Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
SILVER
This woman has my insides tied in knots.
There was something so captivating about her, I couldn’t keep myself away, even though I knew I should.
She was far too good for the likes of me.
Indy had told me that she wouldn’t care about it, but I cared.
I wouldn’t want her mixed up with someone with my past, so I’d be a hypocrite to be with her.
But as I storm down the stairs towards my kitchen, it’s her husband’s I’m pissed at. I push the door open, and take a look at the three men trying, unsuccessfully, to clean my kitchen as I tell them, “You guys are idiots.”
Indy reels his head back in shock. “What do we do?”
“Maybe we aren’t the best at cleaning your kitchen, but I don’t think that makes us idiots,” Ryker adds.
“I’m not talking about the kitchen,” I say, waving my hands around whatever it was they were trying to do in here to clean up. “I’m talking about her.” I point up towards their room and woman on the second floor.
“Uhh… care to explain that a little more?”
“The three of you are her mates, her husbands, and you just left her at the moment she was feeling the most vulnerable.”
“What do you mean? Her wounds had healed, hadn’t they?” Ryker asks.
“Her physical ones, yes, but not her emotional ones. If one of you dick heads had taken a moment to actually look at her face, you would have seen she was crying, and you just walked out and left her like that. Like you couldn’t face her and didn’t care that she was upset.”
“Fuck you, Silver. I left so I wouldn’t say something I’d regret. Seeing her get hurt because she did something that we could have done for her… just makes me so angry.”
“That!” I point at Braxton. “That is exactly what I’m talking about. She thinks you’re angry at her.”
“No, I’m not mad at her, I’m mad at the situation, that I wasn’t there to help.”
“I know that. But she,” I point towards the room again, “Doesn’t. Which is why she was crying.” I watch his face and see it the moment he realizes what I’m talking about.
“Fuck, was she really crying?”
“The second the three of you left, she burst into tears. I didn’t leave until I was able to calm her down, no thanks to you idiots.”
“Silver, I’ve never heard you speak so much in the weeks that we’ve known you,” Ryker says with a wide smile.
“Yes, well, I’ve never had anything important to say before now. But you guys are acting like morons, and I’m going to call you out on it, especially when you’re doing it at her expense.”
“I’m going up there,” Ryker says, tossing his broom to the side. What was he even sweeping?
“No, wait, we should all go, we all messed up,” Indy suggests. “Let’s finish cleaning up this mess and we’ll go together.” Ryker nods.
“Uhh… Silver? How do we clean this up?”
I sigh, pointing to the fireplace. “The mess is in there, see the frying pan and the grill? We need to get those out and cleaned up, and then we should remove all the bacon that dropped in there.”
We make quick work of cleaning out the fire pit before washing our hands and heading upstairs.
As I reach the bottom of the steps behind them, I stop in my tracks, my foot raised above the first step.
I realize that I’m not part of this, I’m not part of their little family.
Reluctantly, I pull my foot back and watch as they bound up the stairs and burst into her room.
Good, this will give them some time to get things settled between them.
I hated seeing her so upset. I understood both sides, the men hated seeing her hurt, but she felt like they were angry at her for hurting herself.
I turn and head to the bar, deciding to get myself a quick drink.
It’s still early, but this morning has been a crazy one already.
Earlier, when I was walking through the tavern getting ready to open and I heard her scream, I swear I felt ice run through my body as I ran back to the kitchen.
When I saw the fire practically attacking her, her men nowhere around, I felt angry.
But it wasn’t directed at her, it was just directed at what was happening to her.
I couldn’t help but worry about her, care for her. Even if she wasn’t mine to care about.
I take a swig of my drink when I hear Braxton’s loud, booming voice. “WHERE IS MY WIFE?” My gaze darts to the top of the stairs where he’s standing, looking down at the tavern with an angry glint in his eye, his hands tightly gripping the railing.
The other two dart out of the room after him, looking frantic as their heads scan the tavern. They all run down the stairs, and I suddenly realize what Braxton said. “What do you mean? She’s not in her room?”
“I wouldn’t be yelling for her if she was,” he grits out between his teeth as he storms towards the exit. I hop over the bar and chase after the three of them as they start calling her name down the rainy street.
“The market,” Ryker says, pointing down the road. “I bet she went there.”
“Why would she go there?” I ask curiously as I keep pace with the three angry men.
“If she thought we were mad at her, she probably went to get us something, as a peace offering.” They get angry at her and her first thought is to buy them a present? That doesn’t seem right, but he knows her far better than I do.
We storm through the stalls of the market calling her name, I ask everyone I know if they’ve seen her and nobody has. When we finally reach the end of the market, we all just stare into the empty street on the other side.
“Where is she?” Brax growls. We decide to ask every person we can if they’ve seen any sign of her, and as we pass a couple stalls, I see where there’s a small alley between them, leading to the forest. Something has me taking a step back to look at it again before I slowly walk down it, looking for any signs of her.
“What is it?” Indy asks, coming up behind me.
“I don’t know, but this alley gives me a weird feeling.”
“I feel it too,” he says as he steps up beside me. Indy is a far better tracker than I am, so I let him take the lead as he scans the ground until he finds what he’s looking for. “There!” He points to what looks to be a small footprint on the ground, much too small to be a man’s.
“Did you guys find something?” Ryker asks as Braxton and he comes up behind me.
“It’s a woman’s footprint for sure, I’m going to follow it.” We all know that this could be any woman, it doesn’t specifically have to be Penny, but at this point we’re grasping at straws.
“I’m seeing a few footprints, but they’re facing the wrong way,” Indy explains.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“It’s like she was walking backwards. Oh—here, she turns and…” He sucks in a small sharp breath.
“Indy, what is it?”
“She… started running.”
“Fuck.” I’m not sure which one of us says it, or if all of us do, but as Indy starts running into the forest, we all follow right behind him.
After a minute, he starts yelling her name and the others follow suit.
“Shh! Listen!” Indy whispers as we stop moving and strain our ears. We hear a sharp whistle to our left, and silently jog in that direction.
After a minute, Ryker yells her name again, followed by Braxton. This time we can hear her voice, but it’s faint. Ryker doesn’t hesitate to take off at full speed, clearly the fastest runner of our group, as we try, unsuccessfully, to keep up with him.
“I see her, over here! Penny!” he yells from a short distance in front of us.
I’m the last one to reach her and my eyes quickly roam the area. She’s clinging to Ryker, but as soon as I set my eyes on her and know that she’s okay, my eyes then move to the body on the ground twenty feet behind her.
“Who is that?” I ask as I move around them towards the body. Indy and Brax move behind me and when I get closer to the body, I suck in a sharp breath as he becomes familiar. “Yariff? What happened here?” I ask, turning to where Ryker still holds Penny.
“Pen? What happened? I promise you’re not in trouble, just tell us what happened.”
“H-he wanted to be my m-mate. H-he wouldn’t t-take no for an a-answer,” she says sniffling into Ryker’s neck.
“You killed him?” Indy asks, sounding surprised, but she shakes her head, before lifting it to look at Indy.
“It was the masked man, he was here again, he saved me… again.”
“Shit, what would have happened if he wasn’t here?”
“Why don’t we get out of the rain, and go back to the tavern so Penny can get out of her wet clothes and calm down,” I suggest. I see Brax and Indy quickly glance at Penny, a look of guilt flashing in their eyes.
Ryker lifts her up and helps her awkwardly move her legs around his waist so she clings to his front and he carries her back towards the market.
Indy runs ahead to push a path through the market for them, Braxton walks right behind them, with me taking up the rear, and it doesn’t take long before we’re stepping back into my tavern.
A few of the locals are sitting inside since I’d left it open.
A couple of them are my friends and I head over to them.
“I need you guys to take care of Yariff’s body. He tried to attack Penny. You’ll find his body just to the east of the back corner of the market, about a hundred paces into the woods.”
“Shit, really? I always knew there was something off about him,” Evan says, standing alongside Mario. “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of it.” I nod before turning back to the stairs and jogging up.
They left the door open and as I stand in the doorway, I can’t help but think that I don’t belong in here. Indy is whispering something to Penny as Braxton tries to peel her off of Ryker, but she doesn’t want to let go. As much as I wish I fit in here, I don’t.
I turn to leave, but I hear the sweetest sound… the soft voice of an angel. “Silver?”
I try to maintain my composure as I turn back to the room. “Do you need something?” I ask, taking a single step in.
“Thank you for helping me earlier, It meant a lot to me.”
“You’re welcome, Sweetheart.” I glance at the three men who are giving me weird looks. “I better get going.”
Indy voice raises in my retreat. “Or you could stay?”
I halt in my tracks for a second before reminding myself about why I can’t. She deserves so much better than me. I don’t respond as I continue my steps, and soon enough, I hear the door softly closed behind me. That’s the way it should be. Them with her and me down here, running my tavern.