Page 12

I mmy paced up and down the foyer.

Maeve and Gray were due here any moment.

That was her boyfriend’s name. Gray Hawkins.

Amazing name. It really suited him.

“Immy, stop pacing,” Jenner called out. “Have you had anything to eat today?”

“I made cookies.”

He scowled. “Cookies are not food.”

Sure they were. “Well, they’re not lumps of coal.” She peeked out of the window. Was that a car coming up the drive? Was it them?

“They’re a treat—hey! Where do you think you’re going!” Jenner yelled.

But she ignored him. That was definitely Maeve. Excitement filled Immy. Lately, she’d been bogged down with worry. And the guys were being ridiculously overprotective of her. It felt like Immy couldn’t even pee without one of them trying to follow her into the bathroom.

She was going insane.

So she wasn’t really thinking properly when she raced down the stairs toward the car. Her legs just sort of took on a life of their own. And they didn’t want to stop as the car headed toward her.

Oh. Cupcakes.

The car slammed on its brakes and she could see Gray and Maeve staring at her through the windshield. She knew she’d likely gone pale. Her heart was racing, her stomach tied in knots.

Unicorn poop.

What did she think she was doing? Gray jumped out of the car and suddenly Jenner was there, grabbing hold of her, running his hands over her.

Oh. That was nice. The fear and shock was gradually replaced by pleasure at his touch.

Yes, there was something really wrong with her.

Jenner drew her against him, squeezing her tight.

God. He smelled so good. Why did he smell like chocolate and cinnamon?

Immy loved chocolate and cinnamon.

Then it all went downhill as he took hold of her shoulders and started yelling at her.

“Why did you do that?” he yelled, shaking her. “That was foolish, what the hell were you thinking, Immy! You could have been run over!”

“I-I’m so sorry.” Immy rubbed her hands together. If there was one thing that she hated, it was being yelled at. All of her childhood, her father would yell. He’d always tell her off for every little thing. After they’d left the cult, he’d grown calmer.

But still, the memory was there. And the damage was done. Immy could handle being scolded. But being yelled at threw her back into the past. She also hated upsetting people.

Especially Jenner.

“I didn’t mean to,” she explained. “My feet got away from me.”

There was a bit of a slope in the driveway and her feet sometimes just did what they wanted to do without her permission.

“She’s safe, Jenner,” Maeve said. “Stop yelling.”

“What?” Jenner replied. “I’m not yelling. Am I?” A look of guilt filled his face as he stared down at her. Then he quickly removed his hands from her shoulders.

Gray was growling at Maeve for moving around on her own, but Immy barely paid them any attention. Nope, she was too busy feeling dumb and stupid.

Then she saw Gray pick Maeve up. Okay, wow. That was so sweet and romantic.

“The doctor never said anything about me not walking,” Maeve grumbled at Gray.

If Jenner wanted to pick her up, she wouldn’t protest. If he just wanted to carry her around everywhere like a baby . . . yeah, she’d like that a lot.

“She said you’re to take it easy, though,” Gray countered.

“That doesn’t mean I can’t walk,” Maeve protested. “It means no running or exercising excessively. And trust me, if I’m running, we’ve got bigger problems than my health. It means the zombies have attacked or killer robots or enraged hamsters.”

“Enraged hamsters?” Gray asked.

“Those things are evil.”

Immy couldn’t believe that Maeve still thought that poor little hamsters were evil. They’d grown up with pure evil. Hamsters were just, well, furry rats. Weren’t they?

“Hamsters are not evil, Maeve,” Immy said.

“You saw that movie too,” Maeve told Immy. “I had nightmares for weeks about evil hamsters.”

“Movie?” Gray asked.

“Some cartoon movie,” Jenner explained. “Maeve has an overactive imagination.”

“Hey, take that back,” Maeve protested. “I remember you nearly peeing yourself when we watched that horror movie with that guy in the mask.”

“That’s different! He was going around hacking and stabbing people. And I was ten.”

“We snuck into a movie theater,” Maeve explained to Gray. “They were playing Halloween reruns back-to-back. We thought we were old enough to deal with it. We were not.”

“I don’t think we need to talk about that,” Immy said hastily. She didn’t want to think about that memory. It was the only time they’d dared sneak away from the cult. They’d only managed it because they’d snuck into the back of a truck that had been heading into town to get supplies for the Camp.

The return trek had been more difficult. They’d managed to jump onto the back of a flatbed truck for part of the way, then they’d walked the rest. She had ended up being piggybacked by the guys for most of it.

But her father had lost his mind when she’d returned home and snuck into her bedroom.

He’d been looking for her everywhere and when he couldn’t find her .

. . well, he’d figured that she’d somehow snuck away.

It was the only time she could remember him hitting her.

But he didn’t have to hit her to make an impact anyway.

Not when his yelling was enough to scare her into compliance.

“We could have picked you guys up, you know,” she said, trying to forget the memory of that day.

“Had my rental car,” Gray said.

“And you’re staying tonight?” Immy asked.

Please, please, stay tonight .

She missed Maeve like crazy and she just wanted her close after what happened to her. Honestly, Immy was scared for Maeve and while she probably couldn’t do anything to help protect her, she wanted to make sure she was all right.

Thankfully, Gray nodded before checking in with Maeve. “If that’s still what you want? We can stay at a hotel tonight if it’s too much.”

“I . . .”

Oh no. Maeve looked scared.

“Fuck,” Jenner said. “I hate that you might be too scared to come here, Maeve. This is your home. We’re going to have to sell the place.”

“Guys!” Maeve said.

Immy nodded, in total agreement. “I’ll start looking for new places. Isaiah and Sampson will want a say on security, but I think we need to look at tightening things up.”

“I’m almost thinking of moving further out of the city,” Jenner said.

“Guys! Guys! You can’t move because of me,” Maeve protested.

Immy turned to her. What was she talking about? Why couldn’t they move? Heck, it wasn’t like Immy particularly liked this place anyway.

And Maeve came first.

“Of course we can,” Jenner said, looking incredulous. “We’ll sell this place, buy a new one. Simple. We don’t even have to sell this one first.”

“Makes it easier.” Immy nodded.

“No, I mean, you shouldn’t sell your home just because . . . because I might find it, uh, hard to be here. I don’t feel that way about the house. It’s just the pool.”

Immy totally understood that. And it seemed Jenner did too.

“Good point,” Jenner said. “Make sure the new place doesn’t have a pool, Immy.”

“What’s going on?” Sampson asked, walking down the stairs and frowning at Gray.

“You can set me down,” Maeve told Gray.

“No. But we should get you in out of the sun.”

“Yes, yes, come in,” Immy said. Why were they all standing out here? She turned to Sampson. “We were just discussing moving to a house out of town with no swimming pool.”

Sampson nodded as they all walked into the house. “Good plan.”

“What? Sampson, it’s not a good plan,” Maeve protested. “You know what? I need to talk to Isaiah, he’s the only reasonable one of the lot of you.”

“Hopefully, he’s coming back tomorrow,” Sampson told her.

“So you have to stay until he comes back, right?” Immy said hopefully as they walked into the living room. “Sit. What can I get you? Coffee? Tea? Something stronger? Beer?”

“Coffee would be good,” Gray said. “Black. No sugar.”

“Right. A tough man’s drink. Got it,” Immy said with a firm nod.

Maeve giggled as he settled on the sofa with her on his lap. Immy knew how everyone else took their coffee.

When she had everything set out on a tray, she heaved it up and walked into the living room to hear Sampson questioning Gray about Maeve.

Uh-oh.

She couldn’t imagine that Gray was going to take that well.

“Oh good, I made it back in time for the inquisition,” Immy said cheerfully.

Jenner jumped up and took the tray from her, setting it on the coffee table, and she gave him a grateful look.

“So, have you asked Gray about his intentions? I mean, he already proposed.” She handed Gray his coffee and Maeve a glass of chocolate milk.

“That wasn’t a proper proposal,” Maeve told Immy. “He’s going to do better.”

“Apparently,” Gray said.

“Cookie?” Immy held out a plate of snickerdoodles.

“You’re spoiling her,” Jenner said to Immy.

“She just got out of the hospital, of course I am. Besides, I spoil you every day and you never complain.”

Jenner shrugged and took a snickerdoodle.

Maeve happily munched on the cookie and sipped her drink.

“Well? You haven’t answered my questions,” Sampson said.

“More like interrogation,” Immy muttered.

“Immy,” Sampson scolded.

“Sampson, Maeve is too sweet to say it so I will,” Immy said.

“Keep your big head out of her business. Clearly, she is into Gray and Gray is into her. We all know you’re just peeved because you couldn’t find anything about him and Isaiah has been too busy to look into him.

” Immy grinned at Gray. “You know we’re only nosy because we care, right? ”

“Is that so?” Gray drawled.

“We just want to make sure you can take care of her. Especially with this stalker,” Sampson said. “I need to know you can protect her.”

Maeve bit her lip worriedly. “You’re right. This guy is even more dangerous than I thought.” She peered up at Gray. “I don’t want you to get hurt. This guy is clearly deranged. What’s to stop him coming after you?”

“Believe me, Little girl. It is my sincerest wish that he come after me. Then I can rip out his intestines and string him up by them.”

“Kind of gross,” Immy said, although she did approve of his protectiveness. “Wouldn’t shooting him be enough?”

“No. I’m going to make sure he suffers for a long, long time before I put him out of his misery.”

Immy guessed that was fair enough. She grabbed a snickerdoodle and sat with her own cup of coffee.

Black. No sugar.

A tough man’s drink. Or tough woman’s drink.

Immy watched on dreamily as Gray and Maeve flirted with each other. This was just all too much.

“You go against any of my safety rules and you won’t sit for a week.”

“Whoa,” Immy whispered. “Anyone else finding this hot as heck?”

“Immy,” Jenner scolded. “We should give them privacy.”

Sampson’s phone ringing broke the spell. Darn it. Immy thought she could watch the two of them for hours.

“Isaiah! I’ve been trying to get hold of you all day!

Why weren’t you answering your phone?” Sampson demanded.

“Right. Got it. Did you listen to my messages? Yeah, we think it was Maeve’s stalker.

Don’t know who else would try to kill her.

No, yeah. She’s fine. She’s here. Really.

You can talk to her if you want. I’ll put you on speaker phone.

Abe’s all right. Just got a concussion. He’s sleeping. Yeah, we’re keeping an eye on him.”

Sampson placed the phone down on the coffee table.

“Maeve?” Isaiah asked urgently through the phone. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Maeve replied.

“What the hell happened? How did someone get past the security system to attack Abe and hurt Maeve?” Isaiah demanded.

“Looks like an inside job,” Sampson said grimly. “Andy is missing.”

Isaiah swore. Jenner attempted to put his hands over her ears, but she brushed them away. Honestly, she’d heard far more swear words than those ones. Although he did owe the swear jar a lot of money now.

“He hit Abe? You think he tried to drown Maeve?” Isaiah asked.

“Don’t know,” Sampson said with clear frustration.

“I don’t get why Andy would try to kill me,” Maeve said. “He can’t be my stalker, right? He was here when I was attacked?”

Gray growled.

“Who was that?” Isaiah asked.

“Maeve’s friend,” Sampson said.

“Maeve’s boyfriend,” Immy added.

“What?” Isaiah asked.

“He turned up just after someone drowned Maeve,” Jenner explained.

“He saved her,” Immy said with a sigh. “It’s all rather romantic.”

Everyone stared at her incredulously. But Immy wasn’t going to take it back. Gray rescuing Maeve was just like something out of a fairytale. Or a romance book.

Immy despaired of ever having that. She’d found her prince charming when she was eight.

Unfortunately, she’d always be just his little sister.