Page 51 of Pay the Price

“It’s not like I'm mad,” I said. “I’m just… surprised.”

His eye started to twitch, his jaw set in a hard line. “I’m not a monster.”

I held his gaze. “I know.”

“Morning,” Wolf said, stepping into the kitchen from the back staircase. He looked every bit as delicious as I’d feared in loose faded denim that hung off his hips and the sleeveless black Pixies T-shirt that looked vintage. He looked from me to Jace and back again. “What’d I miss?”

“Nothing,” Jace and I said, too fast and at the same time.

Wolf raised his eyebrows and I wondered if Otis had told him about Jace and I almost fucking in the hall, or if Jace had told him, sharing the details the way Wolf had with Otis.

It should have made me feel self-conscious. Instead I got wet thinking about them talking about me, about the most intimate details of our sexual encounters.

What the actual fuck kind of reverse voyeurism wasthat?

“Okay,” Wolf said, pausing to scratch the back of the cat’s neck on his way to the coffee maker.

I was pretty sure I could hear the cat purring across the room.

Otis came into the kitchen from the other direction, like he’d come down the front staircase or had been outside in the front. “Hey.” He put his palm possessively against my cheek and kissed me, like it was totally normal. “Morning, doll.”

I scowled, trying to pretend I was annoyed at his presumptuousness when really I felt all flushed and tingly inside. “Morning.”

Jace turned back to the door and set the cat outside. “See you later, Cat.”

He left the door open and I had to admit, it felt good, being back in the kitchen with the three unfairly hot men who’d turned my world upside down, being in the house that my mom had left me with the sun shining and the birds singing through the open door to the old stone terrace.

I could hear the falls rushing beyond the edge of the cliff, and I realized that I was happy here, that I didn’t need my old life filled with girls’ nights out and shopping with Cassie and Sarai and nice meals at Chasen’s.

Not good. Not good at all.

Because temporarily setting aside the fact that the Beasts had killed Blake was a completely different animal from settling in with them for the long haul.

“I’m glad you’re all here,” Jace said.

Wolf leaned against the counter and I wondered, not for the first time, how he made something as simple as a lean look so hot. “Why’s that?”

“I got word from Aloha this morning,” Jace said. “He’s not done, but he had a question.”

“What kind of question?” Otis asked.

“Wanted to know if we knew anything about the Velvet Rope.”

Wolf scolded. “Why would he want to know that?”

“Apparently it turned up in Calvin’s email,” Jace said.

I was obviously missing something. “What’s the Velvet Rope?”

“It’s a sex club in the city,” Otis said like it was obvious.

“What does Calvin have to do with a sex club in the city?” Just saying it was gross. I didnotwant to think about my dad’s body man — the guy who’d kidnapped me for my dad — in a sex club.

“Not sure,” Jace said. “Aloha said the messages were cryptic, which was why he called. Wanted to know if we want him to dig deeper.”

“Hell yes, we do,” Wolf said.

And I understood why: if my dad was involved in trafficking girls, a sex club didn’t seem very far removed. Maybe they were trafficking the girls through this place.

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