14. Riley
Him or us.
Those words hit me so hard I have to push back from the counter for a second, worried I might throw up if I try to eat the delicious-smelling omelet Logan just made for me.
Not that this is the first time I’ve realized how much danger we’re in. It isn’t. But it’s a cold, hard dose of reality after letting myself get lost in the warmth and safety of being home, being loved, last night.
It’s also the first time I’ve felt like I have so much to lose.
“If Austin wins this fight, this war—” I start.
“He won’t,” Maddoc says, cutting me off sharply.
“Eat,” Logan adds, all the feelings he and I still haven’t named to each other coming through in the single, flat word.
He pushes my plate closer, and I scoot the tall stool back toward the counter, knowing it’s his way of caring for me, a counterbalance to the pain we both thrive on.
I force myself to pick up my fork as the men continue to discuss the war looming on the horizon. The one where Austin has all the firepower and resources my inheritance can buy.
“We need to incentivize some of our relationships in the warehouse district,” Maddoc says, rattling off some names and locations that seem to mean something to Dante and Logan.
“I’ll talk to Ruiz about getting the 17th Street Gang to help us fortify a perimeter,” Dante says. “Not sure he”ll go for it, but it”s worth trying.”
Logan’s lips turn down, his voice tight. “His gang is already spread thin. We’ll need to supply them with weapons if Austin…”
I tune out the details for a moment, panic rising in my chest. I hate this fucking feeling. I want to be angry, not scared, but part of admitting my feelings for these three men means realizing how devastated I’ll be if we lose.
If I lose them.
But the time I spent as Austin’s captive and the callous way he and his men treated me speaks to a level of ruthlessness that’s shaken me more than I want to admit.
I’ll do whatever it takes to help defeat him, to help the Reapers wipe West Point from Halston’s streets. I just wish I felt more confident that we’ll be able to stand against him now that he has the power to do basically whatever he wants.
The thought makes my stomach turn, and I choke on the bite of eggs I just took. All three men immediately snap their attention to me, their conversation pausing in a way that tells me more than anything else how much I mean to them.
I recover as quickly as I can, taking a deep breath and schooling my features. I don’t need them worrying about me more than they already do. I want to help, not be a hindrance.
“Everything okay, princess?” Dante asks, cocking his head to the side and studying me intently.
“I’m fine,” I lie, offering a weak smile and forcing myself to take another bite of the omelet I can barely taste.
Maddoc shakes his head. “You might be fine now, but you weren’t fine a few seconds ago.” He pauses, then nods. “It’s West Point. Talking about them upsets you.”
“Their existence upsets me,” I snap, then put down my fork when I realize my hand is shaking. I take a breath. “Sorry,” I say, only half meaning it.
I’m not sorry I let my anger and fear show, I’m just sorry it came across as lashing out at them. But I’m done covering up the way I feel around these three men who would literally give their lives to protect me, and the way Maddoc’s gaze softens for a moment, I know he doesn’t expect me to.
It’s Dante who breaks the tension, though. “We all are, princess,” he says with a low chuckle. “So let’s figure out how to fucking end it, yeah?”
“I’d like that,” I say softly. “They…”
I close my mouth and shake my head as memories of my time in captivity suddenly well up and threaten to choke me. Stupid, because other than the beating Austin gave me at the end, they didn’t actually hurt me.
“They what?” Logan asks, deadly menace in his voice. “You need to tell us. The wounds I treated last night were fresh. Were they the only ones McKenna will have to answer for?”
“Yes,” I say honestly. Then I can’t help but add, “But I know how dangerous Austin can be now. He really is a sadistic psychopath. He has no conscience. Hurting me, hurting you, excites him.”
I shudder, and Logan’s pale gaze sharpens, burning into me as he searches my face.
I hold it, putting my heart on display for him when I realize how that may have sounded. Austin terrifies me, but it’s different. The sadistic pleasure that asshole takes in making others suffer is completely different than the darkness that binds Logan and me together.
Finally, Logan nods, his body subtly relaxing.
“You don’t need to protect me from hearing your plans,” I say, the connection I feel with him—with all of them—giving me strength. “Austin’s going to be hard to beat. Harder now with all that money to work with. But I don’t want to be on the sidelines. I’m in this with you. It’s why I stayed.”
Although I’m grateful as all hell that they got Chloe out of the line of fire.
“We are too,” Maddoc says gruffly. “But I don’t think that’s the only thing bothering you right now. Fuck’s sake, Riley,” he pauses and scrubs a hand down his face. “You looked like you were going to pass out or throw up or—or I don’t even know what. Tell me what’s going on. Now. Did he touch you? Did he—”
“No,” I stop him before he can finish asking the question that’s twisting his features into something dangerously angry. “He felt me up a couple of times, but that’s all. I swear. None of them tried anything more than that. Austin threatened to. You know he—” I swallow down bile but make myself say it, reminding myself it doesn’t matter. Not really. “He married me. It’s how he got legal access to the money. But no one raped me.”
It’s true, but my voice cracks and my skin crawls as I remember the fear that they would. And not just rape. I can survive fucking anything, and I’m no stranger to blocking off my emotions when men want to use my body for their pleasure. But the way Austin’s men talked about me—talked about sharing me and passing me around before they finally killed me, and how sure they were that Austin would “reward” them that way—gets to me on a level I’m embarrassed to have my men see.
But of course they see it.
In an instant, Maddoc crosses the kitchen and pulls me up off the stool I’m sitting on, crushing me against him in a hug so tight it feels like he might break me in half.
“What else?” he demands.
I shake my head, closing my eyes as I lean into him.
It didn’t happen, so I don’t need to dwell on it.
Maddoc feels differently. He tips my chin up, forcing me to meet his eyes. “What happened, butterfly? We need to know.”
“Nothing,” I start.
His eyes darken so fast I shudder, a visceral memory of him belting me rising up inside me.
I almost beg him to do it again. To take me out of my head that way. To lash away these fucking fears that have burrowed into me before they can take root and turn me into someone weak.
But we don’t have time for that, and I’m stronger than that anyway.
I go up on my toes and kiss him, then straighten my shoulders. “Nothing happened, but if I’d stayed there much longer, I think—” My voice breaks as I remember how helpless I felt and how frustrating it was, but I swallow and power on, holding his gaze steadily. “I think it would have been bad. The longer I was there, the bolder Austin’s men got with me. Groping me and taunting me about what he’d do, what he’d let them do, once he had no more use for me.”
I don’t know which was worse, the way they threatened to use me, or the fact that Sienna implied Austin would simply kill me.
I don’t want to bring her up, though. Not with the history Maddoc has with her.
“What did they say they would do?” he asks in a hard voice, his muscles tense and his jaw going tight.
“They wanted to break me. Degrade me. Pass me around and use all my holes. Draw it out and make me hurt, make me cry.” It’s almost too much, but it pours out of me in a cathartic rush, my breath growing short and my throat closing up as the words pour out. “They said he’d toss me to them like a scrap of meat after he got the money. He didn’t let them touch me while he got all the legal shit in order, but they promised he wouldn’t care how much they tortured me afterward, and I… believed them.”
My voice fades away, my throat finally closing up completely as I let the full horror of what the Reapers saved me from wash over me. Every fucking one of Austin’s men was just like him. All of them getting off on the idea of turning me into a plaything that they’d be able to use and abuse with their leader’s blessing.
The color drains from Maddoc’s face, but his features stay hard and still as a block of granite as he searches my face. Then he leans in until his forehead is resting against mine.
“I’ll kill him for that,” he promises in a gravelly tone that’s barely above a whisper. “I should have killed him a long time ago, butterfly, but I swear I’ll make him pay this time. I’ll fucking end him.”
Then he captures my mouth in a hard, deep kiss that goes on long enough to make my head spin from lack of oxygen.
I don’t care. My back is bowed from the force of it, my body held up by his arms, his strength, and the intensity of his feelings slicing through the hold the memories of captivity had on my mind, finally freeing me from them.
I believe him. Austin signed his own death warrant, and the darkness in me rises up and relishes every fucking bit of Maddoc’s intensity as I kiss him back.
He finally releases me with a dark, possessive growl, his entire body still vibrating with emotion. For a moment, I think he’s going to say something more. Instead, he pins each of his seconds with a dark look, then strides out of the kitchen, pulling his phone out as he goes.
A moment later, we all hear the front door slam as he leaves the house.
I blink, lifting a hand to touch my tingling lips, then looking to the other men to explain whatever it was that wordlessly passed between the three of them just now. “Where’s he going?”
“He’s going to make sure you’re safe from McKenna,” Logan says flatly, his pale gaze just as intense and lethal as the anger Maddoc took with him.
“He’s gonna handle some shit with our people,” Dante adds grimly, the easy demeanor I’m used to from him nowhere to be found. “He needs to make sure our territory is secure and fortify protection around our key holdings so that when McKenna comes for us, we can fend him off.”
I suck in a deep breath and slowly exhale. It sounds like Maddoc’s doing everything we were already talking about over breakfast, but the way he left… that’s my fault.
“I shouldn’t have said anything about what happened with West Point. I didn’t mean to piss him off.”
Dante offers a sympathetic look. “No, it’s good that you didn’t lie. We need to know this shit, princess. Madd will be fine. He just needs to work things out on his own for a bit, and putting things in motion to take control of the situation is gonna help him get a handle on his emotions.”
“Okay,” I say, forcing myself to stop twisting my hands together when I realize that’s what I’m doing. I take a breath and repeat it, grateful for Dante’s explanation. “Okay. Fine. That’s… good. As long as he’s going to be okay.”
“He will be,” Dante promises, pausing as he gives me an intense look. Then he lets out a gusty breath, his lips quirking in a faint imitation of his usual smirk. “Although speaking of getting a handle on emotions—” He jerks his head toward the stairs. “I’m gonna need you to come with me for a few.”
I almost reassure him that I’m fine again, but something in his face stops me. I share a look with Logan as I follow Dante out of the room, and even though I can’t say why, it settles me.
I follow Dante up to his studio.
“Do you want me to paint again to get my feelings out, like I did before?” I ask, not hating the idea even though I’m not sure I need to right now.
He chuckles, giving me a rueful look as he pulls me against him. “Nah, not this time.” He cups my face, letting his thumb brush back and forth across my cheek in a gentle caress that reminds me just how much I matter to this man. “When I mentioned getting a handle on emotions, I was talking about me, not you.”
My heart does a slow roll in my chest, and for an endless moment, I get lost in the vibrant green intensity of his eyes.
“Maddoc wasn’t the only one who heard that shit you told us down there, princess,” he says, getting more serious than I’ve ever seen him. “Having you gone was hell on all of us, and I—” His voice cracks, but his gaze never wavers, his entire soul laid bare to me. “I care about you, so fucking much. I want to paint you right now. A portrait.”
“Are you serious?” I ask, feeling a little bashful at the thought. Portraits aren’t his usual style, and it feels intimate, important in a way that transcends what he’s shown me with his art in the past.
Dante nods, covering my heart with his hand. “I need to commit this shit to canvas,” he says quietly.