He tossed the body into the backseat and climbed into the driver’s seat, growling all the while.

  Marshall pulled up into the cab next to him. “Stop grumbling. At least we didn’t have to go to Phoenix.”

  “Stop barking orders. You don’t know what the hell is going on.”

  “Neither do you.” Marshall pushed into his space and kissed him so hard his ears rang. “Get us home.”

  “I will. You keep him from slitting our throats on the way.”

  Even as he said it, Ben knew it was ridiculous. No matter who that was, he was too skinny and too weak to fight them.

  Marsh sat back. “He’s not here to hurt us. Not that way.”

  “I hope not. If he hurts you, I’ll tear him limb from limb.”

  “Ben. Drive.” He heard something in Marshall’s voice, something that told him his lover was barely holding it together. So he drove, turning back into New Mexico and heading for the mountains.

  Chapter Two

  The bus never stopped.

  Weren’t busses supposed to stop? Gas and drop-offs, maintenance checks and pickups?

  Jakob frowned and pushed himself up from where he was lying on the seat. What if he’d missed his stop? Missed Phoenix? He glanced out the window and frowned. This wasn’t Arizona.

  “Don’t even think about any dirty tricks,” someone said. The voice was Ben’s, but that wouldn’t happen on a bus.

  “I don’t have any tricks.” They’d forgotten about him. Brother William had warned him that would happen, that the pack had sent him to be purified because he’d corrupted his mates, that they would erase him from existence, but he’d never really believed that. “I came to make my apologies for being corrupt. I just need to do that and then I will go. You never have to see me again.”

  No one ever has to hurt me again.

  Ben glanced at him over the back of his seat, eyes wide, expression dumbfounded. “Who the fuck are you? You’re not our mate. Jakob is dead.”

  “I’m not dead, but I swear I’ll leave. I just needed to come to you and apologize for corrupting you.”

  “Stop talking nonsense!” Ben roared, and Jakob whimpered softly and pressed back into the seat. He searched for the handle for the door. If he threw himself out at this speed, he never would have to worry about anything ever again.

  “Don’t.” Marsh’s word froze him on the spot, because Marshall knew him. That command was for Jakob, not for some stranger. “Don’t you dare leave me again.”

  But he had to. If he didn’t he would corrupt his mates once more. They needed to have a life without him. Sister Abby was wrong. This was a mistake.

  “Where did you go, Koby? Seriously? Where did you go?”

  “You mean how? He got me with a dart.” And he’d panicked. It hadn’t been until William had shown him that his mates had agreed to his kidnapping, that the pack had signed the orders, that he’d even begun to understand. “I didn’t want to go.”

  “A dart?” Marsh sounded… well, disbelief was probably strongest.

  “Uh-huh. A dart. You could have just told me to go.” Jakob would have walked away. He hadn’t known.

  Ben shook his head as if he was chasing off a cloud of bees. “Made you go. You died! We saw your body all burned.”

  “I didn’t burn.” What was Ben talking about? The pack had him kidnapped, taken away so Ben and Marshall could be more normal. Bad enough they were gay, but having a third made them targets for all the pack’s scorn.

  “We saw your body.” Marshall looked at him and he didn’t know what to do, what to say.

  “I’m sorry.” He hadn’t done anything.

  “Just wait until we --” Marsh turned back to the road. “Are you hungry? Ben has snacks.”

  “No. Thank you.” He hadn’t eaten since he’d left and he couldn’t imagine putting food in his stomach now. He couldn’t imagine anything, if he was honest. Nothing but this deep ache.

  Silence fell in the cab of the truck, and he watched the scenery. High desert gave way to mountain, red rocks and scrub changing out for pinyon.

  He fought the urge to sleep again, trying to stay awake, trying to soak in every second of their presence.

  They turned off on a back road, the surface super bumpy after the state highway they’d been on. They began climbing as the road wound on, and he knew this was their home. Where they’d chosen to go after he left.

  What were they going to do to him now that he was here? Beat him? Turn him out? Tear him limb from limb?

  He had no idea. He knew Ben didn’t believe. He had no idea why. He was Jakob. Always had been.

  “Should we…”

  “Ben, mate. Please. We’ll talk when we get home.”

  “Where are we going to put him?”

  “Hush,” Marsh said. “Just breathe.”

  “I’m…”

  “Please, don’t fight. You two are going to give yourselves heart attacks someday.” They always fought for dominance. Always.

  “Shut up,” Ben snarled. “You left us. You don’t get to play peacemaker.”

  “I did not!” The sharp words shocked him, surprised the fuck out of him. “You had me darted and put in a trunk, sent away to be beaten and caged and all you had to do was tell me you didn’t want me anymore!”

  “What?” Marshall hit the brakes, squealing to a stop on the side of the rough track. “What the hell? We would never do that!”

  “I saw the letters. From the pack, from you. I was… I thought we were… I didn’t know I made you an abomination.” He scrabbled through his papers, through the proof that his pack had sent him to hell, searching for the paper he was supposed to have signed and coming up empty. Whatever. What the fuck ever. He was going to run until he collapsed and let the bugs have him. “I have to apologize. I did it. I’m sorry. Now I can go.”

  “No.” Marsh threw the truck back in gear before he could hop out. “You’re going to explain. Every detail.”

  “Let me out. I apologized.”

  “For faking your death?”

  “I didn’t fake anything!” His scream rocked the truck, loud enough to make the windows shudder.

  “Stop it,” Marsh snapped. “Everyone just fucking stop it until we’re at the cabin.”

  Jakob clutched his little backpack. It held a T-shirt, a spare pair of briefs, his papers, and four dollars. That was it. His whole life. He could leave it behind.

  They finally stopped, the truck rocking to a halt next to a sweet little frame cabin.

  He let himself look for a second, knowing he was going to run as soon as the doors opened. He wanted to remember. Forever.

  “No running,” Marsh barked out, the order making Jakob jump.

  “He won’t run.” Ben was right there, glaring at him, hating him.

  “I said I was sorry.”

  “Inside.” Ben hopped out of the truck and opened his door, not giving him room to bolt.

  They herded him, driving him toward the house, funneling him inside. Jakob blinked, trying hard to figure out what had just happened. Okay. He had to find his papers. Wait. He’d dropped his backpack when the truck had stopped.

  Marshall stopped him right inside the door. “You’re real.”

  “I am.” Unfortunately.

  Grabbing his chin, Marsh tilted his face to the light. “Your eyes are all wrong.”

  “You don’t smell right, either.”

  Everything they said made him feel smaller. “I’m sorry.”

  “Stop it.” Marsh shook him, gripping his shoulders. “Just -- come in and get clean. Then you can tell us everything.”

  He thought he already had. He thought… Hell, he thought he’d said everything.

  “No.” Ben shook his head. “You fed us a line of crap. We sent you away, my ass. I’ll show you where the shower is.”

  Ben. Oh, Ben had heard his thoughts. Still.

  “I didn’t lie.”

  He hadn’t wanted to leave. To starve. To be drugged and beaten and shocked.

  Marsh backed off, hands dropping to his sides. “Go with Ben. I’ll make some food.”

  He dropped his chin and nodded. “I just came to apologize. I won’t bother you again. I swear.”

  Ben grabbed his arm and marched him to the bathroom. He knew that impatient touch, knew that Ben was always the one to lose his shit first.

  “Go wash yourself.” Ben pushed him into the bathroom. “There’s towels in the linen closet. Don’t use all the hot water.”

  Jakob nodded, just once because he didn’t have enough soul left to do anything else. “I won’t. I promise.”

  Ben closed the door, and Jakob was distressed to see there was no window in here. Well, not a real one. Two small vent windows let in light at where the wall met the ceiling, but he couldn’t get out that way.

  Maybe this was more penance, more payment for corrupting his mates, to come to this place and let him see them again.

  He stripped off his coveralls and his sandals, then he turned the cold water on. There was a bar of soap, a bottle of the shampoo that Ben said smelled of the ocean. Marshall always laughed when Ben said that because none of them had seen the ocean before. Jakob had now, of course, and he knew it was wrong. It smelled like shampoo.

  He let the water get lukewarm, but not hot. Even that was better than being hosed down with freezing water. All he needed to do was get clean, get through whatever he needed to do, and then go.

  He closed his eyes when he washed his hair, and if the scent brought tears to his eyes, they ran down the drain with the wash water.

  All he had to do was all he had to do was all he had to do.

  Right?

  Right.

  All he had to do was all he had to do.

  * * *

  Marsh watched Ben pace and listened to the shower run. “Where is that death certificate, babe?” They had one. He knew they did.

  “In the file cabinet. Why would he do this? What’s wrong with him?” Ben looked like he was fixin’ to shake apart.

  “I don’t know. I know he thinks we sent him away. He’s not lying. Why the hell would he believe that, Ben? We were good to him, loved him.”

  “Why would he fake his own death? Let us mourn him? Suffer?”

  Marsh shook his head. “I’m not -- he wouldn’t go that far. Just look at him, babe. Something bad happened. Someone hurt him. He lost a finger, he looks haunted, and his eyes…”

  “They’re wrong,” Ben said flatly. “I don’t like it.”

  “No. No, I don’t either. I don’t like any of this.”

  “I’m sorry. I never wanted to hurt anyone.”

  They both whirled around, staring at Jakob. Ben’s shoulders hunched up visibly, but Marsh put a hand on his arm. “Come sit with us in the kitchen, b-- Jakob. Come on.” He wanted the full story.

  Jakob nodded and followed them. He was dressed in the same coveralls, the same sandals, white hair cropped too short, showing the scalp.

  Marsh waved at the table and chairs. “Sit.” He went to the fridge and pulled out a pack of bacon.

  “What do you want to know?” Jakob was like a statue, right there in the chair.

  “Start with how you left.” Ben growled out the words.

  “I was heading to the desert for a run and then to the grocery store for burgers. I woke up in the trunk of a car.”

  “You said someone darted you?” He grabbed a pan and got it going on the stove.

  “Yes. The man that the pack hired to take me. Brother William.”

  “Why do you say the pack hired him?” Why would they do that?

  “Because it’s the truth. I have papers.”

  “Show us,” Marsh demanded. He wanted to see this.

  “They’re in my bag in your truck.”

  “I’ll get them,” Ben growled. “You stay.”

  Jakob sat, hands folded, head bowed. The scent of bacon began to fill the room, but Jakob never twitched.

  “Are you hungry? I know you love bacon. I have eggs.” He wanted to see something, anything that proved Jakob was alive.

  “No, thank you.”

  “I’ll make enough for you, just in case.” No bacon? No eggs? Jesus. His Jakob had a hollow leg, was always starving, feeding all that energy.

  He would make Jakob eat if he had to, see if that brought light back to those eyes.

  Ben strode back in with a bag in hand. “This is it? You were hitchhiking from Phoenix with this?”

  “I took the bus from California.”

  “Are you nuts? Is that it? Did you go crazy?” Ben’s chin jutted.

  “For a little while, at the beginning, yes. I didn’t understand that it was on purpose. I thought that I was supposed to come home. I didn’t understand that I was sent away. It took a while to believe.”

  “No one sent you away!” Ben thrust the bag at Jakob. “Why would the pack do that and tell us you were dead? There was a body!”

  “You don’t have to lie. I have the notes.” Jakob pulled out a sheaf of papers.

  Marshall turned down the bacon and stepped over to take the papers so Ben didn’t just tear them to bits. They were emails -- stacks of them. From Stephen, their alpha. One from each of the elders. Each saying that Jakob was an abomination, mating with two strong male wolves, that he needed to be removed from the pack structure, that they renounced him and offered him to the Brotherhood.

  Worse than that were the two emails from them.

  “I understand that Jakob Fallen is dangerous to the pack structure, that he seduced me into a triad with my mate, Marshall. We wish to break the mate bond. Benjamin Walkingtree.”

  “I wish to break the mate bond with Jakob Fallen. He carries a sickness inside him. We renounce the bond and release him. Marshall Vena.”

  “I didn’t write this.” Marshall stared at the paper as if it was a snake, ready to poison him with a bite.

  “It’s from your email. I’m going to go. I gave my apologies. I’m tired now.”

  “No.” Ben grabbed Jakob’s shoulder. “No, you stay and explain. Emails can be hacked.” Ben nodded at Marshall and left the room, returning only moments later with a folder full of papers. In the meantime, Marshall glared at Jakob, who stared at the table.

  Jakob appeared smaller every time Marshall looked at him.

  “Here. Your death notice. Your death certificate.”

  Jakob stared at the paper, eyes empty and pale. “That might have been easier.”

  “What happened, Jakob? What happened to you? We didn’t send you away. I swear it.” The bacon popped, and they all jumped.

  “They took me to a compound and took the wolf out of me.”

  “What?” Ben’s voice rose with alarm.

  “They took me to a compound and took the wolf out of me,” Jakob repeated.

  “They tortured you?” Marshall took the bacon off the heat altogether and sat at the table after he turned off the stove.

  Jakob shrugged. “I survived it.”

  “So what’s all this apology shit about? I mean, if they think we sent you away, what’s the logic of sending you back to us?” Ben tapped his fingers on the table.

  “I don’t know. Sister Abby said I had to, that it was the next step. She put me in a truck, that’s all.”

  “I thought you took the bus.”

  “The caretaker drove me to the bus station.”

  “Then say what you mean,” Ben snapped.

  “I did. I said I’m sorry.” Jakob stood up, the chair falling behind him.

  “Stop it. Both of you.” Marshall stood and grabbed Ben, then kissed him silly. “Stop trying to catch him in a lie. This is -- something important is going on here.”

  Jakob made his way to the door, pale and shivering. “You’re still the most beautiful things I’ve ever imagined.”

  “I don’t need you to imagine us. We’re right here.” And Marsh didn’t understand what the fuck was going on, but he knew he wasn’t going to let Jakob leave. Not ever again. This was still his mate. He knew it. Someone had been cruel to them all, but clearly Jakob had suffered most.

  Jakob nodded, but kept backing away, eyes huge in his face.

  Marshall had a few new tricks up his sleeve now, though. He growled, then barked out a Command. “Stop.”

  Jakob’s eyes went wide and he stopped, still and vibrating, and that didn’t work if the wolf was gone.

  If the wolf was gone, shit. That wasn’t possible. They were the wolf. Someone had just forced Jakob to hide it down deep, maybe be afraid of it.

  Snapping out of his indecision, Marshall went to Jakob and pulled the too-slight body into his arms. “I missed you, baby. We missed you.”

  Ben stared at him over the top of Jakob’s head, lip curled.

  Marshall stared right back, willing his mate to try. To open up to the vibes pouring off Jakob. They needed to get to the bottom of this. If Jakob honestly didn’t want to be with them, they could survive.

  He really didn’t think that was the case.

  Their mate had come to them believing they had committed him to a life of torture. If Jakob could do that, then Marshall and Ben could meet him halfway.

  We met him in Gallup, Marsh.

  He was going to beat Ben’s ass.

  Soon. And Marshall was going to enjoy it immensely.

  Jakob began to shake. “Don’t. Don’t tell me that. I can’t believe this was all for nothing or I’ll go crazy again.”

  “You’re not crazy, mate. Just confused. Hungry. You have to be hungry.”

  “I -- I don’t eat meat anymore, Marsh.”

  “Bullshit.” Ben grabbed a piece of bacon out of the pan and snapped off a crispy bit before coming to them. “You mean someone forced you to stop. Meat is your natural diet.”

  “Stop being mean to me, you FUCK!”

  Jakob’s scream echoed, and Ben popped the bite into Jakob’s mouth.

  Eyes going wide, Jakob bit down, then chewed and swallowed. Pink roses bloomed in his cheeks, and he clutched at Marsh’s shirtfront. “Oh.”

  “Good, baby?” Marsh nodded at Ben, who grabbed more bacon and began feeding it to Jakob in tiny bits.

  “I can’t.”

  “Yep.” Ben rubbed a piece over Jakob’s lower lip, and Jakob moaned, the sound almost sexual. Once Jakob ate it, Marshall rewarded him with a kiss, soft and gentle this time.

 

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