Those are important questions that he won’t be getting an answer to just yet. Not when pounding on the front door rattles his already frayed nerves. Suddenly, nothing else matters except making sure whatever is out there doesn’t end up in here.
Wyatt grabs the gun and rushes out into the living area as the third thump shakes the frame, meeting Addison and Emma, who look at him like he can resolve this apparent home invasion.
He steps in front of them, raising the gun.
It all happens faster than he can process until three men spill into the front room. Wyatt doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger, hoping he’ll have time to take out the other two after the first one drops, but there is only a click where a bullet should be, sending a chill deep into his bones and reminding him that Addison removed the clip.
“Hello there, friend.” The one in front says with that same slight accent he’s grown used to hearing come from Addison’s lips. “I believe that’s my wife and child behind you.”
.
Chapter 17
Wyatt isn’t sure who he expected to come through that door, but it absolutely was not her piece of shit husband.
The sight of him feels like a crack in reality, ruining the illusion of domesticity he and Addison have crafted.
There’s a momentary lapse in silence among the group as multiple levels of confusion blanket them. He casts a glance at Addison, who hasn’t moved an inch or said a word. Her arms hold Emma close as they stand behind him, her eyes fixed on the man ahead as if he manifested like a ghost from her darkest nightmares.
She looks smaller somehow, folded inward around her daughter, like the only thing she’s learned to expect from this man is another blow.
At first, Wyatt considered that the husband might be a figment of her imagination, conjured up to keep him from stepping over any lines. As time went on, he realized that wasn’t the case, but beyond assuming him dead at the teeth of a rotter, he hadn’t put much thought into what might happen should they be reunited.
Imagining it always ended the same. With the only person he’s come to care about in what feels like forever, torn away one way or another.
“I thought you were dead,” Addison says. Her voice doesn’t shake, but the hurt beneath it is unmistakable. It’s quieter than the anger she gave Wyatt when he confessed to his lies. Detached in a way that shows she let go of this relationship long before he returned. “Or that you left us for good. Where have you been all this time?”
There’s a brief flash of guilt across the other man’s face at her accusation before he schools his features back into a neutral mask. “I got held up, but I’m here now. And I found our brothers, David and Conrad. We’ve come to collect you for the rest of the journey.”
Her eyes narrow. “It’s been weeks. What could have held you up all this time that didn’t actually kill you?”
“Come now, we have little time to spare and a long road ahead. I’m only grateful to find you both well. Come.” He snaps his fingers with barely hidden annoyance, as if that will manifest his wife and child at his side.
The sound echoes louder than it should, sharp and possessive, and something ugly coils tight in Wyatt’s chest.
If this had happened yesterday or the day before, his reaction would be far different, but Wyatt expects nothing from her after their recent discussion. She would be right to leave him, even if going with this fucker isn’t the smartest option in terms of survival. So he waits. Shifting his gaze between the two, ready to see if he gets exactly what he deserves or if he’s offered a second chance.
“I no longer share your desire to make it to Sedona.” She raises her chin. “We will be staying, but I wish you the best in your travels.”
The words are calm and controlled.
She’s lost a bit of her formal, matter-of-fact pattern of speaking since he’s met her, and it’s jarring to hear it come back full force. The fact that she’s allowed herself to slip in Wyatt’spresence at all suddenly feels like a victory he didn’t realize he earned.
It’s a fragile new aspect of her personality that he wishes he had more time to encourage.
There’s a twitch of anger in Vincent’s expression as he steps forward, reaching out to grab for Emma. “My patience grows thin with you, my darling. We will have plenty of time to—”
Wyatt steps between them in a move that’s far from the smartest thing he’s done recently, considering he’s a few feet from a bullet up the nose. “She said she’s staying. You know where the exit is since you broke the damn thing.”
His heart slams hard enough to rattle his ribs, but his feet stay planted.
In his periphery, the barrels pointed at him get slightly closer, and while every inch of closing distance should ratchet up the fear for his life, all he can feel at the moment is rage that this asshole has the balls to come crawling back after disappearing into the void for a month.
“Getting between a man and his family is dangerous business,” Vincent says calmly.
“I think they stopped being family when you left them behind in the middle of an apocalypse.”
Her husband’s patience runs just as thin as Vincent warned because that’s all it takes for him to raise his gun in an attempt to be rid of Wyatt. What the hell is he supposed to do, though? Stand here and allow her to be hauled away against her will? If he takes a bullet for trying to protect them both, then so be it. Not like he has much other reason to stick around these days.
