“You’ve found them?” she asks, her eyes growing wide with wonder and excitement. Should it wound my pride to see her so happy over leaving me for them? My ego’s going to take a hit with her taking off, but I have to remind myself this isn’t about me and my needs. It’s about Aura, and it has been from the beginning. She’s ready, and it’s past time I bring her to her family.
Oh yeah, so I haven’t exactly told her about her family and all I know about them. I couldn’t bring myself to utter a word about any of them before now. I’m selfish, wanting to keep her all to myself like I have, but I’d do the same thing again if I had another opportunity to. They may be her family, but they’re not good enough for her sort of soul-deep beauty.
It’s hypocritical of me to think so, considering I’m basically on the opposite end of the spectrum as far as good men are concerned. I’ve killed people. Not only one or two, but many. My hands are dirty, stained in blood as is my soul. The kicker is I’m too far gone for her to care about any of it. I’ll lie and cheat, kill and maim, whoever I have to, to make sure she remains safe. Aura leaving my property has me worried. I can control the outcome of a threat here, but in the outside world, it’s not quite as easy. Her family’s loaded, too, a botanical empire she sits at the top of and has no clue of. It’ll only add to the allure of harming her, of using her for whatever some asshole can get his hands on.
“Your parents have missed you, I’m certain of it. I haven’t contacted them yet on your behalf, I wanted to discuss it with you first. Once you give me the okay, I’ll reach out.” Silently, I beg her to tell me what I want to hear, how she wants to stay here away from everyone else, alone with only me. It’s a stretch, but still, my heart reaches for hers, claiming it as my own.
“This is amazing news, Hunter. Thank you for finding them! I-I can’t wait to meet my parents.” She throws herself at me, wrapping me in a warm embrace. Her nose burrows into the spot between my shoulder and throat, making me shiver. It’s a sensitive place, not that it matters at the moment. My mind’s too busy flip-flopping all over the place, scatterbrained with all the things I know can possibly hurt her. Her general well-being has been pushed to the forefront of my priorities, along with her happiness, and this screams danger zone.
“They’ll be lucky to have you,” I murmur instead, fighting the twisting sensation in my stomach. I hold onto her tightly, not wanting her to lean back and be able to read all the raw emotion reflecting in my irises over her excitement.
“They’ll want me?” Her tone grows unsure, and I want to do anything I can to expunge whatever thoughts plague her at the moment.
“Of course, they will. They didn’t stop looking for you. Your parents never gave up on the possibility of you returning to them someday.”
“I’m so happy. Thank you for all you’ve done for me. I’ll never forget you.”
Then why does it feel like she already has with her statement? “You can always count on me, I give you my word.”
“And your word is everything,” she repeats what I’d previously told her about my brothers. How our word and loyalty is all we have when it comes to each other, but it means everything to us. Thinking about it reminds me I need to check in with guys and also give Beast a call to see how he’s been doing lately. He was going to keep his ear to the ground as well as Malevolent on any new information coming through about the island. “When can we see them?”
Her saying ‘we’ warms me a touch, it’s not like I’d planned on allowing her to go alone in the first place. There’s still far too much that doesn’t add up about her disappearance, and I’ll be keeping close to her while I figure it out. Her father shouldn’t mind, after all, he’s the one who regularly calls me asking if I’ve heard anything about his missing daughter. She’d been gone for so long, I thought she was dead. I was harsh in the past and told him as much. He promised never to give up on her, and I certainly hope he meant it because she’s alive and well and deserves everything she never had the chance to have.
“I’ll call them and set everything up, okay?”
She nods vehemently, her face still tucked into my neck. She begins to give me pepper kisses over my flesh, and I jump away. I’m too invested in her, and I need to distance myself until I figure out what’s going to happen with us, if anything. I need to put my guard up if she gets her life back and decides she wants nothing to do with me. It’ll hurt, any amount of time away from her will, but I’ll accept it if it’s what she wants. I’ll have no other choice. I won’t be kidnapping Aura to keep her, she’s already had most of her life taken away, and I refuse to add to it.
“Are you all right?” she asks, a frown marring her beautiful face as concern overtakes her features.
I nod, turning away so she won’t read the apprehension on my face. “I need to shower. I have shit to do,” I respond coldly and head for the master bathroom. I turn the shower faucet all the way to the left, and the moment the steam fills the stall, I step inside. The blistering water cascades over my frame as I bend my head and attempt to process everything and how my life will be changing again. I’m not ready to lose her, but in the world our parents are from, you can easily get swallowed up and become another rich, elite snob. I didn’t fit in with any of them, so I turned to the MC. In their place, I gained a group of brothers I’ve always been able to count on.
I wash myself, lathering for far longer than necessary as I’m lost in my thoughts. I step out of the water when Aura decides to join me. Any other day, and I’d have her pushed up against the tile wall, fucking her silly. Not today. I’ve got other shit on my mind, like how she may meet her family and disappear from my life entirely.
Grabbing whatever I find first in my drawers, I dress and hit her father, Steven’s number. I use his personal line, knowing he’ll be at home, and he’ll want to share this with Lucia, Aura’s mother. “I found her,” I say, rather than waste any more of my time with greetings and pointless pleasantries.
There’s a gasp and coughing on the other end of the line. I wait while he nearly keels over before he clears his throat and apologizes. “I’m sorry. I swear I heard you say you found her. Did I hear you correctly, or is my mind playing sick tricks on me?”
“I did. She’s alive, safe, and here with me.”
“Is she, uh… excuse me. I’m just taken off guard. I had begun to think it wasn’t possible. Us finding her, I mean. How is she?” He sounds like he’s crying, and I can’t blame him. I’d be doing the same thing if it were my daughter home after disappearing without a trace for so long. The entire country mourned her disappearance from their television sets, and here she is, alive, after all.
“She’s fine. You can ask her yourself if you’d like?”
“No-no. I uh… wouldn’t know what to say at the moment. I’m freaking out inside right now.”
I can tell.
I ask, “Is there a problem?”
“Problem? No, of course not. The opposite, this is a miracle from God.”
“It’s something, all right. And yes, to be blunt, she’s fine. She wasn’t when I found her, but she is now.”