WYLDER Page 23

  “Nope. Not okay. I know you and Wolf were together.”

  Cringe. Oh no.

  “Don’t look at me that way, Lori. I’m not a prude or one of those Victorian ninnies. I was glad until I realized he’s being an ass.”

  Oooh, I more than snort at the understatement and throw her a mirth-filled glance that’s dripping with derision.

  “Ass? The man kept me locked in the basement like a dirty secret, and despite the fact that I was supposed to have the usual kidnap victim’s response, I listened to everything he said to me and found a way to deal with it. I even fell for his lines, Rain, so I’d say the fact that he slept with me and then told me to leave is more than him being an ‘ass.’”

  Her muttered agreement makes me feel terrible, but I’m not going to sit in a car with Rain and lie just to make her feel better. The truth is that I love her, a lot, but she’s not going to make me soft soap the situation.

  “I know, but you have to understand that things were very hard for Wolf after…Sparrow. He was torn up, but he had to push it all to the background and keep things going after Al and I broke down. The boys were nineteen at that time, and Wolf was only twenty-two. He’d already been fighting for two years and just got home on leave when it happened. He left it all, he had to, because we…I was too weak…”

  Her sniffles make my heart sink, and I can just imagine what that time must have been like, but I also won’t let her excuse him. That happened eight years ago, almost nine, if this year would hurry up and be done already.

  It’s the past, not to be forgotten, but Wolf has had a long time to stop being a bastard.

  “Don’t. Don’t upset yourself to explain him to me. I don’t hate Wolf.” Lie. “I just don’t want to be near him. I’m over that whole issue with what happened between us. Right now, I just want to focus on me, on getting through my issues and moving on. I’d like to do that and still have you as a friend though.”

  “Always.”

  ********************************************************************

  “I can’t believe you didn’t call and tell us about it! It wasn’t even on the news.”

  I roll my eyes at my mom’s rebuke and ask myself why I listened to Danny and called at all. I don’t call my mom and dad, ever. I love the old bat, but she’s not exactly sensitive to other people’s feelings, and she always finds a way to make everything about her.

  “It wasn’t on the news because no one knew I was missing. My boss got a message on his machine saying I had a family emergency, and well, I was okay, so it wasn’t a big deal. I just have some issues to work through with a therapist.”

  “Nonsense. If no one hurt you, then I don’t see what the big deal is. Are you going to send us something to get the power back on? Your dad’s been sick, and the ranch only has him on a few shifts every other week now.”

  “Mom…I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t promise much. I’m on leave at the moment, and I have a mortgage to pay.”

  See why I don’t call? I left this all behind a long time ago, and yet in the last two months, I’ve been trying to rebuild our relationship to no avail. All my folks want from me is money, a hard pill to swallow seeing as I just wanted to have them show some concern.

  Yeah right!

  “Well, try, Lorianna, please. Things are tough, and it wouldn’t be real fitting of you to live in a nice house when your own parents are suffering.”

  I’m suffering! It’s been a week since I came down here, and I’m scheduled to go back home in two days. I can’t put it off much longer, no matter how nice it’s been with the Wylders. Danny keeps asking me to quit and move down here on the concept that Bear wants to help me out and give me a breather until I get back on my feet, but I can’t do that.

  Besides not being okay with losing my home, I just can’t stay here indefinitely, no matter how good it looks or how badly I want to.

  I’m no better. Yeah, I tried that shitty nature walk and cleared my mind of everything, and you know what, nothing. I still freaked when Danny invited a woman from her baby class over, and it took me almost twenty minutes to get out of the car to go see Dr. Nora yesterday.

  Tomorrow is my last day because the day after, I’m flying out at eleven and I won’t be back any time soon. It’s depressing, but there you have it, and I find it hilarious. I love a family who basically kept me prisoner. No one else would have looked at the situation and been all ‘they’re doing what is best for my safety.’

  I guess I must be really messed up.

  “So…call me if you can help,” Mom says after a short silence, and I huff at her persistence.

  “‘Kay, bye.”

  “Lori! Come on down here, babe. Mom made cookies.”

  I hear the yell and grin when not two seconds later my door bursts open and Lyon leans in, smiling like a lunatic.

  “Cookies! They’re still hot, and I chilled the milk, so it’s gonna be epic.”

  I follow and spend the next ten minutes groaning around the cookies and milk, watching Lyon devour half a plate, which is a struggle for the glutton who eats as if he’s never had a decent meal in his life.

  “I’ll come with you, stay a while, just until you’re on your feet again.”

  “No,” I mumble around a mouthful of cookie. “I need to go home and do this by myself. I’ve been doing the sessions with Doctor Nora, and she’s got me in with one of her pals in Texas so I can just go home and keep doing what I have to. Therapy and work and hanging out with all my friends. She says I need to keep going and push through.”

  Lyon growls, his name so apt when he makes the sound that I can’t help a giggle and shake of the head. When I’m with Lyon, it’s all easy. I never, okay, well, hardly, ever freak when he’s around except that time at the spa, but that was just…anyway, he makes me feel happy, and as much as I love and appreciate him for wanting to help, I need to move on.

  “What if you can’t leave the house? What if you starve because you don’t go shopping and you’re too stubborn to call? I can drive you to work and do the shopping, and if you want to go out, I can go with you.”

  I hear laughing and twist hard to see two men in the doorway, their faces almost exact replicas of Lyon’s. Holy shit on a cracker, I think, staring in slack-jawed wonder when they amble in and Lyon practically throws himself from his chair into the arms of…wow.

  All I can say is wow as I look at the three of them slapping each other’s backs and hugging in that weird man way that isn’t at all cool but is endearing.

  “Lori, I’d like you to say hello to the ugly part of my triplet nightmare. This one on the left with the lazy eye is Hawk, and the ugly ass on the right with the flat ass is Lynx.”

  “Hey! I’ll tell Ma. Remember the last time you called me ugly? She about took a strip off you.”

  “Because you cried like a bitch!” Lyon grunts, grinning at…Lynx.

  I smile, battling with the urge to bolt as the two come over to kiss my hand and take a seat on the other side of the table, immediately attacking what’s left of the cookies.

  “She’s hot. There must be something wrong with his dick if he walked.”

  “True. I’d totally have ‘baby mama’ tattooed on her ass to stake a claim.”

  “Tattoo? Dude, that’s so eighties, man! Nowadays you drop a kid in them and that’s all that needs doing. Nothing says owned like a baby on your woman’s breast.”

  “True, but I’d want to spend at last a year on marriage, ya know, loooong nights of no baby shit.”

  “You’re a pig.”

  “Hey! You’re the one who thinks impregnation is a wedding vow.”

  “Not a vow, just a reassurance.” Lynx grins incorrigibly, winking at me.

  I can’t help my giggles or the laughter that erupts when Lyon leans over and slaps them both upside the head.

  “Shut up already. Where have you two been?”

  “Oh, ya know, having some time off after the last eight years of no fun. Bear said w
e could just have a ball.” Hawk snorts, shaking his head. “Not. We’ve been with Jake and his team down in Jersey. We were closing out a deal that Bear said is our last, setting a trap for the Red Dawn bikers running guns for the Morietties.”

  Lyon stills, and I get the impression he’s shocked while Lynx and Hawk slap each other’s backs and lean back to stare at Lyon.

  “We’re done? Are you serious? Bear never said a word!”

  “That’s because I wanted to surprise you and that big asshole Wolf.”

  We all look up when Bear walks in, smiling at them softly. That’s before Lyon’s up and on him, hugging him so hard I hear Bear groan with a huff of laughter.

  “Bear, man, oh, Bear, thank you,” he chokes.

  I slip out of the room when they hug some more, Bear whispering something at Lyon that has him shuddering and pushing his face into his shoulder.

  This is a private time for them, so I leave and find myself smiling as I go upstairs and start packing in preparation for tomorrow’s departure. The rest of the day is spent either listening to the Wylders make plans to take the team they assembled years ago and branch out, maybe run a few government jobs in places that shouldn’t ever be visited, or—

  “No, we’re going private. I spoke to Jake and his guys, and they all agree that we want to help people who need our expertise. Kidnappings, trafficking rings, etc. are to be our main focus. It’s time we gave back and did it in a way that benefits our own people, not the brass,” Bear grunts, smiling at an excited Danny.

  That’s how the rest of dinner goes, with the men discussing an agency of sorts and setting up headquarters.

  I’m truly, truly happy for them, I think with a smile. This has been a long time in coming, and I’ve had enough conversations with Lyon to know that not everyone in the Wylder clan agreed with Bear about remaining undercover for the rest of their days.

  Wolf, it seems, was just waiting for his chance to ‘get out,’ and he took it the minute he could. Too bad he ran before Bear could put his plans in action.

  “You’re sure you’ll be okay? Why don’t you let Lyon go with you?” Bear says later that night as everyone starts branching off, the three guys going to a bar to let loose and celebrate a long-awaited freedom, while Danny snores on the sofa and Rain sits over knitting that’s getting the better of her.

  “I’ll be just fine, Bear, just fine.”

  “I don’t like leaving you alone with this problem when—”

  “When? Don’t say that you feel responsible, Bear, because that’s bull and you know it. What happened, happened. I’m only alive today because you and that ugly brother of yours chose to help me and Danny. I’m grateful to you, always will be, so don’t walk around with a guilt you have no place feeling. It’s time for you to stop thinking about everyone else and let go of your guilt. You can’t save everyone.”

  My soft words startle him, and I feel his shock from fifty freaking paces before he suddenly grins and hugs me so hard I groan.

  “You’re family, my family, and you call if you need anything,” he growls into my hair. “We love you like…a sister.”

  Oh, hell, I won’t cry, I tell myself, sniffing to hide my tears.

  “And I love you all like my family. But even family has to let go sometimes, Bear. Now, stop trying to crack my ribcage, and take your wife home. She’s starting to drool,” I chuckle, hearing his grunt of amusement when Danny lets out a loud snore and indeed starts leaving a wet spot on the cushion under her cheek.

  This is what I want to remember in the coming days. Family.

  Chapter Eight

  Lori

  Six months later…

  “You sound great, Lori!”

  “Thanks, Danny. I feel great,” I laugh, putting my feet up on my desk and leaning back to cradle the telephone against my shoulder while juggling coffee and a slice of cake.

  It’s my last day with the firm, and Glen threw me a real shindig with balloons and a speech and the wailing of my office mates who don’t want me to leave.

  But I am leaving because I need to. No, I want to. In the last months, I’ve wrestled with myself, gone to therapy, and progressed and regressed so much that some days I don’t know what to do with myself.

  It’s been a long process of thinking about what I want out of my life and struggling to get there despite the issues I still carry around. I laughed, cried, and yelled at Dr. Morris that I shouldn’t have to pay her a cent if I have an attack because her therapy isn’t doing shit.

  She told me she was worth every penny and kept pushing me to confront my stuff, so harshly at times that I’d cry and leave without a word, swearing never to go back.

  I went back though, every single time, and I pushed myself harder than even the doctor, knowing that to get through I had to bleed a little. And I did. I finally resolved some of my stuff and admitted to myself that I was afraid, that I had been afraid, and that I have a right to feel betrayed by the men who took me.

  I resolved to talk to Bear and put it all on the table, thanking him for saving me and needing his apologies for his role in my ordeal even when I know it was his way of saving me.

  It sounds contrary, but I understand it all now, and to move forward, my mind needed someone to acknowledge their part in it all. Bear gave me that and held me when I cried, his demeanor rock steady, if slightly uncomfortable, through my tears and unburdening.

  Doctor Morris wanted me to talk to Wolf, but healing and everything aside, I’d rather eat glass, take a toilet break, and wipe with pool acid than see that man again.

  Oh, I totally understand that part of my issue was that I never came to terms with Wolf basically imprisoning me and keeping me in that cell. I know that. I should have spoken to him and made it all clear that I suffered ripping the cloth of my reality because it wasn’t normal for me to see him as only my savior.

  He was my downfall too.

  I’ve dealt with it alone though, and I’m okay with that. I now know that part of it was feeling betrayed by them. Wolf. Bear, who now knows that Wolf sent me away and that I didn’t betray anyone. Rain, who should have released me if she’d truly loved me. Danny, who didn’t think of me after I was taken away.

  Lyon, who did Wolf’s dirty work.

  Everyone I trusted had let me down, and I needed to come to terms with it and find a way to love them without melting down when I saw them. Or just thought of them, which, admittedly, I do, a lot.

  I miss them all, but I am doing great. So great that I made this huge sale and used my commission to buy a place out in the mountains. It’s a cabin-style place on the outskirts of a town near Danny’s place. I finally buckled after she nagged enough, and I am moving closer, though not close enough to be living with them, thank God. Bear makes a lot of noise at night. The man is a screamer. Yuck.

  So, yeah, I got a place.

  It’s not…

  Well, it’s not glamorous or anything like that, but it’s what I’ve always wanted, and I also managed to open a little grocery store too, just to keep myself in rags as I pursue my dream of building an Internet business that supplies grandmothers of this new century with knitted apparel for the grandbabies they’ll have.

  You think I sound nuts, but hear me out. After I started knitting, a therapeutic task that Dr. Morris wouldn’t let me quit, I found that I liked it a lot. And I was good at it.

  I’d always wanted to start my own business supplying things to people using the web and a delivery system, but I never had an idea of what I’d sell.

  After Danny went into raptures about the simple booties I sent her and the little blanket I crocheted, I was sort of hooked. I went at it so hard I ended up with a stockpile of stuff in my spare bedroom.

  I was obsessed, and I have to hand it to the good doc, the patience and focus required helped me through many a long night when the thought of sleeping gave me hives.

  So, I kept working, and then one day, on a whim, I had my friend Lindi set up a site, just to see if it
could work. I now have a decent business providing grannies who don’t know the first thing about knitting with little items that most pass off as their own creations, keeping the old traditions alive while laughing my ass off at the new modern era’s grandmotherly figures.

  Most of these broads spend their days having lunch and discussing the Housewives shows, not on the porch in a rocker knitting one, purling one, for the next generation.

  I provide a service; they lie through their dentures about being all grandmotherly. It’s a well-balanced deception that keeps me in trade.

  So, yeah, I am moving soon, and thanks to my store and the assistant who will run it, I can focus on this new phase in my life. The store is more of a guarantee, just in case the demand stops one day.

  For now, I’m just happy that I have something new and beautiful in my life.

  “I can’t wait, Lori! You’ll come over and—”

  “I’ll come over when I am not working, and we’ll talk on the phone daily like we have been, but I am not going to move in with you guys, and no, I won’t be over there every day. That’s why I moved to a town a little way away.”

  “I get it. I get it. You want to be independent, and Bear’s being a douche,” she grunts, making me giggle.

  Bear is worse than a real big brother, and I have to say, now that the man stopped pretending to be a mobster and finally set his life back on course, he’s a sweetheart.

  Gone is the gruff—

  Gotcha! The man is still a bear, pun intended, and he growls and snarls at people regularly. It’s just that he’s turned into a real worrywart where I am concerned and does not like me living on my own.

  If he’d had his way, I would be living in a cottage on his property, taking handouts and not lifting a finger. I had to make him promise not to interfere when I started my business, because the man takes over without a thought wherever he goes.

  “Bear is a darling, but he’s too protective. I want to build my life, my new life, not watch others build it for me and give me the keys to a perfect existence. Besides, what the heck would I do with myself if I listened to him and stopped working fully? I’d go nuts.”