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“Nah, he hates people too much.”
Cole was right. The only reason Tanner left the cabin was because working for Carelli gave him an opportunity to let his demons out. If he was stuck here with us for the next two months, shit was going to get real.
I wasn’t entirely sure how we were going to handle him, but Cole seemed convinced it would all work out just fine.
He was fucking delusional.
Eva
Listening to the music eased my raging anxiety. I was fully aware I still needed to leave, but the snow was falling again outside and I had no car anymore. Yes, I could have asked one of the guys to drop me in the next town. I was sure one of them would have if the roads were still open.
However, the lack of money was a problem. And also, my bag was still in the trunk of Brent’s car, so far as I knew.
Silas had returned. I had heard them whispering in the kitchen before they moved out of earshot.
The fire crackled in the hearth while I sat stiffly on the sofa. Under different circumstances, I’d have felt right at home here.
It was a gorgeous room: timber-clad walls and an enormous stone fireplace. In one corner stood a floor to ceiling bookcase filled with a mix of novels, biographies, and random non-fiction titles. There were a few small landscape paintings on the walls, which brightened the place up.
The decor was overwhelmingly masculine, with no pretty cushions or ornaments, but it was tidy, and best of all, it felt like a home.
The house I shared with Brent had never felt like a home. Nothing there belonged to me. Not one thing. Brent rented it off from someone he knew, with the hideous furniture it contained included in the price.
The furniture in this cabin had been chosen for comfort, rather than budget. Some of it even looked hand-crafted. If I was to pick somewhere to live, this cabin would be it.
I loved the whole rustic aesthetic. A woman at work had been reading an interiors magazine on her break, and when she left it in the staff room, I sneaked a look.
There was a feature on rustic interior decor design and the home in it was not dissimilar to this one. In a different life, I would have torn the pages out and added them to my mood board. Instead, I left the magazine behind for someone else to drool over.
There was little point in me musing over interior design choices. I had no home and zero chance of ever making one of my own.
The guys walking in, startling me out of my thoughts. Almost immediately, I tensed. Were they coming to tell me it was time for me to leave?
Silas dropped onto the sofa but not close enough to touch me, leaving me simultaneously relieved and also disappointed. Cole hovered by the fireplace while looking over my head. Eventually, he spoke in a low, measured tone designed to calm rather than rile.
“So Silas went back to your car. Did you have any bags in there?”
My head snapped up. The money! “There was a bag in the trunk, yeah, and my purse was in the glove box.”
“The car was empty, Eva,” Silas told me. I spun around to stare at him. “Empty? But how?” Something told me I wouldn’t like the answer to that question.
“There were footprints all round the car. Someone had been there and cleared it out.” He paused for a moment, he and Cole exchanging a look that suggested they were having a conversation I wasn’t privy to. “Last night, when I found you, there was a guy at the scene. He ran off when I made my presence known. Do you remember anything yet?”
Oh God. It must have been Brent. I still couldn’t remember the actual crash, but I did recall panicking about a car following me. If he knew where I was, he might come here. He might attack the guys.
My thoughts spiraled out of control. Black fog enveloped me like a toxic cloud. I couldn’t breathe. Something heavy sat on my chest, pressing me into the sofa. It wasn’t until Silas touched my arm gently that I realized I was hyperventilating.
“Breathe, sugar. You’re safe. We won’t let anything happen to you.” The soft rasp of his voice settled the swirling panic in my head and I forced some air into my heaving lungs. In and out. Breathe. In and out.
Some of the panic dissipated, the fog cleared, and when I came around, both guys were staring at me intensely.
“Are you running from someone, Eva?” Cole moved closer to perch on the edge of the heavy timber coffee table. I could see every striation in the polished surface.
“I…” Did I want them to know? Did I trust them? If I was stuck here for a while, they needed to know what I was dealing with. They definitely needed to know the man I’d spent the last few years with was an unhinged psychopath who had promised that if I left him, I was dead. I took a deep breath before telling them my story.
“Two days ago, I left the man who became my guardian after my dad died. He isn’t the kind of man to let something he owns go.”
“You can’t own a person,” Silas said, looking horrified. “That’s not how it works, sugar.”
