Chapter 5 - Dove
Curiosity wars with misgiving as I follow Wolf into the mansion. The skirt of my once-white gown drags across the pristine floors like a dishwater mop.
The warm jacket lifts from my shoulders, and he hangs it in the entryway. Since he doesn’t remove his boots, I keep mine.
And gape.
This isn’t a house. It’s a goddamn lifestyle flex. Stunning beams, massive glass windows, and high ceilings that feel like a cathedral if it were designed by a billionaire lumberjack with an inclination for moody art.
Fire dances in a stone hearth, licking the air with orange tongues. The living room, foyer, and rooms beyond are all designer shapes and rich-people textures. Pretty sure that twelve-person sectional would swallow me whole, and honestly, I wouldn’t fight it.
Wolf doesn’t give me enough time to admire each room properly as he pulls me along. His devil-may-care pushiness is both maddening and magnetic.
We climb a grand staircase. Real wood, thick and strong. Iron railing, cold under my fingertips. The air grows warmer as we ascend, more intimate.
Where is he taking me? A guest bedroom? I really need out of this heavy, wet dress.
He leads me down a hallway lined with closed doors and stops before one that’s ajar. Glancing back at me with a mischievous smile, he swings it open and grabs my hand.
My muscles freeze.
He hauls me inside.
The smell hits first. Skin. Sweat. Sleep. And something deeper. Something feral.
Sex.
Then my eyes adjust to the darkness.
A massive bed squats in the center of the room. Like comically massive. Custom made.
The sheets are tangled in knots like they’ve been twisted and kicked and grabbed at. What makes my blood pressure detonate are the human-shaped lumps.
There are people in the bed. Multiple.
How many? Two? Three? Four?
I stumble back, my heels hitting the doorframe.
“Wolf,” I whisper. “What the actual hell?”
Someone stirs. A huge, imposing, chiseled-from-pure-intimidation figure rises from the bed.
Black, bottomless eyes glare out of a face that doesn’t smile. And he’s naked. Just standing there in all his terrifying glory like a war god who doesn’t need armor.
“Go back to bed, pet.” Wolf waves him off, calm as ever.
Pet? That mountain of a man?
The fuck?
“Pssst, Frankie.” Wolf paws through the bedding, searching.
A smaller form pops up and slips from beneath the sheets. A woman. Her movements are soft and elegant as she whispers to Wolf, too low for me to hear. She’s naked, too, her silhouette barely lit by the hallway light.
As she walks past him, he stops her and offers a robe. She takes it, sliding it on like she’s done this a thousand times.
Then she notices me.
Her eyes bulge, round and startling green, as she gasps. “Wolf! Did you get married?”
Chaos.
The bed explodes with motion. Sheets fly. Bodies scramble. A second man stumbles out. Then a third. A fourth?
No.
Definitely three men.
All of them knee-weakenly gorgeous.
All of them naked.
Given the suffocating reek of sex and testosterone, I can only assume they just shared that tiny redhead like a hedonistic fever dream.
Lucky girl.
Meanwhile, I hover half in the hall, half in the room, gaping like an idiot in my rain-soaked wedding gown.
Boxers and pajama pants materialize, and within seconds, all the dicks are covered.
Wolf flicks on the light and pushes me back into the room. “Okay, so… This is Dove.”
Everyone stares.
“She’s not my wife,” he adds quickly. “She ran away from her wedding. Long story. She needs a place to crash. I’m putting her in the guest house, but I wanted you to know so you don’t freak out.”
They are definitely freaking out.
The terrifying one—dark eyes, darker mood—doesn’t say a word. He just grunts and glares, arms folded across a chest full of scars, radiating nope.
Wolf follows my gaze. “That’s my brother, Kody. Technically, my uncle. He’s harmless. Unless you touch his woman,” he says in an ape-man voice.
“You make a beautiful bride.” The woman offers me a small, sleepy smile. “Probably not what you want to hear. You look like you had a day and lived to fight another. You okay?”
She looks younger than me. Impossibly delicate. Almost childlike. With the most direct, soul-piercing eye contact I’ve ever experienced.
Uncomfortable, I look away, colliding with the mismatched eyes of a Viking. He leans against the wall, scratching the scar on his abdomen. His pants hang so low I can see Valhalla. Zero shame, this guy.
“You dragged a runaway bride into our lair.” He tsks. “Bold.”
“I’ll go.” I back away and bump into Wolf’s chest.
“Apologize, bonehead.” Frankie pinches the underside of the Viking’s bulging bicep, making him hiss.
“That’s Leo,” Wolf says at my ear. “Don’t engage.” Then he adds, “He’s my least favorite brother. Technically, my cousin.”
“I’m Monty.” The older one offers a hand, squints at his extended fingers with a wrinkled nose, and yanks his hand away before I can touch it.
Guess we know where those fingers have been. Inside someone, but who? If they’re all related…
“I’m Wolf’s father.” Monty Novak stands tall and regal, wrapping a sheet around his waist like a royal robe. “This is… Unexpected.”
“Now you know.” Wolf nudges me. “Ask them whatever you want, whatever will make you feel comfortable enough to stay.”
So that’s why he dragged me in here and woke them? He wants me to feel comfortable?
He wasn’t lying about his relationship to the richest man in Alaska and the captives mentioned in the news articles. I only need to look at the four men to see the family resemblance. Not just their appearances but their demeanors.
Wolf isn’t the only one hiding a feral, predatory side.
I have so many questions, but I don’t want to ask anything right now. Thanks to my reclusive nature, I burn with anxiety and awkwardness in regular situations. This is so far beyond my comfort zone, I can’t feel my tongue.
Kody studies me, his voice a deep, grave-cold vibration. “Are you in danger?”
I hear the question he doesn’t ask.
Did you bring danger to our home?
“Not tonight.” Wolf gives him a look. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“Nice to meet you, Dove.” The redhead steps through the chaos like she’s used to it. “I’m Frankie. You’re safe here, okay?”
I nod slowly, not sure if that’s true or if I’m in the middle of some exclusive Alaskan sex cult.
“Do you need anything?” Frankie asks. “Clothes? Girl stuff? Food?”
“Cherry-berry.” Wolf tugs a strand of her hair. “I got this.”
“Yeah.” She smiles and presses a kiss to his sternum. “You do.”
“All right. Show’s over.” Wolf claps his hands and pulls me into the hall. “Back to bed, you crazy kids. Don’t make it weird.”
“You made it weird,” Leo calls after us.
Back down the stairs, we go, my hand still in his. The silence settles again, broken only by the creak of the house and the hum of appliances.
We hit the kitchen. It’s warm, glowing with soft light. He opens the fridge as if this is the most normal thing in the world.
“What was that?” I tug on my dress, unsure what to do.
“My family.” He pulls out leftovers, stacking the containers on the huge island.
“In one bed?”
“They’ve been through hell, and fourgies are their therapy. It’s how they keep it together.”
“Trauma bonding with benefits?”
“Foursome is the dreamsome. I’m not part of that.” He gestures at a door off the kitchen. “There’s a bathroom if you want to change. Do you need something to wear?”
“I have clothes.”
And questions.
So many questions.
When I don’t move, he guides me into the small guest bathroom and spins me away. Then a tug jerks me back. And another. And another.
He’s unlacing my bodice.
I clutch the material as it loosens and droops, relief flooding through me.
“Shout if you need anything.” He steps out, shutting the door behind him.
I change into a camisole and cotton pajama pants and emerge with the gown bundled in my arms.
“I’ll have that dry cleaned.” He takes it from me and hangs it in a mudroom off the kitchen.
“Throw it away.”
“You might change your mind.”
“I won’t.”
He slides a dish in front of me. Salmon, rice pilaf, and green beans with almonds. The scent of hot food sends my stomach into somersaults.
“Eat.” He makes his own plate.
“You brought me to an island full of naked people.” I lower onto a stool.
“You needed a place to stay.”
I stare at him. At the rain hitting the windows. At the firelight flickering from the other room. And I wonder, not for the first time, what the hell I got myself into.
And why I’m not in a hurry to leave.
He hands me a fork, plops down beside me, and watches me eat like I’m the most interesting part of his night.
The food is too hot, but my stomach doesn’t care. I chew slowly, unconcerned with the dense silence churning between us.
Eventually, he sets down his fork and pulls off his beanie, shaking out a luxurious mop of inky curls. While I was in the bathroom, he removed his boots, socks, and rings and washed the dark makeup from his eyes.
“Spill it, Angel Wings.” His stare draws me in.
“What?”
“Whatever you’re thinking.”
“It’s none of my business.”
“Cute. Let’s pretend you didn’t meet the family at a full-frontal welcome party. Nothing says hello like surprise nudity.” He shudders dramatically. “Good luck un-seeing Kody’s third leg.”
“I didn’t look.” My face heats.
“Denial’s a lovely color on you. I may not be caught up on all the social norms, but I know what you saw—” he directs a finger toward the second floor “—isn’t a paint-by-numbers situation.”
Since he met me in the trigger-happy-bridezilla phase of my life, we’ve established I’m not the standard type.
“Okay. Fine.” I push away my finished plate and twist on the stool to face him. “You refer to Leo and Kody as your brothers, but they’re not?”
“We were raised in the Arctic as brothers.”
“Raised by a psychopath. The news reports said he’s dead. Who was he?”
“He was a Strakh. Monty and Kody’s brother. Leo’s father. And—”
“Your uncle.”
“Right. But we didn’t know our DNA lineage until we escaped.” A dark shadow flashes across his face. “Doesn’t matter what those tests say.”
“They’re still your brothers.”
“Yeah. Until I push them off a cliff.” He winces. “Bad joke. Delete, delete.”
“Monty wasn’t in the Arctic with you?”
“No. We didn’t meet him until we escaped.
And before you ask… The men in my family aren’t fucking one another.
Legally, Frankie is married to my dad. But she’s also married to Leo and Kody in every other sense of the word.
They share her. Standard foursome rules apply.
Guys can’t make eye contact. Guys can’t make bodily contact. High fives are acceptable.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Yeah. I’m kidding. There’s definitely contact. You know… One in the pink? Two in the stink? Please, tell me you get it so I can shut up.”
“I get it.”
“Praise Jesus.”
As I let that sink in, a million other questions bubble up. The sharing thing doesn’t faze me. Jag has always been openly bisexual with an aversion to monogamy.
The men I just met are imposing, domineering, testosterone-fueled alphas. Like Jag. Except they’re committed in a conjugal relationship with one woman.
A woman who seemed entirely too comfortable prancing around naked in front of Wolf.
“What is your relationship with Frankie?” The question is out before I can stop it.
“She’s like a sister to me. Sometimes a mother. Other times, a best friend.”
“But you’ve had sex with her.”
“What Frankie and I shared…” His focus falters, looking through me, not at me. “It was more intimate than sex.”
My mind sifts through situations that fit that description, and I take a dark turn fast.
Held captive by a psychopath in the Arctic Circle.
Only been in civilization for six months.
I didn’t exist.
They’ve been through hell.
He stares at his empty plate. “If you stick around, maybe I’ll tell you the story someday.”
“Thank you. For dinner. And a place to stay. For all of it.” Even though it’s weird as hell.
“I know it’s a lot, but you’re safe here.”
God, that word again.
Safe.
Everyone throws it around like it means something. I’ve never heard a word more fragile. People promise it, whisper it, swear by it, and still, the worst things happen anyway.
I lean back and examine him. He’s barefoot, lean but muscled, with those wild blue eyes that never seem to settle. His damp hair curls at the ends, and there’s a smear of charcoal under one eye like he forgot to wipe off his makeup completely.
He’s lethally beautiful.
Beautiful men have always been trouble for me. They make promises with their eyes, seduce with their tongues, and vanish before morning. Or worse, they stay and destroy me slowly.
“You ever sleep with them?” I tip my chin toward the staircase.
“Used to. In the Arctic. Not anymore.”
“Why not?”
“I snore. They voted me out.”
“What’s the real answer?”
“They found something I haven’t.”
The way he says it—shoulders relaxed, gaze level, as if he isn’t standing outside the circle with his nose pressed to the glass—he wants the world to think nothing can touch him.
It’s all bullshit.
“Come on.” He grabs our empty plates. “I’ll show you the guest house.”