“Eloden will lock the vehicle for you,” Kheelan suggested letting go of my shirt, but grabbing back his hold of my hand. Had I said his touch was gentler earlier? Big mistake. He had a grasp with the force of a bulldog’s bite.
Eloden came right up to me and leaned over, reaching down to fish for my keys where I had shoved them in the right, back-pocket of my jeans. I looked up at his mischievous face and gave it my best glare, knowing he was copping a feel.
“Not as much fun as where you hid the keys last time,” Eloden teased, reaching over with his other hand to slip into my left back pocket and fully cup my ass. Now, it was harassment. He squeezed. The look he gave me, pupils dilating as he leaned closer and focused on my lips like he was thinking about how to make me come apart by kissing me? Orgasmic.
I responded, body softening as some of the fight left with my fear. I’m as attracted to hot guys as the next heterosexual woman but I had never had all that sexiness directed at me, doing everything I could to avoid attention most of the time. Lust was a starved beast and it had hands wrapped around me and the most intriguing dimples as Eloden closed the inches between our faces. If I breathed out he would inhale from our almost touching lips.
Nobody did anything to stop him. They were all as captivated as me by the sexual tension, even Falin, who I was edging into a bisexual category. He definitely liked girls, too, growling again, but this time it was more like a purr of satisfaction.
My big girl panties? They were wet in an instant.
The car door slammed shut, startling me and Eloden. We bumped heads.
“Fudge,” I said, making an effort after Jackson’s teasing.
“The rest of us are waiting, so either kiss or let’s get inside.”
The deep voice needed no introduction. Dain was here. Cold reality iced my libido.
I peered behind me, still held by Eloden’s hands in my back pockets and Kheelan’s steel grip on my hand. Dain must have snuck around the car from the other side and behind us because there was no way I would have missed his hulking body otherwise.
The twilight did him more justice than the darkness on Friday. His molten gold eyes reflected the dying light like a hawk turning into the sunset. I felt pinned by his stare, helpless prey that knew I couldn’t run fast enough to escape his dive. He was wearing more leather than the rest of them combined, the details apparent that were hidden on Friday in the dark and by my panicked assessment. He looked dressed for battle so perhaps it was better I hadn’t gotten a better look earlier.
The breastplate buckled onto him was well worn, faded creases and softened areas from hard use by the shoulders, with nicks on the moulded chest armour. That must have been why his chest felt like rock. The leather pants could have seemed ridiculous on anyone less imposing, but his big body stretched the leather in all the right ways, bulges hinting at power and virility he barely had confined.
Dain was wicked hot. My libido wasn’t cool enough yet.
I squeezed Kheelan’s hand back harder than he held me, challenging him for bulldog grip, only this time, I didn't want him to let me go.
“She asked for you,” Eloden said.
I swung my gaze to that bastard traitor.
“Get your hands off my butt or I’m going to knee you in the nuts like I did him,” I told Eloden. “Do you both like bad girls to punish you?”
I got mouthy when I was scared. Okay, mouthier.
Eloden dragged me right up against him and a rather impressive bulge of his own tenting his pants.
“It hurts less if you’re already hard for it, love,” he whispered in my ear.
Either he meant yes, he wanted me to hurt him, or my efforts would be wasted because his dick was already hard. I felt it was probably the latter as he didn’t strike me as particularly masochistic, unlike Falin, which the jury was out for most of his preferences.
“I’ll make it hurt,” I darkly promised Eloden.
“Bring her,” Dain ordered, walking past us and brushing hips with mine. He didn’t spare me a glance.
“Bottoms up,” Eloden warned me before he put me over his shoulder.
Well, this was familiar. “My brother is coming,” I reminded them all from my new upside-down position. I rather doubt Jackson would accept a trumped-up excuse this time for seeing me with my stalkers.
“It’s not the cute one,” Falin informed Dain.
“He’s a boy, it won’t be a problem,” came Aeric’s voice to the left.
At least they were all speaking English for my benefit this time. Eloden had been right, it did make me feel more at ease, although being kidnapped was still worrisome. I should feel scared and Eloden’s hold was not a familiar comfort. They were all strangers. Weird strangers.
I wiggled in Eloden’s grip to test it and so I could get a better look at Aeric. I hadn’t gotten that much of an impression from him yet. Kheelan had stood out more. Aeric shared his brother’s stick-straight, blonde hair, but his hair was longer and fell perfectly around his face in a cut that you expected on an ivy-league, graduate photograph.
Actually, a picture would have more life, Aeric’s facade as emotionless as Kheelan’s, although it lacked some of the hardness life carved out of his older brother’s cheekbones. Aeric was one of the tallest of the group but also close to the leanest. Only Orin’s ethereal looks from Friday’s memories were slimmer. Aeric didn’t even have the twins’ football bulk in his shoulders to make him look older than his smooth, slender body appeared. I doubted he had more than a year or two over them if any.
“Takes one, to know one,” I muttered, thinking he was the harmless boy he accused my brothers of being from the superiority of a year or two differences in age.
It had sounded better in my head. Thankfully, I was still being carried and didn’t have to meet anyone’s eyes. I was not explaining myself. It would take the sting out of the insult. I had meant to poke the weakest looking link in their gang to see if I could break free. Tempers and touchy personalities were meant to be exploited.
“I am not a boy, little girl,” Aeric said, getting my intended slight without explanation. Probably not the first time someone used it to prick his temper. At least, his emotionless facade had dropped. I knew it had been an act.
Next, he was going to tell me how he could prove his manhood. It would likely involve either fucking, beer or fighting. Hopefully, he was beyond the age of potty jokes.
“Is Kheelan your brother?” I asked before Aeric could say anything.
Falin held the outside door to my apartment open for everyone to walk in.
“Yes, was it not obvious?” Aeric answered. He muttered something, I couldn’t make it out.
No matter, I knew exactly what buttons to push between brothers after tormenting my own for so long.
“Who’s older?” I asked.
A hand smacked my ass. It was a lot harder than the time Eloden did it. I swore.
“Sorry,” Kheelan said. “I was looking for the door keys.”
He found my phone. Eloden handed him my keys.
“Give me those back,” I demanded. “Put me down,” I added, pounding on Eloden’s back. Fuck pretending nonchalance. These guys almost had me to my door. The irony that they were kidnapping me to my own home was not lost on me.
Eloden put me down. Kheelan kept my things.
Falin closed the door on any chance of escape, stepping up close behind me.
“Back off,” I told Falin. A little of my fear trembled that order.
“There are a lot of stairs. I could carry you,” Falin offered.
“It’s okay, Sweetheart,” Eloden softly added from somewhere ahead. I couldn’t see him, only the pierced features of Falin that did nothing to reassure me. They had to work on their disguises if harmless and nice was their aim.
“My apartment smells. Feel free to wait down here,” I told Falin, walking right through the door that Kheelan had opened and up the first set of stairs. They were narrow and I was fast.
; I could hear them all marching up the stairs behind me. Clomping, big feet making it sound like I had an army following me. The neighbours would complain, especially the cranky, old lady on the first floor. She said she could hear my shower start in the morning, and it woke her up. The superintendent had advised me to shower at night.
I had closed the door in his face and taped a pair of earplugs to her door the next day.
“You’re wasting your time,” I told them on the second set of stairs. I was still in front. “I’m not letting anyone in my apartment.”
Dain reached over my shoulder at the landing and opened the door to the short hallway. “Get in,” he brusquely told me.
This was happening. I stood frozen with indecision. These strangers already knew where I lived and how to track me. Eloden had saved my life and implicated that he was guarding me. From what, I didn’t know because his late arrival to my near mugging hinted the Changs’ neighbourly gangster wasn’t the real danger. Eloden hadn’t anticipated that attack. There still could be something else lurking and waiting to spring on me.
If I wanted answers, then now was the opportunity. My ‘sweet to me but ass-kicking to everyone else’ brother was on his way, so I had to choose. Let fate in my door and figure out the threat or bury my head in the sand and hope it all went away?
I pulled my hoodie up for extra protection and walked through the door. My apartment was the only one up here, part of a small triplex. I waited in the hallway while the rest of them squeezed in to stand beside me. Kheelan still had my keys and phone.
“Take the tracker off my keys,” I said.
“After we’re all inside, we can discuss the charming addition to your keyring,” Kheelan offered.
“Give,” I demanded. This was not a settlement. We were not compromising. They had no idea how difficult this whole thing was for me.
My ringtone sounded. Kheelan looked startled, almost dropping my phone when the glowing screen showed Matthew’s face. He handed it back to me with a gloved hand.
Okay, that was weird. I remembered Dain mentioning gloves on Friday. Maybe the brothers had some kind of contact allergy to metal?
“What?” I answered the phone, somewhat grateful for the delay.
“Bring me back a coffee when you guys come,” Matthew asked.
The twins didn’t like to call each other when they knew the other one was driving. Jackson had gotten into a minor fender-bender last year while distracted.
“Not Starbucks,” I said, listing off another cheaper option on the way. I was down to chump change in my wallet and I wasn’t going to embarrass myself by begging Jackson to pay when I had been the one asked.
“Just make it black,” Matthew said. “You know Mom’s going to make us all eat cinnamon buns until we pop. I need something to cut the sugar.”
“When will Jack be here?”
“He left a couple of minutes ago. He had to wait for Dad to get home to take the jeep. Mom’s van got a flat.”
The rescue was delayed. It was too late to take back my offer to let the guys waiting outside my door in. I hung up the phone without saying goodbye. Matthew knew me.
“Don’t touch anything,” I said. Nothing bad would happen. Jackson drove fast and I had an old, cranky neighbour for an alarm on the first floor to call the cavalry if things got out of hand. My superintendent was more like the past-his-prime rink rent-a-cop than intimidating back-up, but he had the keys to my place and could get the door open.
Remembering keys, I grabbed mine back from Kheelan’s gloved hands and unlocked the door. Orin was the first one in. I hadn’t even seen him standing there, lost amongst the crowd of freaks. That was probably a first for pretty boy to go unnoticed.
“Are you inviting us in?”
It was so tempting to tell Dain everyone but him.
“You have five minutes,” I said. “Waste them standing outside if you want.”
I shrugged and walked in, letting the door close behind me, but somebody caught it.
“Is that a rodent?” Aeric asked.
I looked over at my rat in her cage, Lady Antebellum. She had been a rescue from the lab next to ours when their funding got pulled for a project and they no longer needed their female rats. She was running on her giant wheel.
“It’s a pet,” I said.
“It’s one rat away from an infestation,” Aeric muttered.
Oh, goodie. We were still prickly. I hadn’t wanted to fake being nice for five minutes. Interrogations weren’t supposed to be done over milk and cookies.
“I already have one infestation to deal with right now,” I sweetly told Aeric. “Let me go find the poison.”
The door closed shut as the last of them entered my apartment. Just like when they had surrounded my car, I felt like my tiny apartment shrank around their large bodies. I tugged the hoodie further over my forehead. Too bad I couldn’t crawl inside it. Head in the sand was looking better by the second.
“Before the witch brews something to kill all of us, I suggest Dain explains things,” Kheelan said. He looked older than most of the others except for Dain, so the leadership role wasn’t surprising. What raised my eyebrows was when everyone followed his suggestion without bickering and waited for Dain. It seemed not everything had to be a disagreement.
Cohesion wasn’t my friend. I needed to divide and conquer. I just had to wait for the first foray.
Aeric walked further into my kitchen past the table and grabbed the kitty mug from my dish drying rack. He used his gloved hands to turn on the tap, muttering something I’m sure wasn’t nice. He hadn’t taken off his shoes.
“There’s bottled water in the fridge if you don’t like it from the tap,” I muttered back, slightly louder. Who knew how serious their metal allergy could be?
“Let’s go,” Dain said, sneaking up behind me. It was impressive for a guy his size.
This was a one-room apartment. Unless he wanted me to accompany him to the washroom, there was only one room left.
“Whatever you have to say, you can say in front of your friends,” I told him, crossing my arms so he couldn’t try holding my hand. I could still feel Kheelan’s cool touch. My rejoinder hadn’t been much but it set a boundary these guys better learn to respect. Dain was the same as the rest of them in my eyes. Strangers didn’t touch or drag me into an empty room with questionable purpose.
“We’ll take a seat,” Dain suggested, except he said it more like a command.
I walked over to the kitchen table with everyone else. There were only four chairs and now they were occupied.
Dain picked me up, crossed arms and all like Eloden had, and plopped my butt down on top of the table, then he crowded me, forcing himself against my legs so I had no room to manoeuvre or kick him. I had thought about it.
“I don’t like being manhandled, Dain,” I told him, meeting those golden eyes.
Aeric, Kheelan, Orin and Eloden had taken seats. Falin hopped onto the table to sit beside me, making the wooden legs of my Ikea knockoff complain.
“Do you want me to hold her down?” Falin offered, not listening to me.
I could have had a panic attack again right there. You might think I was prone to them, an anxious ball of quivering fear all the time between what happened Friday night and at the Changs. I never panicked on the outside. I raged against the unfairness of life.
“That’s fucking it,” I screamed as I tensed in preparation for Falin to try to put his hands on me. I had warned them. “I’m so tired of your posturing, pseudo-threatening bullshit.”
I whipped my upper body around like I was possessed and wrapped my hands around Falin’s neck, choking him with anger. I had never seen red before as I did with him. Maybe it was a delayed reaction to my anger at the gangster’s hold over the Changs, Ai Lung’s eyes rolling with fear and Ms. Chang wringing her hands. All I knew was I felt rage and there was a convenient target right beside me.
Dain stepped back to free my legs. I had probably shocked him as
well. I flipped the rest of the way around, onto my knees and straddling Falin’s thighs. I pushed him down, riding his body until I was just inches in front of his face, muscles quivering in anger instead of fear as I held myself over him.
“You don’t even have weapons to cosplay with, Mr. Tough Guy,” I yelled at him. “Just what are you going to do to me?” I asked. “The half pound of metal piercing your face couldn’t even make a decent dagger if you melted it all down,” I said.
I had stopped choking him, it was just a firm hold now. Although Dain had taken a couple of steps back to give us space, none of the other guys had moved and they had front row seats to my fit of fury. That’s right boys, this bunny has claws.
“Eve, we would never hurt you,” Eloden said.
Falin smirked up at me.
I had totally lost control. It’s the only way to explain why I went ahead and did the one crazy thing that had crossed my mind on Friday to Falin, bending down to press my mouth to his and catching his lip ring against my teeth to give it a punishing tug.
I wasn’t gentle but stopped short enough to prevent any real damage.
“Stop playing with her,” Dain told Falin, sounding frustrated. “We have a time limit with her brother coming, remember?”
I released Falin’s piercing. I think he groaned, but I’m not sure because he grabbed me by one hand on my wrists and the other at my butt to flip our positions.
The table may have cracked.
This time everyone shot up out of their chairs.
“Falin!” Dain snapped.
He ignored Dain and bent down until we were nose-to-nose. “I don’t need weapons,” he whispered to me. He straightened up and took a pretend bite of air with a threatening snap of his strong teeth. Had his teeth somehow gotten sharper between the parking lot and my apartment?
Oh, Grandma, what a bite you have.
Dain hauled Falin off of me so he was standing and I was left lying prone on the table with all of the guys staring down at me.
This was when my buzzer rang.
Matthew had such a shitty sense of time. If Jackson was already here, then he had left a lot sooner than Matthew had told me. Thank god, Jackson appreciates efficiency more than Matthew.
No Faerie Tale Love (Faerie Series Book 1) Page 8
