Chapter 49
The yacht hasn’t fully docked before I jump, my rain boots slamming down with more urgency than grace.
I’ve been gone too long. Dove didn’t want me to escort Jag to Sitka in the first place, and now she’s been sitting here for two hours with nothing but her imagination to keep her company.
Kody lands beside me with four guards at his back.
The other four guards stayed at the tattoo parlor, stationed outside Jag’s room with orders not to let him sneeze without checking on him.
Jag definitely wants to kill me for this. I get it. The idea of anyone containing him makes my skin hum with something I don’t want to look at too closely.
Inside the main house, the smell of coffee hangs thick. I follow it into the kitchen and find Dove sitting beside Frankie at the island.
Dove’s honey-soft eyes instantly connect with mine, and my chest loosens.
“You’re home.” Frankie hurries toward Kody.
Dove blinks slowly, her shoulders caving inward in that quiet way she does when she’s out of gasoline. It’s nearly morning, and neither of us slept.
She doesn’t protest when I scoop her up and carry her out, back across the walkway, into the guest house, and up the stairs to our bedroom.
I set her down gently, and she remains standing with her back to me, the tension in her neck warning me that a conversation is coming.
“You want to sit?” I ask.
“No. Just… Tell me.”
So I do.
I tell her every word Jag and I exchanged. Every look he threw at me. Every moment we stood too close. Every second neither of us pulled away. The way he put my thumb in his mouth as if testing to see if I’d burn or break.
I tell her he has the journal and a choice to make before I return.
Her shoulders hitch with each detail, and her breathing tenses like she’s trying not to shake.
“I didn’t kiss him,” I finish quietly.
“I did.” She turns toward me, her expression vulnerable. “Do you hate me?”
“Never.” I step into her space. “If anything, I love you more for it.”
“Why?” She frowns.
“Because I saw you two tonight. I saw what you used to be together, what you still are, the way he looks at you, the way you respond without meaning to.”
Her breath catches.
“It gave me a glimpse into your past.” I touch her chin, lifting it. “I saw your pain in that kiss, what it cost you to allow it, and what it took from you when you pulled away. It showed me more about who you are, what you need, and what you’ve been missing.”
Her lower lip trembles, not with fear or guilt. With relief.
And a tremor of something else neither of us is brave enough to name yet.
We peel off our clothes in tired silence. She shuts off the lights, and I lock the balcony door.
When we finally crawl under the blankets, she curls into me, legs tangled with mine, cheek tucked against my chest. My arms wrap around her on instinct.
But neither of us drifts off. Her breathing doesn’t even. My pulse doesn’t slow. The night doesn’t soften around us.
After a long stretch of shared darkness, she whispers, “I know you’re not asleep.”
“Neither are you.”
She lets out a breath that shakes. Then she starts talking.
“Jag was nine when our parents married. I was a baby, but I remember flashes of him in those early years. When our parents were still alive. I remember him hiding under the bed with me during their arguments, just to keep me company. And slipping extra dessert onto my plate when no one was looking. He was protective, even then.”
I stroke her back, slow circles, silent encouragement.
“When we lost them, everything changed.” She takes me through her life without stopping, from that first year on the streets to the night she ran after Jag in a wedding gown.
She tells me about the cardboard forts, tent villages, abandoned houses, and cold sidewalks they called home.
She tells me about the foster system, the bullies, abuse, molestations, and overall lack of adult supervision, and how Jag saved her from every bad situation with a promise in the bend of his pinky finger.
She tells me about the night she started her period and what happened after she told Jag her virginity had been taken from her.
She tells me about the deep, innocent love she had for him, and how it burned straight through her.
Then she tells me how he killed that love in a drug dealer’s house, how he hurt her so profoundly their relationship never recovered.
I can picture him in those early years, in his late teens, early twenties, homeless, feral, ready to torch the world for her. I can guess why he fucked those women after she offered her too-young body to him. He knew it would end her inappropriate crush and end whatever temptations he was fighting.
Deep down, she knows this, too. She just hasn’t been able to see past the excruciating devastation he inflicted.
“I thought he hated me and wanted to punish me.” Her hand fists in my shirt.
“You were fifteen, Bluebird. He screwed up how he handled it, like a typical twenty-year-old, idiot male. But rejecting you that night was the right thing, the only responsible choice, and he paid for it. Hell, he’s still paying for it.”
“I know that.” Her breath strikes my collarbone, warm and shaking. “Doesn’t excuse his behavior for the last seventeen years.”
“Dead on, darling.” I skate my fingers across her shoulders, tracing the faint scars in silent question.
“The marks are from that night. When I caught him with those women, I ran, shoved myself through a metal fence, and didn’t have the supplies to mend the wounds correctly.”
I keep my hand on her shoulder, but the scars don’t need more words tonight. “We need to sleep.”
She nods, exhausted enough that the motion barely registers.
“When we wake, I’ll return to Jag and see if he read the journal.” I yawn. “See if he’s ready to build trust and let me help.”
“I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
It’s the same crossroads as the dock. Same tension crackling between us.
“You promised.” She lifts her head, glaring.
Fuck. I did. Hours ago, amid the arguing and frustration, I told her if she stayed on the island, she could go next time.
“I’m going.” She taps my lips. “But not to see him.”
That stops me.
“I’d rather go to the garage.” She settles into the pillow. “I need to put in my notice to quit. Finish the repairs that need my attention. Then I’ll wait there.”
I search her face, trying to find the angle I’m missing.
“I want to be close to you, Wolf. In case something goes sideways. If he pulls his usual shit, if you get triggered or shut down…” She presses her forehead to my chest. “I don’t want to be an ocean away if you need me.”
“This has nothing to do with me being tri-curious?”
“Tri-what?”
“Let me ask you something. If Jag was trustworthy—”
“He’s not.”
“If he’d shown up tonight as the man you loved before everything went to hell, if he’d begged your forgiveness and tossed all his secrets at your feet, would you have considered building a relationship with him? A sexual relationship?”
Her breath catches.
“A relationship that involved you and him and me,” I say. “Would you have been interested in exploring something together?”
Silence.
Not cold or angry silence. She sinks into soundless introspection, her eyes shifting in the dark, up to my face, then away, then back again.
I don’t move. I don’t rush her. I wait, hand on her neck, pulse loud in my ears.
Finally, she exhales with an agonized, “Yes.” Her expression creases, fraught with reluctant honesty.
“Jag might’ve been the only person I would ever consider sharing you with.
But hang on. Are you…? Would you share me with him?
I mean, you’re possessive and jealous. You were going to stab your brother just for walking in on us. ”
“I would never share you with anyone. But he already has your heart, whether you’ll admit it or not. And I like him.”
“You want to fuck him.”
“I want to get to know him. There’s more there, hidden under that rugged exterior, and I want to understand it.”
“He isn’t trustworthy, Wolf. He’s cruel, manipulative, and ruthlessly violent. Tell me you’ll remember that when you see him again.”
“Yes, and then some.”
Trust isn’t a feeling. It’s a structure. And Jag’s trust is cracked straight through.
I pull her closer, fitting her hips against mine. Her breathing evens out against my chest, and eventually her weight sinks into me.
But my mind stays wide awake. Because now I know something I can’t unknow.
Long ago, there was a version of Jag who might’ve fit into this life with us. And there’s a future she could imagine, even now, if he hadn’t turned his past into a graveyard.
After I get some sleep, I’ll go to Jag with open hands, but I won’t forget what she said.
Not everyone who wants to stay knows how.
When I return to Sitka, I’ll find out which man Jag really is.