Chapter 46
Chapter Forty-Six
Dahlia
I don’t remember the final half of the journey, or bringing my bags inside, or hanging my clothes, or going to sleep, but I wake up lighter than I’ve been in months in the quiet isolation of the shelter beneath the farmhouse.
The weight of our unspoken words and fractured closure is no longer heavy in my lower belly.
I inhale deeply. My chest fills with optimism, awe, and the steady beat from a well-rested heart.
I leave Spero sleeping on the mattress and go to the solid metal doors.
The bunker seems to breathe as I open it. I step up to the ground floor. The first-light haze filters through the farmhouse, highlighting dust and fragments in the air.
This is my new home.
My forever home…
Our forever home.
I pass down the corridor—admiring the floorboards and trimmings on the walls for the first time—then navigate my way toward the front door that Lagos carried me through months ago.
He carried me over the threshold, which is such a lovely story to tell our children one day.
The house is still but for the wind outside. I don’t know what the walls are made of, some kind of brick, but it does mute the weather, the only echoes of the Redwind coming from the windows.
I am approaching the front of the house when I see something on the ground. I freeze. Lagos is slumped on the floor, long legs stretched out in front of him, a barricade in front of the door.
No one in.
No one out.
Thick arms rest over his chest, and his third eyelid is closed, the first-light haze shimmering along the pearl-like surface. Not awake, but not asleep either—in a predatory state that is both stunning and terrifying.
I study him, my gaze following a path down his torso and catching on the new scar tissue. My heart twists.
I kneel beside him.
Hesitantly, I reach out my hand and touch the smooth surface, inhaling when I feel the heat from his body. What did they do to you? Were you there the entire time? All five months?
Did they break you, Lagos?
That last thought comes unbidden, and I wish it away because somewhere deep inside me, I know he is… He is damaged, but I still want him.
A large, warm hand clamps around my wrist, holding it hostage. “Are you real?”
I gasp, gazing up from his mutilated torso to his blazing black eyes.
“ Yes ,” I whisper.
His free hand touches my face, ardently tracing the curves. “This face…”
I cover his hand with mine, being this close to him, being caught in his gaze, possessed by his hands. In love.
“Things I like,” he murmurs, soft but deep, “this face.”
“You think I’m pretty?” I ask.
His eyes narrow. “Yes.” That one-word grunt brings the brightest smile to my face, one I feel everywhere.
“Pretty but plain,” I agree.
“Plain?” He stares, his eyes lost for a moment, peaceful, the steel-grey rings returning as his pupils shrink. “Plain doesn’t consume. I would happily murder men and women for each one of your freckles, little flower.”
I suck a sharp breath in and feel the jagged edges of his gruesome words. “I don’t want you to murder anyone for me.”
The pause that follows burns like a flame consuming all the air between us.
His expression hardens again. “Do you have your taser?”
I look at my wrist, still banded by his fist. “I’m not carrying that around.”
“You will.” He unwraps his fingers, freeing me. “Go get it now.”
“What happened?” I touch a large wound, the smooth membrane rolling over his strong muscles. “They skinned you. They hurt you. Let me kiss you.”
He snarls, and before I can respond, he rises to his feet, dragging me up with him.
“Lagos!”
Please don’t be like this.
Manhandling me into the bathroom, he positions me in front of the dusty mirror. His chest meets the back of my head, his body lording behind me.
“Look,” he orders.
“I can see,” I say, but lift my chin, wanting to gaze up at him.
“Look!” he demands again, grabbing the back of my head and forcing my face straight ahead. “Look at your throat, little flower. Look what I did.”
Tears build behind my eyes, but I refuse to blink in case they cascade down my cheeks and reveal my sorrow. I know what it looks like. I can feel it. The skin on my neck is purple and red, marred by long red bands—clear imprints from fingers.
“It wasn’t you,” I whisper, voice tight around my nervousness. “It was?—”
“Six.” The dark word slithers down my spine, conjuring memories of that night. The heat of his breath pressing down on me, my fear and arousal dancing together as I willingly surrendered to him. To be close to him. To comfort him.
I love him so much.
It hurts.
I swallow. “Who is Six?”
“Me,” he replies straight away, his matter-of-fact tone is emotionless. “My Shadow number. Zero Zero Six.”
A shuddering breath escapes me as I say, “Do you want me to call you Six?”
“If that means you will keep the taser on you, you can call me anything you like.”
I try to back away. “I’ve seen enough.”
“No.” He holds me in place. “You haven’t. One hand. That is all it will take. Creep up on me again while I’m half-asleep, and you might just feel that. I need to know you’re prepared.”
“If I need to defend myself, I will,” I promise weakly. Not even convincing myself because that night I wrapped my arms around him and let him.
“Prove it,” he challenges. “Go get it.”
The baby in my belly rolls, my stomach churns with nausea, and I swallow over lumps of discomfort. “Okay.”
As I walk into the bunker, he waits just outside the open door, not stepping inside, but his sparks of domineering energy trail me down the steps and over to a tall chest of drawers where my beibao sags on its side on top.
I retrieve the gun from between the sleeves and return to the open door, stopping in front of him.
“Here”—I twist my wrist, flashing the gun in my fist— “I have it.”
“Shoot me with it.”
My mouth drops open. “No.”
“Do it, little flower. Practice.”
I shake my head over and over. “No, no, I don’t want to.”
“Did you fuck Robert?”
I gasp. “No?—”
“Tomar?” He barely lets me finish the word, provoking me, his tone a snarl, a snap of anger. “Did you fuck him? When I came to your room, and you were on the mattress, were you going to fuck him while I was sedated?”
The storm inside me cracks. “No!”
“Did you spread your legs for another man while I was being tortured with your scent? While I was thinking about you, only you, were you fucking other men?”
I sob, shoulders shaking. “No!”
“Shoot the fucking taser!”
My vision blurs behind hot, heavy tears. But I lift the gun and pull the trigger before I can think, or guess, or wonder, the pulse going off in my hand.
The noise is a sharp pang.
I watch as two prongs slice through the air and connect with his chest, almost in slow motion.
There is a pause.
My heart beats in my ears.
Then his third eyelid closes, and his body convulses, heavy, thick muscles jerking around uncontrollably. He falls to his knees but doesn’t collapse.
Holds himself swaying.
Regret and grief pummel me.
He growls through the electrified sensation like a beast refusing to be taken down by a mob of tiny, vicious animals. He fists his hands, fighting the wreckage, the take-down of his body.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I sob, wanting to go to him and hold him, but I can barely see through the salty pinch of my sorrow.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Five seconds later, he reaches for the prongs and draws them from his chest. As he hauls himself to his full seven-foot-one height, the place between his thighs expands. I swear I hear the bunker gasp to behold such a powerful, erotic being.
“Lagos…”
He heaves, staring at me.
“Lagos?”
“ Good ,” he finally states, voice deep and gruff like tyres on a rocky track. “That will slow me down… Fuck .”
Unable to breathe, I merely watch as Lagos takes a single step forward, but I don’t shuffle away from him, only arch my neck to hold his dark gaze.
I inhale the thick air and scent and taste his metallic presence.
Across his torso, his inked skin rolls over dense, chiselled muscles still twitching and contracting with electricity.
Near-black eyes bore into me.
Over me.
Then down on me…
I bite my lower lip when he grabs his dick through his pants and palms the hard bulge, and for a moment, I think he might grab me, kiss me, and drag me into one of the rooms, spread me open and shove inside me, but?—
Spero starts to cry.
I exhale in a rush, and finally step backward, needing space and air. “I have to… I have to…”
Check on Spero…
“Go to the infant,” he finishes, heated eyes on me, hand on his hard dick. “Go. What I need can wait.”
I don’t think it can…