“Any word from the Alpha team?” I murmured to Harper, tearing my gaze from the black and white image on the screen in front of me to the bank statement splayed out on the desk.
So much money. Hunting Hale was a slow damn death, bleeding me dry financially.
“None as yet, although tonight they found Konstance Lane’s premises empty and his prized Maserati gone. All of his bank accounts have been cleaned out. Three billion and change.”
“They’re all running.”
“They’re all running,” he confirmed. “All we need is one of them to lift their heads and we have them. I promise you, London. I will have them before they even know anyone is watching. I’ll track them back to Hale and we’ll have that bastard before he even knows what hit him.”
I closed my eyes. All I saw was that steel table and the cold, clammy skin of the body they’d pulled from the river. “He’s not dead, Harper. I know it in my gut, he’s not dead.”
“Then you keep listening to that and we’ll be there to do whatever it takes to find the bastard and bring him and this whole foul fucking Order to the ground.”
I’d never felt so thankful to have my friends and family. Never been so thankful to have them alive and breathing and under my roof. Silas Ares’ haunted eyes pushed into my mind. There were others out there not as lucky, others left trying to figure out how to pick up the pieces and move on. I didn’t want that. God, I didn’t want that.
An ache ripped across my chest. My senses sharpened, forcing me to open my eyes as a shadow spilled into the doorway. Then she was there, biting her lip, hovering like only Vivienne King could hover. Those big brown eyes wandered across the room before settling on me.
Fuck, she made me feel dangerous.
“Keep me updated,” I directed.
“Every damn step of the way.”
Then he was gone, leaving me sitting there with the phone against my damn ear, nervous as hell. I don’t get nervous, only around her. I slowly lowered the phone and waited. She walked in, those hips sashaying, and I was transfixed by the movement. Just wait until her belly was big and round and full with my—
“You don’t want us to meet, do you?”
I didn’t need to be psychic to know what was running through her mind. “No, I don’t.”
She didn’t flinch, just held my stare. Christ, she was tough now. So goddamn tough…and mesmerizing. I rose from my seat, fighting the urge to look at the black and white images from the gynecologist that had held me transfixed for the last two hours.
I rounded the desk and stopped in front of her. “If I could hide you away forever, then I would.” She crossed her arms, looking up at me as I brushed my fingers across her cheek. “If I could just have us…” I looked down at her stomach. “I would keep you hidden forever. Even if you hated me for it. Even if you…refused me. I would gladly accept that.”
“Why?” Her stare bored right through me. “Why go through all that?”
I scowled. “Why?” She still didn’t get it.
I lowered my head, my voice husky against her ear. “Because I’d do anything to keep you. I’ve killed for just the idea of you. I’ve strangled. I’ve stabbed. I’ve murdered men in their sleep and men staring into my eyes. I’ve ended men as they begged and as they’ve raged. And I’ve done it all because you and our children and my sons are my everything. You want to know why I don’t want you even in the same city as your sister, and I’ll tell you. The only thing Hale wants more than my head on a damn pike is Weylyn King. Hale not only wants to bring the man he once thought of as a mentor to his knees, he wants to destroy him and his bloodline, even if it’s a bloodline he created. He stole the man’s DNA just so he could create women he could use. You and Ryth are that bloodline, the only way Hale can get to King. The man has faked his own death, just so he can disappear. He’s never been more dangerous than he is right now. So, if it takes keeping you away from Ryth to protect you from Hale and The Order, then that’s what I’ll do…even if it…” I winced. “Even if it hurts you.”
Tears welled in her eyes.
She was fighting them, swallowing the hard lump in the back of her throat. I closed my eyes and pulled her against me, wrapping my arms around her tight. “I love you. I love you so fucking much it scares me. I don’t want—” Jesus. “I don’t want to lose you, any of you. I almost lost Colt. I almost lost my son. I can’t go through that again.”
She trembled, holding her composure for a second before she broke, wrapping her arms around me and burying her head against my chest. Her heavy sobs were fists against my chest. Still, she said nothing, just wept until there was silence.
“You can hate me,” I reassured her.
There was a shake of her head before she lifted her gaze to mine. “I don’t hate you, London. I could never hate you.”
I wiped a tear from her cheek. “But you should. You should hate me very much and my sons, as well.”
“Never,” a voice came from the doorway.
I glanced toward the sound, finding Carven standing there, his piercing blue eyes fixed on mine. He moved to her other side.
“You are the only reason we’re alive, the only reason I have my brother.” He glanced at Vivienne. “The only reason we have the woman we all love. Familia est omnia.”
“Family is everything,” I whispered huskily.
“Family is everything.”
I met her stare, knowing exactly what she was thinking. Family was indeed everything, and she was being torn apart because of it. Blood. Heart. I was forcing her to choose. No, I was making the choice for her, which was worse.
“I’ll do it.” I scowled. “I’ll make a way you can see your sister. I’ll keep you safe.”
Her eyes widened. “Really?”
I brushed her hair behind her ear. “Really.”
That sad, beaming fucking smile made me feel like a bastard. I lowered my head, tasting those salty tears on the edges of her lips, before I took her mouth deeper. She responded instantly, not a second of hesitation as she wrapped her arms around my shoulders and pulled me harder against her.
Fuck if this wasn’t something worth dying for.
She was worth dying for.
I speared my fingers through her hair, pressing her ear against my hand, holding on as I deepened the kiss, until she broke away. I lifted my head and looked at Carven next to her. He cupped her jaw and turned her head until he could kiss her.
My pulse thundered.
My breath stilled.
Watching my son with the woman I loved.
It was wrong. I knew that. But the booming in my ears drowned out any nagging worry as Carven took a step and pushed her against me. Love her, he was saying. Touch her. I reached up and gently gripped her throat as their kiss deepened until her cheeks were flushed.
Fuck, I loved that.
Desire hit me hard, making my cock harden.
In an instant, this turned into something else. Something more desperate. Something carnal. She unleashed a moan. Her hand wrapped around my wrist as she leaned against me. Carven turned desperately, breaking away from her mouth to lift his gaze to mine.
His look said it all.
Can we?
I’d shared her with Carven before, but that’d been different. That’d been all fire, all desperation, when we’d been mindless with worry, searching for Colt. But this…
This felt real.
“Do you want this?” he asked the both of us.
“Yes,” she answered instantly. “I need this.”
She needed it. I thought about the implications for us together. My son was all fire…and I was stone. The last thing I wanted was to hurt her. “Are you sure about this?” I questioned.
She nodded, reached up to grasp the back of my neck, and drew my mouth to hers. I kissed her, my pulse beating a thousand miles an hour. A low moan echoed in her chest, sending the vibration through her mouth and into mine.
Jesus.
My body responded, a little too fucking eagerly as my cock punched against my zipper. My hands were all over her, then I grasped her head to turn her toward me.
I fought my own hunger to break away from her mouth and murmur. “Colt?”
“He’s in the gym,” Carven answered. “Has been for the last two hours and will be all night by the way he was looking.”
I met her stare. “My bedroom, then.”
Her cheeks flushed. One careful nod was all she gave before I reached down, grasped her around the hips, and lifted. Her legs wound around me as I turned and headed for the door. Voices from the guards came from outside. But I ignored them, sliding my hands along the backs of her thighs as we headed past the kitchen and toward the private wing.
Clang!
The sound of weights echoed along the hall.
CLANG!
Carven followed, barely a step behind, as we headed for my bedroom. My steps slowed as I took her weight with one hand and opened the door. Then we were inside, sinking into the gloomy shadows. She’d barely spent any time in here, occupied with Colt and Carven. That was the way it should be, the way I wanted it to be.
I stopped at the edge of the bed, staring into her eyes.
“You sure you don’t want to take me to the room?”
CLANG!
“No.” I shook my head, seeing the black and white images of our children. “No, not while there’s a chance of hurting you…or the babies.”
She frowned, a furrow between her brows deepening. “Hurt the babies?”
I eased her down until her feet hit the floor. “So we just take it a little easy,” I murmured, brushing my curled fingers along her jaw. “Until all three of you are out of danger.”
Carven closed the bedroom door behind him and crossed the space, stopping at her back. She lifted her gaze to me as he reached around and worked the buttons of her blouse. “Pet,” I whispered, watching as her blouse opened, then slowly fell away.
“Yes, Daddy?” she answered.
My cock twitched at the word.
Only she could make me feel like this. My lips curled as her bra was unhooked and discarded. Her breasts were full and round, the soft peaks of her nipples tightening under my gaze. I brushed my thumb across the peak of one. “Christ, you’re beautiful.”
“Show me how beautiful I am,” she breathed.
Carven did all the work, easing the zipper down at the side of her slacks until they dropped to the floor at her feet. I risked a glance over my shoulder, listening to silence from outside the bedroom.
“London?”
She drew me back to her, to the way her full lips waited for me to devour them. I was fucking weak with her. I surged forward, grabbed her jaw with one hand, and worked the buttons of my shirt with the other. Carven undressed, too, tearing his t-shirt free before unzipping his black jeans and kicking off his boots…
Until the door to my bedroom opened with a boom!
Wood splintered under the force.
The door handle embedded deep into the wall.
Colt stood in the doorway, eyes blazing with rage as he settled that bestial stare on the three of us.
“MINE!” he bellowed, his lips snarling, before he lunged.
I was hit from behind by a brick wall, lifted, and thrown clear across the room. They were a blur as I hit the wall with a crack. I’d never been hit that hard before, not even by men who ate steroids as a main meal.
I shook my head, lifting my hand to grasp onto the dresser.
This was no man.
This was what The Order had created.
“No!” Vivienne stepped forward, placing herself between me and that…bloodthirsty male. “Beast!”
He whipped that cold, killing stare toward her.
But this was too dangerous.
Far too dangerous for the precious babies she carried.
“Stop!” I pushed upwards and took a step toward her, but that only drew Colt’s deadly focus. “Over here,” I urged, desperate to draw his attention. I risked a glance toward the doorway. I needed to get Vivienne out of here. “Over here, son.”
I moved forward, fully drawing the beast’s wrath.
In an instant, Colt’s hand was around my throat, squeezing tight. FUCK! I grasped his wrist and drove it upward, trying to break his hold. But it was like fighting a goddamn bear. He wasn’t my son in that moment. One look at that distant stare and I knew the son I loved was no longer there.
“Get the fuck off him!” Carven slammed into his brother.
But all that did was piss Colt off more…or the beast, whoever this fucking was. Dark midnight blue eyes were fixed on Carven as that grip around my throat tightened. I tried to breathe, tried to think. My mind drifted to the gun hidden under the edge of the headboard of my bed for a second before I pushed it away.
No.
Stars danced behind my eyelids.
If this is how it ends, then I’d be happy. Happy it was him. Happy it was—
“PUT HIM DOWN NOW!” Vivienne roared.
The grip released around my throat, letting me slump to the floor. I grabbed my throat, sucking in hard breaths.
“I can’t…London, I’m so—” Colt cried.
I shook my head. “It’s not your fault. It’s…”
A savage sound ripped from him as he thrashed his head. His eyes blazed with ferocity until Vivienne stepped between us.
“Hey!” she called, snapping her fingers in front of his nose.
The woman…standing naked in front of him, snapped her goddamn fingers!
“You will get control of yourself,” she demanded.
“Wildcat,” he hissed desperately, then slowly lifted his gaze to me and his brother.
“Carven,” she spoke carefully.” I need you to go into Colt’s room and get the wrist ties around his bed.
“Fuck.” He was already shaking his head. “You sure about this?”
She never once looked away from Colt. Instead, she moved even closer.
He visibly fought that beast inside himself, wrestling like it was his own personal demon. In a way, it was. One who could take control.
“Yes,” she answered Carven. “I am.”
The beast stared into her eyes as Carven left the room and returned moments later. Thick leather straps were in my son’s hand, ones I had had especially made for the nights when the storms hit. Now it looked like the storm raged all day and night.
She took one strap and lifted it. “Beast, hand please.” My son obliged instantly, watching her as she cinched it tight around his wrist. She held out her other hand. “The other.”
Like a well-trained animal, he lifted his other hand for her to strap it tight.
“To the bed,” she commanded.
He turned his head toward me. That dangerous, possessive gleam rose swiftly, making him turn his top lip up and growl.
“Don’t you worry about them,” she urged. “They will not hurt me. You need to understand that. You need to learn to… share.”
He swung his gaze back to her.
“It’s that or nothing.” She laid down the rules. “So it’s up to you.”
One wave of her hand toward the headboard of my bed and he flinched, shaking his head, wrestling with the idea of that. For a second, my mind went to the gun under the edge of the headboard. All it’d take would be one wrong move, and we’d all be dead.
Murder-suicide.
I shook my head. This was a bad idea…a really bad idea.
Until, with a clink of steel, the creature that occupied my son turned and, like a good puppy, climbed onto the bed and lifted his hands for her to secure him to the headboard.
Jesus…this was happening, wasn’t it?
I swallowed hard. Fear moved through me as she secured one wrist and then the other until both arms were outstretched tight.
“London,” she called, turning her gaze toward me. “It’s all or nothing.”
I had no choice here…not if I wanted to keep my family together. With a desperate snarl, I strode forward. “Pet…you’re dancing with death here.”
“We all are,” she answered, and lifted her hand for mine.
