Page 69

Yojimbo

Niko walked into the bunk room where Isobel and Elijah were still sleeping, his attention drifting up from Isobel’s socked feet, where they twisted around Elijah’s calves, to the silk shorts cupping her perfect ass.

Elijah’s arms circled her, holding her tight even in a deep sleep, hands clutching at her possessively.

She was wearing another pair of typical, rich-girl pyjamas, which meant she had packed expensive little silken wet dreams to bring to an abandoned war bunker .

His mate was ridiculous, and he loved every little thing about her, but it was really starting to look like everyone else knew exactly how to fall in line with her, except him.

For so long, he had felt unsteady in his own body and mind.

He had been the first to bond with her, but then the bond was damaged, and so was their connection.

Sometimes, it seemed like all of them had moved on and left him behind, but he knew that wasn’t true.

He couldn’t help but know it. He could feel it inside her—how much she cared for him and how much she cared for the others.

When she grinned at him, rolled her eyes at him, or burned under his unflinching attention, it wasn’t any more or any less than what she felt for the others.

Isobel wasn’t a chaser, at least not a confident one, and he had felt like too much of an alien in his own skin to make room in his mind for the gentleness and softness she deserved.

She loved to be claimed, and he was more than capable of doing that, but he wasn’t as confident in what would be required of him after .

So he held back. And he thought several of the other Alphas were holding back, too—some of them for the same reason.

But there he was, watching the last domino fall, and he was alone again.

He was supposed to be waking them up, warning them that arrests were being announced. The news had broken that morning, but Amina Al-Fahim must have already looped in the authorities, because it was only a matter of hours before the officials were being seized.

His phone vibrated in his pocket, saving him from the words that lodged in his throat. Elijah had set up a signal booster the night before, but this was the first message he had received.

Sora: Are you okay?

He quickly replied to his sister .

Niko: I’m safe.

Sora: They quoted you in the article.

Niko: I know.

It took her a few moments of typing and deleting to send her reply.

Sora: Are you really okay?

She wasn’t asking if he was physically safe.

He exited out of the conversation, finding another message from his other sister, Yume, also asking if he was okay. Nothing from his parents. He switched to the group chat with both of his sisters so that he could talk to them simultaneously.

Niko: I don’t know how this is going to turn out, but either way, I’m done hiding.

Niko: Carter is my mate. You can tell Okasan and Otosan that the silent treatment will never work.

Niko: I’ll give her up when I’m dead.

He chewed on his lip, watching their typing bubbles frantically appear and disappear, before Yume finally responded.

Yume: Why didn’t you tell us earlier?

Niko snorted, looking up to the ceiling with a shake of his head.

He wasn’t ashamed of their group, far from it.

This was the best thing he had ever done, the most positive thing he had ever built.

These were his best friends and … not exactly the girl of his dreams, because he had pictured someone that his parents would accept.

Bu t she was better than anything he had ever dared to hope for, and he was proud of it.

Still, the rest of the world wouldn’t understand, and it was none of their fucking business. He had stepped away from Ironside, and he had no idea what that meant for Eleven, for his career, for his future, but for once, he had the freedom to decide that it was nobody’s business but theirs.

Still … this was his family. Not quite as close as the one he had built over the years at Ironside, but just as important.

Niko: She’s mine, but she’s also theirs. She bonded to each of the Alphas.

Sora: Holy … fuck?

Yume: That little girl?

He frowned down at his screen, ire bubbling up his chest, but his sister’s next message calmed the swell.

Yume: I KNEW she was badass.

Yume: I tried to tell Okasan and Otosan. Our parents ignored me. But I knew. I totally said she was a secret badass.

Sora: That was me! You said she was too sassy for Niko.

Yume: Yeah, but look how sassy Niko is now. I guess they were fated after all.

Niko: I don’t like this.

Sora: Don’t worry, Niko-chan. Carter already won Okasan over.

She sent through a video, and Niko clicked into it, his brow crinkling in confusion.

His screen filled with the image of his mother dancing in the poky living room of their house, her eyes fixed on the television, as if she were copying a music video.

When she did a clunky little spin, Niko spied what was on the screen she was watching.

Waking up with Carter was splashed across the top of the screen.

It was the online segment that Ironside had started, once Isobel’s morning dancing began to garner too many views.

His chest seized at the smile on his mother’s face, the determination in her expression as she tried to learn the steps of the dance.

Sora: She does that every morning. When Carter stopped the segment, she saved all the videos so she could still do them. Says that dancing first thing in the morning is going to help her live to 100.

Niko flicked back to the video, his thumb hovering over the frozen image of his mother on the screen, her small, determined figure in the familiar, cluttered living room.

He could see the edge of the family altar in the background, the black lacquered surface dusted with old incense ash, a framed picture of his late grandparents smiling over his mother’s shoulder.

His chest tightened, his throat constricting around the unfamiliar warmth blooming there.

He could remember sitting cross-legged on that very floor, his sisters on either side of him, his mother’s warm hands on their small shoulders, gently guiding them into a bow before the altar as his father murmured behind them.

Back then, his mother’s hair had been long and shiny, swept into an elegant bun at the nape of her neck, her kimono always perfectly pressed.

Now, her hair was streaked with silver, cut short around her chin, her house clothes wrinkled and loose as she stumbled through the dance moves, her bare feet thumping softly against the mats.

She was breathless by the end of the video, her hands coming to rest on her hips as she grinned at whoever was holding the phone to record her, a bead of sweat trickling down her flushed cheek.

Niko’s vision blurred for a second, and he blinked hard, his thumb shaking slightly as he hit the replay button again.

This time, he watched with a closer eye, picking out every detail of the room he had grown up in, every familiar object, the faint light filtering in through the doors, the sound of his mother’s breath as she moved, the quiet chuckle of his father in the background, clearly trying not to disturb her workout.

They had brought their culture with them to the settlement, as most Gifted immigrants did, hoping to retain a shadow of what their lives might have been in a melting pot of different religions, cultures, and backgrounds.

His parents followed both the Shinto and the Gifted religions, claiming that they were complementary, but he and his sisters had swayed more toward the Gifted religion, visiting the settlement chapel every day on their way to the volunteer school, which was run out of Mrs Morrone’s house.

His sisters always dropped an offering and bowed to Sannara, just as they would to a Shinto shrine, praying for her to aid their parents’ clinic with her healing.

Niko did the same, sometimes, but he mostly bowed and made his offerings to Aphelina.

He prayed for her to change his eyes. To gift him a mate.

He left the chapel feeling guilty every morning, because he didn’t wish for the same someone his parents wished for.

Someone to further their culture and heritage, rather than diluting it.

Someone who spoke their language and understood their customs. Someone who had suffered exactly what they had suffered.

Instead, he prayed for someone who could make people smile, because he wanted to be happy .

He watched the video twice more, his pulse thundering, his breath coming short and sharp in his chest at his mother’s smile.

He hadn’t realised how tightly he had been wound, how much weight had been pressing down on his shoulders.

The tension broke in a sudden, quiet release, like a wire snapping inside him, and a choked, half-hysterical laugh escaped his lips.

The bed creaked, and he glanced up to see Elijah blinking blearily at him, his mismatched eyes sharpening as he took in Niko’s expression, his brow furrowing in concern.

Isobel stirred in his arms, her small hands flexing against his bare chest, her head turning as she tried to bury herself deeper into his warmth.

Niko quickly cleared his throat and flashed Elijah a tight, awkward grin. “Family stuff,” he muttered, his voice coming out rougher than he intended.

Elijah’s eyes softened, his grip on Isobel tightening instinctively, stirring her awake.

Niko glanced down at his phone again, his heart still racing, his chest still tight, but the weight that had been suffocating him for years felt a little lighter now, a little more bearable. His mother was dancing. She was smiling. Maybe she was still his mother too.

He took a deep breath, his thumb flicking to the group chat again, his fingers trembling only slightly as he typed out a new message.

Niko: I’ll call you both soon.

Yume: You better. We have a lot to talk about.