56. Levi

now

I wake up achy, sore, and so fucking satisfied.

Last night plays back in my mind like a movie. One I never saw coming but that just might be my new favorite.

With a groan, I push down the morning wood that won't go away anytime soon if I lie here and fantasize about the highlights reel of last night.

It's not a great line of thinking to go down if I want to be productive today.

Grunting, I sit up and massage my leg. It's stiff, as it always is when I wake, so I work the muscle, warming it up so it'll relax enough for me to stand comfortably. While I knead away at my healing leg, my thoughts go to the messages from my mom, to the heaviness of her request.

Request is a mild term for it, really. A trap is more accurate. One I'm about to knowingly walk into.

Hunter's words tug at me, easing the trepidation. She'll go with me. She' ll be by my side.

I swing my legs over the side of the bed and peer over my shoulder, only to realize then that Hunter's not in bed like I thought. In fact, I'm the only one still up here.

I get up, hobble to the bathroom to take a piss, and make my way downstairs.

In the kitchen, I find Greedy and Kabir sitting across from each other at the table.

My heart rate picks up, and I go on high alert the second I take them in, readying myself to be a buffer and step between them when necessary.

But Greedy's scrolling on his phone, nursing a cup of coffee, and Kabir is reading an actual newspaper.

They're both relaxed in their seats, posture casual.

When Kabir rises, he turns to Greedy and asks, "Need me to top you off?" nodding toward his coffee.

"Nah, man, I got it," Greedy tells him, pushing his chair back.

What the fuck? I've yet to see even cordiality between them, let alone a friendliness like what I just witnessed.

"Uh, hey, guys," I say as I make my way over to the coffeepot.

Greedy beats me to it. He pulls out a mug and pours a fresh cup, then passes it over to me.

"Morning, champ," Kabir greets.

"Champ, huh?" Greedy smirks, his eyes dancing with mischievousness.

Kabir regards him across the kitchen, his expression deadpan. "Don't be jealous, Garrett. It's unbecoming."

"I'm not jealous," Greedy answers a little too quickly.

"Dude." I elbow him in the ribs. "He's teasing you."

Greedy eyes me, his teeth sinking into his lower lip. "I liked it better when he was teasing us both last night."

My dick twitches in interest. Fuck . I was prepared to deal with a decent amount of awkwardness this morning, yet it's like any other day. Okay, maybe not, because I can't say I've ever visualized standing beside my best friend while another man strokes us both to completion .

"Good morning," I tell him huskily.

"Morning," he replies, scanning me—my bare chest, athletic shorts, and nothing else—in a way that makes me feel like a fucking king.

Kabir better watch himself. Greedy's gonna have to call me His Royal Highness if he keeps it up.

I bite back a smirk at the thought. Pretty sure none of us are at that level yet. Though with the way things are headed…

Yawning, I dump a few spoonfuls of sugar into my coffee and give it a stir. Then I turn back to Greedy.

"Where's Hunter?"

With a shrug, he tops off his own mug. Then he saunters over and sits back down at the table. "She's still sleeping."

"She wasn't in bed," I tell him, my heart thumping against my sternum.

Or at least…

"She wasn't in the primary bed when I woke up," I clarify.

With a hum, Greedy nods. "She woke up in the middle of the night. I put her up in the room you had been sleeping in after she fell asleep again."

That makes sense. I didn't think to check the other bedrooms on my way down. Even so, I want to find her. Talk to her. Check in after last night, both for her sake and just to see where things stand.

Decidedly, I fill a mug with water from the tap, then stick it in the microwave. When the microwave dings, I snag a tea bag from the drawer.

"Please tell me you're not doing what I think you're doing," Kabir groans.

Shrugging, I give him a smirk. "What do you think I'm doing, sir ?"

Kabir cocks one eyebrow, and that's all it takes. My dick's already half-hard.

I'm gonna pay for that. I can't fucking wait.

Before I let myself get distracted, I head out of the kitchen. Carefully, I climb the stairs, mindful of my leg and the piping-hot mug of tea .

Once I make it to the second floor, I knock twice on the door of the bedroom I've been using.

There's no answer, so I push in.

"Daisy." The bedding is rumpled, and the sheet is draped over one side so it's puddling on the floor. A quick survey of the room confirms she was here but isn't now. If she's not here, I know exactly where to find her. Smiling, I turn and head up the second flight of stairs back to the primary.

I should have known to check there first.

I make my way all the way up to the top floor without so much as sloshing a drop of tea. "Hey," I announce when I push through the bedroom door and head toward the opposite side of the room.

Only when I step into the library, it's empty, too.

Dread churns in my gut.

It's the same sensation that hits me when the football slips out of my grip, and the fumble is inevitable.

Or when the pastor starts preaching about the sanctity of marriage, but deep down, he really means the alleged sin of homosexuality.

Something's not right.

I peek out on the balcony, but no one's there. I check the en suite just to be sure. Finding it empty, I abandon the mug and take the stairs as quickly as my still stiff leg will take me.

On the second floor, I check all the bedrooms, flipping lights on and grabbing a shirt off the floor. By the time I'm dressed, I'm panicked and sweating.

My breaths come in shallow pants, and my nerves fire off like I've had too much caffeine, even though I've only had one sip of coffee so far. I bound down the stairs, ignoring the pain that shoots through my leg when I land a little too hard.

"Hunter's not upstairs," I inform Kabir and Greedy as I enter the kitchen.

They're both back at the table, exactly how I found them earlier .

They look up at me, their expressions curious but calm. Why isn't anyone else worried right now?

"Did you check the library?" Greedy asks.

"Yeah, of course."

"The bathroom?" Spence suggests. "She just got her period."

"Yes. I checked everywhere ."

"You couldn't have checked everywhere ," Spencer argues mockingly.

Greedy rises, and Kabir follows. Good. At least now they can help me find her.

"Tem!" Greedy calls out as we head up the stairs as a unit.

Kabir makes a sound of disgust. "Must you holler, Garrett?"

I let Greedy take the lead—it's his house, after all. I'm both satisfied and slightly terrified as we venture from room to room and come up empty-handed.

Where the hell is she?

"Tem!" Greedy yells again, louder this time, after we've checked all the rooms and both levels of outdoor spaces. We're back upstairs in the primary, all three of us standing in the center of the room, perplexed.

"Honestly, Garrett…" Kabir chides.

"How do you suggest we find her, Your Royal Highness?"

He smirks. "Easy."

He pulls out his phone and taps at the screen. The moment he hits send on the text, Hunter's phone pings on the bedside table.

Greedy's the first to make his way over.

"Her phone is still plugged in."

The pit in my stomach grows with each step as I make my way across the bedroom. Something is wrong here.

Greedy meets my gaze. "She wouldn't go anywhere without her phone, right?"

"Bloody hell, this can't be right." We turn back to Kabir, who's still in the middle of the room, scowling at his phone as if he's personally offended by whatever he sees on the screen.

In unison, we stride to him .

He thrusts the device out to Greedy. "Do you know where this is?"

Sidling up beside my best friend, I survey the map on the screen. It's the East Coast. South Carolina, North Carolina, the Atlantic Ocean.

"What are we looking at here?" Greedy asks.

"Answer the question, Garrett. Is that place familiar to you? That dot? Right there on the screen? Do you know where that is?"

Greedy uses his thumb and forefinger to zoom in on the pink dot Kabir is referring to. "That's Virginia," Greedy says, "and the dot looks like it's on Route 95. It goes all the way up the coast."

Kabir snatches his phone back and stares at the screen again, cursing under his breath.

"What's wrong?" I demand, my stomach twisted into painful knots. "What's happening?"

Kabir meets my gaze, his expression a mix of horror and pain.

The look is like a punch to the jaw. He hasn't even uttered a word, and yet I know his next words will knock the wind right out of all of us.

"That dot is Hunter."

"The fuck? What do you mean that dot is Hunter?" Greedy demands, his body rigid beside me.

"I can track her. She's in Virginia, and based on my calculations, she's currently traveling 120 kilometers an hour on Route 95, heading north."