, his voice dropping lower.“Tigers are rare,waan jai.Too rare.Our kind has lost many loved ones over the years to poachers who see only pelts and trophies instead of people.That’s why we fight so hard—to make sure no one else has to lose family the way we did.”
Both men flinched at the same time, eyes shadowed by memory.Klarissa felt a sharp ache in her chest, as if she had been the one to carry that loss.Before the heaviness could anchor them, she drew in a shaky breath and offered, “You know, I was in Bangkok duringSongkran—the water festival.I thought I was clever, dodging the kids with buckets.Then an old grandmother nailed me with a hose so strong I nearly fell into the gutter.She laughed so hard she couldn’t breathe.I’ve never felt so soaked and so alive at the same time.”
Her voice softened, coaxing them out of the shadows of memory.“Chaos can be good sometimes.It reminds us we’re still here.”
Klarissa let her head fall back against the pillow, absorbing their words.There was something grounding in learning these details, small pieces of the men who seemed to have stepped out of shadow and fate to claim her.The strange bond that existed between them deepened with every exchange, stitching them together as surely as the healer had stitched her wounds.
They helped her carefully to the bathroom, steadying her as though she was something fragile, though the fire in her veins told her she was anything but.Despite their much-needed help, she was grateful that they also gave her the privacy she needed to take care of things.When she was done, she stepped out of the bathroom, determined to make it back to bed on her own steam.
“You’re really that stubborn you’d try walking back without us?”Rune teased, one brow arched.
