Page 47 of Thaddeus

“Babe, jump off and tie us up, yeah?”

Tatiana did what her husband asked, and when we were secured and off the boat, I was starting to get nervous, which was ridiculous because I’d been in worse situations than this. Maybe it was all the warnings I’d received that was making conditions seem more dangerous than they were.

“Don’t leave my side, Emerson. No matter what you see.”

“I’ve seen how the girls are kept, Brooks,” I bristled.

He stopped, which meant Tatiana stopped, and he faced me. “No matter what.”

“Fine, fine, I get it. No matter what. Can we please hurry? The giant-sized flying bugs are biting my neck.”

Tatiana and Brooks shared a silent moment before we started walking again. My boots were sinking in the mud and I was hoping there weren’t snakes hiding in the muck. We trudged through the thick vegetation in silence and I was impressed by how easily Brooks was navigating. I had the worst directional skills, proven by the last time I’d been traipsing through the jungle by myself, I’d ended where I’d started after hours of walking.

Suddenly, out of nowhere four men appeared, scaring the ever-living hell out of me. Before I could stop myself, I stumbled back and slipped in the mud, landing on my ass. I scrambled to get up, only making the whole situation worse, and ended up twisting and turning in sludge. By the time a hand reached down to grab me, I looked like a pig who’d been frolicking all day in shit.

“Whoa, Emmy. Just get your feet under you,” Thad whispered.

I froze.

Completely still.

When we’d been together Thad mostly had called me, agápi mou. Sometimes Moro mou, meaning my baby. But when he’d thought I’d done something sweet or was being funny he’d call me Emmy. I preferred agápi mou. Hearing him call me ‘my love’ never failed to make my heart swoon. Now, hearing any of the old nicknames hurt. Like, bad, really fucking bad.

“I’m fine,” I told him even though I really wasn’t.

Something felt off. Or should I say, more off than it had.

“What’s wrong?” Brooks asked me.

“Does something feel weird?” I asked instead of answering.

“Weird, how?” Declan’s gaze swung my way.

“I don’t know. I just feel it. It's probably nothing, you guys have all freaked me out with this stay close no matter what stuff.”

The men all exchanged looks, expressions I couldn’t read, but wished I could.

“You hit only four at the kennels?” Declan inquired.

“Yeah,” Max answered.

“We had three in the house. Seven guards. None roaming,” he stated. “Brooks, you’re hanging back until we breech the buildings where the women are kept.”

“You haven’t checked the women yet?”

“No, I wanted you three off the boat as quickly as possible,” Declan answered.

Max’s steely blue eyes pinned me in place and he asked, “You get these feelings a lot? Like something's wrong?”

“No. Never happened before.”

“Fuck,” he clipped.

Declan gave Max and Kyle a nod and the two of them slipped back into the shrubbery and disappeared. Then to Thad he asked, “Ready?”

Thad’s gaze came to mine before he looked at Declan and answered, “Yeah.”

The two men started forward, but Brooks didn’t move. So neither did I.