Page 36 of Ruthless Desires, Vol. One (Ruthless Desires Series Extended Editions #1)

Rhett

Elliot flops onto the bed, still breathing hard. I sit in between him and Wren, leaning down to give him another kiss. This one is slower. Less rough. More meaningful.

Some of the bullets Tyler shot into the woods were terrifyingly close to us—more so than we’ll ever tell Oliver. Our job comes with risks, and we all know that, but normally we’re able to stay relatively safe.

We knew Tyler was an extra danger, and we decided it was a risk worth taking. But after the ordeal we put Oliver through, and my own fear of losing Ell in the moment, I’m not so sure.

We’re going to need to be extra careful, especially since we have Wren now.

“I love you,” Elliot murmurs against my lips.

“Mmm. I know.” I give him one last kiss before turning to Wren. She’s watching us raptly, her lips slightly parted. “Did you enjoy that, sweetheart?”

She nods, her eyes meeting mine slowly.

“Do you want more?”

That seems to bring her back to reality. She blinks. “Oh, I’d rather not. As long as—as long as that’s okay. I don’t think I’ll be able to get out of my head.”

I kiss her temple. “It’s always okay to say no to us, sweetheart.”

“Always,” Elliot murmurs, and Oliver nods in agreement.

The way she relaxes at our reassurance unnerves me. As long as that’s okay. Who made her think she couldn’t say no? That she had to ask fucking permission to not have sex?

I make a mental note to figure out whoever it is, find them, and gut them. Then, with a gentle kiss to Wren’s forehead, I turn back to Elliot. “Shower?”

He nods.

There’s a bathroom attached to all the bedrooms here—Finn made sure of it when he built this place. After Wren uses it to wash her hands, I pull Elliot into the shower.

I grab the soap, rubbing it all over his body, cleaning every inch of him. When he steps under the water, I do the same for myself.

The first time I tried to take care of Elliot after sex, he was confused, saying he didn’t need my help. Now he enjoys it, and I happen to know that me cleaning him up afterward is one of his favorite parts.

“One of us needs to stay with Oliver tonight,” he says eventually, quiet enough his voice doesn’t carry back into the bedroom. “It can’t be Wren. I’m not convinced he won’t break down again.”

I nod. If I thought I’d be much help, I’d volunteer. There are certain things I can do when Oliver has a panic attack—hold him, help him to breathe, stuff like that. But I also tend to freeze up in the moment. Elliot is much better at… emotions.

A lot of the time, I just make things worse.

“I’ve got it.” He squeezes my arm. “But Wren might not be in a much better state. She stayed calm for as long as she needed to, and we gave her a good distraction, but that’s all coming to an end real damn fast.”

I swallow hard. “I can handle it.”

Elliot doesn’t acknowledge the lack of confidence in my voice. Instead, he nods and shuts off the water, and we dry off and get dressed.

In the bedroom, Oliver is already under the blankets, sound asleep. Wren sits next to him, stroking his hair. I don’t miss the slight shake in her hand.

“Hey, love. I’m gonna stay with Oliver tonight.”

Wren jumps, as if she was so lost in thought that she didn’t notice us walk in. “Oh. Hi. Yeah, okay.” With one last kiss on Oliver’s forehead, she climbs off the bed. “Will he be all right? He was so scared.” She blinks rapidly, and then she sniffles.

“He will. C’mere, love.”

She practically melts into Elliot, still trying to hold back tears. I’m not sure what all went down earlier, but it’d be a lot for anyone. She went from going to dinner with her family to almost getting killed in the span of a few hours.

“I’ll be okay,” she says, and her voice is stronger and more determined than I expected.

When Elliot lets her go with a chaste kiss, she smiles up at him. Then she turns to me, a questioning hesitancy reflecting in her eyes.

That’s when I realize I’ve tensed up.

Aside from the phone call earlier and me telling her what to do to Elliot, we haven’t talked since I dropped off those pain meds for her yesterday morning.

One second, I was fine, and the next, everything felt like it was moving too fast. The way Wren looked at me after I handed her the pills was too caring, too intimate. My skin felt like it was on fire, and it took everything in me not to bolt out of there.

Now, I look between Elliot and Wren, working my jaw. This is not the time to freeze up. Underneath his collected exterior, Elliot is exhausted. I can’t dump Wren’s reaction to tonight on him. He needs to rest.

“Come with me,” I say as gently as I can. Then I turn and walk out of the room and down the hallway.

The kitchen is dark, so I flip a light on. My guess is Wren is hungry, considering she puked up most of her dinner.

Was I worried about her all night? Yes. Ever since I laid eyes on her in the restaurant and saw that deer in the headlights look on her face, I’ve been nothing but consumed with worry.

But how do I tell her that? How do I tell her that she means much more to me than she should? And how do I say that she’s handling this shitshow like a champ?

“Are you hungry?”

She grimaces, wrapping her arms around her waist. “No. But I should probably eat.”

“How about something light?”

She nods, watching me cautiously.

Just tell her how you feel. Say something. Anything.

But I don’t. I turn, rummaging through the cabinets, until I find some canned soup. When I hold it up, she nods.

I dump the soup into a pan and light the stove.

The silence between us is so uncomfortable, it’s making my skin crawl. Which is exactly what I was trying to avoid.

Hearing her yell at Adam earlier sent a spike of fear through me. I was so afraid he was hurting her, or worse. And it caused me literal pain to not immediately rush to her side.

I trust Oliver—of course I trust Oliver. But it didn’t stop me from worrying. And now, knowing how close Tyler got to her… Things could’ve gone so differently tonight. For all of us.

Fuck. I have to do something.

I spin around to look at her, and she’s standing exactly how she was a minute ago, frozen, still hugging herself. She looks so small, so scared, so overwhelmed.

What would’ve happened if we hadn’t been there to intervene when Adam came after her? What would’ve happened if she hadn’t been in the hunter’s stand with Oliver? Or if she hadn’t been watching the ladder?

Stop. Stop with the what ifs. She’s safe. Everyone is safe.

I step toward her.

Fuck this.

“Rhett—”

Before she can get another word out, I take her face in my hands, tilting her head upward, and press a kiss to her forehead. “You have no idea how fucking worried I was about you.”

She throws her arms around me and buries her head in my chest. Like this, with her completely enveloped in me, she feels so small. I suppose, in comparison to me, she is.

She doesn’t say anything. Just breathes me in, her body quivering as she tries to collect herself.

“Tell me what you need, Wren. Tell me what you need and I’ll give it to you. Anything.”

“I don’t know.” She clutches my shirt in her hands and looks up at me with watery eyes. “So much happened. I—you—I’ve never seen someone die like that before. There was blood everywhere. And it was so dark, and Oliver was so upset, and I didn’t know where to go. I was so scared, Rhett.”

I tighten my embrace. “I know. I know you were scared. But you kept it together. You got here, and you’re safe now.”

She sobs. “I’m sorry. I’m trying not to cry, but—”

“Hey.” I smooth her hair back from her face. “It’s okay to fall apart now.”

“I don’t want to—to make you uncomfortable.”

“Let me worry about that, sweetheart. Tonight was a normal night for me. But for you? Hell, Wren, you’ve been through something a lot of people never have to experience in their lifetime. It’s okay if you’re struggling.”

She squeezes her eyes shut, and tears fall onto her cheeks. Tenderly, I brush them away before turning off the stove and pouring the steaming soup into a bowl. Then I lift her and set her on the counter so she’s closer to my eye level.

“It felt like someone was watching me,” she whispers. “Like we were going to get lost in the darkness and never find our way out again.”

“And now?” I wipe under her eyes, where her mascara has smudged. “How do you feel now, sweetheart?”

She pauses for a second, and I search her eyes as she blinks up at me. “I feel… safe. Right now. But what about the future? Is it always this scary? Am I going to constantly be worrying about you guys? What if one of you gets hurt? Or dies?”

“We’re always careful. This was a little more of a risk, but—”

“But what if something does happen, Rhett? What if I get mixed up in another job, but this time things don’t work out?”

“We’ll do whatever is necessary to keep you safe. That’s what we do for each other, and that’s what we’ll do for you.”

She shakes her head, and I watch as she struggles with the panic that’s fighting to take over. “What if—what if you can’t find me? Or what if you’re too late? What if I get lost again, but this time I can’t find my way back? What if I forget who I am again?”

I’m not sure what she means, but it doesn’t sound like she’s talking about what happened tonight anymore. She’s catastrophizing, and I don’t know how to stop her.

There’s only one thing I can think to say.

“Wren.” I lean my forehead against hers. “I don’t think you understand that if, somehow, we lost you, we’d burn the whole world to the fucking ground to find you again.”

“Because that’s what you’d do for each other?”

“Yes. And you’re a part of us now. We take care of what’s ours.”

She slumps against me, and I pull my arms tighter around her. It’s a lot for anyone to take in, and honestly, she’s doing well.

For a while, we stay like this. There are no sobs or cries, but I can feel her tears silently soaking my shirt. My hand moves up and down her back in what I hope is a soothing motion, praying desperately that this is what she needs.

Eventually, she murmurs, “I think I’ll be okay.”

“Your soup is probably cool enough to eat.”

As she slips off the counter, I find her a spoon.

“Are you tired, sweetheart?”

She nods. Then she leans over the bowl of soup, blowing on it. “Are you?”

“Yeah. But I won’t be able to sleep.”

With a frown, she stares at her soup. “Do you know why you have insomnia?”

The muscles in my back tense up. “It’s a long story.”

She glances at the butterfly tattoo on the back of my hand. For a second, it looks like she’s going to ask me a question, but then she turns back to her food.

I know Elliot told her about Sammy. She has questions, I’m sure. And we’ll tell her eventually—we have to, considering half of our time is spent getting revenge on the man who killed her. But it’s too intensive of a topic for tonight.

Once Wren is done with her soup, I take her hand. “There’s another bedroom at the end of the—”

“No.”

“What?”

Her hand tightens around mine. “Can I stay with you? I know you’re not sleeping. But I don’t want to be alone. Please?”

Right. Of course she doesn’t want to be alone. Why didn’t I think of that? “Sure. Let me get you a pillow and some blankets.”

As I head toward one of the bedrooms, I peek in on Elliot and Oliver. O is still sound asleep, with Elliot holding him from behind. Safe. Peaceful.

When I come back into the living area, Wren is sitting on the couch with her chin propped on her knees, her arms wrapped around her legs. She’s so far gone to the world that she jumps when I drape a blanket around her shoulders.

“You can sleep here. I’ll stay with you until you fall asleep. If I leave the room, I won’t go far. I promise.”

She hugs the pillow I hand to her. “Thank you, Rhett.”

Kneeling next to the couch, I take her hands in mine, pressing my lips to her fingertips. I’d hold her while she falls asleep, but I don’t want to disturb her when I inevitably get up at some point. And I don’t know how much more touching I can handle tonight. “I’m proud of how well you handled everything today, sweetheart.”

“Rhett,” she whispers.

“Hmm?”

“Kiss me.”

Cupping her face, I capture her mouth with mine. She grabs my arms to hold me close to her, matching the desperation that bleeds into every one of my movements.

I know I’m not everything you need. But I’ll never stop working to be. I don’t want to lose you.

When I break off the kiss, she gasps in a breath.

“Wren,” I murmur, barely opening my eyes to take in the sleepy, content look on her face. And then my mouth is on hers again, and I’m wondering if, with this kiss, I can communicate all the words I can’t seem to force out of my mouth.

Her little sighs warm my heart, soothing the ache in my chest that appears whenever I think of Sammy. This time, she moves away first, her fingers tracing lines over my face. When she yawns, I push her down onto the couch.

“How are your cramps? Do you need pain meds? Or water?”

After I realized on Monday how little I know about periods, I spent the better part of the day reading every article on them that I could get my hands on. Drinking enough water seems to be pretty important.

“I should probably have some water, yeah.”

I grab her a glass, and after she takes a couple sips, I set it on the coffee table. “Sleep, Wren. I’ll be here if you wake up.”

With a moan, she pulls the blankets over her body, wiggling deep into the cushions. “You promise?”

“There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”