AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“She might make a good wife for Elijah. It would be better if he and Everett can start having heirs sooner rather than later, and she might be our best chance at getting him a good woman given his… tastes,” Tony suggests.
My stomach rolls as they speak about the women I consider family in such a vile manner. With such little regard for the fact they are human and should have their own choices, their own free will. Am I hypocrite because I helped Rayne hold Emerson against her will in the beginning? Does that make me a monster just like the blood running through my veins? No. Because Rayne never would have hurt her, he would have done anything to protect her, he dideverythingto protect her. And even before she admitted it to herself, underneath all her fight, she wanted to be there.
“We’ll see if he likes her when he gets back from retrieving them,” Angelo agrees.
“Retrieving them?” The words fall from my lips before I have the chance to stop them. Tommy and Rayne would have already left to head here. The Legion should already be scoping out the club. And we’ve left Storm and the girls as sitting ducks.
Angelo smirks, a look so deadly and disgusting my own stomach flips with disgust. “Like I said, dear nephew, this all ends tonight.”
59
Wynter
Consciousness returns slowly, and at first, I can’t work out what it is that has woken me. It could have been any number of things, from the uncomfortable floor I’m lying on, to the ache in my neck and shoulders from the position I fell asleep in, to the pain shooting through my scalp from crying myself to sleep. But as I lay here, eyes still closed, fighting the reality that comes with being awake, I know it’s none of those things that woke me.
A loud bang outside forces me to sit up and my eyes to spring open. I look around the dark room frantically just in time to hear another series of bangs.
Gunshots.
I push myself up and tug the door open, sprinting up the hallway until I almost run straight into Snow. “Panic room, now!” I shout. The noise is getting closer and I have to get my sisters to safety.
“Emerson.” Snow’s voice shakes, her eyes as wide as saucers.
“I’m going to get her now. Watch on the camera and open the door when we get there,” I tell her but by the time the last few words leave my mouth, I’m running as fast as I can toward the other wing of the house. When we started staying here, we decided to give Rayne and Emerson a room in our parents’ wing, to give them privacy, but I’m now regretting that decision.
My eyes cast over the banister just in time to see the front door explode. The force of the blast knocks me into the wall, the sound causing my ears to ring painfully, but I don’t stop running. I run as fast as my legs will carry me, thanking every god that my parents had the foresight to have multiple entrances to the panic room because there’s no way we’re getting back the way I’ve come.
Shouts fill the house and I keep running. Footsteps on the stairs behind me make my heart jump into my throat and my chest constrict painfully. I have to get to Emerson. Rayne won’t survive without her. She’s the air he breathes, the beat of his heart, his entire world. I can’t let him lose her.
There’s a niggling thought trying to break through my focused mind. This is Everett. He did this. He’s been playing us this whole time. For years we trusted him with our secrets, and now he’s using them to tear us apart.
I don’t allow the thought to drag me under though. I can fall apart once my sisters are safe and not a moment sooner.
I burst into the bedroom Emerson shares with my brother and look from one side of the dark room to the other. “Emerson?” I whisper. I don’t know why I’m bothering. The men that have infiltrated our home know we’re here, but I don’t want to tip them off as to where we are until I can get her to safety.
“Wynter?” Her head pops up from the other side of the room and I allow a sigh of relief to slip from my lips.
“We need to go right now,” I say in a rush, glancing over my shoulder to make sure no one has followed me. If they’re smart, and if Everett is the one calling the shots on this operation, they would have gone to the other wing first looking for Snow and me. Anyone who knows anything about my sister-in-law knows she’ll go to the end of the earth to help the people she loves, and if they were to capture Snow and I, she’d come right out to save us, even if Rayne would lose his fucking mind.
When I’m sure they haven’t ventured to this side of the house yet, I usher her out of the room and into the bedroom my parents used to have. Their combined scent hits me the moment I open the door and I stop dead in the doorway. All I see as I look around the room is them, their smiles, their laughs, they happiness. The emotions beg to be set free, but I don’t have time to feel right now. If I want to live, and I want my sisters to live, I need to put everything back into that little box and hide it as far away as I possibly can until we’re safe.
“This way.” I step toward the wardrobe but stop in my tracks again when I hear voices coming up the way we’ve just come. “Quickly!” I whisper and throw the door open, quietly closing it behind us.
I pull the chest of drawers forward and reveal the door to the panic room, praying Snow is watching all the cameras and not just the door she went through. The quiet hum of the sliding door allows me to let out a breath, relief filling me. We’re safe. We can ride out the attack in the bunker and deal with whatever is left once this is all over.
“Where are these bitches?” a voice on the other side of the door asks.
“Are you sure they’re here?” another man asks.
“Get in right now,” I whisper shout at Emerson. There’s not enough time for us both to get in and pull the drawers back. Even though the panic room is virtually impenetrable, Everett does have the override code and I’m not willing to risk all of our lives on him not using it. At least if the drawers cover the door, it will give us enough time to close it again before anyone could get in.
“What about you?” Her green eyes flash with fear and I long to take it away, but she knows what it’s like to be a prisoner of these men. Men so ruthless she still has nightmares about the time she spent with them.
“I’ll be fine. You and Snow stay in there no matter what. No matter what you see on the cameras, no matter what you hear. You stay put, okay?”
For a moment Emerson looks like she’s going to argue, but when Snow’s head pops out and holds her hand out for her, she relents and drops to her knees, crawling through the door quickly.
“Be careful,” Snow whispers.
