25. Eden
Eden
If you’re hunting big game,
make sure you don’t get gored.
T he forest vibrates with life. Sun dapples the thick undergrowth as it twitches with scurrying animals.
Birds trill to one another, darting from branch to branch.
Spotting a particularly dry patch of leaves, I correct where I’m about to place my foot and silently thank Beau for thinking to bring me supple leather boots among the multitude of lingerie.
They’re soft and silent and offer me far more protection than my last pair of shoes.
My poor foot has only just recovered from treading on that stone.
I shouldn’t be out here at all, really. I know I shouldn’t.
But despite all the quite reasonable conversations I’ve had with myself this morning, I still find myself tracking Dom and Beau through the woods while they make their way to the broken cameras.
Dom’s main argument against me coming today was that I couldn’t keep up. All I’m doing is proving them wrong.
Right ?
It’s too late to turn back now, anyway. It’s been hours, after all.
I may not be a gun-toting hard-ass with buns of steel, but I am a useful person.
I’ll track them to the cameras, surprise them with my apparently shocking ability to keep myself alive for a few hours in the forest, impress them with my stealth, and then help them to fix the cameras.
Or watch them fix them.
To be fair, I really can’t help with repairing wildlife cameras.
I can’t delude myself entirely... this will probably end very badly for me. Either one of them could snap me like a Kit Kat —and gobble me up just as fast too.
But after they get over being pissed, maybe they’ll be impressed?
Maybe ?
Oh , their stupid muscles and stupid smiles and stupid kisses are making me stupid. I’m going to be in so much trouble.
For the third time in as many minutes, I study the ground.
The trees. It isn’t easy. They’ve left far less trace than most game.
Still , they’re two large men, and no skill in the world can completely disguise the impressions of their boots.
Small leaves have been crushed with a heel here, a slide of dirt there.
Making a decision, I push on to follow a few bent twigs.
Maybe I shouldn’t be testing them so much. It’s only been two weeks, after all, and Dom did make some major concessions last night. I probably should have waited, followed the agreed pace.
But the truth is, they terrify me.
I’m scared to death that I’m going to wake up one morning and all of that independence I’ve worked so hard for, all of that self-worth, will just vanish in a cloud of mindless orgasms. That they’ll tell me what I want to hear, and I’ll start nodding along like I always do and just find myself the pampered princess they’ve been treating me as.
I need more than that.
I don’t want to be defined by who I am to them— I did that with my husband and that was a disaster. I need to be an equal. Free . I need to be defined by who I want to be.
And I want to be like this. Free and wild and brave and settled in the forest. It’s so good to be back out among the trees.
I’ve been following them since dawn, and the sun is high in the sky now.
Past noon, certainly. Surely Lucky has found my note by now— I left it in the kitchen, and he never stays out of there for more than a few hours.
Even after my little white lies to the three of them, that will clear things up.
I hope they aren’t too worried I’m gone.
And I really hope they don’t come after me.
Abruptly , a rough, masculine voice snaps an order ahead of me. It’s far enough through the thick brush that I can’t make out what he said, but I know it’s Dom . Satisfaction and pure nerves crash through my veins, and I take a deep breath to settle myself.
I should call out, I know. Let them know I’m here. But the hunt is almost... thrilling. I wonder just how close I can get before I’m discovered. Why I’m craving that look of shock on Dom’s face, I have no idea, but I want it badly. I want that smug confidence gone .
Slowly , and as carefully as I can manage, I ease my way through the trees, slipping behind anything that will hide me as I move forward.
Keep low, stay steady, and watch your damn feet, Eden .
In a few minutes, I can hear them. They’re not making much noise, but definitely more than me. A few minutes after that, I catch glimpses of them through the trees. They’re wearing their Army uniforms, to my surprise, and I can only see them because they’re moving so purposefully.
“ This ... it... fine...”
Grimacing , I pick up my pace just slightly, wanting to hear what they’re saying.
I manage to get closer, close enough that I can see the stubble on Dom’s jaw when he turns his head.
I lower my foot... only to feel the fragile indent of a twig against my boot.
Catching my breath, I glance down and move it to a safer patch of dirt before putting my weight down.
My heart pounds giddily in my chest.
“ Yeah , well, if you didn’t want to talk then you shouldn’t have dragged me out here,” Beau snipes in a tone I’ve never heard from him before. His accent sounds softer too, for some reason.
I slip between two trees, following.
“ Heather wouldn’t have done this. You out of all of them have to know that. You know what she was like.”
There’s a silence, and I edge forward, wanting to hear more.
Lucky wouldn’t give me any details on Heather , but I’ve gathered enough to know that Dom was hung up on her and she left with some guy called Thomas , who used to be part of their team.
I haven’t been alone with Beau long enough to ask any questions, and Dom , well, there’s no way I’m going to ask Dom about her.
But what has she done now? I thought she was out of the picture.
“ What ?” Dom prods.
“ Just trying to figure how to answer that without getting my ass kicked.”
I struggle to split my attention between my feet and the conversation, but they’re not moving too fast, at least.
“ Just say it.”
Beau huffs. “ Fine . Heather was a lot. Sure , she was brave as all hell— I’ll give you that. But she also had a knack for hitting a guy below the belt that you either didn’t see or didn’t want to.”
“ She was tough,” Dom snaps.
I blink. He sounds so defensive of her. Uneasiness sifts through my gut. It doesn’t sound like these are old, dusty feelings at all.
“ She was a dick, and I could never tell if it was intentional or not. There’s a reason the other three hate her, Dom —they didn’t just wake up one day and decide it. She was always different around you and Thomas . Softer . The rest of them...” Beau trails off.
I shouldn’t be listening in like this. This is not the way I should be hearing about them.
But I still don’t make a sound.
“ It’s not like the others are innocent. Lucky put a snake in her bed, for fuck’s sake.”
I bite down on my lip hard to stop a giggle. Lucky’s never put a snake in my bed.
Well , not the fanged kind anyway.
Beau snorts. “ It was a garter snake. Completely harmless. And you know he only did that because she kept saying that he was too soft to watch anyone’s back. She told him flat out that he should stay back with the women and children while she and Thomas went out on raids.”
Dom stops abruptly, and I only just catch myself before I step into view. My heart hammers, then twists a little as I think of Lucky . I’ve seen him in action, and he’s as fierce and capable as any of them.
“ She was joking. She had a mouth on her, but she was only joking,” he says, though he sounds uncomfortable.
Beau makes a derisive sound. “ Yeah , real funny. I laughed a lot when I saw him hurting after that one. I don’t even know how she always found the exact softest spot to hit on a guy, but she was a real pro. I thought Jasper was going to murder her on the spot.”
Dom blows out a long breath. “ And you?” he asks in a low voice. “ She do that with you too?”
“ She —” Beau groans. “ Look , she never wanted to push me too far because she knew we were tight. But as charming and fantastic in the sack as she was when it was both of us, it hit me like a brick to the face when she turned around and made it clear she wasn’t interested in me.
She wanted you, Dom , and Thomas , and as soon as you weren’t around, she made the lines pretty damn clear. ”
The queasiness in my stomach worsens. Fantastic in the sack . Well , that’s just... great. I bet she knows all kinds of fancy tricks.
Maybe it’s for the best that my night with Beau was interrupted.
Damn it, why didn’t I spend more time making Jayk or Lucky show me how to be amazing?
I was so caught up in just being with them I didn’t even think about how I should be with them.
I should have taken notes. It’s unlike me not to have studied.
I’m starting to seriously regret coming out here, and not for the reasons I worried I would.
There’s no way I can reveal myself now.
“ Beau —”
Beau cuts Dom off. “ And I don’t know why you still keep defending her. She did the exact same thing to you. As soon as she made up her mind on who she wanted, she left you in the dust.”
“ It wasn’t like that,” Dom says quietly. “ She’s entitled to decide who she wants to be with. She never hid that she wanted Thomas as well.”
“ I’m surprised the two of you didn’t just share her,” Beau mutters, and the bitterness in his tone makes me wince.
After a moment, Dom says, “ That was never going to happen.”
There’s an awkward silence as they continue walking for a stretch, and I have to push to keep up.
Beau finally sighs. “ I don’t think she would have done this, for what it’s worth.
If there was one thing she cared about, it was keeping our people safe.
She made the civs feel safe. She managed that better than any of us—it’s why half of them left with her.
I agree that she wouldn’t have sold us out. ”