Page 8 of My Three Enemies

My head is throbbing when my eyes slowly open. I'm acutely aware of the brawny arms wrapped around me, slowly petting my hair. It's relaxing, and I want to close my eyes and sink back into the warmth of whoever it is.

“How are you feeling?” Gray asks, easing away to let me sit up on my own. I notice Jackson sitting on the other side of the bed with an ice bag in his hand. He gingerly brings it to my temple and I wince at the chill, but he keeps it pressed against me.

“My head hurts. W–What happened?”

Dax enters the room with a bottle of aspirin and hands me two of them, then a glass of water that’d been sitting on the bedside table.

I eagerly take the aspirin and guzzle water, trying to think more about what happened.

I remember being in bed, and grabbing the knife from the kitchen, then running through the woods before seeing?—

“Bears! There are bears in the woods!” I shout, jumping to my feet and feeling my heartbeat quicken.

“You don't have to worry about that,” Dax says, coming over to me and putting a hand on my shoulder.

My eyes dart wildly between the three of them, and I shake my head and disbelief. “They were huge! When I went out they were chasing me and the?—”

“Calm down,” Gray says, keeping his voice low.

“You don't understand, they were giant ! And they were aggressive on top of that,” I ramble, making myself panic.

“Enough!” Jackson shouts, standing up and dropping the ice pack on the ground. “ Just shut the hell up about it!” We've already said you don't have to worry about them.

I freeze, my mouth hanging open as I stare at him, immediately shrinking myself down.

As if the idea of three monster bears in the woods wasn’t bad enough, now my hands are shaking so hard, I can’t stop it.

Jackson takes a deep breath and gives me an apologetic glance.

His lips part as if he means to say something, but he stops.

Dax leads me back to the bed and sits me down, kneeling in front of me. “Emma, we need you to be honest with us. Is anyone looking for you? Because when we went out there, we found three men with guns, and they didn’t look like hunters.”

My heart sinks and I double over to clutch my head in my hands. I knew this would happen. I was a fool to be hopeful.

“I'm sorry,” I whisper through dry sobs as I try to collect myself.

I need to tell them the truth. Not only so they can protect themselves, but because I trust them.

They saw the men with the guns and they didn't ask them why they were here.

If they did, they're not telling me. But they know those men were looking for me… and they didn't give me up.

“I ran away from my father,” I croak out. “He's a monster. He kept me locked away in my room and isolated my entire life. He's a dangerous man, and he'll be looking for me. He has connections with the mafia and he treats me like I'm some prize to be won by the people he does business with.”

The three of them exchange glances, and then Gray rests his hand on my knee and looks at me tenderly. “What's his name, Emma?”

“Marcus Costa.”

All of their eyes widen as they stare at me with their mouths agape. I expected all of them to recognize the name. Costa Lumber is a national brand with lumber mills in nearly every state.

Jackson gets up and paces back and forth angrily while Gray and Dax remain calm.

“What's wrong?” I ask nervously.

“Your father has been hunting our family for decades,” Dax says, his voice flat, the expression on his face unreadable.

“He and our father had a feud over land that your father wanted to develop for his business. Marcus Costa wanted to buy land from these woods for decades, and our family is the only thing keeping him from that.”

“He killed our father to try to get his hands on it, and he wants us dead too,” Gray says, his voice as flat as Dax’s.

All three of them are standing now, any softness in their demeanor gone. I can see the three of them building walls and blocking me out. My heart aches knowing my father caused them pain, and for some reason, I feel responsible.

“This can't be a coincidence,” Jackson says, pausing to narrow his eyes at me. “This has to be some kind of a setup!”

“We don't know that,” Gray tells him, trying to calm Jackson down. “They have no way of knowing what she is to us.”

“What?” I ask, not understanding what they mean.

What I am to them?

They don't answer me. Instead, they each give me a lingering look before making their way out of the room. I rise to follow them, but they shut the door and when I grab the knob, I realize I'm locked in.

My heart stills in my chest as I rattle the lock, my entire body shaking from fear.

I really am in yet another prison.

Eventually I give up and go back to the bed, grabbing a pillow and holding it against me while I sob into it.