Chapter 11
Wild Ones Tip #23
If a Wild One is screaming, just walk away. Trust me, we’re not dying.
LILAH
I walk out after cleaning up, tying my robe as I glare at my soon-to-be dead brothers.
Killian is tapping a bat’s end into his palm, and Hale is propped up on a shotgun.
“I’ll give you one minute to get back to your cabin. One minute before I grab the BB gun. Then I’ll have no mercy,” I warn them.
Killian’s eyes narrow.
“He took your virginity right next door! We heard you!” Hale shouts.
“I wasn’t a virgin, you creep!” I groan.
“Yes. Yes, you were. And you will be again, as long as you don’t have sex for a while,” Hale says with so much conviction that I honestly believe he thinks it’s the truth.
“My hymen will never grow back,” I dryly remind them.
They both turn pale. “Sick! Stop talking about that,” Killian groans.
“Me?! You’re the two baboons who are in my front yard, assuring me that I’ll be a born-again virgin after admitting to eavesdropping on me having sex!”
“You scared the entire forest! We weren’t eavesdropping! Hell, we had pillows over our ears when you were making those nightmarish sounds that will forever haunt us!” Hale barks.
Okay, now that’s kind of embarrassing.
Benson walks out, fully dressed, and they both tense as he pinches the bridge of his nose. “You guys are seriously going to pay for ruining this.”
“You’re going to pay for de-flowering our baby sister!” Hale shouts.
Killian nods as though he agrees with that ridiculous declaration.
“I’m two minutes older than you,” I say to Hale. “And one minute older than you,” I go on, gesturing to Killian. “I’m the oldest.”
Hale sniffs, shoulders straightening. “It’s a man thing, Lilah. Step aside.”
My eyes narrow, but a hand clamps around my mouth before I can say anything. Benson’s body presses up behind me, and I struggle to remove his damn hand.
“Even you two assholes can’t possibly think your sister is always going to be single,” he tells them. They exchange a look as he continues. “She’s beautiful, smart, independent, and she’s honest.”
Okay, I admit I stop struggling to remove his hand for a minute so I can swoon. But it’s brief. I go back to trying to pry that hand off again, realizing just how strong Benson is when it’s a vain attempt.
“And you can’t be oblivious to the fact I care about her. And I’m never leaving Tomahawk. Until now, she’s never been intimate with anyone from Tomahawk. Would you rather her find someone not in this town? Someone who might take her away from it permanently?”
To this, they both pale, as if they hadn’t considered the fact I might ever leave them. Which I wouldn’t. They drive me crazy ninety-nine percent of the time, but they’re still my brothers, and they love me in their own unusual way, just as I love them. I’d never abandon them.
However, Benson is making a point, and my brothers are less aggressive and more passive in the moment. Which is a first.
“That’s what I thought,” Benson says, his lips twitching as he removes his hand. “So are we going to have any more problems?”
Again, the duo exchange a look, doing that silent communication thing they do. Sometimes I’m in on it with them, but usually it’s me silently shouting no at whatever destructive plan I can see brewing.
They look back at Benson, and their eyes creepily narrow in unison. “We’ll have a big problem if you hurt her,” Killian says.
Hale makes a point of slashing a finger across his neck. Benson’s lips twitch.
“Understood.”
They both toss me a glare before walking back to their cabin, but Hale turns around and points at us before he fully retreats.
“No more sex in your cabin. And we’re not fixing that bed again. He broke it this time.”
Then they turn around and leave us in peace.
“Well, that went better than expected,” I say in surprise.
“I cheated by playing on their worst fear,” he says, smirking as he rests his elbows on my porch railing.
He looks sexy on my porch.
Benson Nolans is actually the epitome of sexy, by my definition.
I lean up against him.
“I’d never leave them.”
“I know that now. I didn’t used to, but I do now. You’re true to Tomahawk until you die.”
He flashes a grin at me.
“You too?”
He nods, wrapping an arm around me.
“The worst is yet to come,” I say on a sigh, and his eyebrows furrow. “Aunt Penny is going to find out about this. Then…the pressure begins.”
He rolls his eyes. “It can’t possibly be that bad.”