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Sifting through my memory of the IDs, I decide it’s Alyssa Yang. Her license is the newest, expiring only two years ago.
Did they rape her? Befriend her? Love her? Kill her?
I don’t know what to believe or who to trust. All I know is she’s no longer here.
No longer alive.
With all the talk about fear being bad and the hills being deadly, I need to keep my guard up. Doesn’t matter that these men were abducted like me. They were raised by the devil, and the devil doesn’t breed innocence.
He breeds raw, seductive masculinity, apparently.
I wish I were immune to them. At the very least, I need to start pretending to be immune.
I need to stop letting them kiss me.
“We need to talk about this.” He shifts beside me.
“Yes. Definitely. You can’t go around kissing—”
“That will never happen again, so there’s nothing to discuss.” Rising to perch on the edge of the bed, he drops his elbows to his knees and stares at his hands. “Whatever you’re doing with Leo needs to stop.”
“What I’m doing?” My eyes flare. “No, no, no. That’s all him.”
“You’re instigating it.”
“How exactly?”
He twists to scowl over his shoulder, and those dark, moody eyes latch onto my mouth.
I press my lips together. “I guess I’m instigating your actions, too? I’m purposefully provoking your attention to my mouth and making you kiss me?”
“Yes.”
“I’m married, Kody. I love my husband.”
“You can’t hide behind that excuse forever. Sooner or later, the marriage won’t matter.”
“It will always matter.”
“We need to address what you saw in the library.” He turns away, bends over his knees, and threads his fingers through his hair. “Wolf destroyed all the videos. All except one. He doesn’t know Leo kept a copy.”
“You’ve seen it?” My stomach sours anew. “What Gretchen did to Leo?”
“Never saw the video. But I know what she did to him. I was too young to stop it.” Dropping his chin, he presses a finger and thumb to his eyelids and breathes deeply. “It’s impossible to forget.”
“Did she…?” Fuck, how do I ask this? “Did she hurt you or Wolf the way she hurt him?”
“No.” With a sigh, he stands and moves to his bed. There, he rolls onto his back and glares at the ceiling. “Leo hasn’t watched that video in years, as far as I know. There’s only one reason he would dig it out of hiding now.”
His gaze shifts to me.
“You’re kidding.” My throat constricts. “Don’t put that on me. I have nothing to do with this.”
“You awaken things.”
“That’s not—”
“You upset the balance.”
“You’re tripping. Seriously, all of you are out of your minds. I’ve never encountered anything or anyone more unbalanced, unstable, unhinged…”
He faces forward, returning to the ceiling, and closes his eyes.
The silence that follows fans the flames of my anger. “Do you disagree?”
“Turn off the light.”
“Does Denver have sex with the women he takes?”
“Has he fucked you?”
“You know he hasn’t. I’m not asking about me.”
He rises, shuts off the light, and returns to the bed without a word.
“You’re going to sleep?” I glare at him in the pink twilight of morning.
“It’s only three o’clock.” He shifts, giving me his back. “Some of us have a full day of work ahead.”
“I cleaned the house and harvested veggies.” My hackles prick. “Tell me what needs to be done, and I’ll do it.”
“Don’t have time to hold your hand.”
Then I’ll figure it out, even if it means following him around.
The next day, I do exactly that. I wake when he wakes. I wolf down breakfast, barely taking a breath between bites, just like him. He grumbles while I check his wound and change his bandage. Then I join him outside.
He casts grumpy glances my way between each missed arrow he shoots at the practice targets.
Sometimes, he aims true, but it’s rare.
Over the next few hours, his accuracy grows worse. At this rate, we’ll be dead before winter has a chance to take us.
No need to voice that. With every miss, his mood grows darker and darker. I’m tempted to give him space, like Leo and Wolf have done all day, but he hasn’t barked at me to leave. I’m starting to think he wants me here.
For some reason, I prefer his company today. Mostly because I don’t trust myself with Leo. I can’t stop thinking about him and the video and all the mistakes I’m making. I watched him masturbate and had a shameful, lusty reaction to it. Instead of putting distance between us, I wrapped my arms around him until he fell asleep.
Then Kody kissed me. Again. If I kissed him back, it wasn’t on purpose. Either way, I know better.
What am I doing? Am I betraying Monty with Kodiak? Am I betraying Kodiak with Leo? Does any of it even matter? If my bones end up in the fire pit, no one will care who I kissed before I died.
