by Callie Hart
“Call me if you need me,” I tell her. She nods. Quickly, she gets to her feet and throws her arms around my neck, hugging me. I kiss her on the top of her head, and then on the mouth, deeply, trying to pass some of my strength into her. She doesn’t need it; my angry girl is a badass. At a time like this, though, there’s no harm in sharing a little.
Michael’s on my heels as I leave the hospital. “Do you want me to follow you back? I have my Lexus here.”
“No, it’s fine. Go home. Sleep. You’ve been out all night.”
“You know me. I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”
I slap him on the shoulder, grunting. “I’ll catch you at the gym later.” Fuck telling him that I need a minute to myself. Fuck telling him that seeing that little girl still and lifeless back there has hollowed me out beyond belief. He reads all of these things on me, though. He’s known me long enough to be able to gauge my moods. Michael retrieves his keys from his pocket and gives me a perfunctory nod.
“Later, then.”
I drive the Camaro away from St. Peter’s, and with every mile I put between myself and that place I feel heavier instead of lighter. I want to smash my fists into something—heading to the gym is probably the best thing I can do for myself right now, but I find myself driving in the direction of the warehouse instead. Back to Lacey. We lived together there for a short period of time, but the open rooms, hallway and vast, empty spaces are so full of memories that it sometimes feels like she’s still there somehow, crashed out on the couch, eating her breakfast cereal, watching TV.
My body is on autopilot, my brain somewhere far, far away, and so I smell the smoke before I see it. A thick, chemical tang thickens in the air as I get closer to the warehouse. Acrid and bitter, the smell grows stronger and stronger until my mind finally snaps back to reality, and I see it: the large, billowing plume of dirty black smoke funneling up toward the sky like a tornado right in the middle of the docklands.
I already know where it’s coming from by the distance and the location of the smoke, and I already know what I’ll see when I turn the next corner: the warehouse, burning. The warehouse on fire.
An alarm is drilling the air somewhere close by. It grows louder, piercing my eardrums, when I park up twenty feet from the burning building and climb out of the car.
What. The. Fuck?
The flames have melted the glass in the window frames on the second floor. The roller door at street level that I always keep locked is still chained, but the metal is warped and turned rust-red. It makes a wobbling, popping noise as I take a step toward the place. Inside, a loud crashing sound splits the air, as something collapses—a support beam or an internal wall.
The fire is well established. Must have been burning for some time. There are no fire trucks or police parked up out front, though. Everyone around here knows better than to call 911 in a situation like this. Who’s to say what the fire fighters or the cops would find in a building like mine. No, the people on the docks are all too aware I’d skin them alive if I found out they’d placed that call, so no one has dialed, and so the building has burned.
The heat from the furnace is almost unbearable. It feels as though it will melt the skin from my bones as I get closer and closer. A huge crack, from the roof down to the very foundations of the building, has rented the main wall almost in two. Inside, every stick of furniture, every book, every single possession Lacey ever brought home with her, is being eaten by the flames.
Motherfucker.
There is absolutely no way in hell this happened on its own. Someone started this. Someone purposefully poured the gasoline and lit the match. When the fire crews eventually do show up, they’ll report that this fire was the result of faulty wiring, or a leaky gas line. They won’t want to involve themselves in business that doesn’t concern them. They’ll find it, though—the accelerant, the device, or the incendiary projectile that was used to cause this inferno—and they’ll then pretend like they know nothing about it.
I know, though. I know someone has taken it upon themselves to declare war, and I have a feeling I know perfectly well who that was.
My suspicions are confirmed when I notice the chunk of metal sticking out of the roller shutter. I don’t know how I missed it—the sharp wedge of steel jammed into the shutter, almost buried up to the hilt. A butcher’s cleaver. The wooden handle itself is on fire, blue flames biting and licking at it. There might as well be a note attached to it, saying ‘courtesy of the Barbieri family.’
Roberto Barbieri, also known as the Butcher of Brooklyn, obviously received my gift. I had doubts Milo would survive the three-day journey back to New York with barely any food or water to keep him going. Obviously he did, though. This is the backlash. Roberto Barbieri clearly didn’t like how I rearranged his boy Milo’s face, or fractured his ribs, and so he has sent a little message of his own in return. This is how feuds begin. One side pokes first, and the other responds. A lifetime of tit for tat ensues, culminating in a generation of blood and death that consumes both parties.
And I’m about to jump in with both fucking feet.
You don’t pitch battle against a guy like me and expect there to be no fall out. You don’t come into my city and fuck with my home, and expect to sleep soundly ever a-fucking-gain. I won’t tolerate it. I won’t allow it. This is only the beginning. If I let this slide, Barbieri will own Seattle. He won’t come here and rule it himself. He will send someone in his stead, and I’ll forever be looking over my shoulder.
So it comes to this. A war, after all. Seattle is my home. It’s where I grew up. It’s where I met Sloane. I’ve walked these streets my entire life, and I won’t give them up now. Blood will stain my hands again. Death will come circling above my head.
As I watch the hungry flames demolish what is left of the warehouse, steel hardens in my veins. Those motherfuckers will wish they’d never heard the name Zeth Mayfair. I swear, they’ll wish they’d never been born.
Chapter Twenty-One
SLOANE
Mason weeps over his sister. It’s the most awful, heartbreaking thing I’ve ever seen. I stay with him until he’s so exhausted he can barely keep his head up, and then I drive him back to the house. He tries to put up a fight, says he ought to stay with Millie, ought to go back to his own place, but we both know he doesn’t really want to be alone right now. The house is empty when we arrive. I show him where the shower is, along with the spare room, and I tell him to make himself at home. He washes up and then collapses on the bed, falling into a deep, much needed sleep. Sleep is going to be his best friend for the next few weeks. If he’s asleep, it means he doesn’t have to face reality. He can switch everything off. He can still dream that Millie is alive and everything is okay.
The afternoon slips away. I don’t call Zeth. I saw how the events of the past twenty-four hours affected him—he needs some time to process. And so do I.
He stayed with me while I treated Millie. He refused to leave either me or her at every turn. When she died, he helped me to face the truth, and then he held her with such tenderness for hours. He brushed her hair and he rocked her, whispering to her…and I could see it. I could see the father in him.
Granted, it was a tragic situation and his actions were driven by sorrow for the young girl who lay dead in his arms, but it was there to see, plain as day—the soft, fragile, gentle, kind part of him that would make him a great father. I was scared before. Scared that the wild, dangerous parts of his life would mean he couldn’t connect with anything but the savage aspect of his nature. I know now, with an unwavering certainty, that that’s not the case at all.
A calm has settled over me. A heavy, relaxed state of peace. I’m not afraid at all anymore. I know we can do this. I know we can have this baby. It won’t be easy. There will be times when I worry I’ve made the wrong decision, I’m sure, especially when it comes to having to take a step back from work, even if it’s just for a little while, but in the long run things are going to be just fine.
Now, thank god, the panic and the fear that has been hanging over me like a dark cloud for the past few days has gone. I don’t know how I would have borne it on top of the bright, stinging ache I carry in my heart for Millie and for Mason right now. It would be too, too much.
I must fall asleep. When I wake, it feels like hours have passed. Zeth’s crouched by the side of my chair, and he’s slowly stroking his hand up and down my arm. “Hey,” he whispers. He smells strange, like burned plastic or singed hair or something. A dark, sooty line runs across his cheekbone and down, ending just above his jawbone.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“Fire. The warehouse is gone,” he says. “I stood there and watched it burn until the flames went out. An empty shell…that’s all that’s left.”
“Holy shit. Are you okay? No one was inside?”
He shakes his head. “I’m fine. No one was inside.”
I just stare at him, trying to figure out what this news means. Zeth watches me with unreadable eyes, his mouth drawn into a tight line. He’s furious, I can feel the anger sizzling off him, but I can’t quite figure out what he’s thinking. “This wasn’t an accident?” I ask.
“No. The Italians.”
My relief from earlier this afternoon disintegrates. This is bad news. Really fucking bad news. Why is this happening now? Of all the times for things to blow up in our faces, now is the worst possible time. Only a matter of mere hours have passed since I talked myself into thinking having a child would be an okay thing for us. More than okay; it would be a good thing. And now I see that familiar spark of darkness in Zeth, and everything I told myself is turning out to be a lie.
“Sloane…” Zeth takes my hand in his and brings it to his mouth, pressing the back of my hand against his lips and leaving it there. He seems to be thinking. Then, he says, “I have to go to New York.”
My stomach plummets like a stone cast into deep water. “Why?”
“You know why. I can’t let this go unanswered.” He growls, his voice filled with fury. “If I don’t do something about them setting the warehouse on fire, they’re gonna set this place on fire next. Probably while we’re in our fucking beds. I won’t let that happen. I’m not gonna let anyone hurt you. Ever. I’ll kill every single last one of those motherfuckers before they lay so much as a finger on you. That means I have to go to New York.”
“Let’s just leave Seattle. Let’s…let’s go to New Mexico. Stay with Rebel and Alexis.” I’m scrambling, desperately trying to reason him out of this. He can’t go to New York. If he does, he probably won’t be coming back, and then what? The mafia isn’t just one guy surrounded by an entourage of minions who can’t think for themselves. These guys have a hierarchy. If Zeth kills the head of the family that is challenging him right now, the problem doesn’t go away. Someone else picks up the reins, and they’ll be seeking revenge as well as trying to assert their power. Zeth will be torn to pieces, and I’ll be alone here in Seattle, stranded, maybe in danger too, and I won’t have a clue how to live without him. It looks like my suggestion has pissed him off though, because his expression is stormy, his shoulders pulled back.
“I don’t run from fights, Sloane. And I sure as shit don’t run to Rebel. You’re barely speaking to your sister. You’d fucking hate it in New Mexico.”
“Not as much as I’d hate it if you were dead.”
He rocks back onto his heels, his eyebrows rising slowly. “You think they’d kill me? What makes you think I wouldn’t destroy all of them for what they’ve done?”
“You could. You might, but what if you don’t? If you die, Zeth, I die.”
This stops him in his tracks for a moment. “If they did kill me, Michael would protect you,” he whispers. “You wouldn’t die.”
“I’d die because I wouldn’t want to live anymore, you asshole! My life would be over without you in it. I couldn’t—I can’t even—” Tears have filled my eyes, clouding my vision. I can barely see him anymore. It’s fortunate because I don’t want to look at him. I want to screw my eyes shut and pretend this isn’t happening. Not today. Not with Mason upstairs, broken and in pieces, and the rest of the world falling down around our ears.
Zeth makes a growling sound, deep in his chest. It’s so deep, filled with such frustration, that I can practically feel it vibrating through the chair. “You know me, angry girl. I can’t just look the other way.”
“Not even for me?” His jaw is set. I can see him warring with how he is going to respond to that question. “Jesus, Zeth. If not for me, will you do it for your unborn baby?”
The words hit him hard, like a slap to the face. He blinks, jerking, his back ramrod straight. He holds his breath, his lips pressed tightly together. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. What have I done? I shouldn’t have blurted it out like that. I should have told him as soon as I found out myself, I know that, but I needed the time to think. And now I just let the news burst out of me like that? It feels like time is standing still.
I can’t gauge the look on his face. Is he happy? Is he angry? God, he just looks confused. He slowly rises to his feet, so that he’s towering over me. “You’re pregnant?” His voice is low and soft, like he’s scared to form the shape of the words with his mouth, let alone allow them past his lips.
I nod.
He’s not happy. I cover my face with my hands. I can’t breathe. I can’t fucking breathe. I love this man so much. He is the blood that keeps my heart pumping. The oxygen that fills my lungs. The balm that soothes my soul. If he hates me for this, if he resents me, it will shatter me into pieces.
“How?” He says the word quietly, the sound of it weighty and resonant in the still air.
I explain about the antibiotics. “I’m sorry. I was sick. I should have remembered. I was so busy with work, though. When I started throwing up, I thought it was still the flu, and then…then I realized what had happened, and…”
“How long have you known?”
“Four days,” I whisper. Zeth doesn’t move. I wish he would. I wish he would pick something up. Throw something. I wish he would speak. Shout. Laugh. Cry. Anything. I need to know what he’s thinking. Either way, good or bad, I just want to know, so we can deal with it. He just stands there, staring, though. The muscles in his arms keep twitching, the tattoos marking his skin shifting as he fights to figure out how to stop his body from trembling.
“Zeth—”
He turns around quickly, picks up his leather jacket from the coat rack, and then he storms out of the house, slamming the door behind him. The house rings with the sound, echoing like a shotgun.
Oh shit. Fuck, shit, fuck.
I lean forward, bracing myself against my knees, trying to slow down the frantic racing of my heart. Now I really can’t breathe. I can’t even form a coherent thought.
He—he didn’t—he didn’t even say anything. How? How could he just leave without breathing one word to calm me, to make me feel better? How could he have stood there for all of those drawn out seconds and be able to hide his reaction so well? He’s angry. He’s angry and he hates me for this, I just know it. God, I can’t fucking breathe. I can’t fucking—
The door swings open again, ripped open so violently that it’s a miracle it remains attached to its hinges. Zeth storms back into the house like a force of nature, a whirlwind, unstoppable, charged and snapping with energy. He throws his jacket onto the ground, coming to a stop three feet away from me.
“You’re pregnant,” he says, running his hands through his hair. It’s a statement this time, not a question. “You are pregnant. With a baby. With my baby.”
“Yes.” He’s not implying that I’ve been sleeping with someone else, and there’s a chance it’s not his. I can tell by the stunned look on his face that he’s just trying to get his head around the concept. I’ve had a couple of days to let this news settle in, after all, and it still has me reeling. It’s understandable that he’s so stunned.
“This…I wasn’t expectin
g this,” he says. “We never spoke about children, Sloane.”
“I know. It was a shock to me too, believe me.”
“How far along are you?”
“Not long. Only three weeks.”
He nods. Nods, and then starts pacing up and down. His fingers are still buried deep in his hair. “And…you…” He blows out a deep breath. Shakes his head. Growls under his breath. I’ve never seen him like this. He doesn’t know what to say. How to say it. I can already hear the words, though.
I put him out of his misery and voice them myself. “And I want to keep it?”
He freezes, eyes locking onto mine. The tips of his ears are bright red. “I know you’re not going to get rid of it, Sloane. I just want to know if…” He scowls, clenching his hands into fists. Frustrated isn’t the word for his emotional state right now. It’s something bigger, something more than that, but I just can’t seem to put a name to it. He sinks into the armchair opposite me, his head hanging, chin almost touching his chest. He looks defeated.
“I want to know how you feel about it,” he says, rushing the words out. “I want to know if having a baby, having my baby, is something you think will make you…happy. Can you…can you see it? In your head?”
He’s never looked more vulnerable. God, I want to rush across the room and throw myself at him, but Zeth handles his feelings in strange ways. He won’t be able to cope with me mothering him. He’ll reject it. He needs me to give him time to get his words out, and he needs me to answer him as plainly and simply as I can. So I do.
“Yes. Yes, I can see it. I can see it all. I want this baby. He’s half of me and half of you. How can I not want that? I was scared to even think about it for a while, I’ll admit it, but I know now. This isn’t planned, and the timing sure as hell isn’t right, but I know we can make it work. If you’re here with me, we can do anything.”