Vic says nothing, but the shape his mouth makes when he frowns scares me a little bit.

“Why?”

Of all the questions Victor could’ve asked, that’s the one that trips me up the most. Why? Why?

“I … don’t know,” I say, because I don’t. Glancing over at Aaron, I can see that he isn’t sure either. Are we back together? If we are, how do things work with Vic? I chew at my lower lip for a moment. “That’s what the sex was about, testing our limits.” I lick my lips and taste the sweetness of Aaron’s mouth. If Vic is my poison, Aaron is my antidote. One burns so good that you can’t help injecting yourself, even if you know it’s wrong. The other is violent relief, a desperate soothing balm that feels like old memories and hope.

I’m stuck right in the middle.

“Our girl,” Aaron says, voice low. I glance sharply in his direction and see that his head is tilted down, his eyes focused on Vic. He’s breathing hard, but he’s calm. Almost too calm. “A Havoc Girl. You keep saying she’s yours, and I can’t blame you. I’d like her to be mine, too, but, uh”—Aaron pauses to grab a beer from the fridge, leaning his back against the door after it closes—“that’s not what we agreed on. You’re as bound to Havoc’s price as she is. Or are you above it, Vic?”

Victor just stares at Aaron, devoid of emotion, as impossible to read as always. The thing is, if you want to consume someone, you have to make room in yourself to hold all of that energy. You have to make space. And what happens to that bit of you that you give away? Sometimes it’s eaten by somebody else.

I can feel Victor inside of me—metaphorically speaking, at this moment anyway—and I know him much better than he thinks I do. His dark eyes slide to mine, studying me.

“I can sleep with any Havoc Boy I want,” I say, and there’s a visible ripple in Victor’s demeanor. He stalks toward me, but I’m not afraid. He just doesn’t scare me.

His hand lashes out, fingers curling around my wrist.

Aaron steps forward, teeth bared in warning.

“I keep trying to let her go, Vic, because I betrayed her, so I know I don’t deserve her. But you know what Bernie and I figured out today? I’m not the hero in the cape anymore. If I want her, I’ll have her. You agreed to that, when you slit her palm with that knife.”

“What’s your point, Fadler?” Vic asks, cocking his head to one side. His entire body radiates with rage, but he doesn’t act on it. He told me I needed to master my anger. How can I argue that, seeing as he’s most definitely got an ironclad grip on his own? “Your girl, my girl. I’m taking her into the bathroom. If I try to talk to you before I do that, I can’t be held responsible for how I behave.”

Victor pulls me away from the kitchen and into the half-bath near the front door.

“Are you insane?” I ask him as he steps inside with me, slamming the door behind us. It’s dark in here, but for a single nightlight. I notice Vic doesn’t exactly rush to turn on the light. Instead, he sits me on the counter, just like Aaron did. Does he know he’s mimicking what happened between us earlier? Not likely.

“I can’t stand the thought of you hating me,” Vic admits, and my brows go up in surprise. He sounds … different, like his voice is fractured in places. Vulnerable and hating it. That’s what he is. “You’ve barely looked at me since the Halloween party. You’re not afraid of me, are you, princess?” Victor growls at me, nuzzling against my neck and making me shiver.

I laugh at him.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I say, curling my fingers around his strong upper arms and digging my nails into his skin, marking him as my property. God help the next girl who thinks she can look at my man, let alone touch him. Because, even if I’m not ready to admit it aloud to him, that’s what Victor Channing is.

Mine.

“Then what? You’re upset about the video, I understand that.” He kisses my neck, and I shiver. “You want to run, because of what I told you. Because I’m selfish and I want you, have always wanted you. Or maybe it’s because of what we did to Aaron? Making him give you up …”

“Victor, shut up,” I snap, and he leans back, curling his lip at me. The nightlight illuminates the room just enough that I can see his teeth, and the shine of his dark eyes. “Yes, all of those things are bothering me. I felt like you betrayed me and honestly … it was almost a worse feeling than watching Neil hurt my sister. Are you stupid or something? I’ve been lusting after Havoc for years, watching you guys for even longer. I’m not going anywhere, not even if you’d truly deserve to see me flee.”

For a few moments, the room is quiet. Then I hear Aaron’s footsteps, moving away outside the bathroom door. He was listening, and I’m glad for it. At least the truth is out there.

“You know it wasn’t just me, right?” Vic asks, and I nod, which in reality just rubs my head against his some more. Primal marking, nuzzling, togetherness. I want more. “Nobody wanted to let you go. They’re all into you, Bernie. All of them. And that terrifies me.” He leans back and exhales. “I haven’t been afraid since I was five and here you come, sauntering in and shattering everything. That’s what you’ve done, Bernie, you’ve ruined me.”

“Good,” I tell him, reaching down to unbutton my jeans. Victor helps me get them off—along with my panties—so he can grind his own denim-clad pelvis against my bare heat. It feels amazing, little aftershocks from Aaron and his body echoing through me. “I like ruined things. Perfect things make my soul and my teeth ache.”

He chuckles at me, desperate and dark, and then lifts his head so that our eyes meet.

“Aaron isn’t the only man in this family I’m worried about. If they get the chance, each and every one of them will try to take you from me.”

“Even Oscar?” I quip saucily. Sorry, but there’s such a thing as stretching reality too far.

“Yes. Even. Oscar.” Victor stares right at me as he says it, each word enunciated and thick with jealousy. “You’re our dark angel, Bernadette.”

I’m flooded with a double sense of disbelief and perverse pleasure at the idea.

Oscar Montauk? No fucking way. Then again, what did he just say to me? Before I left to go with Aaron to the soda fountain … “For what it's worth, this particular incident wasn't just Victor's fault. Some boys just don't know how to share their toys.”

“At the same time, that means they’d all die to protect you. We all would. You know that if we could’ve taken Neil down and kept you safe at the same time, we would’ve?” I nod, but I’m having trouble responding to Victor’s words when his body is singing a siren song that I can’t resist. “If you’re ever in trouble, Bernie, you just call us. You don’t have to say anything, you just let it ring.”

I have no idea why he’s telling me this, especially right now of all times, but it seems important.

“Of course,” I respond, trying to kiss him again, but Vic stops me with a finger on my lips.

“Our safety word is mare’s nest. Do you know what that means?” He doesn’t wait for me to answer; he knows I don’t. “It means bullshit. If you need to tell us something is wrong without alerting anyone else, just say that you need to untangle a mare’s nest.” Victor smirks, his face shadowed and scary in the half-light. “It can also mean disorder, havoc.”

“Telling me all your secrets today?” I ask, choking on a sudden flood of emotion. Between Aaron and that strange flickering feeling, and this push-and-pull with Victor, I’m going to come apart at the seams. I think about Halloween night, about how quick the boys showed up at the house, not long after Aaron and I did.

He must’ve called them in the SUV, before we came inside. Chills creep down my spine at the thought; it’s proof that they think of everything. Speaking of, that stolen SUV was gone when I woke up the next day, like it’d never been. Efficient. I guess the Havoc Boys would have to be, considering they play such reckless games.

I’d still love to know how they managed to get showered up before appearing like shadows in the night. Maybe later though, when my pussy isn’t aching for Vic’s cock.

“I want to tell you everything, Bernie,” he breathes back, sliding his mouth against mine but withholding his kiss on purpose, just to make me squirm.

“Fuck me,” I command, and Vic grins, as sharp as a knife.

“Don’t have to ask me twice,” he snarls, tearing his belt off and tossing it aside. He shoves his pants down his hips like they’ve personally offended him. When Vic tries to grab me and start off on a wild power-fuck the way he does, I stop him with a hand on his chest.

“Condom,” I tell him, looking him dead in the face. The way he snarls, you’d think he was a wild animal. “Now, or no deal.”

“You use a condom with Aaron?” he hisses at me, but I just frown.

“Condom,” I repeat and Vic growls, reaching past me to shove the glass lid off a small ceramic jar that I just assumed held, like, cotton balls or something. Instead, it’s full of condoms.

Wow.

This really was a house run by bachelors, wasn’t it?

Not anymore.

Victor puts the condom on his dick in a way that I can tell he’d murder the latex if he could, drown it in the goddamn toilet or something.

“You are such a bitch,” he purrs as he wraps an arm around my waist and drags me close, pressing my cunt to his hard lower belly. The way he says bitch, though, it’s clearly affectionate.

“How’s this for a boss bitch move,” I begin, adjusting myself and lifting my legs up to put my feet against the side of the doorjamb on one side, and against a shelf on the other. Good thing it’s screwed into the drywall because I’m about to abuse the hell out of it. “Don’t move, Victor. Seriously. Stay where you are.”