“Stop.” Rage cups my face and lifts my chin. He’s smiling. He’s beautiful when he smiles. His eyes lighten up. They go from a black starless night to a gorgeous, gunmetal gray. “I can see your mind working. As much as I wish I could bring Warrick back, I won’t do it. It doesn’t seem right, somehow. And then there’s you, Nia. I’m not handing you over to a sadistic fuck like Gaire. I won’t. Thank you for confiding in me about Gaire being able to come through with his bargain, but…it’s not going to happen. Warrick was such a good person. I know if I gave him the option, he wouldn’t want me to do it either.”
“Thank you.” I wrap my arms around Rage. I breathe him in for a few seconds.
His arms are around me too. Then he’s sliding his hands up and down my back and kissing my neck. It feels good. Too good. I pull away. “This isn’t a good idea.”
I see something flash in his eyes. Disappointment…is there more? He schools his emotions and clears his throat. “Yeah, of course.”
I don’t have to say anything more. He knows why it’s a bad idea. I think he’s developing feelings for me. Someone like Rage would be easy to fall for right back. I could fall in love with him quickly and fall hard. Far worse than I ever did with Gaire.
No!
I won’t!
I don’t want Rage to feel bad about my rejection, so I make an excuse. “I’m hungry. Starving, actually.” I realize that it’s actually true. “I’m also tired. All that teleporting. We’re hoping that Gaire doesn’t find us as easily, but who knows… I think we should work on getting our strength back.”
“I’ll make you something to eat.” Rage stands. He goes over to the refrigerator. “What about a sandwich? Or I could grill up some steaks?”
“A sandwich would be great. I’ll help.”
“Stay right there,” he says. “Let me do this for you.”
I nod. Yep, I could fall for Rage in a hot minute. I feel for this man. He’s so hard on himself. So tortured. I can’t imagine how he must feel. He’s already lost so much.
21
Rage
Later that day…
I wake up with a start. Nia is on the bed next to me. She’s still sleeping. I look around the room, which is bathed in shadows. The sun must be setting. We’ve been sleeping for hours. I listen for footfalls, a heartbeat, anything out of the ordinary. I get nothing. It doesn’t mean that nothing is there.
Gaire will be here soon. I know it. The idea to take us back to the last place Gaire expects us to go was a good one. It’s that, or he’s giving me some time to think about his offer.
Nia mutters something incoherent. She quickly settles. I watch her sleep for a while. Then I turn over, because what the fuck am I doing? Nia is right. We can’t do this. I can’t fall in love with her. What would come next, a picket fence? A family?
No fucking way!
That’s if we survive this ordeal. I plan on fighting. I hope Gaire is running scared. That we are stronger now than we were before. Maybe this time we can take him out. I hope to god it’s true. I’ve never met anyone more disgusting than the Huntsman. It sickens me how he pretended to have feelings for Nia. How he spent a whole year pretending to care for her just so that he could end up controlling her. So that he could turn her love for him into something sick and twisted. No wonder Nia is so afraid of what’s happening between us. There I go again. I need to stop and concentrate on keeping her safe.
“Hey,” Nia whispers. “You’re awake.” Her voice is thick with sleep.
“I haven’t been for long. I didn’t realize how tired I was.”
“Me neither. I guess all the teleporting and nearly dying is exhausting.”
“For sure.”
“What’s going through your mind? You look like you were a million miles away just now.” Nia pulls herself up a little onto the pillow.
“I was thinking about that prick and some of the things he said to me.” How he would kill all my friends, incapacitate me, and then rape Nia while I watched. I’ve never looked into eyes that cold, that calculating. I don’t tell Nia any of this. She is well aware of what kind of a sick person he is. “I didn’t think I would ever want to kill another person again, but I’ve changed my mind. I’ll make an exception when it comes to him.” My voice is deep with anger.
“When it comes time for Gaire to die, I want to do it. If I am able to, that is…otherwise you must do what you need to do, but if there’s a choice, I want it to be me.” She sounds resigned. Like she’s thought this through. “I think it would be better for both of us.”
I also think that maybe she’s trying to spare me. If I kill Gaire it might set me off. It is something I’ve wrestled with. I appreciate that Nia knows this. “Sure thing.”
“Thank you for helping me.” Her voice is so small. It makes my chest clench just hearing how vulnerable she sounds.
“You’re helping me too,” I tell her, turning so that I can look into her eyes. “I’ve never told anyone about what happened to Warrick. I’ve never spoken about that day. Not to my mom, although she tried to talk about it, I couldn’t. I ran every time. The guys know what happened, but we don’t discuss it. It’s become a silent rule.” I pause a second, gathering my thoughts. “I feel better after talking to you. I don’t know why or how, only that I do. You didn’t judge me or try to make light of it. I appreciate that.”
Nia smiles. It lights up her face. She’s so fucking beautiful that my heart aches. I want to tell her some of the things I’m feeling, but I don’t. Nia won’t want to hear them. Instead, I push a strand of hair behind her ear.
I watch her clamp up. I watch as the walls fall into place. I watch the light go out of her eyes. Gaire did that. I pull back, sitting up. “We have two options,” I tell Nia. “We can wait for Gaire to show up, or we can move somewhere else and keep moving until we’re ready to face him.”
“I don’t want to run. I want to try again.” She squeezes her eyes shut. “It has to work this time.”
“I don’t want to run either.” I pull in a breath, “Enough talk of doom and gloom. Do you want to shower first?” I ask. “I have plenty of clean shirts for you to wear.” I lift my brows.
She gives me a half-smile. I read relief on her face. “You go first.”
“Are you used to sharing a bathroom? Did you have to share growing up? I can’t imagine what it’s like having nine brothers.”
She laughs. Her whole face lights up. “Thank god I didn’t have to share. I was the only kid in the house who got their own bathroom on account of being the only girl. I hated having so many brothers growing up, but now that I’m a little older and wiser, I’ve come to realize how precious my family is. I miss them. My family owns a pub in town. It’s everything you would expect, all wood and brass. My grandfather started Hound’s Tooth many years ago.”
“A pub…that’s so interesting.” I smile. “Hound’s Tooth, what a perfect name.”