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As though not a single moment has passed between us, she instinctively wraps her legs around my waist like she always did.

I hug her tightly to my chest, almost afraid I’m cutting off her air flow.

We had been so…fuck. Irate, enraged…there isn’t a word in the dictionary that describes the level of anger we all felt.

There was also a fuck ton of pain. Why tell us about the baby if she planned to abort it? According to chatter coming from the Sidorov Family, Everest and her father had planned the whole thing, merely a way to torture us.

And in reality, our girl had fought for her life, had almost lost it, then spent the last four years alone.

Yeah, Kato, Maddox, and I had been in pain, but at least we’d had each other. I had spent plenty of time either inking or piercing my skin to feel something other than loss and anger,had stuck my dick into any willing hole to fill the never-ending emptiness.

Kato buried himself in work, expanding the empire until we became a true threat to anyone on the outskirts. He’d built a reputation for his ruthlessness, but had also built an army of loyal soldiers who followed his every demand without a single question.

Madd…well, fuck. The dude now lived up to his nickname. Maddox had gone batty as fuck. He’d always been…not really serious, but he’d always had a head for business. The moment we got word from Dima Sidorov, he had become violent as fuck, often reinforcing Kato’s law without backup. Kato and I both feared he had some fucked up death wish and was using his role as enforcer, as a soldier to the Antoniou empire instead of taking himself out by his own hand.

None of that, not a single moment we have spent over the past four years held a candle to what our girl has endured.

Tangling my hand in her hair, I pull her head away from my shoulder and force her to look at me. “I am so fucking sorry. I should have known better. I should have…fuck. I don’t know. Started killing people until I got more information.”

For the first time in what feels like a century, I press my lips to hers. It’s not gentle. It’s hungry, desperate, and filled with so many promises.

“I swear to you on my goddamn life I will make them all pay. If I personally have to walk through those gates and into that house alone, I will destroy every single person who hurt you. Including your father.”

Her bottom lip quivers and my heart shatters a little more.

“I’m such a fucking dick.” My eyes drop to the lines visible above the collar of her sweater. Because it hangs off one shoulder, I can see the top lines of the letter B.

B for Brixton.

B for bastard.

“The initials?” I ask her when I lift my eyes back to her face.

Tears have trailed down her cheeks again. “My father.”

My nostrils flare and a sound rumbles from my chest, the growl so raw and animalistic Everest widens her eyes and her lips pop open.

We had truly believed she attempted to ruin the marks, hide what those letters stood for, but it had been her father and his men who’d mutilated my beautiful girl’s body.

Now tears are pricking the backs of my eyes as I hold her weight with one arm and lift my free hand to tug down the collar of her sweater, my gaze glued to the plastic wrap keeping the large tattoo clean and protected.

There’s evidence of blood along with some ink pressing to the plastic and I have an overwhelming urge to grab a rusty, dull as fuck knife and carve her full name into my chest.

Not that I haven’t permanently carried her across the flesh of my back all this time. She hasn’t seen it yet and while I hope she realizes the gravity of it, realizes I never truly let her go, that I never stopped loving her, it isn’t even close to making up for how we’ve treated her or what she went through.

Lowering onto the couch with her straddling my lap, I lean forward and press feather soft kisses across the outline of our initials and the design. Originally, I’d had Nico incorporate thorns to signify the way she’d ripped us apart, how prickly and dangerous she was.

Now…oh, that fucking design will be completely changed to nothing but beauty.

I pull her face toward mine, capturing her lips, slipping my tongue past the seam and reveling in the sweetness I never thought I would ever have the chance to savor again.

Even when we’d found her, made plans to bring her home, I hadn’t thought I would enjoy a moment like this again.Ofcourse, I’d planned to fuck her, to own her body, to claim her in any way I chose.

But this isn’t me claiming my girl – this is a reunion. This is the very first hint of making up for ever thinking Everest would go against me, againstus, that she would ever intentionally hurt us.

How the fuck had we so easily believed her father? We knew her, knew her better than anyone else in the world, including that cock sucking motherfucker.

When I raise my eyes to her face, I know she sees all the unspoken words there, but I don’t know if she can ever realize how much guilt has piled onto my heart, how broken I now am…and the whole time it was me who’d fucked up.