[2017] Melting Steel

by CM Seabrook

  “Sit down.” Becca pats the chair beside her, brows furrowed.

  “I’m so sorry about all this.” I rub the back of my neck wearily and sit down.

  “It isn’t your fault.”

  I shrug, knowing she’s wrong. “Is Asher coming?”

  “I told him not to.” A small frown tugs at her lips and she lets out a long sigh. “It’s over between us.”

  I look at her, horrified. Only a few hours ago she was standing at the altar ready to commit her life to him.

  More guilt consumes me.

  “Don’t do that.” Becca takes my hand and squeezes it gently. “Don’t blame yourself. Asher wasn’t right for me. I just didn’t want to see it.” She sighs and swipes at a tear that falls over her cheek. “But Henry did. God, he can be so controlling. Bossy. Sometimes I forget he only wants to protect me. I should have listened to him.”

  And because of me, she might lose him.

  “You know, when the first bullet fired, Asher actually hid behind me. It was Henry that pulled me down. Made sure I was safe.”

  “He took a bullet for me.” The words don’t seem real. “Who does that?”

  “Henry.”

  “Yeah.” My Knight.

  Becca tilts her head, a sad smile curving her lips. “When we were kids, he always had to be the hero, saving me and Abby from some imaginary bad guy. Always the protector.”

  A memory of a dark-haired boy and his sword flashes in my mind. My champion. The slayer of dragons.

  “You knew about Abby,” I say, already knowing the answer. “That he wasn’t the baby’s father?”

  Becca nods, eyes clouding over in memory.

  “When the rumors started, Abby begged him to go along with it. I never really understood why he did. To protect her I guess. But after she…when she took her life, everyone pointed their fingers at Henry. I think he started to believe the accusations. That her death was his fault. There was a long time when I thought I would lose him too…until you.”

  And now we might both lose him.

  My breath catches in my throat and I look away, unable to meet the acceptance in her gaze. I deserve her anger, not her support.

  “He’s going to be all right.” Becca places her hand on my shoulder.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I know my brother. He’s a fighter. And he has a lot to live for. He has you.”

  My fist tightens on the ring box. “He was going to ask me to marry him.”

  “I know.”

  “I’ve never believed in happily ever after. Not until him. And now–” A small sob lodges in my throat.

  “Don’t let your mind go there. Not until we know what’s going on.”

  I nod, knowing she’s right.

  “Miss Caldwell?” The muscular, tattooed male nurse that seems to have taken a personal interest in Becca, stands over us, holding two pairs of scrubs.

  “Do you have news? Is Henry…is he okay?” My voice cracks on the last word.

  “Sorry. I haven’t heard anything,” he says, blue eyes stoic. “I thought you two might be more comfortable in these.

  I glance down at my blood-stained dress and cringe.

  Henry’s blood.

  In the restroom, I lean with my palms on the cold, white ceramic sink, and I glance at my reflection.

  A nightmare. That’s what this is. A cold, hellish nightmare that I can’t wake up from.

  “He’s going to be all right,” I say to my reflection, but there’s no certainty in my voice, because nothing in my life is ever all right. Just a chaotic, broken mess.

  He was my forever, and yet I was quick to run, to believe the worst in him. Now I may never get the chance to tell him I love him. That I want to be his. To have his child.

  God. I touch my stomach. His baby.

  I didn’t realize until now how much I wanted it. To be his wife. Be a family. I was just too scared to admit it. Too afraid to give my heart to someone completely. Afraid that losing him would destroy me.

  A humorless laugh escapes my lips.

  I was right. The pain is unbearable. But the love he’s given me. The acceptance. It’s worth the jagged torment that cuts through my heart and soul, leaving me exposed and bare.

  One more day.

  One more kiss.

  One chance to tell him I love him.

  Please. I say a silent prayer to whatever god is listening. I won’t be a coward any longer. Just let him live.

  Chapter 30

  Henry

  Relief swims in the blue eyes that look down on me. The most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen. My angel. My Keeley.

  “You stayed.” My voice is gravelly.

  “Of course, I stayed.” A single tear rolls over her cheek.

  Wires and tubes are attached to my hand when I reach up to touch her face, wiping the moisture away with my knuckles.

  What cuts me up is the fear she tries to contain.

  “You saved me,” she says, holding my palm against her face.

  “And you said yes.” It’s the last thing I remember before I lost consciousness.

  “Yes.” She hiccups over a sob.

  “Hey.” I try to sit up, wanting to comfort her, but pain shoots through my shoulder. Fuck. Getting shot hurts like a bitch.

  “I’m sorry. I’m okay. I just…” She closes her eyes and takes a few steadying breaths. “I thought I was going to lose you. I…”

  “I know, sweetheart.” I bring her hand to my lips and kiss each knuckle.

  Catching her lip between her teeth, I see her warring with the unsaid sentiment.

  “Your brother, is he okay?”

  “They took him into custody.”

  “We’ll get him the help he needs.” The help Abby should have gotten. Drew’s young. With therapy and medication, he may be able to function normally. But one thing is certain, I won’t let him anywhere near Keeley, until I’m absolutely sure he won’t harm her. Physically, mentally, or emotionally.

  She’s my first priority. Always.

  “Sarah, John’s wife was here earlier.” Keeley brushes her hair behind her ear and glances down at the floor.

  “Shit.”

  “It’s okay. She’s a victim in all this.” Her eyes cloud over slightly.

  “What did she want?”

  “To hear the truth from me. I don’t know if it helped.”

  Fuck. I wish that I’d been there for her. I don’t want her to have to deal with anything alone ever again.

  “I’m so sorry.” Her voice is broken, ragged, laced with guilt. “For everything.”

  “None of this is your fault.”

  “Maybe not. But if you’d never met me–”

  “If I’d never met you I’d be lost, broken, missing half of my heart.”

  “God, I love you,” she says on a sigh. Her eyes widen when she realizes what she said.

  A lump knots at the base of my throat. “I love you too, Keeley.”

  “It’s enough.” She fidgets with something in her hand and I realize it’s the ring box.

  “What’s enough sweetheart?”

  “You. Us.” Her voice is soft, gaze downcast, and I can tell it takes everything within her to say the words.

  I hold my breath, watching as her steel fortress melts away.

  Exposed.

  Raw.

  Brave.

  She stands before me, giving me everything – her heart.

  I curse the pain that slices through my chest when I reach for her, but I need to hold her.

  “You’re going to open your wound,” she says, when I pull her down beside me.

  “I don’t care. I need to feel you.”

  Curling beside me, she rests her head on my good shoulder and mumbles, “Strength and warmth.”

  “What?”

  “When I’m with you the emptiness disappears. The darkness goes away. I promised…” Emotion makes her voice crack. “I swore that if you pulled through this, I wouldn’t be afraid
anymore.”

  I hooked my knuckle under her chin, forcing her to look at me.

  “It’s okay to be afraid sometimes. Shit, when I saw the look in Jax’s eye when he had the gun pointed at you...I’ve never been so fucking scared in my life.”

  “You saved me.”

  “I promised I would.” I grin. “Just took me twenty years to do it.”

  She laughs softly.

  A warm ache fills my chest.

  “I love that sound.”

  “What?”

  “You. Happy.”

  “You make me happy.”

  I nuzzle my nose into her hair, and breathe in the sweet scent of her.

  Her body stiffens slightly.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I have to tell you something.” There’s tension in the words that make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  She tucks her chin into my chest.

  “Keeley, look at me.”

  She winces, but obeys.

  “Tell me.”

  “I had one of the nurses run a blood test. I didn’t know, and I wanted to be sure before I told you.”

  “Are you sick?”

  “No. I’m pregnant,” she blurts out.

  Pregnant?

  I choke over the swell of emotion. “Fuck.”

  “Are you mad?”

  “No. God. Of course not. Just shocked.” I brush my knuckles over her cheek and study her. I know the fears she’s kept locked inside her. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes.” Her eyes cloud for a moment, but just as quickly the brightness returns. “Scared. But in a good way.”

  Courage. Hope. Love. I see it in her eyes.

  I press my lips against hers. Just that small contact and my cock twitches. Desire swells. I’ll never get enough of her.

  “How long before I’m out of here?”

  As if sensing the need stirring within me, she chuckles. “A couple days at least.”

  “Shit.”

  “I’ll make it up to you…” Her tongue darts out over her bottom lip and the look she gives me makes me groan. “When we get home.”

  Home. It’s the first time she’s called it that. I grin down at her and sigh.

  Her smile matches my own as she snuggles deeper into my hold, threading her fingers through mine.

  “I’m so tired.” She yawns. “But I don’t want to leave you.”

  “Close your eyes.” It dawns on me that the sky is dark outside my window, the moon high in the sky. My body is washed in fatigue, my eyes heavy. “You can sleep in my arms. Where you belong.”

  “Henry?” Her voice is light.

  “Yeah?”

  “I love you.”

  My chest tightens.

  Maybe the bullet pierced more than my shoulder, because if this isn’t heaven, I don’t know what is.

  She’s my life now. Every beautiful, broken, part of her.

  Mine.

  “I love you too, sweetheart.”

  Epilogue

  Keeley

  Six years later…

  “Mama, mama. Look what Daddy gave me.” A whirlwind of dark hair runs into the bedroom and jumps on the bottom of the bed, swinging a wooden sword.

  Lily squirms in my arms, chubby fists reaching for her brother.

  “My girls are finally awake.” Henry saunters into the room, dark hair mussed. Even now, he takes my breath away. His knuckles graze my cheek, before he leans over and kisses my forehead, eyes filled with an emotion only reserved for me.

  Warmth and strength.

  Harrison drops to his knees beside me and holds out the old wooden sword. “Look Mama.”

  “I see.” I gaze at my beautiful boy. Already so big and so much like his father.

  “I’m going to be a knight and fight dragons.”

  “Like your daddy.”

  Harrison tilts his head and blinks up at Henry, eyes wide. “You were a knight?”

  “The bravest,” I say.

  Henry sits beside me on the bed and wraps an arm behind my shoulder, so that my back is resting against his chest.

  “I’m going to be brave too,” Harrison says, giving me a toothless grin. “And keep you and Lily safe, cause that’s what knights do, right Daddy?”

  A soft chuckle rumbles from his throat. “That’s right. We fight for love. That’s what makes a hero.”

  Harrison grins so wide I feel it right in the center of my chest.

  My little knight.

  Lily babbles and crawls to Harrison. He makes a funny face and she gives a full-chested baby laugh.

  Love. It’s the most precious gift.

  I never thought it was possible to love so much, to be loved.

  Henry threads his fingers with mine and nuzzles his nose in my hair.

  “So damn, beautiful,” he whispers, sending a thrill down my spine.

  My champion.

  My hero.

  My husband.

  I never imagined life could be more than just surviving. But it’s so much more. Love is living.

  And I have more love than any person deserves.

  There are some wounds that still haunt me, maybe always will. But no one survives a battle without a few scars.

  I smile and glance around at my family, heart full.

  Fairy tales do exist.

  Sometimes you just have to fight a few dragons to get your happily ever after.

  About the Author

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  Amazon bestselling author C.M. Seabrook writes hot, steamy romances with possessive bad boys, and the passionate, fiery women who love them. Swoonworthy romances from the heart!

  For more information:

  www.cmseabrook.com

  chantelseabrook@gmail.com

  Also by C.M. Seabrook

  Men with Wood Series

  Second Draft

  Second Shot

  Irish Rockstar Series

  Wild Irish

  Tempting Irish

  Taming Irish

  MMA Series

  Fighting Blind

  Moody

  Standalones

  Melting Steel

  Wild Irish

  Chapter 1

  Delaney

  “Sharp left, wide right,” I mutter, knuckles white as they grip the steering wheel, repeating the only driving instructions the lady at the rental counter gave me when I arrived in Dublin.

  Muscles tense, fingers tingling with nerves, I swallow past the enormous lump in my throat and try to remember to stay to the left without hitting the stone wall and bushes that were built perilously close to the side of the road.

  I’ve been driving for two hours on what my phone’s GPS claims to be a highway. Highway, my ass. There’s barely enough room to fit two cars going each way.

  I cringe when my phone tells me to take another roundabout in two point two kilometers.

  As if driving on the wrong side of the road isn’t difficult enough, they had to make up their own measurement system, and have you drive in death-trap circles every hundred feet.

  I shouldn’t be here. Not alone. This was supposed to be Maeve’s trip. Not mine.

  She’d been planning every detail since she was sixteen. She’d just never been healthy enough to ever take it.

  Now, she never will.

  A wave of grief washes over me, and I have to blink back the tears before they threaten to blur my vision.

  It’s one thing to lose your best friend, it’s a whole other level of grief when she’s also your sister.

  I turn the radio on, needing the distraction, but it seems like every damn channel is playing the same song.

  “I see her face. Blurred by time. Arms outstretched, but never mine.” The voice is pure Irish brogue, deep and sexy, but the words are gut-wrenching, playing with my already fragile emotions. “Let the Irish rains wash away yer tears. Let me kiss away yer pain…”

  A small, almost hysterical laugh rumbles in my throat. If only it were t
hat easy.

  “Come to me, my love. I’m waiting on the shore. It’s safe in yer harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.”

  Safe.

  What a joke.

  There’s nothing safe, nothing absolute in this world. Not the job I worked my ass off to get, or the sweet, well-spoken guy I allowed into my heart, and especially not the doctor’s prognosis that my sister would get better.

  I lost them all.

  One heartbreak after another.

  So, I packed my bags, bought the first ticket out of O’Hare International, gave my cheating fiancé his ring back, and decided to finally do the one thing my sister made me promise – cross off every adventure on her bucket list.

  I pull out the folded note from my pocket, and clutch it to my chest.

  “If something happens…” She’d placed it in my hand before her surgery. That list had gone everywhere with her. All of her dreams scribbled down on a damn piece of lined paper. “If I can’t…”

  “You’re going to be fine.”

  “Promise me.”

  I’d made the promise. Not because I’d thought she wouldn’t make it, but because I believed with all my heart she would.

  Live your life for both of us, Delaney.

  I can’t hold back the tears that spill over my cheeks. Anger mixing with anguish.

  “Damn you, Maeve. And damn your list. And damn you for leaving me alone.”

  The tenor continues to belt out his depressing words. “Whiskey is the cure for a broken heart.”

  There’s no cure for a broken heart. Only ways of numbing the sorrow.

  I can still see her face, hear her words like they were spoken yesterday, “Sometimes I think you feel guilty that it’s me who’s sick and not you.”

  Of course I did. Cystic fibrosis is a genetic disease, one that at the moment of my conception I had a twenty-five percent chance of getting. It wasn’t fair that it skipped me, while slowly killing her.

  “Don’t let my illness stop you from living, Delaney. Find your happiness.” She’d given me the look, the one that always made me feel like she felt sorry for me. Like I was the one who had to go through daily treatments and weekly hospital visits.