Every night, we won’t let her forget. Our touch upon her flesh. Our breath on her skin. Our brand on her ass.
“We’ll winterize it,” I say, stepping forward, my voice carrying through the open door. She startles, glancing back at me. “Board it up. You can sell it later. Leave it behind.”
It’s not a request.
She stares at me, and I see it—the challenge tightening in her jaw, the questions she’s still too stubborn to swallow. “And what if I want to come back?”
There it is. That flicker of defiance. A subtle challenge. Brave. Foolish.
I step inside, the old floorboards protesting under my boots. Jude crosses the distance, following me inside.
“You won’t,” I tell her, closing the distance between us. “Your home is with us now. The sooner you accept that, the better. There’s no escaping it, Briella.”
Her chin lifts. She’s shaking, but she stands her ground. I admire the heat and fury dancing together in those wild, stubborn eyes. “And when you get sick of me? What then? Will my new home be with those bones in your pit?”
Jude shifts beside me, silent as stone, but his presence is both a warning and an anchor.
I reach out, gripping her chin harder than I should, tilting her face up to mine. “The only way your bones end up there, little witch, is if ours are with you. Because you’re not going anywhere. We’re keeping you. To the grave. And beyond.”
I watch the pulse flutter in her throat, the war in her eyes. She pushes back, because she always does.
“How can you just…take it away?” she demands, her hazel eyes burning. “After everything—the Initiation—how can you take my freedom like this?”
My grip softens, just enough to keep her still. I lean in, so close my words ghost across her lips. “Your version of freedom is flimsy at best. Your purest freedom is with us.” I glance around the room—the plants, the half-packed bags, the false safety this place gave her. “Here, you had your plants. With us, you will have your plants, a greenhouse, purpose that comes with valuable hard work. And five men who would tear the world in half, set it on fire, and gift you the ashes to scatter in hell.”
Her eyes glisten, still fighting.
“And what if you get tired of me? What if one day I go too far, say too much, and you finally snap and?—”
I silence her the only way I know how—my mouth crashing into hers, brutal and searing, a promise written in teeth and breath and heat. I grip the small of her back, regardless of her raw wounds, reminding her of that promise.
At first, she fights me, a weak fight with her fists pushing my chest. But they flatten instead, her palms stationed above my heart as she opens for me, giving me her taste, her scent. Along with my control over her, every vision of her during the Initiation fuels me. The power gets me hard every time. Not the desire. And certainly no empathy, though I understand her mind more than anyone in the world.
Her heart? That is for the rest of them…even Rory. Eventually.
When I pull back, her lips are red, her breathing ragged.
“You areusnow,” I growl, my forehead resting against hers. “Blood-bound. Five chains around you. Not to trap you—to keepyou. You’re the eye. The point of convergence. Our core. And that’s final.”
She blinks up at me, trembling, angry, aching.
And I know she feels it too—whether she admits it yet or not.
After Jude helps her load her luggage into the truck, we move on to the plants. The light in her bedroom is soft, golden, catching on the leaves of a fern she’s cradling in her arms like a damn infant.
It’s ridiculous. She’s trying to juggle the quilt and pillows from her bed in one hand and the potted fern in the other. I watch her stumble, nearly knocking into the wall.
I sigh. “For fuck’s sake, Briella—give me the fern.”
She stiffens. “No. I’ll carry it.”
Stubborn to the end.
She shoves the blanket and pillows at me instead, and I take them, rolling my eyes. But something’s off. There’s a nervous twitch in her jaw, an unease in the way she holds the plant too tightly, her fingers white-knuckled around the ceramic pot.
I frown. “What are you hiding, Briella?”
She forces a smile. Too quick. Too tight. “Nothing. It’s just…sentimental. Nothing you would understand.”
