Page 86 of A Knight’s Revenge: The Complete Series

CHAPTER FOUR

JOLIE

I woke the next morning in my bunk at home, my entire body pressed against Zach as if I’d tried to crawl inside his skin while we slept. I’d buried my face in the soft sleep shirt he’d borrowed from Max, and he smelled like my shampoo, awakening that possessive animal in me as I breathed him in.

She was content and very smug this morning.

Muffled voices outside the bedroom door told me that the others were awake and puttering around our little kitchen/living room. Noah had slept on the couch and Bennett on an air mattress next to him, the latter having not-so-politely declined Max’s offer to snuggle in his bunk below mine.

“Morning, baby girl,” Zach rasped, arching against me with a languid stretch. “Sleep okay?”

“Yes,” I muttered into his chest. “After our doctor assured me you would live.”

Zach had staples in his head, a broken rib, and a few other swollen body parts, and he’d promised me it was nothing he hadn’t dealt with on a regular basis, given how much time he spent using his fists in the cage.

“Don’t worry about me, please, Jojo,” he whispered into my hair. “All things considered, I think you’ve had a much worse past forty-eight hours than I have. ”

Zach had received the full debrief as we all ate Chinese takeout around our little kitchen table late last night, so he was now up to speed on my traitorous uncle, my dad’s research, and the lurking, silent monster that was the Shadows.

“I don’t know,” I mused, pulling my face from his T-shirt and looking into those gorgeous dark eyes.

“Anders died a brutal, painful death for what he did. I have the answers I’ve been seeking for seven and a half years.

I have all three of you back with me. Max, Dom, and Laura are safe and healthy.

And the notorious Frankie Fingers is now a Shadow and full-fledged member of Knight.

” I raised my brows, giving him a little grin.

“Things are actually looking pretty great for me.”

He returned my smile, dipping in for a kiss that quickly turned filthy. I moaned against his lips, and I felt him harden against my stomach. “Let me have you, baby girl,” he whispered against my lips, his deep rasp turning urgent. “I need you.”

“Zach,” I moaned. “My family is outside the door.”

“I can be quiet,” he replied with a sexy grin. “Can you?”

I fell into that hungry stare, and I could only nod. He made quick work of my sleep shorts, inching them down my thighs just enough for me to pull one leg out, and I tossed that leg over his trim hips as he pulled his dick from his pajama pants and slid home.

I whimpered as he buried his groan in my neck, and he began to move inside me, slow and steady, while he dipped his hand between us, a rough finger finding my clit.

He brought me quickly to a toe-curling climax, and he smothered my pained whine with a hungry kiss.

He came with me, and afterward we held each other again for a few quiet, blissful minutes.

“You know I’m in love with you, Princess?” he murmured in my ear.

I sucked in a breath. “Yeah?”

“Of course I am.” He righted my shorts and ran his fingers through my messy hair before pulling away just enough to stare into my eyes.

“First, I loved you the way a twelve-year-old loves his best friend. Then I loved you as I mourned you, our lost angel. And now? I’ve never met such an incredible, sexy, powerful woman, and the fact that this woman is my Jojo?

I was a goner from day one, baby girl. I’m so fucking in love with you, it’s not even funny. ”

A tear leaked from my eye, because apparently Bennett had broken the dam, and I was a crier now. “I love you too,” I whispered. “Always have, always will.”

“That’s good, Princess,” he replied with a blinding smile. “Because you’re never getting rid of me.”

Just as he rolled me onto my back and climbed on top of me, someone pounded on the bedroom door.

“Keep it in your pants, Ferrero!” Max barked through the closed door. “Breakfast is almost ready, and then we all have shit to do.”

“Ugh,” Zach groaned, rolling off me. “Sounds like he needs me to kick his ass again.”

I smacked a quick kiss against his lips, then I shimmied down the little ladder attached to the bunks.

When I hit the floor, I peered up at where Zach flopped over the edge of the bed, watching me, and I gave him my sternest glare.

“I’m going to need you to give yourself at least two weeks before you even think about getting back in that cage, or I’ll beat your ass myself. ”

He just shot me a sexy smirk, his eyes heating like he’d really enjoy that. I returned it with an exasperated look and went hunting for some clothes.

I emerged from the bathroom sometime later, dressed in leggings and an oversized sweatshirt, mercifully free of the mess Zach left between my thighs.

When I arrived in the living room, I found all three of my boyfriends—the Heirs of the Four Families of Saint Gabriel City—looking contrite as they sat in a neat row on the couch.

Dom loomed over them with his arms crossed.

Max was seated on a stool at the kitchen bar, shoveling cereal in his mouth with an eager smile as he looked on. Laura busied herself in the kitchen, very obviously pretending to ignore the situation in the living room.

“—and you won’t be fighting over her like dogs with a bone, do you understand me?” Dom was saying.

“Yes, sir,” Bennett replied.

“Of course not,” Noah added.

“She’d cut our balls off,” Zach finished .

“Dom,” I said, my tone saccharin sweet and very threatening. “What’s this about?”

“Hey, honey,” he replied, smiling warmly and impervious to the daggers I glared at him.

He motioned me over, and I padded across the hardwood floor and onto the threadbare carpet in our tiny living room, coming to a stop next to him.

“I was just having a little chat with your boys, here. I am completely convinced of their feelings for you as well as their loyalty, but I just wanted to make sure everyone was confident they could handle the dynamics of a polyamorous relationship.”

“Oh my God, Dom,” I groaned, feeling my face heat.

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” Noah said with a soft smile. “We get that our relationship isn’t the norm and has come together under… interesting circumstances. Dom’s just asking questions because he loves you.”

Zach coughed into his fist. “Kiss ass.”

I eyed Bennett with raised brows. He was the newest member of this…

situation, after all, and I wasn’t exactly sure how confident he was in the whole thing.

That thought flew out of my head, however, as I took in his sleep-rumpled brown hair, his tight gray sweatpants, and his thin white sleep shirt that failed to hide the outline of the gorgeous angel wings tattooed across his broad chest.

He caught me staring at him like a lusty bitch, and a cocky little smirk played across his handsome face before he wiped it away and said, “We had eleven years of being as close as friends could be, and even death couldn’t break that bond. We’ll figure it out together, Angel.”

Laura let out a little squeal from the kitchen. “He calls her ‘Angel’? Oh my God, I’m going to cry.”

“Keep it together, Mom,” Max muttered around a mouthful of cereal.

Dom nodded, seemingly satisfied, and he looped an arm around my shoulder to give me an affectionate squeeze. “You deserve so much love, honey. I’m glad you have them back again.”

I sniffed. Goddamn it, the waterworks had to stop. “Thanks, Dom. So am I.”

He meandered away, heading for the kitchen, and I gave in to my baser instincts and crawled right into Bennett’s lap.

“Morning, Angel,” he rumbled, wrapping his arms around me and pressing a lingering kiss behind my ear that sent tingles down to my toes.

“Hi, Bennett.” I sighed, snuggling into him as I reached out for Noah, who reclined next to him on the middle couch cushion, looking similarly sleep-disheveled and delicious.

Noah threaded his long fingers through mine. “Hey, sweetheart. How are you feeling?”

“I’m good,” I replied. “I’ll be ready to rejoin the real world soon, I think.”

“Good, because Bennett was only able to buy us one more day excused from class before the dean started making noise about getting our parents involved. So, we have a lot to do today if we’re going back to school tomorrow.”

Zach returned from the kitchen with two hot mugs of coffee and settled himself on the sofa table, facing us. He handed me one of the mugs like the king he was, and the sexual moan that escaped me after that first delightful sip had all three of them squirming.

“Easy there, Princess,” Zach purred. “I don’t like thinking that your coffee got you hotter than I did earlier.”

Noah snorted. “I knew that was your ‘I just got laid’ face, Ferrero. I can’t believe you sat here and looked Dom in the eye after that.”

“Dom and Laura know I’m a grown woman with healthy sexual needs,” I declared from my perch in Bennett’s lap. “They’re cool—they have to be, since Max is basically a walking hard-on.”

“I heard that!” Max shouted from the kitchen.

“You were meant to!” I yelled back.

“We’re too young to be grandparents!” Laura announced to the room, because apparently things weren’t already awkward enough.

“Ugh,” I groaned, and my boys all chuckled at my flushed cheeks. “Let’s eat so we can get to work. I want to get things rolling before Ramon is even cold on Andrea’s doorstep.”

By late afternoon, we’d made a lot of progress.

“So, the patents have been filed, and we’re going to be able to run everything out of the Foundation?

” I asked Zepp through the speakers of my laptop currently propped on my lap where I was seated on the floor of the living room.

I had my back against the couch, and Noah was sprawled out on the cushions above me, one hand fiddling with his phone while he ran the other lazily through my hair.

He’d just returned from Laura’s office down in the bookstore, which he’d commandeered for several hours to conduct his own business.

“Yes, we will be funding your charitable work with the profits from the greatest tech breakthrough of the decade, since apparently you’ve decided you do not want to be the richest person on the planet,” Zepp grumbled.

“I’m plenty rich.”

“That’s the spirit,” Noah chimed in.

Zepp took an audible sip of his energy drink. “Fine, I get it. I won’t fight you about it, since you gave me a massive raise, allowing me to keep myself in the finery to which I have become accustomed.”

“How long ago was it that you washed the hoodie I know you’re wearing?” I asked as I scrolled through the various documents Zepp had posted to our secure server.

We heard him sniff. “If I had to guess… at least a month.”

Noah leaned over my shoulder, giving my ear a little nibble before he said into my speakers, “Silver told me she sent you a set of brand-new Knight Technologies polo shirts so you’d have some clean laundry.”

Zepp huffed, turning sulky. “That was unnecessary, and I’m still pissed she found my address.”

Entertaining as the ongoing war between Zepp and Silver was, I was tired, and we still had to get ourselves back to campus later. “I’ll get everything signed and back to the team tonight. I just want my dad’s work to be in good hands.”

“It will be, Jojo. This was a good move.”

He signed off, and I shut my laptop, relaxing my head against the couch and basking in Noah’s continued ministrations.

After a few quiet minutes, I asked him, “When are Zach and Bennett coming home?”

“On their way now,” he replied. “Be proud of Zach—Bennett says he stayed out of the cage even after Max called him a ‘pampered pretty boy prince.’”

“Ugh, Max,” I growled, which turned into a tiny moan as Noah fisted my hair with a gentle tug.

“Relax, sweet girl,” he murmured. “Zach behaved, and they’ll both be home in one piece any minute now. ”

Zach and Bennett had spent the day working on their own projects before they’d fucked off to Dom’s gym to blow off steam.

Zach promised me that he would stick to light weights and bag work because I’d discovered that the key to his obedience was not threatening him with violence—that only turned him on—but instead issuing a firm warning that the muffin shop would close if I found even one new bruise on his perfect body.

His eyes had widened in genuine horror, and he’d sworn to me that he’d be good.

Bennett, on the other hand, went to fight. He’d decided he was going to prove himself to the numerous members of the Shadows that frequented Dom’s gym that he was not, in fact, a pampered pretty boy prince , but a fucking force to be reckoned with.

I wept inside over missing what was likely Bennett in his tiny gym shorts dominating in the cage while I met with Zepp, finishing my tasks for the day.

The sacrifices I made so that I could crush my enemies.

I dropped my laptop to the floor next to me before I twisted in my spot and climbed onto the couch, draping my body across Noah’s like I was his blanket. I tucked my face into the crook of his neck, and he wrapped his arms around me in a snug, safe hug that I never wanted to leave.

“Back to the real world tomorrow,” I mumbled into his neck.

He sighed, squeezing me tighter.

We’d head back to the Academy tonight and be back in class tomorrow morning like nothing at all had happened over the last three days.

Like we hadn’t discovered the Families had murdered my parents just to steal from them.

Like Bennett hadn’t killed my uncle right in front of me for what he’d done to us.

Like Zach hadn’t been kidnapped by his own mother before we decimated the entire Ferrero Enforcer team and stole the most valuable asset from their ranks.

But we knew it was only a matter of time before the Families caught up, and then we’d see what they had in store for us.