Emily
Ipull on the handle of the kitchen door, and this time it flies open. “Ah ha!” I jump through the door. It’s not what I thought it would be. There are no tall, Victorian, oak cabinets. Instead, it’s a steel commercial kitchen. Thayer and Oliver lean against the counter.
“You look like a disappointed little mouse who hasn’t found any crumbs,” Oliver says, and my focus slides from Oliver and the sandwich in front of him to Thayer.
I kick my leg up and hold it out in a crane stance.
“So, fiancé. How about you cut this bad boy off?” Fiancé?
No bleepin’ way. I’m not marrying Thayer Zambrano, no matter how much my fifteen-year-old self is jumping up and down.
Did I write Mrs. Rockwell-Zambrano on the inside of my Freshman lit notebook?
Yes. Did I burn it at the back-to-school bonfire the following year?
No. Because it still had a few pages left in it.
But I thought about it, and that counts.
That was over half of my life ago, and I can still feel it.
The heat of the bonfire, and how he left me gutted.
A year—it took me a year to get over him.
I wiggle my ankle, and I’m impressed with myself that I don’t fall over holding it up as long as I have. Because Thayer is just staring at it. He gives a one-shoulder shrug and watches the monitor, but when his borrowed shirt glides up my leg, his attention follows.
“No.” He takes his coffee cup and sips on it.
I let my leg fall. “Being engaged is one thing, but vanishing from everything I do? People will talk. Pine Green people especially. Whitney’s posse of others?”
Thayer purses his lips.
“Posse of others? What is that, a character from the SyFy channel?” Anders asks.
“No, my high school friend—the wedding in New York?” I cock my head to the side, because this could have all been prevented if Anders had come with me.
I would never have even talked to Thayer if I’d had a date.
“She was a chameleon who blended in with all the cliques. I was in the not-cool kids; the others are—”
“—the cool kids.” Ryder scowls. “I’m not a fan of the cool kids.”
Oliver puts his sandwich down. “I was a cool kid.”
I wave my hand at him. “You’re a prince. That hardly counts.”
“I can attest that you weren’t a cool kid at university.” Thayer places his mug at the bottom of the massive stainless steel sink.
“You wouldn’t know cool if it smacked you across the back of the head.” Oliver raises his hand and Thayer ducks his swing. Ryder’s extended hand lightly taps Thayer’s back.
My gaze bounces between Ryder and Thayer. Thayer’s expression drops, and my heart settles in my throat. Smacking a guy who has a half-dozen armed guards?
Thayer’s lips tilt in an uneven smirk. “No way you’d even recognize cool if you saw it.”
“True. I just wanted an excuse to hit you. Next time I won’t need an excuse.” Ryder raises his eyebrows at Thayer.
“My answer stands, Emily. The monitor stays on. If my father’s men come after you, I need a way to know where you are.”
“You don’t think they would just cut this thing off?” Anders bends down and runs his finger under the band. Goosebumps travel up my leg.
“You have a point.” Thayer moves to the fridge and grabs a tray. He places it on the counter, uncovering a stack of sandwiches. “Help yourself.” He taps his lips. “That’s a really good point, Thompson—he would cut it off.”
“My dad has threatened to get an under-skin implant on me after the whole yacht experience.” Oliver takes a violent bite out of his sandwich and waves it at Thayer. Now it’s my eyes going wide.
“Under the skin? You want to put a tag on me, like I’m some sort of dog?”
“No, it wouldn’t be the same, Em. Those have to be scanned at a vet clinic to get the information of the animal. We would need a real tracker, one that gives us real-time data,” Ryder says.
“Real-time data? You’ve got to be kidding me.” My jaw drops, and I swing my arm at Ryder’s back. But he ducks and I lightly tap Anders. “Oh . . . sorry Anders.”
“No worries.” Anders doesn’t rub the spot, but his eyes lock with mine. “It’s not a bad idea.”
“It’s a horrible, rotten, awful idea. I thought having my dad track my phone in high school was bad enough. A tracker under my skin?”
“Your boyfriends think it’s a good idea,” Thayer says, giving me a wink before turning and getting himself a glass. “Milk, anyone?”
There’s a chorus of yeses and yeahs. And I’m wondering why I’m even here.
I take a step out of their little sandwich club toward the stove where there’s a butcher block.
I slowly inch back until my side hits the counter next to the stove.
I rest my hand on the counter behind me while they’re chatting about the cheese and who likes Havarti over Jarlsberg.
I’m about to reach for the knife when Anders steps in front of me. He places a hand on either side of me, resting them on the counter and pinning me against the stainless steel. “Emily?” He cocks his head at me.
“What? I wasn’t doing anything.”
He leans in, his lips against the shell of my ear. “It’s a shitty place to be in. But we need you safe.” In a beat, he twists me around so he’s against the counter and my back is up against him, his arms around my waist.
“Nice,” Thayer says, covering the sandwiches back up and placing them in the fridge.
“It’s not nice. You say this is for me, yet you’re not giving me any say in the matter.”
“Fine, you want to tell your father that you’re being hunted by James Zambrano?” Oliver asks.
“We could tell the authorities and have the press hounding your family’s homes,” Ryder says.
“I could just tell my dad where you are,” Thayer throws over his shoulder as he puts the milk away. He turns around with his arms crossed over his chest.
“No, no, no. My dad doesn’t need to know anything.” Panic rises up my throat. “If he thinks I might be in danger, it will put him at risk for another heart attack. And he’ll never survive it. I know he won’t.”
The four of them have a really similar look on their faces. Different hair, different colored eyes, and vastly different clothes. But they have to be kidding me. They are all staring at me in the same exact way.
“So then you have your answer, Em.” Thayer pushes his hands into his pockets, and the edge of his jacket flays back.
He’s the quintessential version of a man in a power suit, but the look on his face?
I’m carried back to the young man he used to be.
The one who said he loved me and I believed him.
I tear my eyes away from him because I can’t let myself trust him again.
“I . . . there’s no other way to keep your dad from coming at me but to fake a baby and a marriage?
And yet you had to drug me and shove me in a trunk?
” I glare at Thayer. In my peripheral, I watch the other guys.
My hands move to my hips as my heart has an out-of-body experience.
Because I don’t know how I ended up here.
But there’s a bruise on the top of my knee, and my shoulders are sore.
“You weren’t put in a trunk, Emily.” Thayer’s lips thin. He’s lying. Or partially lying.
“Then how did you get me here?” I’m stalling.
I step away from Anders and push up onto the counter, sitting on it and swinging my legs—something I’d never do at home because Maya would kill me or at least give me side eye and swear under her breath at me for a week.
I’m not a short person. After a good sleep, I’m almost five foot nine.
But they’re making me feel downright tiny, and I can’t deny the urge to be a big strong monster against them all right now.
I’m not lying down and letting Thayer think he’s my hero.
Because he’s not. It’s twisted. That young girl in me might see him as mysterious and someone I wanted to save me from what I thought was a boring life.
A life where Easton got all my dad’s attention.
But damn Thayer—I’m not that girl anymore.
I’m not going to let him think he can push me around.
“You know what? Forget it. It doesn’t matter.
So, if you tell daddy dearest I’m pregnant and we have to get married, you have eight months to bring him to his knees and lock him up.
Or better yet, give him what he really deserves.
Like we had. Or I had . . . the torture of not knowing where one of the people you love most in the world has gone.
And that you might never have him again. ”
My cheeks heat with a fire that bubbles up like lava from my soul.
Maybe this isn’t so bad. I can help take down the man who brought me to my knees for a year, not knowing where my brother was.
Dismantle every part of his life while he watches, not knowing it’s me pushing the nail into his Achilles heel.
I smile. This could be fun. Months of serving up revenge that was only a seed inside of me.
“Emily?” Anders says. He touches my elbow lightly. My head snaps to him and I’m possessed.
“Fine. I’ll marry you, Thayer. But I’ve got rules.” I wiggle the monitor on my leg.
“Rules, such as?” Thayer’s chin points at me.
“This thing between the two of us isn’t real. You don’t get to touch me.”
“My father has to believe this is real, or it’s not going to work.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Fine, you can touch me. But only in public and when absolutely necessary. Two, you can’t touch anyone else.
We’re married, after all. But . . .” I can’t help but smirk.
“I can touch who I want.” I grab Anders’s shirt in the middle and pull him toward me.
His lips are hard but quickly soften as I deepen the kiss.
I’m the one who pulls back first. My pulse throbs in my throat and my core.
I open my eyes. The three other guys are glaring at us.
I spin on the slick counter. A tilt of my head at Ryder has him step over to me.
He’s quick with a wink and grabs the back of my head.
Then his lips are on mine and I’m floating like I’m wearing a beautiful gown and waltzing in the ballroom upstairs.
Heat spreads through me. They’re both good kissers but different. Anders is careful.
And Ryder? I lift my lips from Ryder’s and he’s laughing. He leans back into me and tucks my hair behind my ear. “I don’t know where you’re driving, Emily, but I’ll come along for the ride.” He kisses the tender spot on my neck.
I bite my lip. I don’t know what the heck I’m doing either, but here I am.
“You’ve made your point, Emily.” Thayer glances at me with no expression.
Oliver next to him, though? I couldn’t name what he’s thinking if I had a million years. His lips are turned slightly up. But his eyes give off possessiveness with a touch of anger, and his arms are folded across his body.
“Have I, though? I mean it. You put me in this position. You and your twisted family. Your dad had one point right.”
“What’s that?” Thayer asks.
“You should have left me and my family alone.”
“It’s a little late for that, future wife.” He pivots out of the room.