“Tobias?” she whispered, her eyes widening.
My knees trembled, but I held on. “Yeah, little mouse, it’s me.”
She took a step closer, flinched at the sound of handcuffs being snapped around her father’s wrists, and turned her head. The Principal hadn’t wasted a goddamn second. I eyed the piece of shit as he and his goddamn brothers took Jack away.
But the guards turned toward us. We didn’t have time for the perfect reunion. Instead, Nick glared at me. “We have to go, now.”
“Come on, little mouse.” I grabbed her hand and dragged her toward the open door. “Into the car.”
“No!” She fought, just like I knew she would, twisting in my arms, trying to sidestep me. “We can’t leave him!”
But I left her no room to escape, blocking her in by my size alone as Caleb flung himself into the passenger seat.
“In the car, Ryth!” Nick barked, and he climbed behind the wheel, leaving me to deal with our sister on my own.
I tried to be gentle, I really fucking did, even pushing her head down before climbing in behind her. “You gotta trust him now, little mouse,” I urged, pushing her back against the seat. “Your father knows what he’s doing.”
I yanked the door closed and the locks engaged with a thunk. We were done taking chances where she was concerned, and that included her goddamn family. I eyed those fucking guards as they came toward the car, wanting nothing more than to aim my fucking gun at each one of them and pull the goddamn trigger.
But I didn’t, just shoved across the seat after her, my knee twisting in agony as I went. I bit down on a scream, as the car reversed rapidly back down the drive.
“Rebel.” Ryth reached for the mutt as she tried to climb into her lap. She let the beast nuzzle her hand, taking comfort in rubbing her head. She could take comfort in the beast. It didn’t matter…nothing mattered, as long as we were gone.
Tears shone on her cheeks when she stared out of the window. “Dad.”
I swallowed that fucking lump back down, forcing it into the pit of my gut where the rage seethed. “It’s going to be okay, little mouse. Just you wait and see. It’s all going to be okay.”
Lies…
My knee twitched and shook. I grabbed the damn thing in the dark and whispered. “Yeah, you’ll see.”
I didn’t know if the words were for her or for me.
But by sheer fucking will, I’d make it true. I looked at those shimmering tears falling from the edge of her jaw and that pain in my leg turned into pure fucking rage.
The blur of the gates came before we tore through them, then the tires squealed and Nick spun the wheel, throwing me against the door. A moan ripped free before I could bite down and swallow the sound. I didn’t have time to grab my knee as Ryth was flung toward me. I grabbed my sister instead as she slammed into me.
“Easy.” I pulled her close. “I’ve got you.”
Still, the pain was consuming. My world grayed at the edges. But I didn’t roar at Nick. I urged him to go faster. “Move!”
“Trying.” Nick spun the wheel again and punched the accelerator.
The sedan was a junky piece of shit, used to rolling past corners while money was traded for drugs. Not this…
“We can’t just leave him there.” Ryth shook her head, looking behind us as we left that fucking place behind. “We can’t.”
I tried my best to still the tremble in my hands and turned to her. “Look at me.”
She did, staring up at me, and everything hit me all at once. Mom’s death. Her abduction. My own fucking father…damn…my own fucking father. She didn’t even know. I glanced at Caleb as I realized he didn’t either. Didn’t know dad was dead…and he’d tried to fucking kill me.
“I thought you were dead,” she whispered, shaking her head. “I thought you were…”
“Not even death wanted me, princess,” I answered, holding on tight. “Only you…always you.”
Energy arced between us before she slammed against me, clawing my shirt, grasping my neck, pulling me into her. Fuck, I didn’t need to be asked twice. I fisted her hair and kissed her hard, gripping her jaw as I crushed her fucking mouth.
I needed her. Christ, I needed her. I released my hold, palming her breast instead. Her perfect, small fucking breast. Her tight peak grazed my palm, tightening with the contact. I needed to be inside her. I hungered to be inside her. To feel her, to lick her. To know she was alive and here and…mine.
To know she was mine.
I lowered my head to the crook of her neck and inhaled deeply. The sharp, clinical scent of that fucking place clung to her. But underneath it…was that faint, sweet fucking scent of vanilla.
“You scared the hell out of me.” I fisted her hair and yanked, pulling her head backwards, hard enough for her to know I was pissed. “Don’t ever do that again. From now on…we stick together. Do you hear me? We stick together. Every goddamn second of the fucking day, until we can get the hell out of here.”
Fresh tears slipped free as she nodded. The sight of that was a cocked fist to my balls. My callused thumb was too rough for her skin. Still, I brushed the trail away. “They’re not going to kill him. He won’t let them.”
“Yeah, they will.” Her voice was so goddamn sure and so…fucking empty. “He walked in there to save me.”
Nick lifted his gaze and those dark eyes bored into mine.
I shook my head. “If you think he just went in there blindly, then you don’t know your father. He’s fucking smart, Ryth. He’s so fucking smart, and that makes him dangerous to them. The things he’s told us, the people who are involved… No wonder they wanted—”
“T.” Nick warned, stopping me cold.
My heart hammered. Christ, if she knew the things her father had told us. Things we only guessed after reading her mom’s journal. Chilling things. Things that should never see the light of day. The people who were behind this corrupt, twisted shit, it was fucking sickening.
But she didn’t need to know about that now. Because that kind of shit would only bring her undone. She watched Nick in the rear-view mirror, then turned to me.
I brushed some strands of hair from her eyes. “Trust us, princess. He’s gone in there with a plan.”
I didn’t know if she believed me. I didn’t know if I would, either, in her position.
“Hand me that.” Nick nodded to Caleb.
Caleb grabbed the GPS from the dashboard in front of him and handed it over. “Nick.…” he started.
“Not now,” he snarled, and his tone left no fucking illusion that he was pissed.
We both were.
Ryth blamed herself, but the real person at fault here was our goddamn brother. If he hadn’t gone off half-cocked, hellbent on revenge, then both of them wouldn’t have been taken.
And maybe our father might still be alive.
I didn’t know that for sure.
I met Ryth’s stare. What I did know was that we’d be in a very different position. And none the fucking wiser. Would knowing what we did now have changed anything? I brushed the hair away from her eyes with trembling fingers—not when it came to how we felt about her.
Nick watched the red marker on the screen and pushed the clapped-out sedan harder to get away.
“They told us you were dead.” Caleb was trying to make conversation in the hopes he’d make amends. Fat fucking chance of that. I met his stare, and my own turned dangerous. “Did they?”
Because I almost was…asshole.
There were things we as brothers could come back from. Arguments, rivalry, even where our stepsister was concerned. But this…putting her in harm’s way like that? That shit I just couldn’t fucking forgive. Not even when it came to blood.
He knew…
He saw it in my stare.
We’re going to have a problem, you and me, brother. We are going to have a real big fucking problem indeed.
He gave a careful nod, then glanced at Ryth, giving her a weak smile before turning back to the road.
“What’s going on?”
I shook my head. “Nothing, princess. Nothing at all.”
We followed that marker on the GPS along the winding back roads until it felt like we were the only ones out here. Darkness waited for us, and pain for me. My leg pulsed, shoving a burning fire poker through my fucking thigh, brutal enough for me to catch my breath.
Something was wrong.
I didn’t need my brother to tell me that. Nick met my stare in the rear-view mirror until I looked away. Just get us out of here…I gripped the armrest, wincing. Just get us out.
We couldn’t stay around here, not in this car, at least. A rough plan was all we had, but it was better than no fucking plan, which was what we’d had before Jack Castlemaine called us.
So, we’d take it…whatever he could give us, we’d take it and run.
Nick lifted the monitor Jack had handed us in the brief moments we’d had before we left for The Order and glanced at the blinking red marker as the darkness at the edges of my vision started to close in.
“I think this is it.”
Those words were all I needed to drive the blackout away.
Nick gripped the GPS and switched off the sedan’s headlights. We slowed, heading down the dirt road in the middle of nowhere. I forced myself to fix on the darkened blur of houses through the windshield and caught the glint of lights in the distance.
“There.” I pointed. “Lights.”
Nick followed the motion, glancing at the screen in front of him. “That has to be it.”
He slowed the car and nosed into the stranger’s driveway, then turned and headed for a massive barn near the fenceline. It was exactly how Jack had said, all the way down to the oldtimer waiting for us.
I winced with the jolt as Nick pulled up outside the massive double doors.
That hot poker drove all the way into my balls as I yanked the handle and shoved the door wide. “This way, princess.” I prayed she didn’t hear the whimper, or see my knee buckle when I stepped out.
The world swayed, forcing me to brace against the side of the car.
“Tobias, are you okay?”
I knew the words were coming. My smile was more like a fucking wince, but I gave her all I had. “Yeah, just tired.”
I’d slept in snatches of time, fifteen minutes here, thirty minutes there. But it wasn’t the lack of sleep that had me worried. It was the bullet still lodged in my thigh. The grating scrape of the opening barn doors drew her gaze, right as the driving agony took another fucking bite. “Go.” I forced the word. “Go to Nick.”
The look in her eyes told me she wanted to argue, that she knew I was lying. It was all I could do not to beg her.
Go…go to Nick.
She did, leaving me behind. I sagged against the car as she slipped into the darkness inside the barn.
“She’s stronger than you think.”
I winced. That motherfucking voice was not what I wanted to hear right now. “Fuck you, C.” I narrowed in on my brother on the other side of the car. “Fuck you right to Hell.”
He gave a careful nod, then turned and followed her into the barn.
She’s stronger than you think…
I sucked in a hard breath and shook my head. She was strong, I knew that. But this wasn’t about giving her more burdens, it was about me. There was no way I wanted to see the same pain in her eyes that I’d seen in mine when I watched my mom become sick…and finally crumble.
I just couldn’t do it. Not now…
So I ground my teeth and pushed off the car, forcing the scream back down until the pain was just that grinding throb in the back of my mind.
The interior lights came on from a car parked inside the barn. Nick opened the trunk and rifled through the bags, pulling out one to drop onto the rear seat. “There’s clothes for you, princess.”
In the wash of the lights, Ryth looked inside the carry-on. “You put this here?”
“No.” Nick gave a shake of his head. “Your dad did.”
“Dad did this?” She was surprised, but she shouldn’t have been.
“Yeah.” He grabbed out guns, then handed one to Caleb and another to me before slamming the trunk closed. “We have to hurry.”
I took the Sig, tucking it into the waistband of my jeans along with two fresh clips.
Ryth looked around and settled on the open barn door. “There’s just us here,” I answered.
My hand closed around the weapon’s grip. No fucker would dare even look at her. She gave a nod, then tugged the gray sweatshirt over her head…but she was bare underneath.
Her skin was so fucking soft, creamy and hypnotizing. Those pink nipples hardened with the night air. She bent and shoved the sweatpants free, kicking them away in disgust before tugging on panties from the bag, then jeans, a t-shirt, and a jacket.
“Ready?” Nick asked, glancing my way.
I just stared at her as she grabbed her discarded clothes, rolled them into a ball, and fixed her hair. I looked away, Christ, I had it bad.
Caleb climbed into the driver’s seat, leaving me to follow Ryth as she slid across the back seat.
I forced myself to move, dropped low, and yanked the door closed behind me before C started the engine and pulled the sedan out of the barn.
“The light’s off,” Ryth said quietly as Caleb climbed out of the driver’s seat and walked around the front.
“What?” I looked her way as she pointed to the farmhouse in the distance.
“The porch light was on when we drove in. Now it isn’t.”
“He’s done what he had to do,” I answered as the barn doors closed once more.
“My father did all this?”
“Yeah,” I nodded. “He did.”
“I don’t know who he is anymore.”
Maybe she never had. Maybe none of us had, not really.
Nick climbed in, shoved the car into gear, and pulled away from the barn and the house…and everything. Pain pulsed and gnawed, pulling my focus to that heat that burned my thigh. I gripped the armrest, bit down on a moan, and closed my eyes, hoping like hell sleep took me down, and all the while I prayed.
Just hold on…
Just hold the fuck on.
