CHAPTER 41
WINDY
I feel my phone buzzing. It’s been going crazy for the past three hours. I know who it is, too. It’s my alphas. They were expecting me home by now, and they’re freaking out. Thank goodness. Now, if only I could answer my phone without getting caught.
Taylor has been pacing since we got up to his apartment. Not quite the penthouse, but close enough. There are tons of security, so I don’t know how the guys will get up here if they even manage to find me.
It makes me wish that I shared my location with them. I didn’t even give them my cell phone number; my parents did when I was in the hospital. Now, I’m stuck in this situation without a way out of it.
“Eventually, you will have to let me out of here, Taylor.”
He stops pacing and glares at me. “We wouldn’t be in this situation if it weren’t for you cheating on me. You wouldn’t have that child inside you, and you’d still be mine, which is how it’s supposed to be.”
He’s delusional. How did I not see this before it was too late?
“I was never yours, Taylor. You were a job, that’s it.”
That makes him mad. He starts throwing stuff around the apartment, breaking it. He doesn’t come close to me, but he ruins a particularly beautiful vase. The moment he smashes the case, something inside me goes very still.
Not calm, but focused, like my mind finally snapped into a single, razor-thin line of awareness.
He hurls the vase against the far wall, the crashing ringing throughout the apartment like a warning shot. Porcelain explodes from the impact. I don’t move. I don’t even blink. If I react, he’ll feed on it. He’s just crazy enough to allow this situation to get way out of hand.
“Please, Taylor …”
“You are mine!” he yells, crazed.
“I was never yours, Taylor,” I say again, quieter this time, but sharper with a bite. “You were a job. That’s all.”
He whips around, chest heaving, eyes wild. For a second, I think he’s going to come at me. I wouldn’t blame him if he did. There were things I had to do while I was on jobs that could have someone thinking that I was in love with them, even though that’s the furthest from the truth.
His hands fist into balls of fury, the same grip he used in the car. He just stands there, trembling with the effort of holding himself together. “You ruined everything,” he spits. “You ruined us.”
“There was no us.”
That lands exactly how I meant it to. I see it hit him like a physical blow to the torso.
His jaw clenches so hard I hear his teeth grind.
He grabs a picture frame next and hurls it at me.
It slams into the wall above my head, shattering.
Glass rains down on me, and I shield my eyes and stomach as best as I can.
He still doesn’t come near me, though.
And that tells me something very important. He wants control, not to fight. He wants to have the illusion of dominance, not the risk of actually touching me to see what I do.
He’s a coward.
I straighten a little, not enough to challenge his alpha, but enough to reclaim an inch of myself.
“Eventually,” I say, steady. “You will have to let me out of here.”
He stops pacing. Turns. His stare is cold, flat, and almost eerily calm now.
“We wouldn’t be in this situation,” he says, “if you hadn’t cheated on me with those three pricks. If you hadn’t gotten yourself knocked up. You’d be mine, and I’d be showering you with any luxury you could ever know.”
My stomach twists, but I keep my face blank. I say nothing. Not yet. I watch him. Measure him. I wait for the next crack in his armor so I can’t take advantage of it.
There will be one.
I know there will be.
Taylor Sheffield is an alpha who acts like a beta. He doesn’t have it in him to be dominant for an extended period of time. It’s why I was able to manipulate him the way I did when he was my client.
The knock hits the door like a pulse—one sharp sound that slices straight through the chaos. My heart leaps into my throat. It slams so hard against my ribs, I swear he can hear it.
Taylor freezes mid-stride.
Even the air seems to stop moving.
I try to breathe in, slowly and deep, searching for any hint of who’s on the other side of that door.
I don’t scent anything besides the thick, cloying sweetness of Taylor’s clove tobacco.
It coats the back of my throat, smothering everything else.
My nose twitches as the scent grows and becomes the scent of fear.
It’s a sour smell, almost like curdled milk. Quite disgusting.
Another knock. Firmer this time.
My eyes flick to Darien.
He’s already looking at Taylor.
And Taylor … Taylor’s looking back at him.
It’s not a long look. It’s not even dramatic. It’s quick, like two people silently checking the same calculation. A shared tension. A shared fear. Or maybe a shared plan.
My stomach drops even further. Darien shifts his weight, barely moving, but enough that I see the muscles in his jaw tighten. Taylor’s fingers twitch at his sides, like he’s deciding whether to answer the door or pretend no one’s home.
The silence stretches, taut as wire. I swallow hard, pulse hammering, and try again—one more breath, one more attempt to catch something useful. But Taylor’s scent is everywhere, thick and suffocating, drowning out every other clue.
The knock comes a third time.
This one isn’t polite.
Not even close. The sound ricochets off the wall like a gunshot.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
It’s someone who expects an answer.
Taylor’s eyes snap to mine, and for the first time since this started, I see something flicker behind his anger—uncertainty. Maybe even fear.
Darien’s gaze cuts to me next.
And in that split second, I can’t tell if he’s warning me … or asking me to stay quiet.
I do neither.
“Please, help me! They’re holding me hostage!”
The sound of my own voice shocks me. It feels too loud in the suffocating quiet, too bright against the stale clove-thick air. For a heartbeat, no one moves. It feels like the whole room is holding its breath, waiting to see what will happen.
Then everything happens at once.
Taylor whirls toward me so fast the room tilts. His eyes go wide—white-rimmed, furious, terrified all at once. Not terrified for me. Terrified of what I’ve just done.
Darien’s reaction is different. Subtle. Controlled.
His shoulders tense, but he doesn’t lunge, doesn’t curse, doesn’t even look at Taylor first. He looks at the door.
And that tells me everything. Someone heard me.
Someone outside heard me. Then he decides to come toward me instead of the door.
Shifting back, I push myself as far away from him as I possibly can, but he doesn’t stop.
His fingers wrap around my throat, and he jerks me up.
Both my hands wrap around his arm to keep him from hurting me.
He jerks me until my face is right in his.
He sneers down at me and releases a loud growl that has me shaking in my shoes.
Taylor hisses my name like a warning, like a threat, like a plea he’s too proud to voice. “What did you just do?”
But he doesn’t come toward me. He goes for the door.
Not to open it.
To lock it.
Except …
He’s too slow.
Whoever is on the other side heard me too clearly to walk away. A fourth knock hits the door—harder, sharper, not a request this time but a demand. The kind of knock that says I know someone’s in there. Taylor freezes mid-reach.
Darien’s jaw flexes as he bares his teeth at me, pulling me up and across the floor to get out of the way of the door as Taylor goes to open it.
My pulse roars in my ears. For the first time since this nightmare started, the balance in the room shifts—just a fraction, just enough to feel it in my bones.
I don’t know if I’ve just saved myself.
Or made everything worse.
But I know this:
There’s no taking it back now.
The door swings open, and the man standing on the other side looks like he was carved out of authority itself.
I spy him just through the crack in the door.
Darien slaps a hand over my mouth to keep me from calling out for help and wraps a hand around my throat.
Tears dance in my eyes as I spy the sharp lines of his suit catch the hallway light, but it’s his presence that fills the doorway — tall, immovable, assessing everything in a single sweep of his gaze.
“Is there a problem?” he asks, voice smooth but edged with something colder.
Taylor answers too fast. “No.”
But the man doesn’t budge. He doesn’t even blink. His stare pins Taylor in place, dissecting him, peeling back whatever flimsy lie Taylor thinks he can hide behind. I see the man’s nostrils flare, his jaw tighten. A low, inhuman sound vibrates in his chest—a warning wrapped in restraint.
Then he steps forward, just enough to shift the air in the room.
“You are so wrong if you think I’m leaving, Sheffield.”
Taylor stiffens. His fingers twitch on the doorframe. “We’re all good, Mr. Rothschild. Please, go back to your penthouse. I promise everything is okay.”
Rothschild.
The name hits me like a jolt. Wolf’s father. And now that I know, I can’t unsee it — the same sharpness in the eyes, the same coiled power beneath the surface. He tilts his head, studying Taylor like he’s a puzzle missing too many pieces.
“You see, I would … except—and call me crazy—I heard a female in here crying for help.” His voice drops, silk over steel. “And being the man, I am, I’m not in the market to leave a woman in distress.”
Taylor panics. I can scent the fear wafting off him in waves.
I smile despite my situation. Something tells me that Wolf’s father isn’t going to leave here without me.
He knows I’m here. He has to. There’s no other reason he’d be down here unless the guys got a hold of him and found out who it was that had me.
Taylor tries to slam the door.
He never gets the chance.
Mr. Rothschild’s hand snaps out, palm hitting the door with a force that rattles the hinges. Taylor’s eyes go wide, shock and fear flickering across his face. And then the world breaks open.
Three alphas surge into the apartment like a storm front—controlled, purposeful, unstoppable.
The air shifts with their arrival, thick with heat and tension and something electric that crawls across my skin.
Wolf reaches Taylor first. His fist arcs through the air with terrifying precision.
Taylor drops instantly, hands flying to his face as he crumples to the floor.
Darien yanks me backward, shielding me with his body. The sudden movement knocks the breath from my lungs. My vision blurs with tears. Because they’re here. All three of them. Filling the doorway with their presence, their fury, their focus.
My alphas.
My chest tightens, a sob catching in my throat. I can’t believe they’re here. All of them. I’m busy reveling in the knowledge that my alphas are here that I take my mind off the alpha behind me.
Something slams into my back.
I stumble forward, legs giving out beneath me.
I see everything flash in front of me. My stomach hitting the floor.
Going into premature labor. Possibly losing Daisy.
I cry out, not able to catch myself on anything—but I don’t hit the ground.
Strong arms catch me, steady me, pull me upright with a gentleness that breaks me open.
I look up.
It’s Amos.
His face is the first thing I truly see. There’s a storm in his eyes, and relief that softens it. Anger simmers beneath it all. His hands tighten around my arms, grounding me, anchoring me, like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he loosens his grip even a fraction.
Behind him, Finian lunges toward Darien, but the world narrows to the space between Amos and me. The warmth of his hands. The way his breath stutters when he sees my tears. The way his expression shifts—fierce, protective, undone.
“Hey,” he murmurs, voice rough, thick with emotion he doesn’t bother to hide. “I’ve got you.”
And for the first time since this nightmare began, something inside me unclenches—a trembling, fragile sense of safety blooming in the center of all the chaos.
“And I never want you to let go of me again.” I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him down.
My lips meet his in a kiss that renders me breathless.
His tongue dips into my waiting mouth. His fingers sift through my hair as he pulls me tighter against him.
We get lost in the kiss. Everything else fades away around us, and I want nothing more than to remain in one of my alpha’s arms.
“You all get out of here. I’ll deal with these two,” Wolf’s father steps just inside the doorway. He gives me a small smile, his eyes twinkling devilishly. “The infamous Ms. Carmichael.” He smirks, then looks down at my bulging stomach. “Welcome to the family.”
Something about this man lets me know he’s more worried about my name than he is about me being okay. But I’m not going to look at a gift horse in the mouth. He found me; they found me. I’m no longer in the clutches of those two crazy ass men.
Wolf comes up behind me. The soft cinnamon scent of his wraps around me like a blanket. “We’ve got you.”
He presses a kiss to the side of my neck.
I lean back, look at him, then lift up onto my tiptoes to press my lips against his.
It takes him off guard, but he quickly catches himself, kissing me back.
I feel someone pulling me from Amos’s arms, only to find Finian standing there waiting.
I give him a smile, wrap an arm around his neck, and take his lips with mine.
Willingly.
Wholeheartedly.
Forever.
These men are my forever, and I hate that it took me so long to forgive them.
“I forgive you,” I say, breathless when we break our kiss. “I’m ready for forever with all of you.”
For the first time tonight, I feel safe.
Held.
Loved.
And the weight of that makes my chest ache in a way that feels like breathing and healing at the same time.