Chapter 42
Myles
Half-cleaned rifles sprawl across the scarred wooden table in the weapons room.
I drag the whetstone down the length of a hunting blade. Slow, deliberate strokes. The stitches in my arm tug as metal hisses in a rhythm I don’t even hear anymore.
Because all I can think about is Ivy.
Her face is branded into my skull from days ago—curled against me, wounded, trusting me to protect her. Those big doe-eyes locked on me as if I’m the last safe thing left in this broken world. Like she believed everything would be fine as long as I was there.
And I’ll protect that until my dying breath.
Phoenix says we’ve got time. That the cult’s licking its wounds, and we need to heal, regroup, fortify. Makes sense. But waiting around while they’re out there? While Ivy’s still a target? It eats at me. Every day we’re not hunting those bastards feels like I’m failing her all over again.
Still, Phoenix is right, we can’t leave her unprotected. So I agreed to focus on securing the station first. If the fuckers come back, they’ll break their teeth on this place before they ever get near her.
She’s healing though. Smiling more.
But the thought of that conversation, what we agreed on. It still twists me inside out.
Sharing her. All three of us.
Like that’s a normal thing for men. Guess I’ve never really been normal. None of us have.
And now I have to share her with them.
With Zane—Mr. Goddamn Perfect. Calm. Strong. Gentle in ways I’ll never be. He makes it look so fucking easy.
And Phoenix. Always been mine in ways we never had to say out loud. Now I gotta share him too?
He’s measured in everything he does. Cool and calculated, as if the whole world’s a chessboard and he’s ten moves ahead.
I've always been the one who wanted too much, too fast, too loud. It came out in the way I touched her, pushed her before she was ready.
I’ll never be her first choice. Why would I? They can treat her like she deserves… not like my fucked-up version of love.
The worst part? I don’t just want her—I need her. Every piece. Even if I have to split her with men I’d kill for. Maybe that makes me weak, or selfish. But I don’t care.
But the chance that she still wants me… that maybe she’ll choose me, despite everything? That’s the only thing keeping the jealousy from burning me alive.
The door creaks and I glance up to see Phoenix leaning against the frame, arms crossed like he’s been there a while.
“Need a hand boarding up the front windows,” he says, tilting his head toward the hall.
Grunting, I set the knife aside and follow him.
The front lounge smells like sawdust and fresh paint. The midday sun cuts through the dusty panes, warming the room.
Zane’s crouched by a stack of timber, screwdriver in hand, wearing that easy grin that makes women stupid.
Ivy’s next to him, cross-legged on the floor, painting over bloodstains on the skirting board like she’s erasing the ghosts from these walls.
Loose strands of her golden hair cling to her flushed cheeks, little streaks of white paint tangled in them.
She blows them away and laughs at something Zane said.
That sound—light, free—does something to me. Something dangerous. My jaw unclenches for the first time today. My breathing slows.
Until Zane brushes her hair back and tucks it behind her ear.
The plank of wood in Phoenix’s hand slams into my chest, jerking me out of the fixation.
“You hold them, I’ll get the nails in,” he orders, eyes sharp like he can see every thought I’m choking on.
I grip the board like it’s Zane’s neck and pin it against the window frame while Phoenix lines up the nails. The hammer rings out, steady and methodical, but my gaze keeps drifting.
Laughter drifts around the room but I can’t hold onto any of it. I just keep watching her. The way she throws her head back when she laughs. Her lips, so full and soft—fucking sinful—stretch across her perfect teeth when she smiles that wide.
And her eyes… bright as the sky on a cloudless day.
Something in this moment touches a raw nerve I didn’t know I had left.
Sunlight on happy faces, laughter bouncing off walls. Shit like this didn’t exist in the foster homes I grew up in. Back then, “home” was a locked door and a plate you ate fast before someone took it.
This… this feels like the thing I spent my whole life starving for.
A home. A family.
“Pass me another screw, sweetheart,” Zane says, grinning at her as he screws a new deadbolt to the door.
“I’m painting, Zane. Ask Myles. He’s not doing anything important,” she fires back, winking at me.
Heat punches low in my gut. Butterflies? That’s what people call this shit, right?
But then the words register.
“What?!” I bark, laughing as I check the plank for nails and let go. “This is more important than painting rotten boards, you little brat. Where the hell did you even get paint?” Grabbing a handful of screws, I toss them in Zane’s direction, hearing them scatter on the ground, and stalk toward Ivy.
“Zane found it in the loading dock,” she says proudly, tipping her head back to look at me. The bruise on her cheek is turning green but there’s still dark purple underneath her eye. My chest tightens at the sight. “Said this place could use a woman’s touch. And I completely agree.”
Crouching behind her, I slide my hand into her hair, and steal a kiss from those lips I’ve been obsessing over for the last thirty goddamn minutes.
“I could use a little of that touch too… if you’re done fucking around here,” I rasp against her mouth.
“You mean an ‘Ivy touch’. No other woman will ever be touching you,” she bites, brow creasing.
Is that jealousy? Holy shit. My Ivy’s jealous.
“Greedy girl,” Phoenix drawls behind me. “You get three boyfriends, and we just stay grateful? Is that it?”
“Exactly.” She grins smugly. But her eyes stay locked on me, her head still resting in my hand as my heart beats like a war drum.
Then her stomach growls loud enough to make Zane laugh. Phoenix drops the hammer with a clatter and claps Zane on the back.
“The stomach has spoken. Lunch,” Phoenix chuckles
Ivy flushes pink, fumbling to tuck her paint-streaked hair behind her ear. “It’s fine. We can—”
“None of that,” I cut in, pulling her to her feet with a grin. “You’re eating before you waste away. We’ll finish this shit later.”
The hallway’s too narrow for three huge guys and one little queen we’re all orbiting. Shoulders bump, curses are muttered under breaths, but somehow we make it to the kitchen without bloodshed.
Zane starts raiding the cupboards as Phoenix lifts Ivy onto the counter like it’s the most natural thing in the world. She giggles when he whispers something in her ear and my fists clench on instinct.
“Pancakes?” Zane calls out, holding up a dusty mix box.
“It’s lunch,” Phoenix scoffs, rolling his eyes.
“Oooh, please!” Ivy pleads, turning those baby blues on him. “I haven’t had pancakes since my sixteenth birthday!”
Phoenix chuckles, hand sliding to the back of her neck. “How can I say no when you beg so sweetly?”
Yeah. I know that tone. That’s his you’ve-got-five-seconds-before-I-bend-you-over tone.
We move around her like it’s choreography. Zane mixing batter, Phoenix setting plates, me making coffee strong enough to wake the dead.
Ivy brushes past me to grab something, her hip grazing mine. My blood spikes like I’ve mainlined adrenaline.
“Sorry,” she murmurs, smiling like she knows exactly what that did to me.
I catch her hip, pulling her back into my chest and letting her warmth seep into me. Her scent floods my senses as I lower my face to her ear. “No, you’re not,” I growl, rolling my hips into her, enough for her to feel me.
Her breath hitches and I don’t miss the way she leans into me. For a second, I almost forget we’re not alone.
“Come eat,” Zane calls, saving us all from me doing something reckless.
The table looks like a postcard from a world that doesn’t exist anymore. A tower of pancakes, maple syrup, chocolate sauce, even whipped cream Zane conjured out of powdered milk.
For one long moment, it feels like Sunday morning in a house full of love instead of guns.
Ivy gasps. “This is insane! Where did you get all this?”
Phoenix smirks. “We’ve been guarding this town a long time. Never got picked clean like the cities. Zane hunts, but we’ve still got stores.”
“Expired stores,” she mutters, eyeing the chocolate syrup.
Zane grins. “Half this stuff is so processed it could survive a nuke. Expiry dates don’t mean shit. But the berries are fresh. There’s a blackberry bramble in the forest over the ridge.”
She digs in, humming when the syrup hits her tongue. That sound nearly drags me to my knees.
The clink of cutlery and plates fills the quiet. Then after a while, Phoenix leans back in his chair, sipping on his black coffee as he watches all of us finish the feast.
Ivy licks a smudge of cream off her finger and says softly, “We should play a game.”
“A game?” I raise a brow, shoving more syrup-soaked pancake in my mouth.
“Yeah…” She bites her lip like she’s afraid we’ll laugh at her. “I just don’t know much about you guys. I don’t even know how old you all are. Or who you were before. Before… all of this.”
Leaning back, I smirk. “You’re lucky you didn’t know me back then. I was a hellion.”
“Still are,” Zane cuts in.
I flick a berry at him. “Shut up. Point is, I was young, pissed at the world for leaving me in the foster system and running headfirst into every fight I could find. The law hated me. I hated it back. Until the army got a hold of me and Phoenix here taught me how to channel that rage.”
“He was your commander?” she asks, surprised.
“His Sergeant,” Phoenix says, sipping his coffee. “Myles was my headache and my responsibility. Still is.”
I grunt, hiding the warmth that flickers in my chest.
“I’m twenty-five now. Phoenix is… what, twenty-eight?” I add.
Zane licks chocolate off his thumb. “And I’m twenty-six. I was a football star, baby. And I was good. On my way to go pro after I graduated college.”
Ivy’s cheeks flush at Zane’s flirtatious tone.
“What about you, little stray?” Phoenix asks, voice smooth as whiskey. “Where’d you come from?”
Her face drains as she laughs nervously. “I think I’m twenty-three now. Maybe twenty-four. When the world ended, I was seventeen.”
Seventeen? Jesus Christ. She was just a kid.
“And I was headed nowhere in life except an arranged married,” she continues, oblivious to our bodies stiffening. “I came from a strong family. A little overbearing. But we had money, power. Influence. Thought it would save us.” She purses her lips. “It didn’t.”
Phoenix tilts his head. “An arranged marriage?”
She laughs nervously, twirling her spoon. “My family… they were old money. Like, scary old. The kind that doesn’t pay taxes because they probably wrote the first tax laws.” Ivy grimaces and adds, “we belonged to… a society. Arranged marriages were pretty normal.”
“A secret society?” I finally say, a grin breaking through because that shit is metal as hell. “Like some Illuminati-level shit? That’s badass.”
Zane kicks me under the table.
She hesitates, her eyes focused on something a million miles away. “Pretty much. We kept bloodlines pure. Controlled wealth and information. It was everything to them. If you broke the rules or talked… you were executed.”
The room goes dead quiet. My fork creaks under my grip.
Holy shit. My little doe didn’t just survive—she walked out of a goddamn lion’s den.
Ivy forces a laugh. “God, why am I even shy about it? They’re all gone now. The money. The power. Everything.” Her eyes lift, bright with something fragile. “I spent my whole life under someone else’s thumb. You guys… you’re the first ones who ever made me feel like I had a choice.”
Phoenix reaches out and takes her hand. For the first time, it doesn’t sting. It soothes. Because he saw what she needed and gave it when I couldn’t move fast enough.
Then his other hand slides under the table, warm on my thigh.
While my cock reacts to Phoenix, my heart responds to Ivy’s smile. Loving and warm.
Something has shifted in the house. Something in us.
And Ivy… I don't know how to name the way she looks at us now. Like she's blooming under all the attention. As if the ghosts of her past are slowly stepping back into the dark, replaced by the warmth she finds in all of us.
I used to feel like a wild thing trying to behave inside a cage. But this doesn’t feel like a cage anymore and I don’t feel like the only wild one. It doesn’t feel like three men tearing each other apart for one girl.
It feels like a pack.
A family.