“Why are you smiling?” he asked without opening his eyes.
“Because this is one of the first times I’ve seen you completely happy and at ease in a long time,” I told him softly. He opened his eyes, and I gently kissed him on the lips. “I like it.”
“You and Nic make me happy,” he said quietly, holding my stare. “This group, however crazy it has gotten, works, and I feel like I’ve found where I’m supposed to be. My past and everything… It’s a lot. Most people would have walked away when they realized everything I lied about.”
“You did lie,” I responded slowly, pulling back so I could look him in the eye. He tried to avoid it, but I didn’t let him. I lightly touched his chin, and that was all it took to have him looking at me again. It shook me to the core to see fear in his hazel eyes, like I had the power to completely destroy him right now. I wished we had talked about all of this before now, but our lives had been nothing but chaos lately. It was time we fixed that.
“But you had good reason to, and you don’t remember most of it. Does that really count as lying? Everyone deals with trauma differently. I don’t care what your name was before or what you want to call yourself tomorrow. You’re mine, and I’m yours. As long as that stays true, everything else will work out.”
Tears made Oli’s eyes bright, then he crushed me in a hard hug, knocking the breath from my lungs. He buried his face in my neck, making me shiver when he kissed me there. “I don’t deserve you.”
“You do,” I promised, rubbing his back. “You deserve every fucking good thing, Oli. I think I speak for myselfandNic when I say that you are amazing just the way you are.”
My phone buzzed right then, and Oli grabbed it from my pocket while he released a shaky breath. “Alexei and Maksim are here.”
I kissed him one more time then let go. He handed me back my phone and finished getting his stuff. A few minutes later, we were walking out. A group of men were standing in the hallway, and they explained that they were Emmerich’s men. A few words were exchanged, and then we were in the elevator.
“I love you, Bodhi.”
He wasn’t looking at me and didn’t glance over even as I twined our fingers together.
“I love you too, Oli.”
“Now, let’s go meet up with your other boyfriend, the others, and track down our loose cannon of a girlfriend before she burns her hometown to the ground.”
“That would show a lot of restraint on her part,” I murmured, recalling how Nic had broken down while talking about her parents and being kicked out at seventeen just because she was bisexual. Her parents were some of the top people in a trafficking ring that exploited children, but they had an issue with her liking more than just men?
Yeah, razing the town would be a huge sign of restraint, and from the maniacal gleam in Oli’s eyes when he looked my way, he knew it too. We were both fucking excited to see what Nicholette had planned, and underneath their anger and frustration, I knew the other men were excited too.
* * *
A few hours later,we were pulling up to Millfield, and it wasn’t anything like I had expected. Alexei parked at a gas station on the edge of town, and we got out, the others parking nearby. It was a small town, probably the smallest I’d ever seen—a gas station, about five stores in a row, a church, and a police station, then nothing. Just hills, woods, and country spread out for miles.This is where Nic grew up?
Rhodes got off his bike and lit a cigarette after taking off his helmet. Maksim did the same as he leaned against the car. Ansel and Blake shared a knowing look before Blake started quietly talking to their two men while their father went over to talk to Rhodes. Sacha and Vas strolled over toward us, my boyfriend wrapping an arm around my shoulder as Vas made a phone call, probably trying to reach Nic or Wrenn.
“Still no answer?” Oli asked, and Sacha shook his head.
“This isn’t exactly what I picture when I think of Nicholette,” I commented, still taking in our surroundings.
We all stood out, though some of us more than others. There was a church at the far end of the street, with a few people standing around watching us before running inside. How many people were at church on a Tuesday?
“No answer.” Vas cursed. “And I don’t see your car anywhere.”
“We need an address.” Sacha squeezed me tight, and I leaned into him.
“She never talked about here,” Blake said, and their father confirmed as much with a shake of his head.
Commotion down the road caught my attention, and my eyes widened when the police station doors opened. Out walked Wrenn. She wasn’t in cuffs, and she didn’t look concerned as she talked to one of the men in uniform. The guy started yelling, his hands gesturing wildly as if trying to prove a point, but Wrenn stared at him, unimpressed.
“Wrenn,” Vas growled, but he stopped with a quick gesture from his brother.
“Let’s see how this plays out. I think we’ll draw enough attention without getting in the middle of things.”
All of us stood there, some of us trying to look busy and others having their own quiet conversations. There wasn’t much to do but watch this thing with Wrenn play out. They were far away, but I swore she seemed more amused than anything else by the guy’s ranting. In my periphery, Ansel shifted, then his eyes narrowed, staring past Wrenn. I looked around to see what had caught his interest, but I couldn’t make out anything important or unusual.
Before I could ask what he had seen, the cop started full-on yelling.
“Are you fucking kidding me, Wrenn?!” He threw his hands up in the air, stalking away from the blonde woman watching him. “No way.” When he turned and caught sight of us, he paled. It would have been funny if he hadn’t looked back at Wrenn before stalking toward us.