Wolf (The Henchmen MC #3) (3 page)

He was in for a rude awakening.

I was pissed. As in... seriously pissed.

I wanted blood.

And since I couldn't have Lex Keith's, well, I was okay with having his. At least some of it. Whatever amount I could get before he took me down. I was under no illusions. There was no way I could actually take him in any kind of fight, not even if he just stood still and let me wail on him. I'd probably break my own hands before I caused any kind of damage to him. But that didn't mean I didn't want to unleash a bit of my frustration on him.

I mean... who took someone somewhere against their will anyway? Even if maybe he was trying to do the right thing and get me away from the cops who would definitely take the burn on my arm as some incriminating evidence. And, well, if they got my clothes into a lab, they'd find a lot more than a trace of bomb and Molotov cocktail residue.

Maybe I should have been thankful to him. He obviously had his head on straight when he offered me a ride. I had been losing my shit on the side of that road.

But that being said, I didn't need to be holed up in his shack in the woods. I needed to be getting the hell out of town. Christ, what if that Josh guy decided to rat me out? The further away I was, the better. I might have been risking my relationships with everyone I cared about by doing what I had done, but I wasn't exactly keen on the idea of being trapped behind bars for the rest of my life.

Wolf turned the truck up a driveway that was steep enough to require you to take it on foot or by some other behemoth with huge traction like his truck. I guess that was why he left his bike at The Henchmen compound.

"You planning on chaining me up?" I asked, uncomfortable with the lingering silence as we drove up the long lane.

Wolf's gaze cut to mine for a second and I could have sworn he almost looked offended. "No."

"Then you can't keep me here," I decided, looking away out the windshield.

"Okay," he said in a tone I didn't trust, like he knew something I didn't know.

The driveway seemed to twist forever, secluding us deeper and deeper into the woods, the treetops long barren. Despite myself, I actually felt myself relaxing. There was something soothing about knowing you are somewhere that no one would look for you or find you. Especially after all the reckless and unforgivable things I had done that night.

Wolf finally pulled his truck up beside a small cabin, looking like it couldn't have been any bigger than an average loft apartment inside.

"Do you even fit inside that?" I asked, meaning only to think it, but there it was... all out there.

To this, Wolf made some sort of snorting sound that I took for amusement when I glanced over and saw his honey-eyes dancing. "Come on," he said, swinging out of his door and bleeping the button to undo the child-locks.

Without much choice, I followed, the jump down from the cab making me feel like a little kid when I landed hard, the impact ricocheting up my legs. When I looked up to see him standing beside his door, lips twitching, I lowered my eyes at him as I approached. "Not all of us can be Paul Bunyan," I bristled. I stopped in front of him, planting my feet wide and craning my neck up to look at him. "If my arm wasn't throbbing like a mother right now, I'd make good on my promise. As it stands, I need to get cleaned up and down some pain medicine. But don't think I forgot about it. It wouldn't be very smart to fall asleep around me right now."

There was more lip twitching and he nodded his head at me, acknowledging my threat the way a parent acknowledges their child's proclamation that they are Superman when they tucked a pillowcase into the collar of their pjs like a cape.

When he said nothing, I sighed. "So do you actually have indoor plumbing in this place or is this a cop a squat behind a bush kind of situation you have here?"

There it was again, the lip twitching. Apparently everything I had to say amused him. I found myself both annoyed and flattered by that realization. Annoyed because nothing I said was meant to be funny, especially the parts where I threatened his life. And flattered because, well, no one ever laughed at me and because I knew Wolf was not the kind of man to find amusement easily. He was one serious dude.

He moved to open the front door, left unlocked, and pushed inside. He said nothing, but then again, he rarely did, so I followed behind. The inside of his cabin was a loft floor plan with a straight, small kitchen against the wall to the left with a small dining table. There was a worn leather chair against the back wall, a end table beside it stacked with magazines and a massive TV attached to the wall beside the front door. To the right was a giant bed with plush red and black flannel comforter; true mountain man style. There were two doors which I imagined led to a bathroom and a closet. That was it. That was all there was to his place.

I mean I guess I was judging a little harshly given that I had spent the last eight years living at Hailstorm, a survivalist camp/ lawless military compound that was made out of shipping containers with no windows where I slept in a barracks-style room with a bunch of men and women. But if you were going to have a sanctuary in the woods, why not go whole-hog and make it more, well, sanctuary-ish.

Still, it was cozy. The log walls, the wood floors, the curtain-less windows, the braided rugs here and there. It screamed 'home' to someone who all but forgot what home felt like. If it had some massive built-in bookshelves and a killer wifi connection, I could be comfortable there.

I felt my good wrist tagged in his giant hand and looked up as he started pulling me forward toward the door beside the bed.

"Quit pawing at me," I grumbled, uselessly trying to pry my arm from his grip. He opened the door and reached inside to flick on the light then dragged me inside, slamming the door to give us more standing area in the small space with a square sink vanity and mirror, shower stall, and toilet. That was it. No medicine cabinet. No linen cabinet. God, his whole place screamed 'I'm a man and don't need all that useless shit like a guest towel or bath mats'. I was suddenly turned, my stomach pressed against the sink cabinet, crushed there by Wolf's solid frame at my back. He reached around my body, turning on the tap and putting the stopper in the sink. "What are you..." I started, then found my burned forearm submerged in the cool water, pressed and held there by his hand wrapped around mine. I repeat: his hand was holding mine. I'd never had a man hold my hand. As in... ever. And here it was happening for the first time with my well-intentioned kidnapper who meant it as nothing else but a silent instruction to keep my arm under the water.

I focused all my intention on keeping my fingers still under his, not wanting him to think I was making as big a deal of it as I was. His free arm pulled open a drawer by my thigh, dragging items out and putting them on the counter beside my arm: factory-wrapped gauze, tape, and a huge white tub with a prescription label.

"What is that?" I asked, reaching for it with my good arm and holding it up to read the label. "Silver Sulfadiazine," I read, turning my neck to try to give him a questioning look.

"Burn cream," he answered, taking it from my hand and putting it back on the counter. That was the end of that. He wasn't going to explain. I mean not that I really expected him to. That wasn't who he was. He wasn't a talker, a conversationalist. Which, given that I almost never shut up, kind of bothered me. I couldn't just keep talking with no comment from anyone else. I mean, I could, but I would look crazy. And, suddenly, I found myself not wanting to look crazy. Normally I didn't give a good god damn what anyone thought of me. But for reasons I was choosing not to analyze, I didn't want Wolf to think I was off my rocker.

So I stood there silently, looking down at my arm under the cool water. Actually, I wasn't looking at my arm at all; I was looking at Wolf's hand wrapped around mine. Like the rest of him, it was massive, but in that large knuckle, tendon, and vein way that only large men seemed to possess. Like they could handle anything, like they could hold on forever and never tire, like they could take any burden and lift it.

Jesus Christ.

I was starting to think like Lo, all wishy-washy from reading all her silly love stories all the time.

That wasn't the kind of woman I was. I didn't romanticize things. I certainly didn't think of poetic ways to describe a man's freaking hands. What was wrong with me?

As I was thinking that, my hand was finally released and I watched my fingers instinctively flex and reach outward, like they were seeking the contact again. Mortified, my head swung around to look at Wolf. His gaze wasn't on me or my hand though. He was reaching behind the door for a white towel and moving it to rest on the sink counter. He pulled my arm out of the water and rested it there. I reached for the edge of the material that was so stiff I knew that, among not believing in bath mats, he also had some kind of aversion to fabric softener, and moved to blot the water off my arm.

"Don't," he growled, swatting my hand away and giving me a hard look that I guess was supposed to impart some kind of information, but it was completely lost on me before he turned away to focus on the gauze. I watched as he carefully laid out strips of the gauze then used some sort of sealed stick to glob the burn cream onto the soft material. "Dry?" he asked, turning to look at me.

"Um... yeah," I guessed, not having the damndest clue. I was too focused watching him, watching the way his powerful frame seemed capable of the smallest, delicate tasks in a way that seemed unnatural. He reached for my wrist, pulling it up and letting go of it in mid-air. It was another silent instruction: keep your arm like this, it said. It was amazing how much he was able to communicate silently. Then I stood stiff as a board and watched as he picked up the coated gauze and carefully wrapped up my burns. He did it so lightly I barely felt it and it seemed wrong for such a big man to be able to be so gentle. Finished with the wet gauze, he wrapped me in about ten coats of dry gauze then attached the medical tape and put the remainder down on the counter.

When he turned back, his eyes went to my face for the first time since we were outside his house and the effect was physical, like a falling sensation in my belly. His hand raised slowly, his fingertips whispering across my jaw and the sensation stopped being falling and started to be a fluttering in my stomach. His eyes went soft for a long minute before he shook his head slightly and let his hand drop. "Triple antibiotic," he said oddly, pulling open a drawer, finding some, and slapping it on the counter before reaching for the door and opening it against my back until I moved out of the way.

And then he was gone, leaving me staring at the closed door for a long minute before turning back to the sink and looking into the mirror. It was then that I got it. I had a bunch of shallow scrapes and scratches down my cheek. They were nothing, superficial, wouldn't even scar, but they had made his eyes soften. How freaking weird was that? I sighed loudly and washed my face, skipping the triple antibiotic because I didn't really need it.

I was just starting to fret about what I was supposed to be doing when there was a knock at the door. With drawn-in brows, I pulled the door open and there was Wolf, holding out a white tee with various items piled on top: a toothbrush, towel, washcloth, and bottle of ibuprofen. "Shower tomorrow," he instructed, shoving the pile toward my chest then waving at my arm as an explanation in case I was too stupid to realize that I shouldn't bathe with freshly wrapped gauze.

"Um... thanks," I murmured, closing the door before I remembered I was supposed to be plotting his incapacitation instead of showing him gratitude. But, well, there was no way I would make it to my car without being spotted by some idiot cop asking questions. Especially once they realized who I was. I had to wait until sunup when walking around wouldn't be so conspicuous. And, well, my clothes were filthy.

I piled the stuff on the counter, tying my hair up with the band I kept around my wrist, then digging out the toothpaste and brushing before stripping out of my filthy clothes and unfolding Wolf's t-shirt that was large enough to completely swallow me up, hanging most of the way down my thighs and wide enough to fit another me and a half inside. I felt naked (because I very nearly was), but I couldn't sit in the bathroom all day to save my modesty. With a sigh, I walked back into the main area of the house to find Wolf scrolling through something on his phone. It didn't take a genius to realize that the grim set to his mouth implied he had just learned that not only did I blow up Lex's mansion and The Henchmen compound, but also Hailstorm, the Mallick's bar, and Summer's father's estate.

Hearing me step out, his head snapped up, doing a very short inspection that didn't linger anywhere womanly, instead landing on my face and staying. Uncomfortable under his gaze, I shrugged a shoulder. "Not going to ask why I blew up most of the criminal empires in the area?" I asked, deciding it would be better to own up to it than be accused of it.

"No."

"Why not?"

"You got reasons?" he asked, surprising me enough to answer automatically.

"Yes."

To that, he shrugged.

"Bed," he said gesturing toward it like it could have possibly escaped my notice, taking up half of the room as it did.

"Um... yeah... that's a bed." If I didn't know better, I would think he was daft.

I got another of his amused snorts and his lips stopped twitching and gave into a small smile as he shook his head at me. "Sleep," he clarified. "I'll be there," he added this time, gesturing to the recliner.