Page 110 of Shaped By Darkness

How did they know?

“Mom knew for a while, even before I talked to her about Ryker, she knew what you were up to,” Garrett tells me as he walks up beside me, a smirk on his lips like this is all highly entertaining to him, and I guess it probably is.

If this situation were reversed, I’d laugh at him.

The thought of him here with another girl twists my stomach, and I feel my shadows bleeding from my hands.

Crap. Okay, I wouldn’t laugh; clearly jealousy is a trigger.

Ryker shoots me a questioning look, but I shake my head, breathe, and try to get control again. Thankfully, it works, and Ryker seems to be the only one to notice, since our fingers are twined together.

Pushing all thoughts of Garrett with another woman far away, I get back to the topic at hand.

“She always knows everything.” I chuckle, shaking my head because, really, I should have known. Even as kids, we couldn’t get anything past her. Somehow, I don’t think it has anything to do with her ability to see the future, and more to do with motherly instinct.

“We should get some sleep, though. That wasn’t exactly a small injury this time, Serena.” Blair walks up behind me, and I feel him like a warm hug even though he isn’t touching me.

“I’m fine,” I insist, even though I know it will fall on deaf ears.

“Well, how about we go to bed because the rest of us need our beauty sleep? Not all of us are machines.” Pike walks around us, headed toward the castle. Turning back to walk backward, he yawns, folding his arms behind his head. While I know it’s fake, I can’t stop myself from yawning as well.

Damn him.

“HA, see you are tired!” Pike shouts before he runs back toward me, yanking me into his arms and tossing me over his shoulder. I drop my hold on Ryker instead of risking having my arm pulled from its socket.

“I didn’t say I wasn’t tired. I never denied that!” I shout, slapping a hand to his ass hard enough that my hand stings.

“Oh, spank me harder, Mommy,” Pike says with a moan, and I dissolve into a fit of giggles, half embarrassed that someone might have just heard him and half turned on because… well I’m not really sure why, but I don’t think I really need a reason with these guys.

I guess that’s one of the cons of having so many sexy men as mates. I get to live in a damn near constant state of horniness.

Figuring out rooming took a while, but eventually we got it.

Garrett had attempted to give him a room in the guest wing. The same wing our actual rooms are, including the one from when I was just a girl, but considering none of us stay there, I didn’t love that idea. I wasn’t going to leave him alone to run. I see the panic in his eyes; all of this is new and scary for him.

No, if he was staying there, I was staying with him.

Saying so had almost caused an all-out brawl.

So instead the guys pulled a mattress back to Garrett’s room, and he got to sleep under my favorite window where I wasn’t too far away.

I caught his gaze as I crawled into bed with the guys and felt a pang of longing to have him here with us.

I know better than to push too much, though. We’ve already come a long way tonight.

One step at a time.

As if he could read my mind, a smile turns his lips, and I can’t help but smile back under the weight of it.

Ryker is hot, but that smile… he’s heart-stopping.

For a moment, I worry he might not be here when I wake. Maybe he’s staying awake so he can leave once we’re all asleep. But my fear only lasts a second when I remember him telling me he doesn’t sleep all those nights ago in his cabin.

He said it like it was a bad thing, but with how tired I am lately, I wish I didn’t need to sleep. Unfortunately, I do, and between the stress of the day and the feeling of the guys around me, I’m out in seconds.

My dreams are filled with fire, blood, death, and that tree again. People scream and run; I feel their fear, like a hand wrapped around my throat, cutting off my oxygen.

Draven isn’t here this time, but I almost wish he were; watching him fight the tree was so much better than this.

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