Heart Recaptured (Hades Hangmen, #2)(54)

“That man was a Diablo, a biker rival, and it seemed for years after, the two clubs were at war. I was brought up away from the club with an aunt across town, and Ky would come and visit me again, becoming the brother I always dreamed of.”

Elysia sat forward and pressed her fingers to her temples. “Something bad happened to me a while back. I was in a relationship with a guy and… I’m sorry, but I can’t talk about it.”

“Please, don’t apologize,” I replied. “I know how that feels.”

Elysia cast me a grateful smile and said, “Anyway, Ky and Styx helped get me back without involving any of the Hangmen. But I was in a bad way and some dangerous people were still looking for me… still are looking for me.”

My eyes widened and I drew in a breath. Elysia noticed and gestured to the ranch. “Ky bought me this ranch, where no one would find me, and I’ve been here ever since.”

“And your father?” I asked.

Elysia shrugged. “Him and the old prez, Styx’s dad, were killed last year in yet another Diablo war. In a way, their deaths, along with that of the Diablo prez and VP, produced a truce among the new officers of the clubs.” Elysia sat back in her chair and began rocking. “There’s only me and Ky now. He has the club; I have this place, rearing horses and running my ranch in solitude.”

I rocked in my seat, reeling from what Elysia had told me. Poor Ky and poor Elysia, coping with so much loss.

“My father, Ky’s father, wasn’t a great man, Lilah,” Elysia abruptly said, casting a glance back inside the cabin, I supposed checking Ky was not nearby.

Happy everything was quiet, she added, “He brought Ky up in the outlaw life and filled his head full of ‘ideals’ that were stupid. The biggest one being that women were nothing more than holes to be f*cked.”

I gasped at the crudity and Elysia cringed in agreement. “Fucked up, ain’t it? But that was Big Poppa Willis. Pussies are to be licked good and f*cked hard—never worshipped, and I’m afraid to say it, but Ky has lived exactly that life. I thought he was still living that life…” Elysia leaned over and touched my hand, my eyes staring into hers. “Until he brought you here yesterday, and I see how entranced he is by you.”

My stomach flipped at what Elysia was saying.

“You’re different for him, and I’m so f*ckin’ happy about that.”

“You are?”

“Yeah, darlin’, I am. Ky has this ‘live life to the full’ attitude, but I knew he wasn’t always gonna stay that way. In outlaw life, without a good woman by your side, you become jaded, bitter, and in the end, f*ckin’ miserable or dead. I never wanted that for my brother. But I worried he wasn’t ever gonna settle down.” Elysia freed my hand and commenced rocking once again. “This morning was the first morning I woke up and didn’t feel that immediate sense of dread wondering if he was okay.” She threw me a smile. “That’s because I know he now has you.”

Warmth spread through my body and I could feel my face blush. “And who do you have?” I tentatively asked.

Elysia lost her smile. “No one yet, and maybe no one for a while, but one day, I hope to have a man that loves me, protects me. Makes me feel safe.” As Elysia said each of those words, love, protect, and safe, Ky immediately came to mind.

I had found it with Ky. I had experienced what Elysia held as ideal.

“Until then, I got my ranch, a good vibrator and a lotta batteries,” she joked. I smiled, but had no idea what she was talking of. I did however, see the yearning for a love of her own in her soft eyes.

Footsteps suddenly pounded on the cabin floor, and within seconds, Ky burst through the door, shirtless, still only wearing his leathers.

His face was tight as he searched the porch, then his eyes relaxed when he spotted me. “Baby, there you are.” He breathed a sigh of relief. Just hearing that endearment spill from his lips made me feel so alive and my heart began to race.

“I came to watch the sunrise and hear the birds sing,” I said, and he shook his head, smirking, walking straight to me, scooping me up in his arms, pressed an owning kiss to my lips and sat me down on his lap. I stiffened in shock at the bold gesture, but Ky did not feel it or downright ignored it.

His hands immediately went into my hair and he pressed his lips to the side of my neck. I had to clench my thighs together at the explicit feelings his touch stirred in my core. Ky must have sensed my reaction, for his nostrils flared with need, and our eyes met, the same magnetic attraction evident between us.

A cough sounded, and we both met eyes with Elysia. “Nice to see such a scene, big brother, but remember I’m your sister and there is such a thing as too much!”

Ky mock saluted and my head fell to his chest. I could not help but remember the life Ky had lived, losing his mother, being brought up to believe that being loving toward a woman was wrong. Robbed of his childhood, his life was filled with violence and war. I realized, in these respects, we had not been so different after all. I felt even closer to him this morning, discovering aspects of his life, him holding me in his arms and never letting me go.

Without conscious thought, I reached down and took his hand in mine. I could feel the shock in Ky at my gesture, but he simply wrapped his fingers around mine.

I could get used to this, I thought. I could get very used to this.