Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Shiloh

Three Weeks Later

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Coming backto Sabine Valley was a mistake. No one else seems to agree with me, so I’ve kept my opinion to myself, but there’s no shaking the dread that dogs my steps every waking moment since we breached the city limits. Three weeks of jumping at shadows, startling at every loud sound, and looking over my shoulder for an attack that never comes. It’s frazzled my nerves and me wonder what the hell I was thinking returning to a city that shares such a complicated history with me.

Sabine Valley.

It’s unlike anywhere else. I’m honestly not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I stare out the window of the office Monroe and I have traveled to every day for the past two weeks. It’s the tallest building in the Amazon faction, and Monroe’s office presents a stellar view to the south, showcasing the river that branches around the island where the three factions hold their feast day rituals. At the island, it splits to the south and east, creating a natural barrier between the factions. Amazons to the north. Raiders to the west. Mystics to the east.

They all look identical from up here.

Really, for all their superficial differences, the factions aren’t that different from each other. One ruler, a family that surrounds and supports them. Each nursing a superiority complex that might be funny if they didn’t hold so many lives in their hands.

Both Ciar of the Mystics and Aisling Rhodius of the Amazons are ruthless to a fault. I’ve never had reason to deal directly with Ciar, but the rumors that abound about the Mystics say he holds them in a tight grasp of superstition and fear. Aisling uses cold logic to make her leadership decisions and the Amazons might appear to love her, but she’s not above sacrificing a few for the greater good. She won’t lose sleep over it, either.

At least I know Abel cares about the people within the compound. I’m honestly not sure about the rest of the Raider faction. Some days, it seems like the only time he has compassion for them is when Harlow is insisting on it.

And Monroe, heir to the Amazon faction?

Three weeks of being glued to her side, and I still don’t have a good read on the woman. She’s gorgeous and infuriating and strides through life as if nothing can touch her. She also flirts as easily as she breathes and has no concept of personal space. There’s a savvy mind behind that pretty face, but she does a damn good job of concealing it.

At least, she does when we’re not in this office.

I glance at Monroe’s desk, where she and her mother, the Amazon queen, currently have their heads bowed together and are speaking in low voices. They look nearly identical, though Aisling’s beauty is icier and Monroe’s is far too earthy for my state of mind. When I first started acting as Monroe’s babysitter during these forays into Amazon territory, they banished me into the hallway when they had their little meetings.

They don’t bother any longer.

I kind of wish they still did. Being in the same room as Aisling is hell on my control. It’s far too tempting to grab the nearest item that can be used as a weapon and throw it at her gorgeous face. It won’t do much but get me killed, but it might drown out the memories that lurk at the edges of my mind whenever I’m in Amazon territory.

“Profits are trending up this quarter despite the fiasco at Lammas.” Aisling’s cool voice cuts through my thoughts as she points at a spot on her tablet. Being in the same room at this woman has me clenching my fists and striving to keep my rage off my face. “In particular, the trade agreements with Carver City are doing well.”

“Of course they are. Aunt Malone is overseeing them on her end.” For once, Monroe doesn’t have a mocking expression on her gorgeous face. She’s utterly concentrated on the report in front of her. “Still, there’s room for improvement.”

“There’s always room for improvement.”

Spending so much time in corporate headquarters for the Amazon faction has only driven home how much I prefer the Paine brothers’ way of doing things. The top tier Amazons are all CEOs and COOs and CFOs. They have hierarchies within hierarchies, and the constant dancing around each other exhausts even me, who’s outside it. As heir, Monroe is as close to the top as she can be without holding the throne, but that doesn’t stop others from challenging her in ways I barely understand. It’s a giant fucking headache. In the Raider faction, people seem to say what they mean and follow through on it, for better or worse. There are a lot less thinly veiled insults and undermining a person at every turn.

The Amazons like to pretend they’re so much better than everyone else in Sabine Valley. Superior in every way.

They’re all a bunch of fucking hypocrites.

“Monroe, can you take this report down in person? I don’t trust Rachel to understand our shorthand without having to double-check with me, so talking through it with her will cut down on my headache later.”

“Of course, Mother.” Monroe doesn’t hesitate to gather up the paperwork and start for the door. She might be the baddest bitch when it comes to dealing with everyone else, but when her mother issues commands, she doesn’t push back.

As soon as the door closes, Aisling steps between me and the door. “Shiloh, was it?”

I fight not to tense, to strike out, to scream in this woman’s face. “Please move out of the way. I’m her security—I’m going with her.”

She waves that away. “Monroe will be back in a moment.” Aisling might look like a fragile blond woman, but she’s got a steel backbone and a heartless streak. She eyes me. “You know, I’ve been doing some digging on the people who accompanied the Paine boys back to Sabine Valley.”

Alarm bells toll through my head, getting louder with each second that passes. She can’t know. She can’t. “And?”

“Every other person has an origin story.” She laughs a little. “Abel really went out and decided to build himself an island of misfit toys, didn’t he? I suppose one must work with what one has.”

It takes everything I have to maintain my relaxed pose. Aisling is across the room from me. While she might have a gun stashed in that smart pantsuit of hers, I highly doubt I’m in physical danger at the moment. She’s too smart to play things that way.

But if she recognizes me…

The only other time I saw this woman was twenty years ago. She’s barely aged in that time, but I look much different than the malnourished child who caught sight of her through a cracked door during an unexpected visit to my parents’ house. There’s no way someone looking at me can connect me to that child. No way at all.

“Yes, everyone has an origin story,” she continues breezily, as if we’re just two friends having a chat. “Except you.”

“I’m nobody.” I say it slowly, fighting not to snap back and sound defensive. I have worked hard to be nobody, to put my past behind me. I always knew being back in Sabine Valley would rattle the skeletons in my closet, but it’s a small price to pay in order to be part of Abel Paine’s plan to bring the city to its knees.

“Nobody,” Aisling repeats. She props her hip against the desk. “I think you’re somebody, Shiloh. I’d look into your past even if my daughter weren’t fond of you. And Monroe is fond of you.” She narrows green eyes so like her daughter’s. “I’ll do anything to protect my daughters.”

Apparently that protection only extends to your daughters, not anyone else’s.

I shut the thought down before it can show on my face. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“See that you do.” She straightens and heads for the door, opening it just as Monroe slips back into the office. “See you tomorrow, darling.”

“Sure.” Monroe flips her hair over her shoulder. “See you tomorrow.”

Aisling doesn’t know. She can’t know. If she had a clue who I really am, where I really come from, she’d have me removed on the spot, and to hell with the consequences. I’m a blight on the Amazon claim to perfection—or rather, my parents were. Then again, maybe I’m overstating my own importance. I’m just a single woman with a troubled past. Ultimately, I am a cog in the machine. Hardly worth getting worked up over, even is Monroe is fond of me.

“Shiloh.”

I give myself a mental shake. “What can I help you with, Monroe?”

She smiles. Impossible not to notice how perfect her lips are, especially when she’s painted them a bright apple red. Everything about Monroe is perfect. She’s gorgeous, has a body that’s built deceptively strong, and she practically breathes seduction.

I want to hate her.

I really do.

She’s the enemy, and I’ll never forget that, but she’s also… I give myself another mental shake. No use thinking about that, either.

She stands and stretches her arms over her head. Today, she’s wearing high-waisted pants almost loose enough to look like a skirt and a cropped form-fitting top that I mistook for lingerie on the first glance. There is a blazer that matches the pants, but it’s currently draped over the back of her chair.

I wish she’d put it on. That slice of toned stomach showing between her pants and her top is almost as distracting as the curves of her breasts offered up by the structure of the top. It’s not transparent, but that doesn’t stop me from having to fight the urge to search the lace for her nipples.

Yeah, Monroe is dangerous in ways I never could have predicted.

She finishes her stretch and leans a hip against her desk. “You don’t like me.”

“I don’t have an opinion about you one way or another.” Not true. Not true at all. But admitting that I can’t stop picturing her and Broderick having sex, tormenting myself with the images over and over again, is the equivalent of diving into chummed water and hoping the circling shark doesn’t eat me. My odds aren’t good in either scenario.

She smiles like I said something clever. “Jealousy is so exhausting, Shiloh. Why don’t you set it aside for a while?”

“I’m not jealous.” I am 100 percent jealous. It doesn’t matter if I have no right to it. It wouldn’t even matter if I’d ever gotten the courage to admit my feelings to Broderick. Finnegan and Iris are dating, and that didn’t stop Abel from assigning him Matteo of the Mystics as Bride. They were expected to put their relationship on hold, at least long enough for the handfasting to be consummated.

It doesn’t matter what I might have done if I were braver; Broderick and Monroe would still be handfasted, they still would have consummated it the night of Lammas, and things would still be unbearably awkward between me and Broderick. The carefully balanced throuple might have worked with Abel and his two Brides, but Broderick loathes Monroe, and so my being attracted to her would further complicate an already complicated situation.

And that’s the best case scenario.

The worst case being Broderick gently, but firmly, sits me down and explains that while he cares about me, it’s only in a friendly kind of way, without a shred of the attraction that I feel for him. I’m beyond certain our friendship couldn’t survive that step, and I’ll do anything to preserve it.

Even deny myself the one man I want.

“Liar. You are the very definition of jealous.” She says it so casually, I can almost convince myself I misheard her. Monroe stalks toward me, all smooth, predatory movements. “Broderick might be as dense as the brick wall that surrounds the Paine compound, but I like to think I’m not a complete fool.”

Only someone with no sense of self-preservation would ever call Monroe a fool. As she approaches, it feels like the room gets smaller with each step. I hold my ground through sheer force of will. I’ve dealt with scarier people than this woman, but I can’t think of any off the top of my head, not with her so close.

She stops just short of us touching. It’s strange to notice that she’s several inches shorter than me. She feels larger than life, but she can’t be more than five-three. She reaches up with a perfectly manicured finger and winds it through a strand of my hair. “Shiloh.”

It’s everything I can do not to shiver at the dark promise in her voice. I clear my throat. “Is there something you need?”

“There are many things I need.” She tugs on my hair. This time, I lose my battle with the shiver. I have no business being attracted to this woman, but I might as well resent the sun for shining. It feels that inevitable when she’s like this. She might be the enemy, but in my heart of hearts, I can admit I want her. She leans forward a little and lowers her voice. “The first is for you to stop planting listening devices in my office.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m sure you don’t.” She gives my hair another tug, her expression contemplative. “We’ve been working hard. What do you say we go have some fun?”

I’m already shaking my head, which only makes her hold on my hair more apparent. “That’s not sanctioned.”

“Fuck sanctioned.” She releases my hair and stalks to her desk, sweeping up her blazer and heading for the door. “I need a drink. You need one, too.” I open my mouth to argue, but she never gives me the chance to interrupt. “Don’t bother to lie and say you don’t drink. I saw you and that fearsome brunette with beer the other night.”

I’d like to say Iris isn’t fearsome, but there’s a reason she’s one of Maddox and Cohen’s top picks when they put together small teams for dangerous tasks. I sigh and follow Monroe out of the office, waiting while she locks up behind her. I didn’t plant another listening device today. I don’t have the full details about Abel’s plans, but he was very clear on the schedule for hiding bugs in Monroe’s office. I suspect it’s so, eventually, she’ll become complacent and stop scanning the space.

I’m not sure Monroe and complacent have ever been used in the same sentence, but Abel seems to know what he’s doing. Especially since he’s got his two Brides in line and they’re all working together. It’s made a huge difference in our welcome in the Raider faction.

All good things.

None of it helps make Monroe easier to deal with.

She strides down the hallway, forcing me to rush to keep up with her. It doesn’t seem to matter that my legs are longer than hers. The woman is a menace.

We take the elevators down to the main floor and head out to the street. I keep waiting for it to be easier to move through the Amazon faction, but even though my childhood home was far from the city center, there’s something about the people here that are innately familiar. It doesn’t matter their gender, their race, their age; they all feel like Amazons to me. I hate that familiarity. I wish I could scrub it from my brain, could divorce myself from that identity with the same violence I divorced myself from this city the first time.

It won’t happen. If it was that easy to purge the secret demons from myself, I would have done it long ago.

The Raider truck is waiting for us at the curb, just like it is every day. I ignore the little stab of disappointment when I see Maddox behind the wheel instead of Broderick. Of course, it wouldn’t be Broderick. He hasn’t been our driver even once in the last two weeks. He’d rather cut off his arm than spend thirty minutes in an enclosed space with his Bride.

Even if I’m there, too.

At least Maddox is one of the few people Monroe doesn’t mess with. It’s fascinating, because she has no problem poking at Cohen, who’s easily the scariest motherfucker in the entire compound, but Maddox, his best-friend-sometimes-lover is where she draws the line. The big blond man is handsome and charming, and I don’t understand what he did to accomplish putting her on her best behavior when he’s around.

I’d love to be able to replicate it.

She climbs up into the truck and slides to the center of the bench seat, leaving me to follow. I yank the door shut and nod at Maddox. “Any trouble?”

“No.” He puts the truck into gear and pulls smoothly from the curb.

Monroe slouches against the seat and lays her head on my shoulder. Her shampoo teases my tenses. It took me days to identify the scent, to diagnose the maddening combination of apple, vanilla, cedar, and chrysanthemum. I should push her away, but giving her a reaction will only encourage her.

And… Maybe part of me likes the weight of her body against mine. A very, very small part.

She’s playing with my hair again, braiding several strands together in an absentminded kind of way. “Maddox, would you agree that Shiloh does a good job?”

He doesn’t look over. “I want no part of whatever you’re trying to get at, Amazon.”

“Yes, yes, I’m the very worst. We can all agree on that.” She finishes the braid and starts on another. “But it’s been three weeks since Lammas, and Shiloh has been at my side nearly every moment of it. I want to take her out for a drink to say thank you.”

Maddox glances at me, his gaze lingering on Monroe’s fingers in my hair. His handsome features look chiseled in stone in the fading light of day. “That’s not a good idea.”

“Please. If I wanted to cause trouble, I would stage an ambush on one of the trips across the river.” She smiles sweetly. “Not that I would, of course.”

“Of course not,” I murmur. “Not when your sister and uncle are still in the compound.” Quite the brilliant little hostage situation the Paine brothers have put together. We’re still sitting on a ticking time bomb with all the powerful, dangerous people living under the same roof, but they’ve managed to ensure mostly good behavior up to this point.

“Exactly.” She tilts her head to look at me. It’s only then that I realize how close we really are. It would take no effort at all to lean down and kiss her, to see if she tastes as sharp as the words she deals. Monroe’s gaze drops to my mouth. “We’ll just have a few drinks in Old Town. You can come along and ensure our good behavior. Or assign another babysitter if you don’t think Shiloh can handle it on her own.”

Oh, that was clever. From the way Maddox’s hands tighten on the steering wheel, he realizes exactly how clever. If he insists on staying, he’s effectively undermining me and saying he doesn’t believe I’m capable of doing the job they assigned me after Lammas. It wouldn’t even hurt my feelings; I’m the first to admit that Monroe really needs two handlers—or half a dozen. But Maddox is too good at balancing our people to ever pull a stunt like that. “You get an hour.”

“You’re a peach.” She snuggles closer to me, her breasts pressing against my arm.

I honestly can’t tell if Monroe is just this touchy of a person or if she uses physical contact to set people on edge. It could be both, honestly. All I know is that she’s always touching me. “Drop us at the Goat, please.”

“Will do.”

We cross the bridge back into Raider territory, and a little of the tension bleeds out of my body. No matter what Sabine Valley says about handfasting and Brides, I can’t quite believe the tentative peace is anything but an opportunity for someone ruthless and ambitious enough to break the rules. Three weeks isn’t nearly enough time to weed out potential issues in the Raider faction, but at least we’re making progress there.

In the Amazon faction?

Enemy territory doesn’t begin to cover it. Every single person I encounter is aware of what we took from them. Their heir, their spare, their queen’s beloved younger brother. They would like nothing more than to stick a knife between my ribs and leave me bleeding out on the sidewalk. They’d even do it, if not for the carefully balanced juggling act that Abel and the rest of the Paines have put into place. I don’t have to know every detail to know their entire plan rests on the assumption that Monroe and Fallon are more loyal to their family than they are to their faction. That they don’t believe in acceptable losses.

At least, acceptable losses that include their family members.

But will it continue to be so?

I have no idea.

And that keeps me up at night.