Chapter 13
How do I take my coffee? Seriously . Very seriously.
— Milena’s secret thoughts
MILENA
I woke up in my bed.
I blinked open my eyes and stared at the man sharing my bed.
A smile bloomed on my face, and I launched myself at him.
Dima laughed, caught off guard, and slammed back against the headboard.
“ When did you get in?” I cried, squeezing his neck hard.
Which , inevitably, wasn’t that hard.
When he squeezed me back, it was to cause my breath to seize inside my chest.
Only when he let up did I say, “ Does anyone else know that you’re here yet?”
“ Shasha was here when I got here. Got pissy that I didn’t tell him that I was coming,” he said. “ You want to talk about it?”
He knew.
Which , honestly, didn’t surprise me.
I mean, if Shasha was here when he got here, then Shasha would’ve shared.
There were no secrets in my family.
At least, not the ones that didn’t come as happy surprises when certain people came home…
“ Not really,” I admitted.
I mean, what was there to tell?
I’d seen my rapist in prison.
He’d been sitting behind me, likely fully aware of me, the entire time.
Meanwhile , I’d been happy and content where I was, thinking that my rapist was in prison, far, far away.
“ When did he move?” I asked. “ I thought he was in Tennessee ?”
“ He was,” Dima said. “ But he was moved a couple of months ago due to overcrowding issues in the prison back home.”
Before we’d moved to Texas , we’d lived in Tennessee .
When our sister, Maven , had been kidnapped from Gatlinburg on a family vacation, we’d settled there in hopes that one day she might come back.
Except , she never came back.
It was two decades later that an app that Maven’s best friend had created made a match with Maven’s missing person’s poster. From there, we’d moved to Dallas , wanting to be closer to her and her family.
We’d left Tennessee behind.
I , for one, had been more than happy to do that thanks to all the horrible memories that Lyle had given me.
I’d thought I was safe and happy here.
I was wrong.
“ Shasha and I are kicking ourselves for not telling you,” Dima said. “ He wants to know if you want to have dinner with the family tonight.”
I was already shaking my head, my mind skipping to a different place that I wanted to be.
“ I need to go see my… I need to go see Cutter ,” I confided.
“ Cutter the motorcycle club friend?” Dima asked. “ I’ve heard about him, too.”
I smiled. “ I want to let him know that I’m okay.”
“ Do you mind if I tag along?” he asked carefully.
I thought about it for a long moment and then said, “ Dima , I’d like to do this alone. I have to explain today.”
He was quiet for a long moment and then, “ What if I drive you there, and you send me a text that you don’t need me, and I’ll leave?”
Used to making compromises for the protective men in my family, I agreed.
“ But first I need to find out where his clubhouse is,” I said.
Dima laughed. “ Leave that to me.”
I left it to him for half an hour while I showered again and got dressed.
I chose to wear leggings, an oversized long-sleeved t-shirt and tennis shoes—my go-to outfit when I wanted to feel comfy.
Today practically begged for comfortable, too.
After the day I’d had…
“ You look like a drowned rat,” Dima said as he came into the bathroom and sat on the counter next to where I was drying my hair.
I gave him the hair dryer and my brush, then turned around.
Used to helping me, he took both and started to blow dry my hair.
One of the deals that we had when I wanted to cut my hair at seventeen was they’d— Shasha and Dima —help me blow dry it whenever I wanted. I don’t know why it was so important to keep the long hair, but I’d never cut it. Even though I’d wanted to.
Badly .
He was on minute twenty when the hulking form of my oldest brother filled the door of my bathroom.
I smiled at him hesitantly, and he took a long step forward and wrapped his arms around my body.
Dima shut the hair dryer off and I had no other recourse but to bury my face in Shasha’s chest.
“ I’m sorry for not telling you, Mil ,” he rumbled.
I nodded, not bothering to say a word.
I knew he felt bad, and there was no reason to make him feel worse when he’d only done it to save me the heartache of knowing that my rapist and abuser was in the same state as me, and two hours away at that.
“ Let me finish this, bro,” Dima suggested a long while later. “ My ass is getting numb from halfway sitting in the sink.”
Shasha let me go, but not before he gave me one last squeeze.
Dima finished my hair while Shasha leaned against the doorframe watching us.
His dark, all-knowing eyes stayed on me while I looked down at my toes.
I didn’t want him to see the fear in my eyes.
Today had been…bad.
That night, thirteen years ago, had been the worst night of my life.
I’d been home alone except for the guards. Daniil had been the newest guard added to my brother’s team, and he was currently suffering from a case of food poisoning. But he’d stayed doing his job until his replacement had shown.
He hadn’t wasted time when he saw the guard come in, darting out the door after a brief exchange.
I’d gone back to binge watching Christmas movies on the Hallmark Channel .
I was on one about a snowman coming to life when I felt the hair prickle on the back of my neck.
Turning my face, I stared at the guard. Christensen .
He was closer than he was the last time I looked at him, but he wasn’t paying attention to me. He was looking out the window.
“ Hey , Christensen . What is it?” I asked.
That’s when Christensen turned, and I realized that the guard in my room wasn’t a guard at all.
I made a dash to climb over the sofa and run, but that only put me at the worst possible angle.
He was on me in two strides.
I’d only had time to lean over the sofa in my attempt to escape when I felt his hands on me.
He roughly ripped my pants off and…
“ Done ,” Dima said, pulling me out of the memories of the worst night of my life.
Sick .
I felt sick.
I’d done all the things after that night.
I’d gone to a therapist. I’d talked about it with my family. I’d been open and honest about everything that I experienced.
There’d been very bad days, but eventually over time, I’d learned to cope with the horror that had happened to me.
I’d never gotten over it, per se, but I’d learned to deal with it in a semi-healthy way.
Sure , I’d buried it deep so I basically never thought about it, but I was living.
I’d slept with men since.
I’d had many, many boyfriends.
All of them knew about what happened to me, because I made sure to tell all of them so if I freaked out, they knew why.
But I didn’t freak out all that much anymore.
Unless , that is, I saw my rapist at a prison he wasn’t supposed to be at.
The day that he got out was going to be the worst day of my life.
And the worst day of his, because I knew that the moment he was free, Shasha and Dima were going to kill him.
I cursed myself every single night for fucking up and calling the police instead of my brother.
Had I called my brother, he might’ve gotten there faster and dealt with the problem. But I’d automatically called the police, and they’d stopped Shasha from killing him.
Now , he was alive and living in prison knowing that he only had to serve a thirteen-year sentence.
I had exactly two years left until I had to start dealing with the fact that life was about to get complicated.
“ Are you even listening to me?” Shasha asked.
I looked up at him and said, “ When he gets out…”
Shasha grinned then, showing his upper and lower teeth. “ Then he’s going to die.”
I shook my head. “ Find a way to do it so that your daughters don’t have to grow up without a father.”
“ Daughters . Times three. One more on the way.”
I blinked.
Then I straightened out of my lean against the counter and said, “ What ?”
“ Brecken is pregnant again. With another girl,” he said. “ We found out about fifteen minutes ago. Wanted to come over and tell y’all the good news in person.”
I shrieked and threw my hands to his face, then pulled it down to mine so I could kiss him on the cheek.
“ Congrats , man,” Dima said. “ Looks like I came home at the perfect time.”
After I did the whole jumping and dancing thing, Shasha put his arm around my waist and guided me into the living room where Brecken was sitting with their daughters, Vivi and Rosie .
The moment I saw her, I excitedly moved to her.
She looked at me sadly, and I pulled her to her feet and said, “ I can’t wait until she’s here!”
Brecken laughed and we all exchanged another round of hugs and kisses.
Vivi , too, joined in on the excitement.
“ Are you excited, baby?” I asked her.
“ I’m not the baby anymore,” she declared. “ Haven’t been for a while. You’re going to have to find a new name for me.”
“ Okay , how about…” I tapped my upper lip. “ Tiny ?”
She scrunched up her nose. “ That’s derogatory.”
I laughed. “ I’ll think of a new nickname, then. One that’s not derogatory .”
Shasha had given Vivi a word of the day calendar, and she’d used the words in daily speech relentlessly.
I loved it and hated it, because some of the words not even I knew, and I was a thirty-one-year-old woman.
After we’d all calmed down, and were sitting on the couches, Vivi declared that she was going outside to sit in the hot tub.
Her bodyguard went with her to keep an eye on her, and the three of them stared at me, studying me.
I stared back until finally I said, “ Shasha , did you or Dima find out where the Truth Tellers MC clubhouse is?”
“ Yeah ,” he answered. “ Will you take a guard with you?”
I shrugged. “ I will until I get there.”
Meaning , I didn’t want one to stay.
Or come in with me.
Shasha sighed.
Dima said, “ I’ll take her.”
Shasha turned to him and said, “ What’s going on with you?”
“ What do you mean?” he replied, looking away.
“ You had another four months left on that deployment. You shouldn’t be here,” Shasha countered.
Dima opened his mouth and then closed it for a long time before saying, “ I’m not ready to talk about it yet.”
“ Fair enough,” Shasha said, turning back to me. “ You’re sure you’re okay?”
“ I am…going to make it,” I said, not bothering to lie.
That was all I could give him.
I wasn’t great.
But I wasn’t bad, either.
I was what I was, and that wasn’t going to change until this looming presence of Lyle Pennington stopped hanging over my head.
The moment he was dead, then I’d be good.
But not until then.