The man doesn’t stand a chance, swallowing as she practically bats her lashes at him.
He rubs the back of his neck and I can see he’s already going to agree by the pained look on his face. “I suppose as long as one of us is with you—” He doesn’t get to finish as she launches herself at him with a delighted squeal, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him in for a quick kiss. Lucky bastard.
“Thank you!” she enthuses, releasing him, and the poor guy looks shell-shocked. “I’ll need to order some craft bits, paper, scissors…oh, and glitter! Everything’s better with glitter, don’t you think?”
“Uh, sure…” he agrees, completely blinded by her, not that I can blame him. He reaches into the back pocket of his jeans, pulling out his phone. “Order what you need, Peaches.”
She takes it, fucking beaming up at him and a flare of jealousy hits me in the chest. I want her to look at me like that, and I bet she did the same when Rowan gave her permission to order all the stuff that was delivered.
“I can take you down to the centre tomorrow to have a look and see which room would work best if you like?” I say, her head snapping up from Hunt’s phone to stare at me, her jaw slack.
“You mean I can leave the flat?” she asks, and my stomach tightens as I struggle to maintain eye contact.
“You’re not a prisoner, it’s just not safe out there for you, Peaches,” Hunt says softly, a frown on his face as his gaze slides away from her. Clearly, he’s feeling a tad guilty too.
“But I can leave tomorrow? With Roman?” she asks while looking back up at him, not addressing her status here, which makes me feel even more shitty. Does she think we’d keep her here against her will unless it was absolutely necessary?
He reaches out and smoothes some hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ear. “Of course, as long as you stay on theestate and have one of us with you, you’re free to leave the flat anytime.”
“Thank you, Hunt.” Her tone is soft as she goes on tiptoes and presses a swift kiss to his mouth. “How long until we eat?”
“About half an hour, I made enchiladas,” he tells her, and my dick hardens even more as she licks her plush lips.
“Yum. I love Mexican food, and the culture is amazing too. When Dad and I went there a couple of years ago, the sheer amount of colour and pattern was like a feast for the eyes wherever you looked.”
I’m reminded of how different our pasts are. How she grew up in the lap of luxury, visiting far-off lands and experiencing all the beauty that the world has to offer. We couldn’t be more different, our world countless shades of grey and black, filled with cries that we soon learned went unanswered.
And yet, we all ended up here regardless, in a flat in one of the biggest estates in London. It’s almost like waking up one day to find an exotic bird has flown in your window. It’s so beautiful, so full of life and colour that it makes everything seem brighter somehow.
But you know what they say about trapping something that was never meant to be caged. It’ll either turn on you, tearing your throat out while you sleep, or you’ll slowly kill it until it no longer shines but is a shadow of what it used to be.
We may think that a bird in a cage sings, but what if it’s just crying, its pleas falling on deaf ears?
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“ABUSE ME” BY EX HABIT
IRIS
After I’ve ordered all the things I think I’ll need to run a kids’ craft club, including a fuck ton of glitter, we have a delicious dinner of enchiladas that leaves me full and content. The conversation was light, and although they still refused to tell me what they’d been up to the past few days, they did tell me some stories about what they used to get up to growing up. Unsurprisingly, they sound like fucking terrors, getting into all sorts of trouble, and I laugh so hard I snort when Hunter tells me about the time Roman was running around stark bollock naked after almost getting caught banging someone’s wife when he was eighteen.
Once we’re finished, Hunt and Rowan tell us to get a film set up in the movie room while they load the dishwasher, so Roman and I head towards the enormous screen.
“As our guest, you get to choose,” Roman tells me, pulling me onto his lap before grabbing the remote. Then he passes it to me after setting up Netflix, the others finishing up in the kitchen.
I flick through, pausing when the listing for365 Dayscomes up.
“Feeling naughty, Princess?” Roman whispers in my ear, and my breath shudders out of me as a tingle races across my skin.
“I’ve never seen it,” I reply in a hushed tone, my finger hovering over the play button. I’ve heard about it though, some of the girls at finishing school giggling that they never made it through the entire film without pouncing on their boyfriends.
“Then you best press play,” he instructs, his hands reaching underneath the oversized jumper I’m wearing and making me hiss when they make contact with my bare skin.
I hit the button just as the others walk in, settling down either side of us on the enormous sofa.
“What did you pick?” Rowan questions, placing some drinks on the coffee table in front of us, then like earlier, he tugs my feet onto his lap.
“You’ll see,” Roman answers for me, and I glance over at Hunter to see his face relaxed as he looks at us. Reaching over, I take the hand not holding a beer bottle into mine and give it a squeeze.