Page 26

Chapter Twenty-Five

MERRICK

We don’t waste a moment. Not a second. Throwing the keys to the valet attendant, we unfold from the car and head straight toward the elevator. If we weren’t staying in the penthouse suite, it would probably be faster to climb the staircase, but none of us want to be out of breath, either, considering we don’t know what we’re going to be walking into.

When the elevator bell dings and the door slides open, we walk as if we are simply one person. Together, we move through the doorway of the car and into the hall. Our suite door is closed.

Jerking my chin toward Boden, I watch as he takes his key card out of his pocket and moves toward the door. He’s first. The rest of us step to the side, drawing our guns, and are ready to do whatever we have to do.

But when Boden opens the door, we are all met with silence. And as we move into the living room, we are met with even more deafening silence. We’re alone. Panic fills my veins as I immediately think that Colette and Theron must have been taken or worse…

Boden, Grayson, and Vaughn start going through the other rooms to clear them, but I walk toward my own. Reaching for the handle, I start to push it down, but it’s locked. I relax, but only marginally.

Lifting my hand, I tap my knuckle against the door and call out to Theron. I hear a muffled cry and take a step backward, drawing my gun, ready to take out whoever the fuck is hurting Colette.

But when the door opens, I instantly drop my gun because there, standing side by side, are Theron and Colette. She’s got her hand covering her mouth and tears streaming down her cheeks before she rushes toward me.

Wrapping my arms around her, I hold her close to my body, my eyes focused on Theron. He shakes his head once, the pain from the past sitting just below the surface. We usually all stuff that shit down, but right now, it’s bubbled to the top, not just for him but for us all.

“What the fuck?” I rasp.

Theron grunts, brushing past me, but he stops when he reaches the shared living room. Slowly, he turns around in the room, doing a complete three-sixty before he faces me.

“Where the fuck is he?” Theron snaps.

“All the rooms are clear,” Grayson announces as he, followed by the others, makes his way into the shared living room again.

Theron’s eyes are wild as he looks around the room, down on the floor, up at the ceiling, and then his gaze meets mine.

“ Where the fuck is he ?” he hisses.

Clearing my throat, I open my mouth to tell him that I don’t know when Colette takes a step back from me, my arms falling to my side. She moves into the center of the room, just a foot or so away from Theron, and she points to a spot on the floor.

“I hit him over the head with a bottle right here. He was sprawled out on the floor. Where did he go?” Colette asks.

“You what?” I demand. I cannot fathom what she just said. Her eyes widen, and she waves her hand around. “He was going to kill Theron,” she snaps.

Swinging my attention over to Theron, I take him in for a moment. He is disheveled in a way that I don’t remember ever seeing him as an adult. Like the rest of us, he prides himself on control and on being put together at all times.

It’s who we are—men who have done anything and everything to stuff down the traumas of our lives. And it takes a tremendous amount of self-control to contain everything inside of us.

“I hit him over the head with a bottle. I thought he was out, at least for a while,” she says with a shrug of her shoulder.

Tilting my head to the side, I take her in for a long moment. She thought that he was out. She actually hit this monster over the head, this absolute piece of shit that would have killed her and not thought twice about it. This man who tortured me and my five best friends for years.

Maybe she’s not as soft, sweet, and quiet as I thought she was. I open my mouth to say just that when Vaughn bursts into laughter. His booming voice bounces off the walls around us, his eyes dancing as his roar dies down to a chuckle, and then he speaks.

“Goddamn, Colette. You’re a regular warrior princess. I had not a fucking clue that you were as crazy as Lucille,” he says before his gaze cuts to mine. “You guys and your crazy-ass women. How the fuck you found these two is beyond me, but I can’t deny that it’s a fun roller coaster of events to watch.”

Rolling my eyes to the ceiling, I think about telling him to fuck off, but I don’t, mainly because he’s right and because I want to know where that fucker is. If I know one thing about Malcolm, he isn’t going to just forget any of this happened.

COLETTE

I’m not sure how I feel about Vaughn’s statements. I know that I’m not a badass chick like he’s attempting to claim. I only hit Malcolm over the head because I couldn’t let anything happen to Theron. He has a wife he loves. I couldn’t imagine her losing him over me. I wasn’t about to let that happen.

But I’m not this strong woman who he’s saying I am. I was scared to death. I was ready to throw myself over the edge of the balcony instead of fighting. The only reason I didn’t was because of Theron.

I saw the look in his eyes when he was face to face with Malcolm. There is something bigger going on here, and I want to know what it is because all these men know him. I open my mouth to ask just that when Merrick’s gaze locks in on mine, and my words are stolen—my breath escapes.

Pressing my lips closed, I look at him, watch him, and wait for what is going to happen next. What does, I don’t expect. He stalks toward me. I can hear the other men talking, but I can’t make out their words, not anymore.

Everything just kind of fades away in the background.

Merrick reaches down, slides his arm beneath my knees, and picks me up. Wrapping my arms around his shoulders, I look into his face. But he’s staring straight ahead as he walks away from the men and toward the hall, where I know the main bedroom is located.

As soon as we are in the bedroom, he kicks the door closed behind him, but he doesn’t set me down on my feet. He moves toward the bed and slowly lowers me down but doesn’t straighten and stand next to me. Instead, he crawls onto the bed beside me.

I expect him to stay on top of me, but he doesn’t. He lies down on the pillow next to mine on his back and looks up at the ceiling.

“You were going to marry him,” he rasps.

“I never even had a conversation with him,” I whisper. “It wasn’t my choice.”

There is a long silence, and I think that maybe he wants me to get up and leave him alone or something, but he doesn’t. Instead, he rolls onto his side to face me. I feel his hand slide across my stomach, and then his fingers curl around my side before he tugs me over and closer to him.

Rolling onto my own side, I lift my hand and cup his cheek. I need to be close to him. I don’t know why, but I feel like this is going to be a momentous thing between us. There is something gigantic happening here, but I just don’t know what it is.

“Tell me, Merrick. Tell me what is happening,” I whisper, thinking out loud.

He sinks his teeth into his bottom lip and then closes his eyes slowly, almost as if it’s painful. “That man is a monster,” he whispers. “The things he did to us, the things he made us do. I never want to think about them again, let alone repeat them. He hurt us.”

The way Merrick says the word hurt , I know he feels it deep inside of his soul. Gently sliding my thumb along his eyelid, I let out a heavy sigh before I lean forward and touch my lips to the same place before I shift backward enough to see his gorgeous face.

“I’m here for you, Merrick. Tell me everything so I can help you.”

Merrick opens his eyes. Whatever vulnerability he’d shown me is now gone. “You can help me by staying alive, by doing what I say when and how I say it. Take no chances. And never get that close to Ravet again.”

Pressing my lips together, I roll them a few times, then try to think of how to respond to that. Especially since I almost didn’t stay alive today by my own hands.

I’m not sure if I would have been able to actually jump, but it was at the forefront of my mind, and I would have rather been dead than taken by Malcolm. I have a feeling that my gut was right on that, too, judging by Merrick’s reaction.

“I never want to see him again, Merrick. I don’t know what he wanted from me, but that man is evil.”

Merrick lifts his hand, tangling his fingers in the back of my hair before he tugs my head back. I can feel my neck stretch, but then his lips are on the center of my throat before his tongue snakes out, and he tastes me.

With a moan, my eyes slide closed, I know what’s coming— deliciousness .