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He blew out an unhappy breath but released me. “We’ll be right here.”
I headed over to the guest, who stared at a painting on the wall. It was the last one I’d painted for the exhibit, the one I’d spent the most time on. In fact, I hadn’t finished it until just two days previous, all but collapsing when I’d added the final brush strokes to it.
“I didn’t invite you,” I said.
Bradley smiled but didn’t actually turn toward me. Instead, he kept staring at the painting. “We’re bound together, you and me. I need no invitation to check in on you. I am surprised you have yet to reach out and ask about the fate of our mutual friend.”
I knew who he meant without having to ask. I would have loved to say the moment I walked out of the auction, I never thought about Lorien again, that he neither deserved nor occupied any part of my mind, but it wouldn’t have been true. I thought about him often, still woke up from nightmares now and then, but those things were outside of my control. I refused to ask a thing about him. “He isn’t my problem,” I simply said.
Bradley let out a soft, amused laugh. “Then all I will assure you is that you will never have to worry about him. Of course, seeing just how talented you are in art, I fear you went for too low a bid.”
“That is probably the weirdest compliment I’ve ever gotten.” I paused, then added softly, “But thanks.”
“This is my favorite,” he said, nodding at the painting we stood before. “I went all around the exhibit, but I like this one best. When you are prepared to part with it, I would like to purchase it.”
“Really?” I frowned as I looked around the room, catching sight of the other pieces. This was far from my best piece by any real standard.
“Don’t get me wrong, your ability is obvious in them all. You captured an amazing amount of softness in subjects who would not be considered soft.” He moved his gaze over to other pieces as he spoke.
One of Nem, of Colton, of Bray. On the walls hung paintings of all the people in my life who mattered. I’d given my all to each one, showing what I saw rather than what the world saw.
“You have an uncanny ability to look beyond the surface of your subjects. Everyone can look at someone and see what they show to the world. I understand why Lorien fell for you—you see something else, something deeper, something they hide from everyone else. You bring that out and expose it. He was a fool, of course, but he wasn’t wrong about you.”
“So why do you like this one?” I peered at the largest of the paintings, that of a cage, the thick bars I’d been on the inside oftwice.It sat on a stage, in a spotlight, but the cage was empty, the door open. I’d painted it in place of putting my own image there, as a way to represent myself in the exhibit.
“Believe it or not, we all exist inside our own cages. Even those who appear to have it all, they have their own chains. Something about this, about the sight of those chains left behind, that door open, it speaks to me, I guess.” He shook his head, as though waking up, then offered me an embarrassed smile. “I should get going. I didn’t intend to intrude—I just wanted to show my support as well. Good work, Kenz. I’m glad things worked out the way they have.” With that, he nodded and left, as much of an enigma as he had been the first time I’d seen him.
“We might have to kill him.” Hayden set his chin on my head as he came up behind me. Tor stood to my other side and nodded in quick agreement. Char and Vance laughed, but that laugh wasn’t an argument.
I looked around the room, taken in again by all the people who had gathered. Nem, the Quad, Jarrod, Sasha, even Bradley. For so many years I’d thought I was alone in the world, forced to do nothing but follow others’ lead, listen to them, live the life they wanted me to. I remembered standing in that wedding dress, thinking my future was nothing but marrying a stranger because my father ordered it.
Then everything had changed, and I’d felt stuck.
“Kenz?” Vance cupped my cheek, his blue eyes worried.
I set my hand over his and smiled even as my eyes burned. “I’m okay,” I promised him. “I was just thinking about how much my life had changed.”
“And that makes you cry? I know Vance is a pervert, but we’ll keep you safe from him,” Char said.
I laughed and shook my head. “Thank you. I had no idea I could be this happy, that I could have this much. I owe it all to you.”
“No you don’t,” Hayden said. “This is all because of you. You worked hard, you risked your life and everything else. You have what you have because of you, Kenz.”
I turned again to face the painting of the open cage, surrounded by the men I loved, the ones who had stood by me, the ones who I couldn’t imagine living without anymore.
Maybe they didn’t realize it, maybe they never would. I might have been the one to step out of my cage, but they’d been the ones to give me the strength to do it.
And I knew with all my heart that they were the reason I had the life I had. I could never thank them enough, but all the years I had left, the future I never thought I’d get, the happiness I’d found, I’d spend them all with the men who had made it possible.
I wasn’t my sister or my mother or my father, and for the first time, I was okay with that. It had taken getting sold at an auction, getting purchased by strangers and having my life risked more times than I could count to get me here, to make me understand my own truth.
I was Mackenzie Williams, and because of the men who loved me, because of how much I loved them, I finally knew exactly what that was worth.
