know, no one would be coming to save me or to mourn me. At least everything would be over.
“So, you know what? No one gets away with disrespecting me. Those freaks? I’m going to hunt down each and every one of them, kill every woman and child I see, and put a bullet through every male’s head. Who knows who else you fucked? You could be carrying another monster inside you!”
I shook my head.
“No, no, love. You don’t get to beg,” he said and caressed my face with false gentleness. “You don’t get to beg for them. You will, however, beg for yourself. I am never going to let you go. I will take you back with me, drag you, if I must, and we will honor those fucking wedding vows. And you will give me a son too, or so help me God, I’ll make you regret the day you were born.”
The numbness from before was completely gone. I could handle my own death. I could handle being forced to live with him again, even. But the bears? The poor bears? Nancy, her cubs, Milo… someone had to stop Jack.
I begged and pleaded through the gag, but all that came out were muffled sounds. I watched him check his weapons and drape himself in more guns than a private army would need. He was going to massacre the trailer park community, and there was nothing I could do.
“See you in a few hours, love. Sit tight,” he mocked and closed the door, locking me inside.
I struggled against my bounds, determined to break free or die trying.
Fifteen
Lincoln
I couldn’t believe that I’d been gone to work for one day – one freaking day! – and that had given Brooks and Colt plenty of time to mess up. Brooks had taken Rosalie into his own trailer without consulting us. Which was fine. Whatever. Milo was his cub, and he needed her to feed him and take care of him. But Colt? What the fuck had he been thinking? When I got home, there was a strange female bear getting out of his trailer, cursing and raging at everyone, demanding to know where Colt was because he’d brought her there and he needed to take her back home. Fiona was her name. And then Colt showed up, shifted from his bear form, and told Brooks and I that someone had kidnapped Rosalie.
Here we were now, deep in the woods, trailing Rosalie and her kidnapper. Colt didn’t know who he could be. It didn’t matter. If he’d touched a hair on her head, the bastard was going to die. I could smell her scent as we neared the far edge of the forest. She was scared, I could tell. No, she was terrified. The thought that she was being hurt right now, tortured even, was driving me crazy. No one had the right to touch Rosalie! She was ours. Brooks, Colt, and I had shared her in so many ways. And that was fine because we were friends. We were like brothers. Now that she was gone, now that she was in danger and needed us to save her, I couldn’t focus on anything else but her.
Rosalie Olsen. She’d come to us in the strangest circumstances. Brooks had found her guilty of Krista’s death, and Colt and I had chosen to stand by his side. It hadn’t been too long ago, but it felt like forever. It felt like she’d been with us for months now, even though there had only been days since the accident. She belonged with us. How hadn’t I seen it before? She was the only woman who could complete me, who could see into my soul and not judge me. She was the only female who could accept me just the way I was.
I couldn’t lose her. We couldn’t lose her.
I could tell that Brooks had fallen for her. And not just because she was so good with his cub. She was good with him, too. From what I could tell, she’d practically moved into his trailer and started cooking and cleaning for him. I wanted that, too. I wanted her attention, her care. And I was sure that Colt wanted the exact same things, even if he’d behaved like a fucking moron today.
This was all Colt’s fault. He’d driven her away. By bringing that woman here and trying to fuck her in front of Rosalie, he’d broken her heart. And while breaking her body was fine because she