Page 3 of My Three Enemies

I blink my eyes rapidly trying to force away the stinging sensation. When I finally manage to see without a blurry blue dot in the way, I study the faces of the men around me.

The three of them must be brothers, because if they’re not related, then I don’t understand anything about the universe and I spent far too long locked in a room with books as my only friends for that to be the case.

All of them are very tall with broad shoulders, thick necks, and bodies that I can tell are well-toned.

They're arms strain against the fabric of their shirts.

Each of them have dark brown hair, though the cuts are slightly different.

The one by the door and the one by the window both have dark brown eyes that glimmer against the warm lighting of the bedroom.

The man standing beside me with my neck back in his hands has cool gray eyes that widen as they rake over my body.

“Why are you really here, Blondie?” the man by the window asks. His eyes fall from mine to my heaving chest as panic of being held by the neck rolls through me.

A smile forms the corner of his lips, and I see a glimmer of something in his eyes. He bites his lip before forcing a stoic expression back, struggling against the urges he is so clearly feeling. He looks like he would pounce on me if given the opportunity.

“Don't bother lying to us either,” the gray-eyed man behind me growls.

My heartbeat quickens as I feel his breath against me.

A shiver runs down my back but it’s not from fear.

It’s from something else. Something I never felt before.

Heat spreads through my belly and settles deep in my core.

I try to force my feelings down. It's not normal to feel this way being held captive, right?

“Look, I ran away from home, okay?” I glance between the other two, trying to ignore the gray-eyed man standing behind me. “Please, I can't go back there. You don't know what it's like.”

“Then tell us what it's like,” Gray-Eyes demands.

I take a deep breath and nervously bite my lower lip, as I try to work up the nerve to explain.

I've never had an opportunity to tell someone what was going on in my house.

I didn't go to school, and I didn't have any friends.

The only people I saw on a daily basis were my father and his guards, and they knew all too well what was happening.

The idea of telling someone is simultaneously freeing and terrifying.

“I was a captive. I wasn't allowed to do anything. I couldn't leave the house—I wasn't even allowed to leave my room most of the time. If I hadn't runaway I would have been in a bad situation, so I took the opportunity when I could.”

Stinging behind my eyes forces me to blink rapidly, fighting off the tears. These men can't see me break down, not while they already have the upper hand. Of course, I'm not telling them the whole truth. I just hope they don't know that.

“We can't trust her,” the man by the door says, shaking his with a determined look in his eyes. “Let's just kill her and get it over with.”

My eyes widen in terror, fear swirling in my gut like acid. I shake my head, looking between the other two men with a pleading expression on my face. “No! Please, I'll leave, and I won't tell anyone about this, I swear!”

“We can't just kill her,” the man by the window says, tossing a dirty look at the one by the door.

“Don’t be foolish,” Gray-Eyes says as he turns toward the man by the door. He finally lets go of my throat and I sink back against the bed, moving as far away from him as I can, pressing my back hard against the wooden headboard.

“Please, just let me go. I won't be any trouble to you, I promise,” I continue to plead.

“You can't leave. Not right now, anyway,” Gray-Eyes says, his voice absolute. He looks at friend and points to each of them as he introduces them. “My name is Gray, and these are my brothers Dax over there, and Jackson.”

Of course, the man with the most startlingly clear gray eyes that I've ever seen is named Gray.

Dax steps forward, nodding his head subtly toward me with that same feral look in his gaze he was giving me before.

Jackson, on the other hand, doesn't look pleased with me at all.

He glares at me, and I feel a nervous chill run through my body.

I jump when his fist crashes into the wall by the door, leaving a powdery hole in its wake.

Before either of his brothers can say anything, he storms out of the room. Gray and Dax exchange a glance with each other. It doesn't take long before Dax's eyes are back on me, while I look at him apprehensively.

“Go, I've got it from here,” Gray demands, nodding to the door.

Dax looks at me one last time before leaving, just as he was told.

“Why can't I leave?” I ask Gray now that we're alone. Even though minutes ago he was choking me… and licking my neck, somehow he seems like the most level-headed of the bunch.

“Because I don't know what to do with you yet. And I'm too tired to figure it out.” He backs away from the bed and stares at me with his arms crossed. “Right now all I know is you're filthy and you need to shower before I let you sleep in my bed again.”

I look down at my torn, dirty clothes and realize the state of the rest of me can't be any better. In the back of my mind, I'm well aware of the fact that I just escaped one prison and it seems like I’ve walked into another. Regardless, a shower sounds heavenly.

I stand up and look at him with a faint smile on my lips. “Thank you. And I really am sorry about coming in here uninvited. I didn't mean to cause any trouble.”

A grin forms on his lips that makes me think this isn't as simple as I initially thought. “Don't thank me yet, Blondie.”

Gray walks around the bed and grabs my arm, dragging me to the en suite bathroom. Both of us stand in the snug, tiled space as he reaches his hand in the standing shower and turns on the hot water. I wait for him to leave before I take off my clothes and climb in, but he doesn't budge.

“I really don't have all night.” Gray's eyes lock on mine and by the stoic look on his face, I know he's not kidding.

“You can't expect me to shower right in front of you,” I laugh incredulously.

“Undress.” He stares at me expectantly, folding his arms over each other while he waits. When I don't comply immediately, his eyes darken and he takes a step forward. “ Now .”

I have to look away from him while I unbutton my pants and lower them to the ground.

I can feel his eyes studying every inch of bare skin as I reveal it.

Next is my sweater and the tank top I have on underneath.

I don't want to take off my bra and panties, but I know that I have to.

Looking up at him with pleading eyes, I silently ask if I need to, and he nods.

After two days without changing and trekking through the woods in the rain, I'm relieved to be out of my clothes. I just wish the circumstances were different.

Gray's eyes roam over my body as I stand before him, completely naked.

He licks his lips and it's not lost on me that a bulge begins to form at the front of his pants.

Seeing that and feeling his eyes glued to my skin is more exciting than I would have imagined.

It feels wrong to feel that way, but I can't control it.

I let the water wash over my body and I try to ignore the fact that there's a stranger watching my every movement through the clear glass.

As the water heats up and I lather soap all over my body, I'm thankful for the steam of scaring me from him.

That is, until he opens the door and watches me without being obscured.

For a moment I thought he was watching because he was afraid I would escape, but after that I know that's far from the reality of it. He is watching me for his own pleasure.

I use the shampoo and conditioner already in the shower, which smells very like cedar and orange. When I turn around to rinse the shampoo from my hair, my eyes open to see Gray staring with his mouth hanging open.

When I'm finished, he grabs a fluffy white towel from the rack and holds it in front of him. I step out, shivering against the post-shower air and let him wrap it around me. His hands linger on the front of the towel as he closes it near my breasts.

I follow him out of the bedroom as he digs through a dresser drawer, tossing me a black t-shirt. I unfurl it and hold it against me, seeing that it’s about eight sizes too big.

“What about my clothes?” I ask, acutely aware of the fact that he did not throw me a pair of pants to go with it.

“Those filthy things? I'll take care of those later. They're not touching my sheets again.”

Gray takes his shirt off and tosses it to the side of the bed, revealing exactly what I expected. He looks like he was made out of stone, carved by some Italian Renaissance artist. His muscles flex as he leans down and pulls the comforter to the side.

“Get dressed, and get in bed,” he commands before walking to the other side and unbuttoning his jeans.

“Why do you want me to get in bed with you?” My voice shakes a lot more than I want it to.

“Because I've hardly slept in two days, and I'm not going to have you delay that any longer,” Gray says, a hint of annoyance in his voice.

“Look, we need to figure out what to do with you.

I can't do that unless I've had some rest. Now would you get your little butt in bed and go to sleep with me for a few hours?”

I lift the shirt over my head, hoping to slip it on before the towel falls to the ground, unsuccessfully. Gray gets one last look at my naked body as the towel pools around my ankles and I fit my arms through the sleeves of the oversized shirt.

He watches me with his eyebrows raised and a smirk on his lips as I climb into bed, pulling the covers to hide my bare legs from him.

I watch him nervously as he lowers his pants, revealing a pair of tight briefs that hug his waist. The bulge at the front of them makes me swallow and my body responds in a way that I do not appreciate.

“Go to sleep, Blondie.”

I lean back thinking I'm going to have a restless night next to this strange man. But when my head hits the pillow, my eyes begin to feel heavy and I drift off in no time.