C85

Indianna forced a smile. "I would never."

Greyson chuckled. "Are you not eating any more, sugar?"

Indianna stared down at the food on her plate, feeling full. She had taken a lot more food than she could manage to consume. She shook her head.

Greyson turned to his sister. "Has she actually eaten a decent breakfast?"

"Greyson, I've eaten!" Indianna argued.

Kirstie rolled her eyes. "Trust your mate, you dick. She ate enough for a whole family."

"Great. In that case." Greyson took Indianna's plate from her and sat down between the two girls, tucking into the remains of Indianna's breakfast.

"We better get organised," Mac said, running his hand along Kirstie's thigh. "We gotta a lot of men to get today."

"No rest for the wicked," Kirstie sighed and jumped up from the floor. "Let's go tear down Rogue's empire, lover."

Mac chuckled and let Kirstie pull him up from the floor. "Let's do this."

"You know," Oscar said, furrowing his eyebrows as he stood up with Kirstie and Max , "you'd think that being the third wheel would get easier when you're constantly surrounded by mates."

Greyson laughed. "Stop whinging and get to work, Oscar."

*

Three hours later Greyson was finalising plans with Ace, Kal and Harry. Figuring out the logistics to getting all of their pack back to the house.

Kirstie, Mac and Oscar had gone and successful captured two men and brought them back to be freed from Rogue's control. They were currently being fed by Laura and recovering from the exhaustion of the rebranding.

Indianna was with Brooklyn, Kimberly, Sasha and Alec, discussing what was going to happen when they left. Brooklyn had yet to call Harry's parents to find out their location. She was sitting with a distant look in her eyes, not present in the conversation. Indianna was worried about her. She didn't know how she was going to function without Harry.

"We're going to have children," Alec said. "We can't drag them through the woods for days. We need to know how far the distance to travel is."

Indianna looked at Brooklyn who was staring, unblinking.

"Brooke," Indianna said softly. "Brooke, we need you-"

"She needs to talk to my parents, doesn't she?" Harry's voice cut off Indianna. He walked up to them, looking at Brooklyn in concern.

"We need to figure out the safest way to get there. And that means we need to know the location," Indianna said. "Harry, is she going to be okay?"

Harry narrowed his eyes. "She'll be fine," he said sharply and crouched in front of Brooklyn, taking her hands. "You'll have their location in five minutes." Effortlessly, Harry pulled Brooklyn up from the floor and took out his phone as they went to an empty corner of the room.

"Babe," Harry murmured. "You're worrying me. Talk to me."

Brooklyn didn't say anything.

"Brooklyn-"

"I'm not broken," she said, her voice hollow. "Don't talk to me like I'm a child, Harry."

"I'm not talking to you like a child, babe." Harry reached up and took Brooklyn's face in his hands. "I'm not saying you're broken, but it's okay if you are."

"I'm just so tired, Harry," she whispered. "I'm exhausted. I can't do this anymore."

"You can."

"Since when were you optimistic?"

Harry smirked and kissed Brooklyn's forehead. "Babe, this is nearly over. You can do this."

"What if I don't want to?" Brooklyn asked, shrugging her shoulders. "What's the point anymore? Dead or alive, he's still going to ruin my life. I can't go a day without thinking about him. I'm done, Harry. I'm done feeling like this. I've put up with feeling disgusted with myself for years and I think that's enough now."

A glare covered Harry's face. "No," he said sternly. "No. You don't get to talk like that. I won't hear it, Brooklyn. You're a fighter. God, babe, you're the most stubborn person I've ever met! You don't get to give up. I won't fucking let you."

"Harry," Brooklyn sighed. "I gave up a long time ago."

"So, pull yourself together. Sort yourself out. I'm not letting you leave here in a matter of days with you thinking like this," he snapped. "You have so much to fight for, Brooklyn. So fucking fight."

"I don't need you yelling at me right now," Brooklyn said, her voice rising. "You think having a go at me is going to make this better? God, Harry, get off me. Let me go!"

"You are not going anywhere, babe," Harry said, catching Brooklyn's hands as she tried to push him away from her. "You're going to fucking talk to me."

"No, because you're just going to yell at me!"

"Like you're yelling at me now?"

"Harry!" Brooklyn groaned in frustration. "Get off me. Seriously, you're not helping-"

"Shut up," Harry demanded. "Babe, shut the fuck up and let me talk."

"Go fuck yourself-"

Brooklyn gasped when Harry pushed her up against the wall, arms pinned above her head and his hand across her mouth. He trapped her legs with his, his hips pressed firmly against hers so she couldn't move. He raised his eyebrows challengingly at her when she glared at him. "Listen," he whispered.

Brooklyn attempted to swear at him from underneath his hand.

"I'm not going to baby you. You don't need someone who doesn't raise their voice or is too soft with you. You need tough love. I know you, babe. I know it drives you insane how well I know you. So, I'm not going to stand there and let you talk like that. I'm going to tell you to shut the fuck up and to fight. I need you to be the girl who infuriates me because she's stubborn. I need the girl who will scream back at me in an argument because she's not scared. I need the girl I love, because right now I'm not seeing her and it's scaring me. If you leave the girl you are now then it may be the last time we see each other because I'm not going to be able to think straight if I'm worrying about you. I need to be able to trust you, Brooklyn. If I trust you then you can trust me to fight the best I can. If I don't trust you then you're going to be the one who kills me. Not Rogue. Not any of his men. You."

Harry let Brooklyn's arm go and he removed his hand from her mouth. She didn't move. She was staring up at him, her expression unreadable. Minutes passed and then Harry recognised a familiar spark in her eyes. Anger.

"You're a fucking asshole," she snapped. "You're not going to die. You don't even get to talk about dying. After all the fucking shit we've been through you are not dying and you are definitely not blaming it on me, Mr! And you are also not dying because that would make me a single mother and I'm not raising this kid without you because I'd probably end up feeding it the wrong thing and killing it and I'm not having two deaths on my hands, thank you very much. So, you're going to live and I'm going to continue to be pissed at you until this is all over so you better not die otherwise I'll never have the chance to make up with you. Now, you're going to fuck off before I slap you and leave me in peace so I can call your damn mother."

Harry smiled.

Brooklyn's nose flared as she glared at him. "Don't smile at me like that! You can't say all that and then smile, you dick!"

"There's the girl that drives me insane," he murmured and kissed Brooklyn fiercely before turning around and leaving her alone.

Brooklyn stared at Harry's back in anger. She wanted to shout, but instead she bit her tongue and took out her phone, dialling Harry's parents.

She tried to calm her voice when the call was answered and she smiled when she heard the familiar voice of Harry's mother.

"Hi," Brooklyn said softly. "It's me. No, I'm okay. Harry's okay. I... I was actually calling to ask a favour."