by Snow, Jenika
And the entire time everyone fucking fussed over me, every time someone threw out that it was a damn miracle I was alive, that I probably owed some otherworldly entity a fucking favor for still being here breathing, that entire time, I watched Zoey. I stared at her, memorized every curve and hollow that made her up, knowing that no matter where she was, where she ran to, I’d find her.
She’d leave eventually—no doubt about that—but I knew I would follow her. I already deemed her mine.
Chapter Thirteen
Zoey
I didn’t know how much time passed since Wilder had woken up, since we had this weird interaction, this almost comforting and perfect silent exchange, but Kimber and Amelia pulled me out of the room so the guys could have alone time.
This was the first time I’d been out of my prison, although if I were being honest, I was starting to see it as anything but, because Wilder was in there with me.
I could have left since leaving the bedroom and the guys with Wilder. Amelia and Kimber weren’t even paying me any attention as they made dinner. Yeah, I could have left a handful of times already since being out here... yet here I was, standing by the back window, staring out at the lawn that was as far as the eye could see before disappearing into the thickness of the woods.
This place was isolated, and although I don’t think we’d driven terribly far to get here when Frankie had taken me, I’d been in shock. I couldn’t have told anyone my name at that point, let alone know how long we’d actually driven. We definitely weren’t in the city anymore.
Why didn’t I leave? Fuck if I knew. I could have blamed it on fear, but that would have been a lie.
I could’ve said they would’ve caught me before I tried to scale the gate, but that wouldn’t have been true.
I could have even reasoned they’d find me, and I didn’t want to know what they’d do to me when they did. But that hadn’t even crossed my mind until right now, and even then, I didn’t even bristle at the thought.
The absolute truth was I really didn’t know why I was still in this house except for that wounded man in the bedroom. He wedged himself into my heart, that organ I thought had been locked down pretty tightly so it would never get hurt. He’d done that with no effort, not even realizing or trying to.
But there is was. I was a fucking idiot.
“I’d like to have a family meal tonight,” Kimber said to Amelia, and I looked over my shoulder at the women. It was pretty damn clear they were glowing over the fact that Wilder was actually awake.
I couldn’t blame them. Everything was more upbeat in the house. I even felt a heavy weight lift off me.
I overheard them speaking softly about how it was a damn miracle he made it, heard Amelia tell Kimber it was all her doing, for saving his life. Kimber shook her head and in a serious tone said, “That was all Wilder and whoever was looking down on him.”
I focused back out the window and blocked them out. The very thought of leaving Wilder had my chest feeling funny. An outsider looking in would say there was something wrong with me, having the opportunity to leave yet here I still was. I could take Amelia and Kimber if they tried to stop me. I was probably faster than the guys if I tried to outrun them. But I didn’t want to go. I wanted to see Wilder again, talk to him, sing to him. I wanted to have him tell me all the things he’d never told anyone before.
I closed my eyes and exhaled. Five days I’d been here. That’s how long he’d been out.
I don’t know how long I stood there starring out the window, but the scents of dinner being made finally waft to me, and I faced the women. They already set the table, and I felt like I should have offered to help. How fucked up was that? Being held here against my will yet feeling bad I didn’t help cook my captors’ dinner?
That just annoyed me.
“Zoey?” Kimber prompted, and I glanced at her. She gave me a small smile. “Could you get the glasses? It’s in the cabinet over there.” She pointed to which one she was talking about.
For a second, I just stood there. She wanted me to help... to be part of whatever it was they considered themselves. A family? A group? Just a houseful of thieves? I didn’t know really anything about Amelia and Kimber aside from Kimber was a nurse and with Cullen, and Amelia used to work at a jewelry store—a store the Preacher brothers robbed, and subsequently, Dom had taken Amelia, because he was just so obsessed with her. It all seemed so incredibly strange, stranger than fiction, if I were being honest.
But I was proof it was real, and I was stuck right in the middle of it now.
I found myself walking toward them, almost as if I were on autopilot, and went to the cabinet. At first, I only got out four glasses, not including myself or Wilder for obvious reasons, but then Amelia asked me to get two more for us, as Wilder was going to attempt to join tonight against Kimber’s medical advice, and they wanted me there.
Well. Okay then.
For the next several minutes, I finished helping them set the table, then stood back, feeling extremely out of place, not just because this wasn’t something I normally did—the whole family thing—but because of what family I was currently involved with.
I heard the bedroom door open, and I held my breath as I stared down the hallway, knowing the guys were most likely helping Wilder out. He was the only reason I was still here, because come hell or high water, I would’ve tried to escape already otherwise.
I saw Dom come out of the hallway first, his eyes trained right on Amelia. Then Cullen was next, and once again, he focused on Kimber. The one thing I noticed about these men without fault was that there wasn’t anything more important to them than their women, aside from each other. Family was clearly very important to them.
And then I held my breath as I finally saw Wilder and Frankie. Frankie was close to Wilder, and when he reached out, Wilder shook his head to silently tell him he was fine. My body was rigid, stiff, my muscles aching from how tense I’d become. And then Wilder searched the room almost frantically, his eyes moving from the living room to the kitchen, and finally landed on me.
He’d been searching for me the same way Dom and Cullen had looked for Amelia and Kimber. I didn’t know how I should feel about that realistically, but in this moment, I felt that tension leave and found myself going to him. I felt everyone staring at me the closer I got.
“I’m good, Frankie,” I heard Wilder murmur to his brother, and then Frankie made a deep sound in his throat before stalking away. Wilder braced a hand on the wall to steady himself, and I saw the way his muscles bunched from the action. He certainly didn’t look like he almost died, not with the color back in his face, his body looking strong—well, stronger than what I became accustomed to seeing these last few days.
“Hey,” he said in a deep voice, and I felt that lone word move through every cell in my body.
“Hey back.” Everything was so strange, so jumbled in my mind, concerning Wilder. He could look into my eyes to know every single secret I held, like he could unravel the puzzle that was me.
His hand that rested on the wall for stability started to inch closer to me, as if he wanted to touch me. I could still feel everybody watching us, the silence of this seemingly private and intimate exchange between the two of us being witnessed by everyone. The heaviness of their eyes on us was far too much for my liking.
I cleared my throat and looked over my shoulder, seeing each of them watching us, confirming what I already knew. But I didn’t care. It didn’t even matter, because when I looked into Wilder’s eyes, what he saw in me was all I cared about.
And a part of me feared that, but a stronger part loved it.
Chapter Fourteen
Wilder
Frankie was scowling at me, the asshole giving me the dirtiest look he could muster up. But I wouldn’t change how I felt or what I told him no matter how much he tried to mean-mug my ass.
“You can’t seriously be pissed at me for what I did during a time of severe fucking stress.”
I sat
on the edge of the guest bed and lifted my hand to run it over my face. It had been a week since I’d been shot, and a couple days since I’d woken up and realized I wouldn’t let Zoey go. Those feelings had only grown every day. Hell, every fucking second of the day, my feelings grew until they threatened to spill from me. They already fucking consumed me.
I pushed those thoughts aside for a second so I could focus on this. I shifted on the bed and grimaced as a sharp pain lanced up the center of my body.
“Kimber’s gonna be pissed if you don’t take it easy,” Frankie said, and I side-eyed his ass.
Despite Kimber’s protests about me moving around, I couldn’t just lie in bed all damn day. I was stubborn as hell; I never pretended not to be. I had to move, had to get blood flowing to my legs and arms. I couldn’t just be stationary. I wasn’t running any marathons or lifting any weights, but that didn’t mean I’d just lie around and stare at the ceiling, letting my body and mind rot.
“Living with Cullen, she has to know the Preacher brothers are stubborn as fuck.”
Frankie grunted his agreement.
I stared my twin, and he glared right back at me before exhaling as if frustrated.
I brought up the whole Zoey being taken situation with him days ago, but he’d blown it off. I knew he agreed with me to an extent. We weren’t like Dom and Cullen, but we weren’t always good guys either. And after bringing it up to him again right now, knowing we had to really talk about this and figure out what the fuck was going to happen, his sour-ass mood came back tenfold.
Kimber and Amelia had taken Zoey out of the room so I could talk to Frankie about it and not make her even more uncomfortable. She’d been staying in the guest room with me, even after I mentioned she could stay in my room down the hall. She just shook her head and said she was good here. I wondered if she wanted to tell me that she could just leave, stay in her own place, but thank fuck that conversation hadn’t been brought up. I didn’t know if I could have kept my inner possessive-asshole-caveman side down.
I could’ve talked to Dom and Cullen about this as well. Hell, they probably would have been on my side, seeing as they were pussy-whipped for their women. But this was a me-and-Frankie situation. He brought Zoey into the fold, and we needed to straighten that shit out.
“Listen,” I said and exhaled slowly, shifting on the bed so my back was to the wall and my feet hung over the edge. “We need to figure this out, Frankie.” I wore a pair of sweats and a plain white T-shirt, my feet bare, the shower I’d just taken the first one since I’d been shot. The sponge bath I’d been doing hadn’t been anything to write home about. I was clean, freshly shaven, and didn’t feel like ass. I was ready to hash this shit out.
Frankie and I didn’t butt heads often, but when it did occur, it got pretty dirty. We were too similar, which meant we didn’t back down. Stubborn to a fault, that was us.
What I felt for Zoey went above all rationalization and common sense. I wasn’t even sure Frankie would understand that. It consumed me, wrapped all the way around me until I couldn’t breathe. Zoey owned my heart, and I hadn’t even told her. I was sure she could see the way I looked at her, how I tracked her movements constantly. I didn’t try to hide it. But she was a captive here in every sense of the word, had only been in my life for seven short days, and all I saw with her was eternity.
Yeah, how the fuck could I tell anyone that? They’d think I lost my damn mind.
“I understand why you did what you did, Frankie, and I’m not faulting you for that. Hell, I would’ve done the same thing.”
“Then why are you busting my balls about this?”
Because what I feel for her scares the shit out of me. What I feel for her defies all logic and reason, and I don’t want her to hate me because of what you did, good intentions or not.
That’s what I wanted to tell my twin, but the words refused to come out. I didn’t want to make things worse.
Me and Frankie had always been thick as thieves… literally and figuratively. Being brothers, especially twins, had us forming a bond that was undeniable, that no one else would ever be able to experience. Maybe it was because we shared the same womb. Maybe it was because we were the same age and had been attached at the hip as kids. Or maybe it was being the person we leaned on as we watched our father beat on Cullen and Dom to protect us?
Whatever the reason was, I knew I wanted to be honest with him, but I felt myself protecting my feelings for Zoey harder than I ever protected anything else in my life. Because how I felt for her, how she looked at me, how she made me feel, had become the most valuable thing I ever owned. It was more precious than all the money I’d stolen, all the gems, priceless jewels, and artifacts we’d taken as ours. The way she made my heart race when I looked into her blue eyes, the way she stole my breath when she sang, and how she made my heart race with a soft touch to my arm—nothing in this world could top that.
There wasn’t a hell of a lot that scared me, but this, being honest with my family, terrified the fuck out of me.
Frankie exhaled and then leaned back on the couch, his legs slightly spread as he took on a relaxed pose, his arms thrown over the back of the couch cushions, his big body taking up the entire space. He stared at me, an identical version of my face looking back at me. He could read me as easily as if I were looking in the mirror and pointing out all my flaws.
“Do you think I’m blind?” Frankie finally asked. I knew where he was going with this, but I kept my mouth shut. “You think I don’t see the way you both look at each other?” He leaned forward then, bracing his forearms on his upper thighs, his stare impenetrable. “I heard her sing to you when you were unconscious, stood in the doorway and listened. I watched as she held your hand, saw her fall asleep kneeling beside your bed, her head resting on the mattress, her hand in yours.” He paused as if he wanted that to sink in. “I knew in that moment that things were a lot more complicated than they seemed. I knew when you woke up and saw her sitting there, things would change.” He exhaled, but this time it sounded weary, as if he were tired. “Maybe I should’ve let her leave before you woke up. Maybe things wouldn’t be so complicated like they are now.”
I didn’t move, didn’t speak as I stared at him. I wasn’t surprised he knew this would’ve been the outcome. We might be two different people, but we thought the same, just as strong, just as powerful. It was as if we were the same person in two different bodies.
“Because in the end, Wilder, you know you can’t keep her.”
Like fuck I couldn’t.
The very thought of Zoey leaving—even if it was the right thing to do—had my entire body tightening painfully. I gnashed my teeth together.
“Shit, Wilder. Look at you. The very mention of her leaving has you ready to fucking destroy something.” He shook his head slowly.
I didn’t even try to deny it. I didn’t want to. I rolled my head around on my neck. “Dom and Cullen have their women,” I said low, cutting a hard glance back at my brother.
“Yeah, but look at the shit they went through, put us through, and risked to have those women.”
I clenched my teeth together so tightly my jaw ached.
He gave me this expression that said I was fucking insane. I wanted to call his ass out for the shit he went through with Nadja, the “one who got away.” He tried to act like he was over it, past it, but we all knew that was furthest from the truth. But I didn’t want to kick below the belt, so I kept my damn mouth shut on the subject.
“You’ve known her like a fucking week, and you’re what, already in love with her?”
I didn’t need to explain myself to anyone, least of all Frankie. “Dom knew Amelia a fucking hot minute before he claimed her.”
Frankie snorted, and I heard his unspoken words. He thought Dom was fucking insane too.
He could obviously see on my face that I didn’t care what anyone thought. He knew I wasn’t going to tell him shit, because he started running his mouth again.
“I meant what I said when I told her that once you were better, I’d take her wherever she needs to go. She can’t stay here, Wilder. We have enough shit we are dealing with, enough fucking things we should focus on. When Dom then Cullen found their females, shit got turned all upside down. We have jobs that need panned. We don’t have time for everyone to be fucking getting their dicks wet—”
“Shut the fuck up, Frankie,” I growled. “Don’t talk about Zoey that way.”
Frankie rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything else.
I leaned forward, taking on the same position as him, with my forearms resting on my upper thighs, my face a hard mask. “She’s not going fucking anywhere, Frankie. You leave Zoey alone. She’s mine.” He had the same stoic expression I was probably wearing, and for long moments, he said nothing. But then a slow smirk formed across his lips, and he lifted up his hands in surrender.
“You are all fucking crazy as shit.” He stood and shook his head.
I didn’t bother bringing up her, the one woman who’d gotten away, the one female Frankie didn’t talk about, because I knew it hurt him. And I didn’t want to hurt him. But I knew if she came back into his life, he’d go down the fucking rabbit hole just like the rest of us.
But in the end, Frankie wouldn’t fight me on this. He might’ve given Dom and Cullen shit, but he kept his mouth shut with me.
The thing was, what I wanted with Zoey was pretty damn final, and because of that, telling her that I already saw her as mine could very well be the catalyst that pushed her away.
Chapter Fifteen
Zoey
I ran my hand over the foggy mirror, wiping off the condensation on the glass and staring at a blurry visage of myself. My dark hair was damp from the shower I’d just taken, hanging over my shoulders, my skin looking pale under the dim lighting.