Isla’s POV~
Maddox’s confession was still echoing in my head.
I lied.
I was a coward.
It didn’t fix anything.
It just made the ruin look different.
Before, they were monsters who hated me for no reason.
Now, they were monsters who hated me because they were broken, too.
It made it harder to hate them back.
And that was the problem.
I felt myself shutting down.
It felt like I was carrying a backpack that was filled with rocks.
Then someone suddenly just pointed at it and said, “Hey, that looks heavy,” and now I couldn’t stop feeling the straps digging into my shoulders.
I took a step back.
I needed space.
“Nope.” Colt’s voice resounded.
Before I could turn, before I could even tense my muscles to run, the world tilted.
“What the hell—”
My breath left my lungs in a rush.
Colt had me.
He’d scooped me up like I weighed nothing, one arm under my knees, the other around my back in a bridal style.
“Put me down,” I gasped, my hands instinctively flying to his shoulders to steady myself.
“Absolutely not,” Colt said.
He was grinning.
Actually grinning.
Like this was a joke.
Like he wasn’t holding a girl who was currently having a mental breakdown.
“You’re doing that thing where you overthink and spiral,” he said, bouncing me slightly as he adjusted his grip.
“And we’re not allowing it.”
“We?” I repeated, staring at his stupid, handsome face.
Slade appeared on Colt’s left.
He wasn’t looking at me.
He was looking at the path ahead, his expression bored, but his body was close enough that I could feel the heat radiating off him.
“We,” Slade intoned.
So finally they could read me now?
I felt a flare of indignation that cut through the sadness.
Damn, so my own privacy is dead now.
“Where are we—” I started to ask, trying to twist in Colt’s arms to see where we were going.
“Food.
You need to eat,” Slade interrupted.
He didn’t even look down at me.
He just kept walking, his long strides eating up the ground.
I rolled my eyes.
“I’m not hungry.”
“We don’t care,” Colt chirped, squeezing me tighter.
“You’re eating anyway.”
“That’s not how hunger works—”
“It is now,” Slade added, his voice rough.
They didn’t stop walking.
I stopped arguing.
What was the point?
They took me to a small restaurant on the edge of the Pack Territory.
It smelled like home.
It smelled like something I hadn’t had in years.
My stomach gave a traitorous growl.
Colt deposited me in a booth gently.
I say gently because I expected him to drop me, but he slid me down the seat like I was made of porcelain.
It surprised me.
He slid in next to me immediately, trapping me against the wall.
Slade took the other side.
He sat down, and the booth suddenly felt very small.
They were boxing me in.
Deliberately.
Slade on the right, Colt on the left.
I was in the middle.
Should I be annoyed?
Probably.
Should I feel trapped?
Was I?
Hell no.
My wolf gave me a toothy grin.
“Look at us,” she purred.
“Shut up,” I snarled at her.
“You’re an idiot.”
I pushed the feeling down.
I tried to summon fear, anger.
But sitting there, with the smell of food in my nose and the heat of two massive men pressing against my sides, the fear felt…
far away.
What is wrong with me?
No no.
What was wrong with my silly wolf?
Why was she purring at the people who had ruined my life?
I stared at the table.
“Menu,” Slade said, sliding a sheet toward me.
I didn’t move.
I couldn’t.
My brain was short-circuiting.
Colt leaned over, his shoulder pressing into mine.
“I recommend the burger.
It’s huge.
You need the protein.”
“I’m not eating a whole burger,” I muttered.
“Then we’ll share,” Slade said.
He picked up the menu, effectively ending the discussion.
“Two burgers.
Fries.
Milkshakes.”
“Chocolate,” Colt added.
“Strawberry,” Slade corrected.
They were ordering for me.
Again.
I should have screamed.
I should have thrown the table.
Instead, I sat there.
And I let the warmth of their bodies seep into my skin.
And for the first time in three years, the knot in my stomach loosened, just a fraction.
The waitress materialized out of nowhere.
She was middle-aged, with graying hair pulled back in a messy bun and a name tag that read Betty.
She had a kind smile, but when she looked at the boys, her expression shifted into a knowing look.
“The usual for you boys?” she asked, her voice raspy from years of smoke or shouting.
“Whatever she wants,” Slade said, gesturing vaguely in my direction.
My brow shot up.
I looked at him.
His face was a mask of boredom, but his eyes were locked on me.
So he was finally letting me choose?
The waitress turned her gaze to me.
She waited.
“I… I don’t know what they have,” I finally stammered.
I hadn’t ordered food for myself in years.
I just took what was given or stole what I could find.
“Everything’s good,” Colt assured me, leaning forward, his elbow on the table.
He looked eager, like a golden retriever waiting for a treat.
“But the burger is legendary.
Seriously.
It’ll change your life.”
I looked at the menu again.
“Burger, then,” I said.
“Good choice, sweetheart,” Betty said.
She winked at me, then disappeared into the kitchen.
Silence fell again.
But it wasn’t the heavy, suffocating silence from before.
Colt’s thigh pressed against mine.
The heat from his leg seeped through my leggings.
Behind me, Slade had his arms draped along the back of the booth.
He wasn’t touching me, but I could feel the heat radiating from his chest.
It felt like being sandwiched between two furnaces.
They were claiming me.
Both at the same time.
“You okay?” Colt asked quietly.
The playfulness was gone from his voice.
“I don’t know,” I said.
It was the truth.
“Fair enough,” Colt said.
He tapped his fingers on the table.
“The apology thing,” Slade began.
He was looking at the salt shaker, twisting it around.
“That fucked with your head.”
“A little,” I admitted.
I picked at a loose thread on my hoodie.
“You don’t have to forgive us,” Slade continued.
He turned his head, looking at me.
His dark eyes were unreadable.
“Or trust us.
Or even like us.”
“But you’re stuck with us anyway,” Colt added.
He was grinning again, but it was softer this time.
Sadder.
“Mate bond.
No take backs.
It’s a lifetime subscription, babe.”
I opened my mouth to argue, to tell them to go to hell, but the kitchen doors swung open before I could speak.
Betty carried a tray that looked like it weighed fifty pounds.
She set it down with a thud.
And oh my God.
The burger was indeed huge.
It was stacked so high I couldn’t see the bottom bun.
Cheese was melting down the sides, dripping onto the plate.
It smelled like heaven.
My stomach gave a traitorous, loud growl.
It echoed in the quiet booth.
Colt laughed.
“See?
You’re hungry.”
“Shut up!” I snapped, but there was no heat in it.
I grabbed the burger with both hands.
It was hot.
I took a bite.
Oh.
Mmh.
The flavors exploded in my mouth.
The meat was juicy.
The bun was soft.
It was the best thing I had ever tasted.
I closed my eyes without meaning to.
I was just three bites in, chewing happily, when I realized the air had changed.
I opened my eyes.
They were both staring at me.
Slade wasn’t looking at his phone.
Colt wasn’t looking around the room.
They were looking at my mouth.
At the burger.
At me.
“What?” I asked, my mouth full of chewed beef and cheese.
I felt a sudden, intense self-consciousness.
Did I have something on my face?
“Nothing,” Colt said.
But he was smiling.
A slow, lazy smile that made my stomach flip and it was not from hunger.
“You’re just… cute when you eat,” Slade added.
His voice was low, and rough.
I turned red.
I actually turned bright, humiliating red.