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I just keep staring.
Part of me can barely believe this is real. That they’re here. Victor is here,alive, and I saw him get shot. The whole time I’ve been away from them, I wasn’t even sure that he had made it through the night I was taken. I have a split second of being unsure, worried that he’s a ghost. That me thinking I see him is proof that this is a dream or a hallucination. That my mind has finally broken from all the torment I’ve been through since Mexico.
Maybe this is just my brain blocking out the truth by making up this scenario. By giving me the thing I want the most, the brothers here with me, when in reality I’m just getting assaulted by Troy with no end in sight and no help coming.
Troy howls in pain again, and I shake myself.
No. It has to be real. It has to be.
Everything catches up to me in a rush as my mind struggles to process it all. Being locked in that crawl space, barely eating, Troy forcing himself on me again and again. My emotions spike, and I sway as I clamber to my feet. My legs are shaking like they can barely support my weight, adrenaline rushing through me and making my skin go cold and clammy.
A tiny noise escapes my lips, barely audible over the other sounds filling the entryway, but Ransom turns toward me immediately.
“Willow,” he says, his voice hoarse with relief as he rushes over to me.
That seems to spark Malice and Vic out of their rage, and they leave Troy where they’ve pinned him to the wall and come over to me too.
For a moment, all I can do is stare at them as they gather around me. I’m overwhelmed, shaking and lost, and when I open my mouth, nothing comes out.
“Hey,” Ransom murmurs. “You’re okay now. Angel?”
“She’s in shock,” Vic says.
“No surprise after what that fucker has probably been putting her through,” Malice growls.
“Willow, nod if you can hear me.” Ransom’s voice is low, worry shining in his blue-green eyes.
I look at him and feel myself nod, even though I’m not really aware of having given my body that command.
He grins, bright and perfect. “Good girl. There you are. We’ve got you. We’re going to get you out of here. Fuck, what did that monster do to you?”
He takes in the sight I must be, my hair wild and matted, bruises on my skin from fighting with Troy, my face gaunt and my eyes hollow.
Malice makes a noise low in his throat, almost like a wounded animal. He takes his jacket off and passes it over to Ransom, who helps me wrap up in it.
“There you go,” Ransom murmurs. “It’s okay, pretty girl. We’ve got you. I’m so fucking sorry we didn’t get here earlier. But we’re here now.”
And they are.
All three of them are here, gathered around me until I can’t even see Troy anymore. They’re here, solid and real, not just figments of my battered, tormented mind.
“I—” My voice gives out, and I swallow and try again. “I can’t believe you came. You found me.”
“We’ll always find you,” Malice says. “Always.” But the strength of his words isn’t mirrored in his face. There’s a tortured expression there, something haunted in his eyes. “We tried to come sooner. As soon as they took you. We tried to get to you.”
I nod because I know. I know they would have been here the very same day I got here if they could have. I can picture them frantically searching, tearing the city apart to find me. There’s no doubt in my mind about that.
Ransom reaches out and touches my face, drawing my attention back to him. He pushes my hair back, tucking it behind my ears as Troy lets out a low moan behind the brothers.
“What happened?” Ransom asks. “What did he do?”
In truth, even though I lived it, I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to bring it all back up. But the three of them are all looking at me intently, so I try to get my mouth to form at least some words.
I lick my lips, and it takes me a few tries to start speaking.
“He… he got me back here, somehow. I was out of it for that, so I don’t know how. When the drugs started to wear off and I woke up, I was… I was in a wedding dress. He and Olivia forced me to marry him, to go through with the deal.”
Malice’s jaw clenches, rage swimming back to the surface of his stormy dark eyes. Vic’s face is set in hard lines, his entire body almost unnaturally still, as if there’s so much chaos inside him that one tiny movement will unleash it all.
