Chapter Eleven
Ryker
He was sitting on the couch, Stella draped over his shoulders in her favorite spot, when he heard his partners outside. Then the lock of the door snicked open and Ian barreled through, laden with bags, and then came Hudson with a woman perched on his hip.
It wasn’t an entirely unfamiliar sight—sometimes Ian and Hudson brought a woman home to play with, though they more often used space downstairs.
This felt different though. They always gave him a heads up if they were planning to have someone in the loft but they’d informed him yesterday Cosima was indeed going to be living with them, and that she would be coming home today and he was to make a good impression. As if he would be a dick. He wouldn’t be. On purpose anyway. Okay, maybe they had a point.
And they’d reminded him this morning, over lunch, and as they left to pick her up from the hospital.
“Cosima is coming home today. You need to be nice. Make her feel welcome. You can’t lurk around and scare her. You need to introduce yourself properly. She’s very sensitive and we need to make her feel safe. We take full responsibility for her but don’t make this any harder.”
Now she was here, being toted by Hudson with her arms wrapped around his neck and her head on his shoulder. She was small. He remembered that from when she’d come to Hive, but it was different to see her embraced by Hudson who made her look minuscule and fragile, like a baby bird who’d fallen out of her nest.
They’d dressed her in some soft grey sweatpants and a matching hoodie that had a pink and white leopard print on the inside. She wasn’t wearing shoes but fuzzy socks, probably because her feet were still healing.
He’d barely seen her when Ian had brought her into their home last time, but while there were still bruises that made him wince internally, her hair at least looked like it had been cleaned. Her face was still a mess but not as swollen, and he knew that bruises looked worse even as they got better. Still, this girl…
It wasn’t just the injuries, either. Those were horrifying and whoever had done that to her should rot in hell for the rest of eternity. Submission was a gift—not something you could take by force and not something to be taken lightly. He’d been suspicious verging on angry when he’d first seen her at the club with her top because he could tell something wasn’t right, although he hadn’t fathomed the depths to which she’d been hurt. That motherfucker had betrayed her trust and then abused his power over her. Nearly killed her. The knowledge made his blood boil until he could only see red.
She was impossibly sweet as she clung to Hudson and he knew in that moment he’d never be able to touch her. Not in the way he’d want to anyhow.
* * *
Cosima
“Here we are, Cosy, this is home,” Hudson told her.
She peeked out from where she’d buried her head in his shoulder. Being in the big SUV from the hospital to here had been a mix of wondrous, parted-lips staring out the window at the city going by and also terror because she wasn’t used to being out in the world like that.
She’d kept one hand pressed to the window and the other tucked safely into Hudson’s hand until she couldn’t bear it anymore and she’d had to burrow into his side and close her eyes, try to stop shaking because it was too big and too many people and too much noise and altogether too much.
She’d been ridiculously relieved when they’d pulled into the garage of a mid-rise brick building. Quieter, contained.
Granted she was with two near strangers who could’ve done anything they wanted to her at any point. That should’ve worried her but Hudson didn’t scare her. Neither did Ian even though she’d spent much less time with him. Plus she had a phone and its charger tucked in her pocket—her very own phone!—that Doctor Eric had given her.
He’d showed her how to call someone, how his number and Nora and Hudson and Ian and some other people’s numbers were already in her contacts, and how to play music and use the internet. So cool. She’d play with it later when she wasn’t so fascinated by everything around her.
Hudson and Ian had said there was another man who lived with them who she would meet but probably wouldn’t see much. That must be the person she saw standing up from the couch and walking toward them, trailed by a grey cat.
The man stuck his hands in the pockets of his black jeans and ambled over. His black hair grazed the collar of a grey cardigan open over a white t-shirt, and when she forced herself to make eye contact, she saw he had grey eyes too. Slate grey, like almost blue but not. What a strangely monochromatic man.
She clung to Hudson a little tighter although she didn’t know why, and Hudson rubbed her back.
“Remember I told you about our other partner? This is Ryker. You’ll spend a lot more time with me and Ian but if you need something, Ryker can help you too.”
Ryker didn’t say anything, just extracted a hand from his pocket. He was wearing black fingerless gloves and that seemed odd but maybe that was fashionable now? She had no idea.
Panic squeezed her chest when she thought he might offer to shake her hand because what would she do? She didn’t want to be rude but she was so on edge she couldn’t stand to be touched by anyone but Hudson.
But Ryker didn’t offer her his hand. He laid it on his chest and made a little bow. Oh. That was okay. Kind of funny. Charming even. She held up a hand and twitched her wrist in an approximation of a wave.
Thankfully Ryker didn’t seem insulted by her lack of greeting and shifted his attention to Ian who was bustling around. Ian probably did that a lot and it didn’t bother her. He was like a friendly bee who couldn’t sit still.
“Ry, we were going to put Cosima in the guest bedroom down here with us.”
The man nodded and noticed her studying the cat that wound itself around his ankles. Before she could ask its name, he held out his hands and the cat sprung up to his chest. Ryker caught the cat neatly like they’d done this a million times, and the cat closed its eyes and purred, flicking its tail around his neck.