by S. Van Horne
“Thank you,” her dad says, looking down at his grandson.
I hear a sniffle and spot my dad wiping away tears. I glance down at Len and smile. I give her a small peck on the lips and lean back on the headboard, taking her with me. We sit and watch as our family gets to know our newest family member.
Twenty-Five
LEN
I start to wake up slowly from my nap. We were so emotionally drained after the morning’s activities that we needed to rest. I find that I take naps more often than I did when I worked at the hospital. I know it’s because my body is trying to adjust to being a mom and getting a balance on my hormones too.
I turn over and see that Dante is still out of it. He didn’t get much sleep last night between Marcus and my nightmares. I decide to let him get more rest. I just need to figure out how to get out of the bed since he has me locked tight in his arms and legs.
I glance over to the small basinet that Ms. Cindy had gotten for me and notice that it’s empty. I start to panic, but then stop, because I’m sure that one of our family members probably snuck in and took Marcus out of the room.
I start to wiggle out of Dante’s arms, and I’m almost free when he tightens his arms and squeezes me into him. I feel his lips on my neck, and I’m instantly turned on.
“Where do you think you’re going, mio tutto? I was having an amazing dream and, since I didn’t get to finish it, you’re going to have to take care of the problem I have going on,” he groggily tells me while he rubs his hard cock against my ass.
“Dante, I need to go and see where Marcus is. Also, the house is full of people. We can’t.” I know it sounds so damn lame because I can’t control the moans that are coming from my mouth.
“Marcus is with OPG. I heard her when she came in and snuck him out of his basinet about forty-five minutes ago. We can be quiet. Come on, Len, it’s been a while since I felt your sweet pussy on my cock. I need it bad.” He chuckles into my neck.
“Dante, it has only been about five hours since the last time we’ve had sex.”
“Like I said, it’s been a while. You know I’m in control in the bedroom so I don’t know why you’re arguing and not getting naked for me,” he murmurs out and bites my neck where it meets my shoulder.
Damn it, he knows my triggers. I decide not to argue with him after that because I’m in dire need of him since he has me all wound up.
I sit up and to take off my clothes. I know it’s almost time to feed Marcus so we’re going to have to make this fast. Just as fast as my clothes are gone, so are his, right before he pounces on me.
He ravages my mouth which makes me grab his hair at the nap of his neck. He’s let it grow out a little while I was gone and I have fallen in love with it.
“Len, this is going to be quick.” He reaches down to test how wet I am. “Fucking soaked.”
He lines up his cock and slams into me. It makes me moan loudly which makes Dante cover my mouth with his hand.
“You have to be quiet. We don’t want anyone to know what we’re doing.” He chuckles in my ear as he thrust hard into my body.
I wrap my legs around his waist and meet him thrust for thrust. It isn’t long before I’m already feeling myself on the verge of falling over.
“That’s right, you’re almost there. I’m going to let you come and do you know why?” he whispers into my ear and I’m too far gone to answer him so he answers for me. “Because I own this body, mio tutto. It was made for me and me alone. I’ll always give you what you need.”
He thrust in two more times, and I fall over the edge. Wave after wave of pleasure washes over my body. I’m vaguely aware of him growling his release in my ear as he empties into my body and then collapses on top of me. We hold each other as we come down from our releases.
“Condom,” I mumble against his chest.
“I got some from Sin earlier, Len. We’re covered.”
A knock on the door makes me jump which makes Dante laugh in my ear.
“Hey, sex addicts, Marcus is starting to get fussy. I think he needs Len’s spectacular breasts,” Sin yells through the door.
This causes Dante to mumble out something I couldn’t make out and causes me to giggle. He jumps up and opens the door butt naked.
“You better not be talking about my woman’s breasts. I’m going to fuck you up for those comments!”
“Dude, you are so easy to get going,” Sin says, snickering out in laugher. “But seriously, you need to get your woman out here to feed your son. Lucky also wants to talk to us about what we’re going to do. We went through the car while you were ‘napping’ so we need to talk.”
I see Dante stiffen at that comment and then look behind him at me. He then nods at Sin and shuts the door.
“Come on, Len, let’s go get our son taken care of.”
I slowly get up and worry about what was found. I have a feeling this isn’t going to be good.
DANTE
I watch Len as she feeds Marcus. Each and every time I see her feeding him makes me fall in love with her a little more.
“Let’s go outside and chat about what we found in the car. We also need to figure out if we’re going to call the detectives or if we’re just going to wait until he’s found,” Eagle quietly murmurs to us.
We all head outside and sit around the table that’s out on the deck.
“Eagle, Sin, and Doc looked into the car. They found papers under the spare tire hatch and something that threw up tons of red flags. Dante, you’re not going to like this.” Lucky pushes a bag my way along with a pair of gloves.
I notice he has gloves on so I grab the pair he hands me and put them on. I open the bag and look inside, and what I see makes me sick to my stomach. Right there on top is a picture of Len when she was about seventeen, naked laid out on what looks like a bed. I get a feeling that she didn’t do this on her own because her eyes look glossy like she’s drunk or high.
I reach in, pull out a few more images, and each one gets worse. There are some that are close ups of her body and some of her laying on a guy. I’m assuming it’s Steven but can’t be a hundred percent certain because his head isn’t in the pictures and no tattoos are visible. There are some of her in her dorm, shower, walking across campus, in the hospital, and tons more of her in town with family and friends.
There are notes about how much he loves her and all about the night when they partied together. He explains how he knew she was the one for him since the moment he laid eyes on her. There are plans on how they were going to get married, have babies, and move to another country so they could help third world countries. There are also notes of how angry he is with her for being with me, and how he’s going to punish her.
We find a detailed list of every man he thinks was after her, and how some of them disappeared. I catch my breath when I see all of our names on here.
“I guess you got to the list of names… We’re dealing with a man who’s not right. He’s obsessed with her, and I have a feeling we’re going to have to get the detectives involved. The question is, do we wait or call them now?” Lucky sits back.
“What list?” Carlo asks while he takes a seat. I glance up and see that Nicoli, Pops and Dad are with him.
"What you're about to see isn't something any of us want to see of Len," Neil warns them.
I don’t say a word as I toss gloves at all of them, and then push the contents towards them. I get lost in thought as the boys get them caught up with what’s going on. I’m not sure what the fuck to do now. I know we need to let the detectives know what’s going on, but I don’t want to just yet. I want to wait and see if we can figure out his next move.
I snap out of it when I hear a roar and hear a chair crash to the ground. I turn towards the noise and see Pops glaring down at the picture in his hand. I have never seen him like this and I’m not only in shock, but also kind of freaking out.
“Pops, take a deep breath and calm down. I kno
w the rage your feeling, but we can’t alert the women right now. We need to figure out what we’re going to do before we question Len about the pictures,” Doc states in a calm voice which also shocks me, because I know he has deep issues when it comes to woman being taken advantage of.
“Calm down? That’s my baby girl, and I couldn’t protect her from the asshole when he kidnapped her. Now I’m finding out he also violated her!” he says through his clenched teeth.
“Trust me if anyone understands that feeling it’s me. My high school girlfriend was raped by her grandpa our senior year, and I didn’t have a clue. She ended up writing me a note telling me about it, and then she took her life. The bastard got off because her family made it look like she was crazy. I understand the feeling of not being able to be there for the one you love,” Doc tells pops in an eerily calm voice.
We’re all staring at him because he’s never told us this. We knew he had issues from the past as well as issues from the mission that made all of us leave the Seals. We just never heard him open up about those issues.
Pops snaps his mouth shut and stares at him. He nods, picks up his chair, and sits back down.
“What I’m wanting to know is, what does he mean by disappear?” Nicoli murmurs while he reads the notes.
“Not sure what Adams meant. We need to do a search of the names and maybe we can put it together. We’re going to have to talk to Len about the names of the guys she was friends with or dated and ask her if any just disappeared. The question is, what do we do with the information once we have it?” Dad pops up after shuffling through some of the images with anger and disgust written on his face.
“I think what we should do is first talk to Len. After we get names we can do an intense search on the secure laptops I brought, and then we can talk about everything,” Sin offers, getting up to get his electronics he brought with him.
“Who’s going to talk to Len?” Carlo asks and glances around the table.
“I suggest Lucky, Doc, and I do it,” Nicoli states, looking at me. I open my mouth, and he holds his hand up, stopping me. “Hear me out, I think she might be afraid to tell you names because of how you get all caveman on her. With Lucky and me, we’re brothers who are protective, but not caveman. Doc can be there to help gage her body language and help us keep her calm.”
I sit back and think about what he’s saying. I know he’s right but I don’t like it. I need to be there to help her through this.
“I agree, and this will give you a chance to go and look over the car with Carlo. Just in case anything else was overlooked. It’s good to get another set of eyes, because once the police get that car, we won’t get the chance to see it again,” Pops says looking over at me.
“Shit! Fine, but the moment you feel she needs me someone better come get me. Understand?” I growl at Lucky.
“Absolutely.”
We all split up and I head towards the shed. I’m not liking the info we found out today. And by the way my gut’s responding to everything, something’s about to happen, and I know it isn’t something good.
Twenty-Six
LEN
I’m dumbfounded at what I just learned from the guys. Seeing the images of me like that just makes me want to run and take a shower. They make me feel so dirty.
I remember a morning where I woke up in a weird room and didn’t know where I was. I felt horrible and couldn’t remember a thing after eating dinner with a group of college friends, and then arriving to the party. Looking at those pictures, I realize I was at the fraternity house, where the party was hosted, and I was in someone’s room. However, I don’t recollect whose room or exactly when I went down stairs. All I remember is waking up and finding Sara knocked out on the couch.
When we talked about that night she told me that I drank a lot, and that I must have passed out. After that night, I didn’t drink at parties anymore, which I really didn’t matter overly much, because I was so wrapped up with school and residency. Now, seeing the pictures in front of me, I have a feeling that I was drugged. It makes me ill thinking that, not only could I have died due to drinking with the drugs in my system, but that I could have been violated even more than I was.
I glance back down at the note in my hand, and a sense of fear washes over me seeing the names on it. I don’t know all of them, but I do know four of them and they are all dead. Three are male friends from college that went missing and one that ended up committing suicide from what the note stated.
“Len, are you sure that’s all that you can think of?” Doc murmurs at me with a gentle voice. It’s like he can sense I’m on the verge of losing my sanity knowing that they could also be victims, and it’s all because of me.
“Yes,” I whimper out.
“It isn’t your fault. Adams is a very sick man. You can’t take the blame for something that he did,” he gently tells me while rubbing my back.
“I know that in my head, but my heart won’t accept that answer. If they weren’t friends of mine, they might still be here and not missing,” I sob out and lean into his shoulder.
“I know, Len, but you can’t take that on your shoulders because it will drag you down.”
I just nod my head, because what else was I supposed to do or say? I don’t know how to get this feeling away from me. Doc picks me up and places me on his lap. He continues to hold me while I sob out on his shoulder. I finally start to calm down and relax from the crying fit I just had.
I hear whispers around me but can’t seem to open my eyes to see who’s talking. I feel strong arms lift me up, and I know immediately they are Dante’s. I relax and drift off to sleep feeling safe in his embrace.
DANTE
I stretch in my seat and rub my hands across my face. I have been staring at this damn laptop for hours, searching for the names that Len gave us. I think back to what I saw when I walked into the house after searching the car and finding nothing that the boys missed.
Seeing her asleep in Docs arms with tear stains on her cheeks, broke my heart. I was pissed they didn’t come and get me when she broke down. Eagle stopped me before I could go off and explained that it happened about thirty minutes before I got there. They were getting ready to grab me when she finally fell asleep.
I ended up picking her up from his lap, carrying her to the bedroom, and holding her before Mom and Momma Connie came in to take my place. I didn’t want her waking up by herself after what happened.
Now, we have been pouring over everything we could find, but we’re still running into dead ends. I’m beginning to think we’re going to have to get the detectives involved.
“Fuck! We’re going to have to call them,” Lucky says as he leans back in his chair.
“I was just thinking that. Why don’t you go and give them a call? Also, have you heard from Mace and Coleman? I’ll let everyone know that we’ll more than likely get a visit from them shortly.”
“Yeah, they have their teams searching for Adams. So far, nothing is popping up.” He stands up and heads off to the edge of the tree-line.
I walk into the cabin and come to a stop at the sight before me. Len is in a rocking chair holding Marcus with a grin on her face. The love that shines from her takes my breath away.
“Anything come up?” At the sound of Dads voice, Len pops her head up.
“I just came to tell you that we’ll have to call the detectives. Nothing’s coming up, and we need their help with this.”
I walk over to Len and kneel down in front of her. I kiss Marcus on his head and then lean up and peck her lips.
“I love you, Len. One more time, mio tutto,” I whisper against them.
“I love you, too. One more time.”
I think about the ring that’s in my bag upstairs. I kept it on me when she was gone because it was what helped drive me to keep going through the files. I decide that, after the detectives leave, I’ll make sure I give it to her. I won’t give her a choice if she’s going to marry me
. She gave up that option when I took her virginity. However, I do plan on making sure I take her to a spot I found in the woods when I ask her to marry me.
“They’re on their way. They weren’t too happy we didn’t call them right after we found Len, but oh fucking well. They’re also going to bring a tow to get the car.” Lucky’s voice breaks my thoughts up.
“Let’s go for a walk along the shoreline while we wait for them,” I murmur to Len.
Nodding, she goes to get Marcus ready to go outside. I rush upstairs and dig in my bag for the ring. I can’t wait anymore.
“What are you looking for?” Lucky says behind me.
“I’m going to put my ring on your sister’s finger finally. Don’t tell anyone, because we both know they’ll follow us just to see the proposal,” I grumble at him.
“About fucking time. I figured you would’ve done that right when you found her. That’s actually why I followed you up here.”
I grunt at his words as I grab the box and shove it into my pocket. I turn towards him, but end up doubled over in pain.
That son of a bitch just punched me in my gut.
“What the fuck was that for?” I groan out in agony.
“For getting my sister pregnant without a ring on her finger. I warned your ass that I was going to get a hit in. I didn’t get a chance to do it before due to the fucked up shit that happened. Let’s call it even now,” he proudly tells me while cracking a huge grin.
“Fucking asshole,” I groan and walk off before I punch his ass.
I meet Len in the backyard and see some of the guys are standing there. I shake my head because I have a feeling they are going to want to jump in on this walk, but that isn’t happening.
“Ready to go for our family walk, mio tutto.” The boys snap their heads at me.
“We were just talking about going for a walk with you,” Eagle says with a sly grin.