Page 27 of They Will Burn

Kaos makes a noncommittal sound of agreement, and it doesn’t surprise me that he’s not asleep. His body is way too big for that armchair, and the few times I’ve looked up at him, his neck has been at an angle I’m not envious of.

This is the most complete our family has felt since Caleb died, and I lean into the feeling, knowing that when we leave this room, war will be at our doorstep.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CAMILLA

Consciousness creeps in slowly, my body is delightfully comfortable, but so hot I can barely breathe.

I force my tired eyes open and find my face is pressed against Bishop’s bare, tattooed chest. Kovu is still nestled between my legs, but he’s rolled onto his side and is holding my leg against him like he’s worried I’ll slip away if he’s not holding onto me. And Crew is pressed against my other side.

I glance up, and my eyes clash with Kaos’s, his face set in steel as he stares at the four of us on the bed.

I honestly didn’t know where we stood before he handed me over to Charles like I meant nothing to him, and now? Now that line seems even more blurred than ever.

“You awake, Little Menace?” Crew murmurs from where his face is nestled in my neck, and I turn to meet his mismatched eyes. It doesn’t seem to matter how much I look at them, they’re always just as startlingly beautiful.

“Yeah,” I whisper. I could probably sleep some more, seeing as I barely slept during the days I was away, too afraid that Charles or one of his men would visit me while I was sleeping. But despite how tired I am, I don’t want to spend the day in bed, not when I’m certain there will be repercussions for my escape last night. “What time is it?”

“Just after nine,” Kaos tells me.

Without warning, Kovu rolls onto his stomach and stares up at me, his wild blue eyes full of mischief. I’m about to ask what he’s up to when he kneels and plucks me from between the sheets before climbing off the edge and carrying me into the bathroom.

“If it wasn’t clear, I shotgun in showering with our precious little lamb.” He smirks as he slams the door behind us.

A giggle climbs up the back of my throat as I wrap my legs around his waist, holding onto him as he moves toward the shower.

“I missed seeing you wearing my clothes,” he admits as he reaches into the stall and turns the water on as hot as I like it, bringing a smile to my lips.

“I missed wearing your clothes,” I whisper. “Charles didn’t have much I would consider clothing available to me.”

His name on my lips makes Kovu tense, and I regret the words as soon as they fall from my mouth. At some point, I’m going to have to deal with the things that happened to me during the time I spent away from them, but for right now, I’m just relieved to be back in their arms.

Without another word, Kovu sets me on my feet long enough to pluck his shirt from my body and shove my panties down my legs before he has me back wrapped around him. He’s still kicking his boxers off when he steps us into the shower, and the warm spray washes over our bodies.

I trail my fingers over the scars on his chest, so many littering his skin that I could spend an entire day learning them and still not be able to memorize them all. I hate that he’s known such pain, that the unhinged man who has looked after me since the moment I arrived here has had to endure so much.

I press a kiss to a cigarette burn on his shoulder. And then to another a few inches away from the first, and all the while I feel his eyes on me.

My lips brush along a long scar that I hate to think about the origin of. When you’ve seen violence like I have, your imagination can fill in the gaps, and the idea of my unhinged psychopath going through those things makes my stomach churn.

I flick my gaze up to meet his, and I’m struck by the reverence in his gaze a moment before he presses my back against the cool tiles and his lips descend on mine with so much hunger I can barely breathe.

Kovu sinks his teeth into my bottom lip, and a soft mewl escapes my throat of its own accord. When it comes to these men, my mind and body are not one. Even when I know I shouldn’t want them, when I should be protecting myself, protecting my heart, I can’t help but fall harder for them. How can I not when they look at me the way Kovu is right now?

The taste of copper touches my tongue, and I flick my gaze up to meet Kovu’s. His wild blue eyes stare back at me with such reverence, and I can’t help but fall a little harder for the scarred man.

“I need you,” he murmurs against my lips. “But I can’t be gentle. If you let me fuck you, it will be hard, dirty, and rough.”

“Yes,” I breathe. “Please, Kovu. I need you.”

The words fall from my lips of their own accord, even though I shouldn’t want it. It’s my second time, and it will be with a different man than the first, while my first is just outside the door.

I can’t quite make sense of it, but I’m done with thinking. I’m done with always having to make the smart choice, the one that will benefit the family most. I’m done being the pawn in others’ games.

It’s time I take my place on the board as the queen.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

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