Chapter 5
Chapter
Five
TUCKER
Iwatch Forest through the window as he stands in place, staring out at the community in the distance. I wait for him to notice me watching, but it’s like his mind is elsewhere. His arms and legs are stained with tattoos, and I imagine the rest of his body hidden beneath his clothing is too.
When I look at him, I see the things we used to do.
Who we were. Who we were supposed to be.
I think about the forbidden parts of him, the parts that tasted the sweetest. The danger of being caught, of sneaking out into the wilderness at night.
What began as visceral fucking under the midnight moon turned into something more—making love in the dirt.
I see the way his mouth fit around my cock, the way he licked me clean when I was done. The way his eyes peeled upwards, meeting mine, as he tugged himself to release, shooting his seed onto the earth.
I’ve waited ten goddamn years.
Those deep, woodsy eyes haven’t changed, filled with the same longing. I’d recognize his face anywhere. Even with the way in which he’s desecrated his face.
I slide the glass door open and step onto the balcony.
The air hangs heavy and humid from the storms that’ve only just passed.
The kind of wet heat that suffocates the weak.
But us wildborne boys are anything but weak.
I join Forest at the railing, but he pretends I don’t exist, staring blankly ahead at the log cabins just beyond the tree-lined path.
“Where’s my father?’” he asks in a whisper.
I study the side of his face. The words Love Kills is tattooed on the side of his neck. “He’s up north on a retreat.”
His gaze shifts sideways. “When is he coming back?”
“Could be a week or two. Maybe longer. He takes off without much notice and comes back when he’s gotten whatever he gets out there.”
I can’t stop looking at the ink etched into the crown of Forest’s head, a crown derived from deer bones, the antlers peaking up into curved temples of blonde, buzzed hair.
Can’t get over how he’s sullied his beautiful fucking face with…
art. Can’t get over how much I don’t even fucking care because he’s still him.
The word Loser is tattooed under his right eye, obfuscating the dark bags that linger underneath. On the left side of his face, Runner is written vertically where his sideburns fade just above the ear.
And then there are the piercings. A black ring pierced through the middle of his lower lip.
What looks like diamonds stabbed through his lobes, with a long bar stretching through both ends of the top of his right ear.
There’s a thick ring pinched between his septum and a barbell through his left eyebrow.
He’s always been fond of pain. I imagine each piercing, each tattoo, each tattering of his body was borne of a need to feel the very pain that’s always driven him.
I remember the way he’d gasp at first when my spit-stained cock would enter him, the way I’d ask if he was okay, and the way he’d bury himself to the hilt.
Only satisfied when he was filled completely, burning from the width of my cock.
Remember the way he used to scratch the blade over his flesh and smile as his blood dripped into the fires of offering.
I exhale, cutting through the silence. “I don’t want you to think I’m fuckin’ your dad.”
He shoots me a squinted, pointed glare.
“We’re not in love or anything like that.
There was some family drama after you left.
Your dad and his brother had a falling out.
” I place a hand on his back, soft at first and then firmer.
“You were the only heir to the throne. Once you left, your father tried to produce another child, but it never came to pass.” I shift my hand lower, to the small of his back.
He doesn’t seem to notice, and if he does, he doesn’t seem to mind.
“Your cousin Darius stood to inherit this place, so your father found a loophole.” I remove my hand from his back and place it on the wooden railing, the emerald gleaming beneath the eye of the sun.
“By marrying me, I officially became a Wilde.”
Forest seethes. “You don’t have an ounce of Wilde in your blood.”
“Like I said, a loophole.” I shrug. “Besides, the Wilds have blessed me. It has whispered through the trees, anointing me as the new chosen one. Sometimes, these things are messy.”
“Why don’t we call this what it is? My father makes the rules. This idea of the fucking wilderness being some deity is as insane as it always has been.”
I raise a finger to my lips and shush him. It won’t be happy to hear the blasphemy and might respond accordingly. “What do you remember about life when we were younger?”
“Not much,” he scoffs, “and that’s still too much.”
“You remember the things we used to do?”
His eyes meet mine, the way he used to look at me. The way he used to stare into my soul. The way I was his and he was mine. “I can’t remember half of it, and the half I do remember I wish I could forget.”
That stings.
But his eyes don’t waver from mine. It’s like he’s searching mine, trying to pull the memories from within me.
“We used to run through the woods, most of the time naked. That was freedom, to feel the wind on our skin. You were always good at running, and I knew someday you’d run too far.
” I caress his cheek, and the feeling of his bare skin under my flesh steals my breath.
“I didn’t expect it’d take you ten years to run on back. ”
He reaches for my hand and brushes it away. “I didn’t come here willingly.”
“The scary letter brought you back,” I say deadpan. “Either you chose to come back here, or the Wilds brought you back here. Both of which you’ve now denied, so which is it? Do you believe you’re in control, or do you believe there’s something out there pulling the strings?”
His eyes sink as he lets out a soft, exasperated exhale. “We can’t rewrite the past. We can’t undo the things we did.”
“Our lives are a song we don’t get to write. Stop fighting and embrace the wolf within. We can’t make the wrong choice because we’re not really making them. We’re animals, simple as that. Pawns on a chessboard made of dirt.”
“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” There’s venom in his voice, like he’s kissed a rattlesnake and regurgitated the poison.
He brushes past me, rips the door open, and turns to me.
“We made our decisions, over and over again. And the things we did out here, I stopped doing out there in the real world. Because…” He drags his palms over his face, leaving pale finger marks down his cheeks.
“Because it’s fucking sick. This is all sick. You’re all sick.”
“Do you have another stepbrother I don’t know about?” I question, unable to contain the smile on my face.
He slams the door shut and steps forward. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
I stare him down for a moment, my eyes unwavering as I close the distance between us. I palm my hand over the side of his face and pry at the corner of his lips with my thumb. He retreats, his back pressing against the glass.
“Ten goddamn years,” I whisper.
And the silence between us is cracked open by the call of the Wilds.
I take him by the mouth, tasting the forbidden fruit. The sweetest Wilde. Tobacco and iron, drawing the faintest note of blood. The hunger overtakes me as I shift my knee between his legs, my cock hardening beneath my jeans. Begging for release.
Forest breaks away from me, gasping at first, and then grunting.
He grabs me by the back of the neck, ducks underneath my arm, and pushes me backward.
Strong as he ever was. I lose my footing and crash through the glass door, the sting of broken glass tearing through my skin.
I land with a thud on the hardwood floor, thousands of shards raining down all around me.
“I’m talking about how we killed your fucking mother,” Forest screams.
And then he freezes in place, staring blankly ahead as if he’s not really here. Like he’s somewhere else. He doesn’t even fucking blink as my heart races to a furious beat. My chest heaves as I fight to control the animal within. I’ve killed men for far less.
Forest jerks in place, his eyes snapping open wide and twitching from side to side. His hands tremble as he raises them to examine them. “What the fuck happened?”
I groan as I sit up, tiny pieces of glass falling to the floor. I take hold of a piece of glass lodged in the side of my arm and rip it out, disposing of the bloodied shard on the hardwood. “Little brother Wilde still has that wolf in him.”
I raise my gaze to meet his.
He shakes his head defiantly, as if he didn’t just throw me through a fucking glass door.
He’s always been stronger than his size would suggest.
Rage flows through his blood like the roots of a tree.
But the other part?
I rise to my feet, the sting of cuts all over my back taking a backseat to the inquisition in my mind. “What the fuck did you say about my mother?”