Until My Last Breath

by Tiffany Patterson

  My eyes popped wide. “How do you even know that word?”

  “Jake says his mom made his dad sleep in a different room for a long time, and now they’re getting a divorce.”

  I frowned. “We’re not Jake’s parents.”

  “But I heard you tell Father he has to sleep in another room.”

  Placing my hand on Carter’s back, I rubbed soothing circles on it. “You don’t worry about your father and I.” I pushed his hair aside with my free hand to kiss his forehead.

  “He was just teaching me to swim.”

  I bit my tongue. Carter loved his father beyond measure, so of course he was going to try his best to protect him, even though he’d been petrified earlier as a result of his father’s actions.

  “Go to sleep, baby,” I whispered and tugged at his ear, causing him to giggle.

  I stayed by his bedside, rubbing his back until he turned his head to face the wall, and his breathing steadied, alerting me that he’d fallen asleep. Quietly, I rose to my feet and padded my way across the carpeted floor, opening the door and slipping out. I stopped abruptly when I came face-to-face with Robert.

  “He’s sleeping.”

  “I was just coming in to check on him.”

  Lifting my chin, I folded my arms across my breasts. “He’s fine.”

  “Deborah—”

  I shook my head. “No, Robert. No,” I stated sternly, walking away and swiftly entering our bedroom, shutting the door firmly behind me.

  ****

  Then

  Robert

  “What?” I barked into the phone as I answered.

  “M-Mr. Townsend, you have a call on line one,” my secretary responded through a shaky voice.

  I pushed my hand through my hair, pissed at the interruption, pissed at the fear I heard in her voice, but mostly pissed at myself for letting things get this damned far. It’d been days since I’d slept in my own bed. Days since my wife said more than a handful of sentences, and fucking days since I’d been able even touch my wife. I was spazzing on just about everyone in my office.

  Earlier in the day, one of my executives had asked me if Deborah had been out of town for the week, because that was the only time when I was on edge. I almost decked him. Luckily, a member of my security staff had stopped me.

  “Tell them I’m busy. They’ll have to call back another time.”

  “Uh, when would you like—”

  “I don’t give a shit! Tell them to call back!” I hung up the phone, not wanting to hear anything more about whoever was on the line.

  “You’re going to regret that.”

  Lifting my gaze from the file on my desk I was trying to work on, I frowned at the six-foot-seven dark haired man, standing in my office’s doorway. “The hell do you want?” I growled at Rick.

  “Our two o’clock meeting.” He gestured to the clock on the wall directly across from my desk.

  I sighed. He was right. I’d hired Rick as the head of Townsend security, weeks after I’d been made CEO. I couldn’t trust any of the previous security staff seeing as how many of them had helped to keep my father’s secrets, or were just highly incompetent. Rick, on the other hand, had proven himself savvy, intelligent, and willing to get his hands a little dirty when things called for it. I’d made him an offer he couldn’t refuse—I allowed him to bring on the entirety of his staff from his own agency, plus have his own opportunity to hire whomever he’d needed to complete the security staff at Townsend. Not only did his security staff ensure the safety of Townsend Industries, but of the Townsend family. There were very few people I trusted taking care of my family. Rick was one of them.

  That thought alone had the pit in my stomach growing larger. Just knowing that I’d somehow endangered my own son’s life, stole my very breath. I didn’t know if that knowledge, or if the look in Deborah’s eyes over the past week, was worse.

  “Want to talk about it?” Rick asked, shutting the door behind him.

  “Mind your damn business.”

  He grunted as he casually strolled toward the chair, sitting in it and crossing his legs, giving me a smug look. He was obviously unintimidated by my attitude. Which was part of the reason I liked him.

  “You can tell me to fuck off. Doesn’t mean I’m going anywhere. I’ve got two more years until I’m fully vested, anyway. Then I can cash out, retire on the beach, and never think about the name Townsend again.” Chuckling, he lifted his hands, clasping them behind his head, and leaned backward as if he was practicing for lounging on the beach.

  “You’ll still be here in two years.” Rick could talk as much shit as he’d like, but I knew he’d retire and be bored inside a month. His ass would be back at Townsend so fast it’d feel like he’d never left.

  “Whatever,” he grunted, sitting up. “This is about Deb and the kid, huh?”

  I gave him a sharp glare that said tread carefully. As grateful and fond of Rick as I was, I didn’t let anyone bring up my family.

  “I’m just saying, you only get that gleam in your eyes when something’s affecting your family. It’s the same one you had when all that shit was going down with the leaks, your father, and that asshole you were friends with who tried to frame Deb.”

  I pushed a few papers on my desk aside, not knowing what to say. He was right, I knew it and so did he. That didn’t mean I was up to talking to him or anyone else about it. But hell, I had no one else to discuss it with, seeing as how my wife wasn’t listening to my reasoning.

  “How the hell are you supposed to know how to be a father when you had a shitty one?”

  Rick’s response was immediate. He grunted and made a disbelieving sound with his mouth. “Hell if I know. Exactly why I ain’t having kids. You can mess those little fuckers up.”

  I frowned. “Don’t curse in my office.”

  He shrugged, unperturbed.

  I went to respond but my desk phone rang again.

  “What?”

  “You have a visitor. It’s Mrs. Townsend,” my secretary stated quickly, likely out of fear of my reaming her out again.

  “Send her in.” I immediately hung up the phone and headed to my office door.

  “Welp, I know when it’s my time to go. Never been one to overstay my welcome, anyway.”

  Despite his size, Rick easily slipped past me on his way out of the door. “Mrs. Townsend,” he greeted, as he and Deborah passed one another.

  “Rick. Good to see you.” Her face was pleasant as she returned his greetings, but as soon as she turned to me, the placid expression she’d been giving me for days returned. At least it was better than the fuck you look she’d been throwing my way for the first two days after Carter ran to her crying.

  She didn’t say anything as she passed me to enter my office. No kiss or anything.

  Sighing, I closed the door behind us.

  “You got off work early?”

  “I did.” Her response was stilted, as she sat in the sofa at the far end of my office, distancing herself from me.

  But I was tired of the distance between us. I moved from the door, to the couch, sitting next to her.

  “You came to see me.”

  She nodded, glancing away from me, out of the floor-to-ceiling window that looked out on downtown Williamsport.

  “I trust you more than anyone in the world,” she murmured, her eyes still turned away from me.

  “You’re going to have to look at me when you say that, princess. Because right now I don’t believe you.”

  She turned to me sharply, her gaze narrowed. “Right now I’m not so sure I believe it either. How could you, Robert? He’s our son. Our baby boy and you nearly watched him drown!” she hissed, but keeping her voice low.

  “He was never in any danger, Deborah.” I’d said it over and over the past five days, but I’d continue to say it until she believed it. “Deb—” I reached for her hands but she snatched them back. That was worse than a slap in the face. My wife had never rejected my touch. Ever.

/>   “You say that, but …” She shook her head.

  “Deborah, I’m his father. You think I don’t know what my son’s limitations are?”

  “He’s just a boy. How can you know what he can and can’t do?”

  “Because it’s my blood that runs through his veins. My boys won’t ever live in fear. They will live with the high expectations we set for them. For all of them. And they won’t give up on their dreams or what they desire out of life simply because they were too pussy to go out and get it.”

  Deborah gasped, her eyes widening.

  “I knew what he could do because I know my boy. Carter wanted to know how to swim. He would stare at that lake every day, obviously toying with the notion of swimming in it. He ventured that far out onto the pier because he knew I was there. I will be there to catch him if he falls, but I won’t handicap my son.”

  “So how do I know you won’t go overboard? That you won’t overdo it and treat him like—” She broke off.

  There was silence as her words settled around me.

  I sat back, staring at my wife’s profile.

  “Treat him like my father treated his own sons.” I felt sick to my stomach saying the words that she refused to.

  But she nodded.

  I stood and removed my suit jacket, feeling hot and exposed. It’d been a question that plagued me from the very first moment I found out Deborah was pregnant. Up until then, there hadn’t been a doubt in my mind that I would become a father. But once it was real, I began to question what kind of a father would I make.

  Repeating the same missteps as Robert Townsend Sr. didn’t sit well with me. I’d seen what his heavy hand could do to weaker men like my younger brother, Jason. My boys wouldn’t turn out like that.

  “I would never lay a hand on my sons.” My voice was stern, hard, and unrelenting. “That is a line I wouldn’t cross.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Would you have married a man who you thought was capable of hurting your children?”

  My heart pounded in my chest as I awaited her answer.

  “Of course not.”

  I moved closer, going to my knee in front of her and reaching for her hands. I was relieved when she didn’t pull back this time around.

  “Princess, I’m going to screw up this parenting thing at one time or another. But never, never would I intentionally place my children in harm’s way. Never would I lay a finger on them, other than to keep them safe and protected. Not everything I teach our boys will you agree with, but trust me when I say, I am doing it for their survival, for their betterment as men. Too many people in this world will try to attribute any accomplishments of theirs to their last name. It’s my job to show them they can’t rest on who and what came before them. They will need to work for everything they desire in this life.”

  “And what’s my job?”

  “To make sure I don’t get out of line.”

  She lifted an eyebrow, eyeing me for a few seconds. Eventually, she leaned forward, cupping my face. “Robert?”

  “Yes?”

  “I love you more than anything in this world.”

  I felt like I could breathe again for the first time in days.

  “But I promise you, I will kill you and anyone else who hurts my kids.”

  Sure, my wife had just threatened to kill me, but the deep chuckle that emerged from my belly couldn’t be stopped. I pressed my lips to hers. Again, she didn’t pull back, further alleviating the ache I’d been carrying in my chest for days.

  “You only have to worry about killing me. Leave anyone else who tries to hurt our boys to me,” I vowed, staring deeply into her eyes.

  She sighed. “Carter asked me this morning if he could go out on the lake to practice swimming this summer.” She paused.

  In a few weeks, Carter’s school year was ending as summer was beginning.

  “I guess his fear of the water is lessening. Maybe he can teach his little brother how to swim.”

  “Yeah, maybe—” Pausing, I pulled back, staring at Deborah. Slowly I lowered my gaze to see her right hand covering her belly. “Are you …”

  “I’ve already chosen his name. Since you insist this one will be a boy, too, his name will be Joshua. Joshua Townsend.”

  And that was how I found out my wife was pregnant with our second son.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Present

  Deborah

  “I appreciate the way that story turned out,” Kayla stated, smiling across the table at Joshua as we sat in their dining area. Kayla held a sleeping Victoria who’d been fussy and clingy all day, likely due to a little cold she was getting over.

  “Carter told me that story,” Michelle said from the other end of the table. She had joined us over Josh and Kayla’s since Carter was working late and their oldest, Diego, was sleeping over his friend Monique’s house that night. Sam, who was nearing eighteen months, was upstairs, in one of the spare bedrooms sleeping. “I remember thinking that sounded completely insane.” She giggled, as did we all.

  I shook my head. “Trust me. I was livid with Robert. But after a few days, I realized it was the emotion of seeing my crying five-year-old son more than anything that had gotten to me. That and pregnancy hormones.” I glanced across the table at Joshua, my second born, but third youngest.

  “Well, Carter’s a hell of a swimmer now, and he did teach me to swim right in that lake,” Joshua added.

  “He’s not doing that to Sam,” Michelle firmly interjected. “Thankfully, Diego can already swim.”

  I wouldn’t put it past Carter or any of my sons. As Robert’d said, they had his blood running through their veins.

  “Carter told me that was the biggest fight you two ever had,” Michelle noted.

  I nodded. “We’ve had plenty of disagreements, sure, but since then, they’ve never risen to the level of me kicking Robert out of our bedroom.”

  “Father was soft by then. There’s no way Kay’s kicking me out of our bed for days.” Joshua’s voice was full of bravado.

  “Try that mess and see what happens,” Kayla quickly retorted.

  Watching the two of them stare one another down, I giggled.

  “That was our biggest fight but it wasn’t the biggest test of our marriage.”

  The room went silent as three pairs of eyes turned to me, silently waiting. With a heavy inhale and deep exhale, I went into the most painful experience in my forty years being married to Robert.

  ****

  Then

  Deborah

  “What did I tell you? Four boys! Carter, Joshua, and now twin boys!” Robert was practically glowing, walking on air as we strolled out of my doctor’s office.

  I was exactly twenty weeks and we’d just gotten our first sonogram. We’d found out weeks ago we were having twins, but a part of me was still unbelieving. Not until seeing the images of two little bodies on the monitor did it really begin to sink in. And yup, just as Robert had been predicting all of these years, both were boys, identical twins. That made four boys.

  “I never doubted you for a second, babe,” I stated sarcastically, as he held the door open for me to get in. He’d opted to drive his Audi Coupe to the appointment instead of being driven in the usual town car.

  “I’m sure you didn’t,” he said before lowering his lips to kiss mine.

  “I’m hungry.”

  He chuckled. “You can have anything you want.”

  “Good, ’cause I want a cheeseburger and fries. Now.” Dammit, if I was carrying twins, I was going to eat whatever I wanted. This would be my last pregnancy. I didn’t know if I was more excited to meet my babies once they were born or just be done with being pregnant forever.

  “We need to think of names,” Robert said as I sat on the couch, chewing away at the cheeseburger and fries we’d picked up from the local fast food restaurant.

  I ignored my husband.

  “Josh, what do you think of the name Billy?” Robert questioned our nearly fou
r year old.

  Joshua’s head popped up from the coloring book he’d been working in, and those blazing green eyes of his narrowed, as he thought. Soon enough, he frowned and shook his head.

  “Agreed,” I said around a stuffed mouth, before swallowing. I wasn’t fond of the name Billy.

  “Their names should start with the same first letter,” I offered, before taking another bite. “This is soooo good!” I exclaimed, causing Joshua to giggle.

  Robert gave me a look. “You don’t allow the children or me in here to eat, yet you’re doing it.”

  I shook my head. “You all make a mess. I’m the one who cleans up after you monsters.”

  “We can afford an entire staff to clean our home daily.”

  I shook my head. I’d been resistant to getting more help with cleaning the house. We had a maid service who came in once a week to clean but that was it. I didn’t want to be one of those women who hired staff unnecessarily just because I could afford it. This was our home, the least I could do was clean it by myself most of the time.

  As that thought past through my mind, Robert sat down on the couch next to me, swiping one of my fries. I leveled him with a glare. He simply tossed me a smirk and a wink.

  “Josh, why don’t you head upstairs to go play with Aaron and Carter,” Robert called.

  Aaron was spending the weekend at our place.

  Josh didn’t protest. He took his crayons and coloring book and went running out of the room, heading for the stairs.

  “How long do you think it’ll be before they’re all arguing up there?”

  “I give it ten minutes,” Robert responded.

  “You’re generous. I say five.”

  “Then we better choose two names quickly.”

  I sighed, taking the last bite of my burger. “I want it to be something with the letter T. For both of their names.”

  Robert nodded and thought a moment. “How about Travis.”

  I mulled the name over in my head, and eventually nodded. “I like it. And Tyler. Travis and Tyler.”

  “Those are our two boys.”

  ****

  “What’s wrong?” I cried out in pain. I was thirty-five weeks and in labor. Severe, sharp pains reverberated through my lower back and down my legs. I had nearly collapsed just trying to walk into the hospital. Thankfully, a nurse quickly met us at the entranceway with a wheelchair. We’d been whisked up to the private wing of the hospital where I’d given birth two times prior. I knew the staff and hospital well. I was comfortable with my doctor and my husband was by my side. But something felt wrong.