Chapter Nine #4
“You were burning yourself out,” he says. “We saw it. You needed to shut down for the night. Remind yourself you’re not a robot.”
I want to argue. I want to say rest is pointless when Kimber is still out there. But the truth is my body feels lighter. My head clearer. My emotions… not quite steady, but steadier.
Then reality surges back in, cold and sharp. Kimber. Her terrified eyes in that video. What Dean and Bryce are capable of. What I’ve already lived through.
Ronan must see the shift in my face because he cups my chin and tilts my gaze up to his. “Baby,” he says softly. “I don’t want you anywhere near this.”
I open my mouth—ready to tear into him—but he presses two fingers to my lips.
“Let me finish.”
I glare but remain silent.
“We know you’re not sitting this out,” he says. “We know you’d rather set yourself on fire than let this go. And you deserve the revenge that’s coming. You deserve that closure.” His voice deepens. “But we can’t lose you again.”
His eyes are raw when he says it. Raw in a way he never lets himself be.
“We thought you were dead,” he goes on. “Just like Reign. And when we found out what they did to you, what they took… baby, we still haven’t processed it. Losing you again? We wouldn’t survive that. None of us.”
My heart cracks wide open.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I whisper. “Not unless it leads me straight to Kimber.”
He nods, pulling me onto his chest, pressing his forehead against me. “We’re going to find her,” he murmurs. “We will. And then we’ll put those bastards in the ground where they belong.”
A crash comes from the kitchen—something that sounds suspiciously like a skillet hitting the floor. Emerson swears. Rowan mutters something sharp.
Ronan groans and drops his head back to the pillow. “Breakfast is going to kill us before Dean and Bryce ever get the chance.”
I laugh. Really laugh. “Come on,” I say, sliding off him and offering my hand. “If they burn the house down, where will we murder-plan?”
He threads his fingers through mine and tugs me close for one more kiss, slow and warm.
“Let’s go save breakfast,” he murmurs.
“Or bury it,” I whisper back.
Together, Ronan and I head toward what should be a kitchen but currently looks like a crime scene. My muscles feel loose and warm; my brain is sharper than it has in days, but nothing prepares me for what waits outside that doorway.
Chaos.
Absolute domestic war zone chaos.
Flour covers every inch of the counter like someone tried to summon a demon with a baking spell and messed up halfway through.
Batter drips from the cabinet handles in congealed little stalactites.
A mixing bowl is upside down on the floor, as if it’s given up on life.
Smoke curls from the toaster—why the toaster?
—and the smell is nauseatingly sweet and burned, like someone set fire to a bakery.
Ronan and I stop in tandem.
We look at each other.
Then lose it.
Laughter bursts out of me so fast I have to grab the doorway for support. Ronan bends at the waist, hands on his knees, wheezing like chaos itself punched him in the lungs.
And then I see them.
Rowan—tall, tattooed, deadly Rowan—is wearing a floral apron with frilly edges. Where the hell did he even find that? He stands there stiffly, chin up, chest out, holding a spatula like a knight with a sword. Flour dusts him head to toe like a pissed-off angel who fell through a bakery roof.
Emerson… Jesus Christ. He looks like the Pillsbury Doughboy’s feral cousin. Flour in his hair, on his shoulders, smeared across one cheek like face paint. He blinks at us, and a puff of white floats off his lashes.
Ronan finally chokes out words. “What the fuck… are you two… doing?”
Rowan bristles, pointing the spatula at us. “We’re cooking breakfast.”
“Attempting,” Emerson mutters.
“Failing spectacularly,” I add, stepping over the remains of a pancake that appears to have tried to flee the scene.
I walk forward, laughing so hard my stomach aches, and kiss Emerson first. He beams like he’s single-handedly saved the world, then I kiss Rowan—who tries very hard not to melt but still leans into me like he’s starved for the connection.
Then I turn and scrape their culinary atrocities straight into the trash.
“Hey!” Rowan protests. “We worked hard on that!”
“You worked hard to commit food homicide,” I correct. “There’s a difference.”
Emerson tries to look insulted but ends up grinning, wiping his forehead and sending a cloud of flour drifting into the air like snowfall.
Ronan snorts. “You two couldn’t cook as kids. You set the microwave on fire trying to boil water.”
Rowan snaps, “It was an experiment.”
“And you nearly blew up the kitchen,” I remind him. “I still have nightmares.”
He scoffs, but he’s smiling. The apron somehow makes him look both ridiculous and unfairly attractive. Domestic Rowan is a danger all its own. Note to self—sexy aprons for all three of them once we survive this hell.
I take over the stove because clearly, it’s a public safety emergency. In minutes, the kitchen smells like something edible instead of toxic waste—warm vanilla, sizzling butter, hope.
The boys clean while I flip pancakes, bumping into each other, stepping on each other’s feet, arguing about who made the biggest mess. Emerson hums off-key. Rowan mutters curses every time flour shifts. Ronan sneaks up behind me twice to steal pancakes like a gremlin.
It almost feels normal.
Almost.
We finally sit down to eat—proper food, not despair pancakes—and my body loosens in a way it hasn’t in days. The guys watch me more than their plates, like seeing me fed steadies the ground beneath us. Like it proves I’m here. Breathing. With them.
When breakfast is done, they usher me out of the kitchen, practically herding me down the hall while murmuring about cleaning up. I pretend to protest, but honestly? I let them. This small bubble of care is doing dangerous things to me. Softening edges I didn’t think could soften again.
But as soon as I step into the war room and the glow of the screens washes over my skin, something sharp and familiar slides back into place.
Purpose.
Vengeance.
Electric focus.
The fear for Kimber settles into something colder, hungrier. A blade instead of an ache.
The boys will clean up the kitchen.
I’ll clean up our enemies.
And the moment breakfast settles, I’m ready to dive back into the hunt with blood on my teeth and fire in my veins.
Because the world might pretend monsters don’t exist… but I’ll make sure they remember me.