Ensnared (Brutes of Bristlebrook, #1)(98)

Beau lets out a piercing whistle, followed by two shorter hoots, lower than the last. I don’t flinch.

“Are they all dead?” I whisper as we wait.

“They better be, or I just called them all over to say hello,” Beau says. Studying my face, he winces. “Sorry. They’re all gone, darlin’. Dom’s just done the final sweep, but I’m sure we got them all.”

We. That includes me, I realize, that acidic, gnawing nausea building in my stomach. I got one too.

“Easy there,” Beau murmurs, pulling me closer.

A whistle sounds to our right, and Beau calls out, “Here.”

Dom appears through the brush, dark and fierce and bristling with a palpable energy. It’s hard to tell with my vision out of focus, but I’m sure color runs high along his cheekbones. He looks both of us over, brows raising slightly at my bloodied hands. I bury them deeper into Beau’s shirt, not wanting him to see how badly I fucked up this time.

And I did. It’s not a mess, I didn’t bungle it. I fucked up.

“We’re clear. There’s the brook back the way we came where we can clean up.”

Clean. A laugh sticks in my throat. A Macbethian urge to scrub at my stained skin rises, but look how it turned out for her.

Some things can’t be wiped away.

“She okay?”

“She’s alive,” is all Beau says.

His hand wraps around the back of my neck, and he urges me forward. Something relaxes in me as he takes charge.

Suddenly, I want to turn it all over to him. He can take responsibility for all of it, for all of me. Dom and Beau, the other men, they know what to do in these situations. With these kinds of feelings. I was so, so wrong to think I could do it myself.

“You dropped your knife.”

When I turn, stomach dipping, Dom is ducking to pick up the pocketknife. My pocketknife.

“No.”

My voice is barely audible, and he’s scooped up the bloody, awful thing before I can stop him.

“Here.”

I stumble back a step into Beau. “I don’t want it.”

I sound panicked, and after my vomiting fit, my throat is raw and sore. Dom stops and studies me, and I cringe away from that knowing stare.

He tucks the little knife behind his belt and lifts his hands.

Tears prick my eyes again, and I swallow twice, trying to keep it together. Beau’s hand moves to the middle of my back, and he nudges me.

“Come on now, let’s get cleaned up, have something to eat. You’ll feel better after some food.”

The way it’s seething right now, I’m sure I’ll bring up anything that I try to force down but I just nod and let him lead me through the forest. I feel golden eyes on my back and try not to let my shoulders hunch. This is exactly what they wanted to avoid. Me meddling in things I shouldn’t be meddling in. Dom should be saying “I told you so” right now. The least I can do is actually listen to them, the way I should have done in the first place.

I never should have left Bristlebrook.

What’s wrong with being pampered and coddled, really? If it makes them happy, and it means I’m not doing . . . this . . .

isn’t that better?

What’s the point of having choices if I just keep making the wrong ones?

When we reach the water, Beau stops. I stare blankly at the scene. The sun beats down between the trees, sparkling over the clear water. It whispers and burbles around the stones and branches, running in a playful path through the greenery. The grass is soft and thick, almost mossy, and the loamy earth has a kind, welcoming give under my feet. My teary vision gives the scene a hazy glow, the details blurring into each other prettily.

It confuses me. I feel like a whole day must have passed, a century, but it’s only been a few hours. It’s not right. It should be night, all black and shadows, bare tree limbs catching and tearing at my clothes.

I must have stared too long, because Beau’s hand wraps around my wrist, then his fingers skate down to twine with my bloody ones.

I look up at him, and his face is throat-closingly soft.

“Oh, darlin’, I’m so sorry,” he murmurs. Not taking his eyes off me, he raises his voice. “Dom . . . ”

There’s a beat of silence, then Dom says in a low voice, “I know. She needs it.”

A crush of tiredness, of sadness, squeezes me. Needs what?

Beau strokes the pad of his thumb over my hand in slow, soothing motions. “Eden, sometimes we use kink as a way of processing things. To help get feelings out in the open.”

He’s so unusually grave that I force myself to pay attention to him. Why is he talking about kink? Why on earth would he be talking about it now?

“Eden, Dom and I . . . we want to help you. Will you let us do that?”

To process things? I try to keep up. My mind floats back to my talk with Dom before all of this mess, about how the two of them set a scene to work through Beau’s issues, but the memory just makes my stomach sink further.

“Are you—” I have to swallow; my throat is so raw and dry. “Are you still mad at me?” I whisper.

Beau’s expression breaks, and his eyes sink closed. I watch his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows too. Finally, his eyes drift open, and he whispers back, “No, darlin’, I’m not mad.”