Page 69 of Haunted Prey

I nodded even if I didn’t feel completely assured. Emery kept me close, placing an arm around me, as he led me out of the exam room.

When we slipped back into the communal space, several faces turned our way, none looking giddy with joy.

Cassidy, of course, fixed me with an icy glare as she sat on a nearby couch, wearing a shirt and sweatpants. Lena, who had barely touched a plate of bacon and eggs in front of her still looked weary as Lez now sat beside her. Lez glared at me too as if we had interrupted some conversation he had been having with her since he leaned in toward her. Dom was the only one who looked passive at best, sitting back at his computer.

My eyes drew over to Micheal, standing by Dom. Like Cassidy, his glare was glacial, his white-blond hair messy, his black shirt unbuttoned, the collar bent as if he had pulled at it hard.

As he took a few steps closer to me and Emery, he placed his hands in his pockets. “I go away for one day,” he said in a quiet,almost threatening, tone. “But this was my fault. I should have known you wouldn’t be able to stay away from her.”

Emery didn’t respond, didn’t so much as move, except to tilt his head up as if in challenge. I kept my ground next to him, trying not to shift uncomfortably or pull my hand from his in case a fight broke out.

“I’ll be honest,” Micheal continued, “I expected to show up here and find these girls locked in a room, banging and crying at the door. Then I would have had to beat your ass. I’m relieved now to find that won’t be necessary, will it?”

Emery squeezed my hand gently. “No,” he answered.

Micheal glanced at me, his icy stare freezing me in place. “Has he hurt you?”

Emery tensed beside me. “No,” he answered before I could.

Still, Micheal looked to me for an answer so I said, “I’m fine.”

He nodded, then said, “If you ask it right now, I will put you somewhere safely out of his reach. You don’t need to be scared to ask, you have several here, including myself who will help you.”

Emery snorted. “She doesn’t—”

“I’m asking her,” Micheal snapped.

I shivered as the air turned colder around us.

“He’s not holding me against my will,” I said after a pause.

“Even though he took you.” Micheal glared at Emery again.

“I wasn’t ecstatic when that happened either,” I confessed. “But…it’s complicated.”

Micheal drew a hand up to cover his eyes and laughed. “Complicated. Right.” He slid his hand through his hair before dropping it. “I don’t know what kind of brainwashing manipulation you have on her, Emery, but this shit is not happening here.”

“It’s not—” I started to say before Micheal cut me short.

“He killed your family. You expect me to believe that?”

“I think she’s telling the truth, Micheal,” Andrea added as she slipped by us from the room.

“You think?”

“They got some kind of sick love,” Cassidy said, crossing her arms.

I refused to cast my eyes down or look away. So what if it was true? Even if all of them, including Lena, looked at me and Emery as if we were crazy.

“Eve…” Lena said, shaking her head in disbelief.

I had to be strong, even if it felt like a bad dream. I licked my lips and swallowed. “It’s complicated.”

Besides a “Yeah, right” from Lez and a bitter laugh from Cassidy, none of them seemed interested in arguing. Only Lena’s look of disappointment made me feel sorry.

“We’ll take your word for it,” Micheal said. “Though I don’t know why your friend got into this?” He turned his glare on Dom and then Lez. “Can someone tell me?”

“Don’t look at me. That’s all Emery, too,” Lez said. “I was ready to knock her out, but Emery wanted her too. Probably to spare his girl from hating his ass. We didn’t have time to argue about it.”

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