Chapter 49
Delilah
Winter air blasts across my cheeks as I burst through the front door and down the stairs, barely noticing that the space where the black car usually parks is empty. Dirt and gravel scatter as I stalk down the driveway, unable to rein in my emotions.
I know why Fallon did it. Pushed me. Why they allowed it. But it doesn’t help lessen the pain. It doesn’t help me see past the rage turning my vision blurry. I swipe at my cheeks, gritting my teeth as the tears continue to spill.
I’m nothing like him. I didn’t use her to feel safe. For my comfort.
I love her.
I will kill for her.
Fallon used every scrap of love I have for them against me. He reminded me that my father is sick and cruel, then took that awful truth and punched it into my lungs.
Exactly what Rune would do.
“Get back here, Kitten,” Reaper growls, his tone frayed. Aggressive. His boots thud behind me, keeping up pace but leaving a few feet between us.
“No,” I shout over my shoulder. My feet carry me blindly, my body screaming to just get away. Away from the crushing weight of knowing I’ll soon face my father.
Lie to him.
Kill him.
Away from the truth that Cora is a knife he’ll twist in my heart if he finds out I betrayed him.
“Delilah!” Reaper yells. My name now. No more pet names. No more patience. No more passion and flares of hunger.
Just the raw, bitter truth.
We’re all in danger. And it’s up to me to keep everyone safe.
“You know what happens when you don’t listen,” Reaper growls, his voice growing even louder.
Goosebumps rise along my arms, from the subtle threat, lined with a dark and bitter fear.
But I refuse to stop. He can beat my ass raw before I stop moving.
Before I succumb to the traitorous ache searing through me that just wants this all to stop.
For him to hold me like he did the other night. For them to protect me from Rune.
I don’t know why I’m so desperate for it now. They never have. They may have controlled the amount of damage caused to my heart, releasing information bit by bit, but they’ve never protected me from the whole, brutal truth.
“We had to.” It’s Breaker’s calm voice that makes me pause.
I swirl around to face them. They all stop at once, lined up in a perfect row. Reaper and Striker in the center, Breaker and Viper flanking either side. Just like the first time I saw them all.
That night slices through me, doubt poisoning every moment we’ve shared.
I just need a minute to breathe.
My gaze shifts, focusing on the carriage house, and I take off again. I just need a minute to think. Every day has been so consumed by them, I haven’t had time to process, or really examine everything from all angles.
“You need to be prepared.” Breaker’s voice snaps through my thoughts. “Rune will hurt her if he thinks it will break you.”
The truth of his words rips a growl from my throat.
Fuck Rune.
Fuck them.
“You know it’s true,” Breaker calls, his voice growing louder the closer he gets.
“Leave me alone,” I say, marching forward, ignoring the needling sensation pricking at the back of my neck, telling me Breaker is too close.
They all are.
“We had to prepare you,” he says.
“Get back here, Delilah,” Reaper barks out, his dark tone making my steps falter. His boots thunder behind me, growing closer, and I break into a run.
“I don’t recommend that!” Striker’s shout cracks through the air.
The dark edge in his deep growl twists an odd combination of fear and arousal in my belly.
I shoot past the carriage house, breaking into a full sprint, breaths growing heavier, but steady, all that running with Striker pays off as I dart toward the tree line.
The targets blur in my periphery as I fix my gaze on the dark woods.
I tear past the tree line, shielding my face from low branches.
Thudding boots close in behind me, and a cry builds in my throat.
An arm snares my waist, yanking me backward.
My scream cuts through the air as we tumble.
Just before impact, he twists, his body cushioning mine against the cold, unforgiving earth.
“Caught you, pretty kitty,” Reaper growls in my ear, breaths hot and heavy on my skin.
“Let me go!” I scream, struggling to get free. My elbow lands in his ribs, and I dig in, ramming it back into him harder and harder. Reaper’s grip loosens, a guttural sound slipping out of him as I break free of his grasp and scramble to my hands and knees.
“Restrain her,” he grates.
Before I can stand, one of them snatches my left boot into a tight grip, then my right, and my arms give as they drag me backwards. My face hits the ground, and I cry out.
“Stop,” Viper says, irritation making the word rough. “Hold still before you hurt yourself.”
“Fuck you,” I seethe, my cheek raking across the dirt as I scrabble for purchase, but I’m drug backward further, making it impossible. This feels far more brutal than that night in the woods. I’m fighting harder. I am harder. Stronger. The fight in me driven by raw truth.
A huge body slams onto my back, covering me completely, shoving my breath from my lungs as he pins me to the ground.
“Tiny Thing,” Breaker breathes, his massive hands pinning my arms. His warm cheek presses against mine, and I realize he removed his mask. “Stop fighting us.”
Knees hit the dirt near my head. The black fatigues stretch over his thick legs. The tattoos on the back of his fingers stand out harshly as he grips his thighs, like he’s trying to keep himself from reaching for me.
“You let him win,” Reaper grates. “You allowed him to get under your skin.”
“And you let him insult her,” I spit out. “You let him—”
“You’re not listening, Delilah,” Reaper says. His voice is gutted, rougher than it has ever sounded. “You never fucking listen.”
The urge to scream burns my throat. I have been paying attention. I know what’s at stake. I’ve heard, seen, lived and breathed every cruel second of my demise since I woke up on that worn wood floor.
Bucking, I try to get Breaker off me, but he’s so big, so heavy, I can barely move.
My pussy throbs in response to his weight, and I swallow a frustrated growl.
The way I respond from being pinned down by them again, surrounded by their brute force, sends fire raking across my brain like sharp talons.
These men turned my body against me. Turned my mind against me.
They’ve ruined my life.
They saved Cora.
That scream finally breaks free, shredding my throat, and I buck once more, weeks of bottled-up agony breaking me open. I’m so fucking angry, more at myself than them. Enraged that I can’t trust myself with this desperate need blooming inside that feels like an addiction.
My arm slips free of Breaker’s grasp, and I twist, attempting to roll him off, but Reaper clutches my wrists, flattening them to the ground with one large hand.
Breaker’s weight leaves, and the cold blasts across me.
He straddles my thighs, then grips the waistband of my leggings and tugs. Freezing air slaps my heated skin.
“Fuck you,” I seethe. “Get off me.”
“Fuck me?” Reaper asks. “Or fuck you?”
I press my forehead to the ground, grinding my teeth, and fighting tears, but I fail, and they slip out. My teeth gnash together as I choke back a strangled sob. My nails dig into the dirt, trying to ignore the heat blooming between my thighs, begging for what they refuse to say out loud.
That they care. That they are as ravenous and consumed with the need to own my heart as I am desperate to own theirs.
“Was that little whimper a beg, Sweetheart?” Viper asks.
Dirt sticks to my cheeks as I twist, meeting Viper’s eyes.
His mask sits slightly askew, the fanged mouth grinning at me cruelly, but as our gazes lock, the same softness I saw days ago turns the turquoise color brighter.
Knowing. The fact he knows how badly I constantly want all their roughness and hard edges, reignites the fire in my chest.
“We’re trying to keep you from dying at his hands.” Viper’s focus shifts briefly to Breaker, to Reaper, then Striker, before landing back on me.
“But you’re too fucking stubborn to see it,” Reaper says, hand tightening on my wrists, as if trying to force his words to sink under my skin. “Everything I’ve done was to ensure your safety.”
“Everything you’ve done to me is sick.” I hate how my voice cracks. Hate this pain lacing through me. “Your plan, the mind games. Fucking me.”
Breaker jerks my pants even lower, exposing my rear and thighs to the winter winds whipping through the trees, stealing my breath. His large palm lands sharply on my rear, hard enough to sting, to shock me, but not enough to hurt.
The fact that Breaker, out of all of them, spanked me, makes my vision blur.
“How long do you think he could have hidden his hunts from you?” Striker snaps. “Because he has been spiraling out of control for years.”
My angry growl earns another sharp smack on my ass.
“You’re too smart, Delilah,” Reaper grates. “He couldn’t hide it from you much longer. And then what?”
I shake my head, refusing to answer.
“You have no idea how cruel he is,” Reaper says. “Or what he’s already done. The choices he’s made.”
“You made the choice to involve me,” I snarl, my lips dragging across the dirt. “You made me a part of this.”
“Rune made you a part of this long before you discovered the truth,” Reaper says. “He—” His voice cuts off like he’s stopping himself from saying more.
“What would he have done if you had found out about the hunts before we prepared you?” Striker asks.
Viper leans over, making sure I’m paying attention. “We know what you would have done. We’ve watched you long enough. You would have tried to stop him.”
“Alone,” Striker adds.
“Then,” Breaker says, “he would have killed you. No hesitation.”
“That’s right. I’m no good to you dead,” I snarl, bucking, but Breaker flattens his palm to my back, and another slap sears across my rear. Fingers weave into my hair, and my head’s yanked back hard enough that pain tinges in my neck.
Reaper’s black eyes bore into me. “You’re going to fucking listen now,” he says. “The purpose of this mission has always been to avenge my brother, neutralize Rune, and ensure the safety of our girls.”
Our girls.
“Liar,” I snap because I can’t stand the awful truth. Deep in my gut, I know what they are saying is true, but waves of doubt tangled with terror wash over me until I’m drowning in it.
“You’re ours.” Reaper’s voice curls around me like smoke, lined with possessiveness.
His hand leaves my hair, and he cups my cheek, leaning down.
Our gazes collide, and all the darkness that lives in him swirls, like he’s gathering it up, ready to pour it into me.
“We told you we’d never let you go. Don’t you ever doubt that again.
Never doubt me. You’ve been mine for so long, you’ve never belonged to anyone else. ”
Reaper lets me go, and I press my face to the ground. “Just do it, already,” I grate. “Let’s get this over with. Take the belt to me. Punish me.”
Hurt me, so I don’t have to feel this gnawing yearning.
Fuck me. Ruin me.
Love me.
So much that they can’t stand it. So much that they never send me back or put me in harm’s way. Love Cora madly. Free her from Rune and bring her to me. Then we could all protect each other, and no darkness would ever touch us again.
Not Rune. Not Fallon.
Nothing.
A choked sob escapes. Tears spill onto the ground, soaking the dirt and leaves under my cheek, the weeks here flashing through my head, turning everything I thought I knew upside down.
Fallon made me doubt myself. Them. Everything.
I finally accepted that this awful ache that grows every time they look at me, every time they touch me, glows too gently to be anything but love.
It’s too bright and warm, and I can’t begin to unravel whether it stems from whatever games they’ve played with my head or if it’s from all the things I’ve learned about them.
I don’t think it matters.
It just is.
But Fallon just ripped it away, and I’m left once again wrapped in fear, hoping for the impossible. That all of this will be worth it.
That they aren’t just manipulating me.
That they are mine.
A palm slides across the back of my neck, warm and steadying. “Princess,” Striker says, voice low. “We’re not hurting you.” His hand squeezes, getting my attention. “Everything you feel right now? He’s going to use every bit against you, and you’ll break.”
But they’ve already broken me.
“Kitten.” Reaper's stern tone slides over me, heating my cold skin. “Eyes on me.”