Chapter 24
BONNIE
Marcus is claiming my baby.
The words echo in my head, over and over, until they stop making sense.
Ghost’s arms are the only thing keeping me upright. My legs won’t hold me. My brain won’t process what I just heard.
Fifty thousand dollars. A patch. All for delivering me to Marcus Stone so he can claim me and the baby growing inside me as his property.
“Get him out of here,” Ash says, voice cold and flat. “Barnes, Miller—take him to the cells. We’ll deal with him later.”
The prospect is unchained and dragged out of the barn.
I don’t watch them go. Can’t take my eyes off the spot where he was chained. Blood pools in the dirt, dark and wet.
“Bonnie.” Ash is in front of me now. “Look at me.”
I can’t.
“Bonnie.”
Ghost’s arms tighten around me. “Give her a minute.”
“We don’t have a minute. Marcus is putting a bounty on her head. We need to move. Now.”
“She just found out the man who—” Ghost stops himself. Starts again. “She needs a minute.”
Titan appears beside them, still covered in blood. The prospect’s blood. Red mixing with red until I can’t tell what’s his and what isn’t.
He looks at me, and something in his expression shifts. The rage that was there moments ago softens into something else. Concern, maybe. “Come on,” he says quietly. “Let’s get you inside.”
“I’m fine,” I hear myself say.
“You’re not fine. You’re in shock.” Titan moves closer. “Ghost, let her go. I’ve got her.”
Ghost releases me slowly, like he’s afraid I’ll collapse the second he does. Maybe I will.
But Titan’s there, one massive hand on my elbow, steadying me. “Can you walk?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
“Then walk with me.”
He guides me out of the barn, his hand firm on my arm. The afternoon sun is too bright after the darkness inside. I squint against it.
Brothers watch as we pass. Their expressions range from pity to anger to determination. They all heard what the prospect said.
They all know Marcus Stone is claiming me.
Titan leads me across the compound toward the back building where his room is. We climb the stairs. His door is at the end of the hall—reinforced, like everything else about him.
Inside, Titan’s room still amazes me every time I see it. The massive bed with its custom frame could easily fit three normal beds. Heavy furniture reinforced to support his weight. Everything oversize, built for a man who’s six-foot-six and carved from stone.
The first time I came in here, I couldn’t stop staring. The ceiling is higher than standard. The doorframes are wider. Even the bathroom has a shower that looks like it was built for giants.
Now it just feels like his—solid, strong, unmistakably Titan.
“Sit,” he says, gesturing to the bed.
I sit. The mattress barely dips under my weight.
He stands in front of me, still covered in blood. His shirt is soaked with it. His jeans splattered. His hands—
I stare at his hands. Blood under his nails. Some dried, some still wet.
“You should shower,” I say.
“Yeah.” He doesn’t move.
“Let me help you.”
His eyebrows rise. “Help me?”
“Wash off the blood. You can’t do it yourself with your hands like that.” I stand and move toward the bathroom. “Come on.”
He follows me into the bathroom. The shower stall is huge, easily big enough for two people. Three, maybe.
I turn on the water and let it heat while Titan strips off his shirt. His torso is a map of scars and ink.
His jeans come off next. Then his boxers. He has zero self-consciousness about his nakedness, like modesty is a concept that doesn’t apply to him.
His cock hangs heavy between tree-trunk thighs, the blunt head brushing the inside of one leg like it’s too lazy to lift yet.
A single fat vein snakes the underside, pulsing when the first blast of hot water hits his skin.
The shaft twitches, thickens a fraction, and settles half-hard against his thigh while red rivers run from his knuckles and swirl down the drain.
I strip faster—shirt, bra, jeans, panties—until I’m bare and shivering under the spray. The water turns pink around his feet, then clear. I lather a fresh washcloth until suds drip over my wrists, and then I step in close.
“Lean down, big man.” He bends, folding that massive frame until his shoulders are level with my lips.
I start at the base of his neck, cloth gliding over ink and scar tissue, scrubbing slow circles that make the skull on his shoulder blade gleam.
Soap slides down the valley of his spine, tracing flames and names of the dead.
I follow every line with the cloth, then with my bare fingers, memorizing the heat of him.
“Higher,” I whisper, and he dips lower, water plastering his dark hair to his skull.
I wash the nape of his neck, behind his ears, the sharp cut of his jaw. My breasts brush his chest with every stroke; my nipples tighten instantly against the slick muscle.
When I reach his pecs, I ditch the cloth. Palms flat, I spread suds over slabs of muscle, thumbs circling flat nipples until they stiffen and he exhales through his teeth.
His cock lifts another inch, brushing my belly.
I slide lower, tracing every ridge of his abs, nails scraping lightly through the thin trail of hair that arrows south.
His breath hitches when I wrap one soapy hand around the root of him—still not fully hard, but heavy, the head flushed darker now, a bead of water clinging to the slit.
I stroke once, watching his thighs tense. “Easy,” I tease, voice lost in the hiss of the shower. “I’m just cleaning.”
He growls, low and dangerous, and the sound vibrates straight to my clit.
Arms next. I lift each massive bicep, scrub dried blood from the creases. When I finish, he straightens, towering again, water cascading off his shoulders like a waterfall.
“Your face,” I say.
He looks down at me. Water streams down his face, plastering his dark hair to his forehead.
“I can’t reach.”
Without a word, he bends down to my level. Still too tall. So he scoops me up, hands under my thighs, lifting me until my legs wrap around his waist.
Now we’re eye to eye.
I take the cloth and wash his face. Gentle around his eyes, firmer on his jaw.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
“No.”
“Stupid question.”
“Yeah.” I rinse the cloth and rewash his face. Making sure I get everything. “But I’ll survive. I always do.”
“You shouldn’t have to.”
I meet his eyes.
“None of this is fair,” he continues. “What your dad did. What Marcus did. What we’re putting you through now, keeping you locked up. You deserve better.”
“I’m exactly where I chose to be.”
“Did you choose it? Or did circumstances force your hand?”
I’m quiet for a moment, still washing his face even though it’s clean now.
“Both,” I say finally. “I chose you three. The circumstances just sped up the timeline.”
His arms tighten around me. “I won’t let him take you.”
“I know.”
“I mean it, Bonnie. Marcus comes for you, he dies. Anyone who tries to collect that bounty dies. I’ll kill every last Savage Legion fucker I can find if it means keeping you safe. In fact, I hope it does.”
The words should scare me. The violence in his voice, the promise of death delivered so casually.
But they don’t.
Instead, my stomach does that traitorous flutter thing. The one that happens every time one of them makes it clear just how much I matter.
“Titan—”
“No. You need to hear this.” He shifts me in his arms, holding me tighter. “You and that baby are ours. I don’t care whose DNA it has. It’s ours. And I protect what’s mine.”
I relax into his arms for a long moment.
“Feel better?” he asks.
“Yeah. Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For this. For making me feel safe even when everything’s falling apart.”
His expression softens with that rare, genuine smile that transforms his whole face. “Someone’s gotta take care of you. Might as well be me.”
“Ash and Ghost take care of me too.”
“Yeah, but I’m better at it.” He grins, that cocky edge back in his voice as he sets me down gently. “Now let’s get you cleaned up.”
“I’m not dirty.”
“You’re covered in my dirty bathwater. That counts.” He reaches for the body wash. “Turn around.”
“Titan—”
“Turn. Around.”
I roll my eyes, but the second my back meets his chest, he cages me with one arm under my breasts, the other sliding soap down my spine in one slow, filthy glide.
His palms spread the lather, thumbs digging into every knot along my shoulders until I melt against him.
“Fuck, you feel good,” he growls, lips brushing my ear.
He cups my ass, lifts, and spreads me open so the hot water rushes between my cheeks. One big hand slips forward, cups my pussy, thumb settling on my clit in a lazy circle that makes my knees buckle.
“These tits,” he rasps, sliding up to weigh them, rolling my nipples slowly, “are getting heavier every damn day. Love how they spill over my hands.” He pinches, tugs, then soothes with slick palms until I’m panting.
His other hand glides over my belly, tracing the faint silver lines. “These marks are mine,” he says, voice rough with pride. “Proof you’re growing our kid.”
When he’s done, he rinses me off and turns off the water.
We step out together. He grabs a towel and wraps it around his waist. Water drips down his chest, following the lines of his muscles. He looks like something out of an adult magazine.
He grabs another towel and wraps it around me. The fabric covers me from chest to knees, drowning me in terry cloth.
“You look like a burrito,” he says.
“You look like a wet mountain.”
He laughs and scoops me up, carrying me back into the bedroom. Sets me down on the bed and heads to his dresser.
My stomach growls loudly.
Titan looks back at me, grin widening. “Someone’s hungry.”
“I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
“Can’t have that.” He pulls on gray sweatpants. No boxers. The fabric hangs low on his hips and clings just enough that I can see everything.
I stare. Can’t help it.
“Eyes up here, baby,” he says, but he’s smirking.
“You’re doing that on purpose.”
“Doing what?”
“Going commando. Walking around with your dick on display.” I flick my finger at the thick ridge straining his sweatpants. “The old ladies downstairs are going to lose their minds.”
“I’m comfortable like this.” He steps between my knees, grabs my wrist, and drags my palm down the length of him, until my fingers curl around the head through the soft cotton. “And this cock?” he growls. “It belongs to you and you alone, Bonnie.”
My breath catches. “Oh.”
He presses my hand harder, guiding me in a lazy stroke. “Feel that? That’s yours. Only yours. Forever.”
I squeeze and watch his eyes roll back.
“Not now, burrito,” he says, kissing me quickly and moving away. “Stay here. Don’t answer if anyone knocks.”
“Where are you going?”
“To get you food. Can’t have my girl starving.” He straightens and heads for the door. “Be back in five minutes.”
He’s gone before I can respond.
I sit on his massive bed, wrapped in a towel that smells like him.
True to his word, he’s back in less than five minutes, carrying a tray loaded with food. Sandwiches, chips, fruit, cookies—enough to feed three people.
“I didn’t know what you wanted, so I grabbed everything,” he says, setting the tray on the bed.
“This is too much food.”
“You’re eating for two now. Need to keep your strength up.” He sits on the bed and pats his lap. “Come here.”
“I can feed myself.”
“I know. But I want to feed you.”
I climb into his lap, still wrapped in the towel. He adjusts me so I’m sitting sideways across his thighs, my back against his chest.
He picks up half a sandwich and holds it to my lips. “Eat.”
“This is ridiculous.”
“Open.”
I take a bite. Then another. He feeds me slowly, making sure I finish the whole sandwich before moving on to the fruit.
“You know I have hands, right?” I say around a strawberry.
“Yeah. But mine are bigger.” He pops a grape into my mouth. “And I like doing this.”
My throat tightens. “You’re too good to me.”
“Nah. I’m exactly as good as you deserve.” He feeds me another strawberry. “Which is pretty fucking good, if I’m being honest.”
I laugh and settle deeper into his chest. Let him feed me chips, cookies, and pieces of melon while we sit in silence.
He feeds me the last cookie and sets the tray aside. Then he just holds me, his hand resting on my stomach where our baby grows.