Chapter Four

Shelby

Three days.

Three days of being lucid enough to learn that being awake constantly hurt, that Sherry wasn’t coming back unless there was an emergency after River and Rain had interfered, and that those boys had absolutely no boundaries.

They were golden-eyed bulldozers bent on helping me whether I liked it or not. So far, neither they, nor anyone else, had hurt me, but I feared it was only a matter of time before the other shoe dropped. I obviously wasn’t in any sort of legitimate facility. If I were, surely there would have been more than a handful of men checking in on me, or the police would have been by.

Those men had quickly discovered that any treatment had to be done while I was sedated. I couldn’t stand for Blake, the man who had helped Sherry and who I thought was some sort of doctor or nurse, to touch or see me below my shoulders without having a panic attack. It helped that a woman came in to do my bathing, even if it were a bird bath at best, and change the hospital gown while one of the cousins stood guard with their back turned. She’d been called in after the two had made a mess while attempting to wash my hair and had arrived in plain scrubs along with a bag of supplies slung over her shoulder. She didn’t talk much, nor make eye contact, but she was gentle and non-threatening enough that with her quiet directions and warnings before she touched me or moved my limbs, I was able to keep the panic at bay. I had to assume none of them knew that a feminine presence wasn't the reassurance they thought it was, not after what Sasha and Marigold had done to me.

It was after her second visit that the man I’d mistaken for Carter showed up again. I only vaguely remembered him . The shock of recognition then the subsequent relief I’d felt when I’d realized he wasn’t my bodyguard were all I could really recollect. His appearance didn’t bode well though, in my opinion, so I fully expected bad news.

From what I’d picked up from the cousins, he was the man in charge around here, and for some reason, I was being hidden away wherever ‘here’ happened to be. It was too bad the beating Winston gave me hadn’t rendered me brain damaged enough to check out from reality. Instead, I had to deal with the aftermath while I was certain he was waiting in that house to collect me back. Heck, for all I knew, I could still be in that house, though I didn’t think that was the case. The property, maybe—

My wandering mind was brought to attention real quick when Gavin barked out my name and snapped his fingers in front of my face. I startled, futilely jerking back against the raised head of the hospital bed. I did manage to hold in my groan from the ricochet of pain it caused, though the panting breaths through my nose had to have given me away.

Rain was suddenly just there , blocking Carter’s almost-doppelganger from sight while River took him to task.

“Don’t yell at her, Gavin.”

“I wasn’t trying to yell, River, but I need to talk to her,” he said quietly and with more than a little exasperation. It made me wonder how long I’d spaced off. “You two have put me off for the better part of a week. Time’s up now. Or did you forget I have a compound to run and…people to answer to?”

My mind was immediately suspicious of the ‘people’ part, especially with the way he’d obviously wanted to say something else. On the other hand, I liked the creepy cousins a little bit more for running interference and trying to protect me.

Carefully, I extended my arm enough to hook my pointer finger into the belt loop on Rain’s jeans and gave it a little tug.

He turned his head to look at me over his shoulder. His amber gaze lit with curiosity and surprise as he fixated on where I was willingly touching him even though it was only his clothing.

“You need something, firecracker?” he asked, eyes flicking up to mine. His patience was something else, but I’d come to expect it. They wouldn’t leave me be for anything, but they’d wait me out until the end of time if I needed it, so it seemed.

I let my finger slip loose and gave him a thumbs-up, the signal I could handle with ease and the least discomfort. Using the rest of my fingers, I motioned for him to step aside, which he did with more than a little reluctance if his tense shoulders were anything to go by.

Pointing at River, who was also watching me by then, I repeated the motion.

A smirk popped up as he complied. “Pretty girl, are you bossing us around?”

The thought hadn’t even occurred to me, and I felt a blush fill my face before I got dizzy with how fast the blood drained back out. I hadn’t meant to. How could I apologize before they got mad if I couldn’t talk? My mind started to spiral as I tried to force my sore throat and damaged jaw to work despite the swelling and the hardware holding it together.

“Shelby, stop it! You’re fine!” River snapped at me, having knelt down until he was below me and could catch my downcast eyes.

Tears blurred his visage as they tumbled down my cheeks one after the other in the face of my helplessness, pain, and terror.

“Come on, now. Don’t look at me like that,” he crooned, using his thumbs to gently try to wipe away the emotion pouring from my eyes.

My breath hiccuped through my nose in combat for space with the snot I was sure was about to make an appearance on my face. But I didn’t care about any of that after I was able to focus on the compassion in River’s stare. He isn’t mad at me. Slowly, so very slowly, I brought myself back under control, then the embarrassment set in. I was loath to face the other two men.

Girding myself for whatever reaction they might have, I glanced from one to the other. Rain was much like his cousin, worried more than anything else, but Gavin seemed pissed even though I thought he tried to hide it. It was only a moment before he let on that he wasn’t angry with me .

“I apologize, Shelby. I didn’t realize…” He shrugged helplessly, at a loss for words, and I couldn’t blame him. There likely wasn’t any polite way to finish whatever he was thinking.

Hoping to get on with the reason for his presence, I shakily lifted my hand and put my thumb up. It was a decent enough icebreaker that there were huffs of mirth and relief from all three of them. The cousins took that as their cue to play bookends again, leaving Gavin to the bedside chair.

The man who looked eerily like Carter, but not, rubbed the back of his neck with a work-roughened hand. I didn’t want to be inattentive, yet I couldn’t help that my gaze shied away from the reminder of the man who should have protected me. Instead of looking at his face, I took in the rest of his frame. From his worn, unbuttoned button-down over a black t-shirt, to the dark-wash jeans and black work boots, he reminded me so much of Carter the night we’d met that I couldn’t think of much else. He even had his sleeves pushed up over well-muscled forearms, and that’s where my stare hung up until I was called out.

“Is she checking him out?” I heard one of the bookends hiss to the other. My wide-eyed gaze flew to Gavin’s face in consternation while I shook my head the best I could. The flare of pain automatically had my hand creeping for the button that supplied my hardlined pain killer.

As for Gavin, he choked and glared at the two troublemakers before giving a long-suffering sigh.

“If you could wait a few minutes on that, I’d appreciate it,” he said, pointedly glancing at my hand. I froze, then let my hand rest, though not too far from the button. “Thank you. I’m going to guess I’m making you uncomfortable. Once you’re able to communicate better, I’ll be asking why so I can try to fix it, but until then, there are some things you need to know and decisions to be made.” Gavin was blunt and to the point, and I really didn’t want to listen to him now, let alone have to answer why I didn’t want to look at him later.

Of course, my first instinct was to agree to keep the peace, so that’s what I did, my thumb going up almost of its own free will.

“Do you remember what happened before you came here?” I carefully nodded my head once and settled my gaze at a point on the wall behind him, unable to look at anyone if that was going to be the topic. “Are you sure?” he asked, confusion in his voice. It was almost enough for me to make eye contact, but I chickened out and gave a half-shrug to answer him. “Okay then, I’m going to go over what I know. You lift your thumb, so I know where I need to start filling in the blanks.”

I didn’t like it one bit, but I was a captive, if unwilling, audience. The need to check with the cousins for reassurance nearly overwhelmed me, but the memory of being dependent on others kept my eyes unfocused on that spot on the wall. If I had to be alive, then I should probably find out what my future looked like.

Gavin sighed, then started without a warm-up. “You and Dirk were in the security wing.” Trembling, I held my thumb up. “Carter carried you out to these two.” I dropped my thumb but broke my resolve not to look at him.

Slowly, I shook my head. I had a feeling there was more than a little of a time jump between the two points in Gavin’s timeline. At least the confusion was helping with my anxiety. The man was obviously uneasy with the subject with how stiffly he sat in the chair. It made me a little less upset to know that he was uncomfortable too since he seemed intent on rehashing everything just to torment me. No one had hurt me yet, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t coming, or that they wouldn’t start in on me mentally while I healed physically.

I knew my thoughts weren’t normal, that I was likely projecting, but these men were tangled up with Carter, and that meant they were somehow linked to my husband. Trust and hope were a little hard for me to come by anymore.

“Was Carter in the room?” Gavin quickly continued when my fingers stretched to reach the button for the pain pump. I relaxed my hand again with a frustrated sigh and shook my head. If he was going to take all day, I wasn’t going to wait. My body hurt, and for once I had a way to escape it—if the men would just leave me to it. “Dirk, Milo, and the women were?”

He stared me dead in the eyes as he said it like it, like it wasn’t a surprise to him what had gone on, nor with any accusation or disgust. It was a first for me; even Jerry had acted ashamed. My shock was such that I almost missed raising my thumb, and only the bands between my teeth kept my mouth from dropping open.

“Shelby, I’m trying to be delicate here. Were you engaged in activity, or were you hurt?” Compassion, or what I thought it to be, sat in his gaze. Not pity, not blame. A hiccup of breath jerked my chest before the air was forced back out in a sound I couldn’t begin to describe, but other than a wince on behalf of my protesting throat and ribs, I didn’t react.

He’d asked two questions, but I couldn’t exactly speak, so I shook my head then lifted my thumb. The boys grumbled something from their posts, but they didn’t move and I wasn’t about to take my eyes off of Gavin. The air was thick with something I couldn’t name. Whatever he was getting at, I had a strong feeling it was going to change things. For better or worse was the question I needed answered.

“Look, I don’t know you, but I’m just going to set this out. There was an—accident, and you were the only survivor from the security wing.” Gavin leaned forward, gripping a knee in each hand until his knuckles whitened. I inanely registered all of that as I tried to process what he’d said.

An accident.

No survivors.

Dirk’s dead?

Raising eyes blurred with tears, I tried to blink my vision clear. None of the men spoke as I looked from one to the other, shock leaving my hands and feet tingly.

Finally, it was River who broke from his post to kneel down next to my bed and gently take my hand in his. Looking up at me, he said the words I needed to hear.

“Dirk and Milo are gone, Shelby. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

I broke down in sobs over both that they knew and that my tormentors were gone. The relief at the news and the subsequent fear of what would happen now vied for supremacy, but with the underlying embarrassment, it all commingled to leave me a snotty mess, gasping for air.

I didn’t quite care though. Dirk was dead.