Page 14 of Bounty

Wisteria Jean is already awake, watching Colin sleep. I’m not sure if she’s admiring him, or thinking of ways to end his life. She’s too smart for her own good, so I’m sure she can come up with some creative ways to get the job done.

“I got you a cup of coffee, baby girl.”

Those violet stunners swing to me, and I get an even harsher glare. She sits up with her back against the headboard. I sit on the edge of the bed, putting the other mugs down on the bedside table before giving her her mug. She sips it slowly, as if trying to suss out if it’s poisoned.

“Cream and sugar,” she comments with a hint of surprise.

“I remember how you take it. I can’t forget anything about you, baby girl.” I hope she picks up on the double meaning.

“Except how to reply toyour baby girl’sletters,” she barbs, pricking me deep enough to bleed. I hated ignoring her, but it was for the best.

“It wasn’t like that. Colin and I have a lot to tell you over dinner.”

Jude can seriously fuck off. I won’t tell her everything, but I won’t let her continue thinking I threw her away like a foul piece of garbage.

“Save your breath. I thought about it, and I’m not going back. My life is here in New York. There’s nothing and no one for me back at the farm.”

Jude, Colin, and I are at the farm. Her whole family is. I know she’s hurt, and she has every right to be, but her words still cut me. She gets out of bed, and makes it all the way to the bedroom door. Her frustrated sigh as she jiggles the locked handle is adorable.

“Try to run, but you won’t make it far. All the doors and windows are locked. If you do manage to escape, Colin and I will chase you and tie you up. Chloroform is only one drug in my arsenal.”

“You’d seriously drug me?” she asks indignantly.

“I’d hogtie you if it kept you in one place,” I deadpan. “You’re coming home whether you want to or not.”

“We only want what’s best for you. There’s so much we need to tell you,” Colin says calmly around a yawn. He was always better with her. Way more gentle.

He stretches his arms over his head, his back arching off the bed. My eye is drawn to how his Adonis belt peeks over his pajama bottoms. Wisteria’s eyes are drawn to it too, and flashes of memories run wild in my mind.

Nights in the woods, the three of us laying under the moon on a picnic blanket as we watched the stars. The way Wisteria would alternate between kissing Colin and me. Taking turns licking her sweet little pussy as her moans echoed through the trees. How we worked together to make her come. How she would gasp when Col and I pleasured each other.

I love Col, always have. But I love Wisteria, too—she completes us, belongs with us. And with Jude too if he ever wises up enough to claim her.

She deserves so much more than living alone in a crumbling shack. Or a dead end job and a car one steep hill away from the scrap yard. She deserves the world, and we’ll give it to her or die trying.

It’s already noon, and we can’t stay much longer. The drive to West Virginia from here is nine hours, if we make good time in traffic. Colin is at her house packing her bag while he looks for anything of consequence one last time. Jude gave us an idea of what to look for, but so far, nothing fits the bill. Every time one of us checked her house while she was at work, we came up empty handed.

Wisteria is locked in our bedroom, of her own doing. She wanted to be alone, and Colin said to respect that. The solitude she came to know in upstate New York will become a distant memory once we bring her back home, because she’ll never be alone again.

I work quickly preparing meatballs and spaghetti with a tomato sauce from scratch, one of her favorites. When we were kids, Wisteria, Col, and I would bring our plates out to the picnic tables and eat together. I’d call them our pasta dates. The two of us were enamored by her, listening to her talk a mile a minute about everything and anything.

Once Colin comes back with her bag, it becomes clear that this isn’t a rebirth of our pasta dates. We eat in a terse silence, looking at each other before glancing away. It’s odd. I know who she is, but not really. The woman sitting across from me is notthe same Wisteria Jean. She’s older, wiser. More jaded by the harsh realities of life off the farm.

I guess she can say the same thing about us. We aren’t the boys she grew up with. We’re the dangerous, vile men they became, for better or worse.

“Wisteria, we have some things to tell you,” Colin starts. I let him lead the conversation, because although it pains me to say it, he’s Wisteria’s favorite. She’ll be more receptive to him.

“My name is Willa Jean. Please don’t call me Wisteria, or little flower, or baby girl. You have no right to and no claim to me. Not anymore.” Her lush lips are set in a tense line on her mouth.

“Says you. You’ll always be my baby girl, whether you want to be or not. Don’t argue with us,Willa Jean,” I grouse. I hate her new name. “Do yourself a favor and listen. There’s some important shit you need to know.”

“Your aunt wasn’t who she said she was,” Colin says, leading her right into the thick of it. “She was a plant-–”

A loud explosion rips through the house, and the ground quakes beneath us. I hear the tacky, decorative plates on the wall shatter against the tile floor and a feminine scream. The table is on its side, food splattered everywhere. Dust floats down from the ceiling and the lights in this piece of shit house are out. Wisteria is flat on her ass, her hair everywhere, confused as to what’s going on. I pull her to me and perform a cursory check for injuries. She’s not bleeding, and she’s able to move.

“Come on Wisteria, we’re moving,” I yell as I shove her behind me. “Colin, let’s go.”

He’s already up, packing our weapons that we stored in the closet. “Her bag is in the car. I say we come out of the garage guns blazing.”

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