No family or friends in this town. No one would notice if I disappeared. Just me and a man who would never stop hunting me.
And then there were these three. These strange, intense, inexplicable men who kept showing up when I needed them. Who looked at me with emotions I couldn’t name.
Who, unironically, made me feel safe against all logic and reason.
And maybe this was the worst decision I’d ever make.
But Hudson got through a locked door in minutes. No bolt, no painted-shut window, no cheap inn lock was going to stop him. Three men who could kick down a door faster than he could gave me better odds than anything I’d find on my own.
I wasn’t trusting them,I told myself. It was more of a survival instinct and picking the safer bet.
“Can I...” My voice cracked. “Can I stay with you? Just until I figure out what to do.”
Percy’s whole face lit up. Solomon’s mask cracked, just for a second, revealing a bit of hope. And Lucian’s permanent scowl softened into an expression I couldn’t read.
“Yes,” Lucian said. His voice was rough. “For as long as you need.”
The way he said it, it sounded permanent.
Here goes another bad decision, I guess.
I followed them out of the ruined room and into the cold morning.
This is hoping to God I hadn’t just walked out of one nightmare and straight into a worse one.
4
— • —
Solomon
I drove because neither of them could be trusted.
Lucian would have turned the car around by now, hunting Hudson through every back road until he found the bastard and peeled his skin off in strips. Percy would have talked until Mira jumped out of a moving vehicle just to escape the noise.
So I drove. Hands steady on the wheel, eyes fixed on the road, every other sense tuned to the woman in my backseat.
She’d curled herself knees to chest, arms wrapped tight, shoulders pressed against the door as if she was ready to bail at the first opportunity. My jacket still hung around her and the sight of her wrapped in my scent made my wolf pace restlessly beneath my skin.
My scent was already doing what I wouldn’t let my hands do. Seeping into the lining of that jacket and every minute she wore it, the transfer deepened. My wolf wanted her drenched in it. I could feel the pull in my chest, the instinct pushing my scent outward in waves.
Mine. Ours. Claim her. Keep her.
Her fingers found the jacket’s collar and tugged it higher, pressing her nose into the fabric. An unconscious gesture. She didn’t know what she was breathing in or why her body craved it.
But I knew.
I shoved the instinct down. She wasn’t ready for that.
Through the rearview mirror, I catalogued her. The copper bleeding through her dark hair dye, bright against the morning light. The way she kept her left eye angled away from me, probably self-conscious about her heterochromia. The faint tremor in her hands that she tried to hide by tucking them under her arms.
The oversized hospital scrubs did nothing to hide the curve of her hips, the swell of her breasts beneath the thin fabric. My hands tightened on the steering wheel as I forced my gaze back to the road.
I noticed everything. It was what I did. What I’d always done.
The slight hitch in her breathing whenever Percy moved too fast in the passenger seat. How her eyes cut to the side mirror every few minutes, watching the road to check if we were being followed. I angled my rearview mirror wider so she could see theempty road behind us. Her shoulders dropped a fraction of an inch.
Two years. That piece of shit had spent two years conditioning her to expect violence from anyone around her. Teaching her that hands were weapons and raised voices meant pain.
