by Nashoda Rose
“Fuck. Baby. Baby,” I cried as I fell to my knees beside her. Roman rolled off her and my heart lodged in my throat like a boulder, strangling me. “No. Baby. No.” There was blood all over her sweatshirt, the red slowly spreading like a spider’s web.
“Get a doctor,” Ream shouted. “Now.”
My mind was a haze of agonizing fear as I reached for her. Her eyes were closed, hair a curtain lying across her mouth then down to her shoulder, the tips now laying over her wound and soaked with blood. When I picked her up in my arms, her head fell back, limp as if . . . No. No. She wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be dead.
“Baby. Baby. Please, baby.” I ran with her to a gurney and placed her on it.
She wasn’t moving. She wasn’t fuckin’ moving.
Was she breathing? I couldn’t tell with her sweatshirt.
“Out of the way,” a man shouted.
I knew there were people all around me, someone tried to push me aside and I grabbed for her hand. It lay cold and lifeless in mine and terror gripped me like a dark suffocating blanket.
“Let her go, sir. You need to let her go,” a female said.
I was running alongside the gurney, latched onto Haven’s hand. I didn’t even know I was running. All I saw was Haven unmoving, her lips slightly parted, her grey eyes hidden.
“Both of you, please, you have to let her go.”
A hand came own on my shoulder. “Let her go.”
I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her enough to look at him, but I knew it was Logan. “I can’t.” I was terrified if I did, I’d never see her again. “I fuckin’ can’t.”
“Vincent,” Ream said. He was on the other side of the gurney, his face as devastated as I was sure mine was. “They’ll save her.”
It was then I noticed a nurse beside him, her gloved hands covered in blood as she pressed on Haven’s shoulder. She met my eyes and there was sympathy in their green depths. “I’ll take care of her.”
The gurney started moving again, and each of my fingers slid down her palm then off the tips of her fingers. I watched her disappear behind the swinging doors, Ream beside me.
Anguish and staggering disbelief collided. It was an explosion detonating with the numb cold silence of shock. I didn’t know which to grab hold of. Which was safer.
But the reality was if I lost Haven, I’d shatter and my pieces would be lost.
Head bowed, I sat beside Ream, arms resting on my thighs, and hands clasped, hanging between my legs. I hadn’t moved in an hour as I waited for someone to walk back out the double doors where Haven had disappeared through.
There were police officers everywhere, talking to Luke, Roman, and Vic, who showed up and took control of the scene. A perimeter was taped off so the police could investigate Lily’s death and what had occurred. Statements were taken from witnesses and we’d given ours, but I couldn’t even recall what I’d said.
A gurney passed by us with a body—Lily’s body.
The girl who shot Haven. Luke had taken her down from behind.
My head dropped lower as my gut twisted at the thought. She’d been in our condo. She’d almost fucked Kite.
Jesus.
I’d been told who she was, but I couldn’t even decipher who told me; my mind refused to take in anything beside the continuous replay of Haven getting shot and falling.
“You really love her,” Ream said.
I continued to stare at the beige linoleum floor. “Yeah.” It was barely a whisper.
“It’s like it’s happening all over again.” I knew what he was talking about. When he was sixteen, he brought Haven to the hospital after overdosing, and she never came back through the doors. “I can’t go through that again.”
I saw movement from the corner of my eye and Kat was beside him, reaching for his hand and linking their fingers.
“She’s strong,” I said. And that was what I had to hold onto. Haven wouldn’t give up. She’d fight. For years, she’d fought and never given up. She wouldn’t now. She’d keep her promise to herself and find normal.
Our normal. Mine and hers.
Maybe it was the shift in air as the double doors swung open. Maybe it was the creak of the orange plastic chairs as everyone tensed. Whatever it was, I knew it was the doctor, who had taken Haven away, who strode toward us. I looked up for the first time in an hour.
It was going to be devastation or relief the moment I saw his face. He wouldn’t have to say anything and all of us would know.
There was silence as if all the commotion around us stalled for the moments between raising my head and seeing the doctor’s expression.
Then a tear escaped to trail down my cheek as I locked eyes on him and saw his smile.
One month later
HE STALKED TOWARD me, the casual swagger lighting the spark of desire to a firestorm of heat. I ducked left, then went right, my feet splashing through the water as I took off running.
We were in Fiji on one of the islands, a private ten-acre resort that was surrounded by the lush tropics. There were sixteen villas, which were built into the vegetation, each overlooking the ocean. Crisis had booked the entire resort and then invited everyone to come with us.
The media frenzy had lasted a couple of weeks, but we’d gone to the farm and avoided most of it. Kite spoke to reporters when he came out of the hospital and the fans were more focused on him than the story of me.
Of course, there were reports about the shooting at the hospital, but our involvement was kept quiet. The story was spun that a girl, Lily Hendrik, went on a shooting spree in the hospital and I was shot. My association with Lily remained concealed and I suspected it had to do with Vic.
The wet sand squished between my toes as I ran as hard and fast as I could. My heart raced and my body tingled with anticipation of him catching me. Because he would. I was fast and could run far, but he was faster with his long lean legs, which covered the ground quicker than mine.
I thought of when he’d chased me in the thunderstorm. It seemed so long ago and so much had changed. Now, I wanted him to catch me, but I was never one to make anything easy for him.
The tide washed up on shore and sloshed against my calves. I was already soaking wet after the two hours spent in the water with him. He’d insisted on teaching me how to swim, and it was frustrating because a half-naked Crisis was hard to resist. And he was serious and kept having to unwrap my arms from around his neck. Eventually, he threatened to put his cock on hiatus if I didn’t follow instructions.
Empty threat. No way would he do that, but I knew he wanted me to learn to swim, so I let him teach me.
I heard his feet gaining on me and put more effort in as I headed to our villa. As I left the beach, the deeper sand slowed me down.
“Oh, baby, you like games? Because I excel at them and never lose.”
I was breathing hard. It wasn’t far, but running as fast as I could in the sand was hard. “Bullshit.” I was saying Bullshit, the card game, because I beat him at that.
Hitting the sandy grass at the bottom of our villa that overlooked the beach, I scrambled up the wooden stairs. I heard him right behind me and started taking the stairs two at a time. He did too.
Just as my foot hit the deck, his arm hooked my waist and I was running, but not going anywhere, as he lifted me right off my feet. His breath was harsh and ragged as he breathed against my neck.
“I’m thinking I should have taken you somewhere cold, not the South Pacific. Watching you run in a bikini and chasing you, with my cock hard as fuck . . . painful.” I stopped struggling then turned in his arms and slid down his wet hard body.
I stood on my tiptoes, my hand reaching around his neck to drag him down to my mouth. “I love that you brought me here.” It was my Christmas present, but really it was his, too. It was ours.
Crisis walked me backwards until my ass pressed against the railing. “Going to fuck you now. That okay with you?”
I bit my lip and nodded. He liked to do that, as
k me. It just became his thing and I think it was to give him assurance that I was good with it, because once I said yes, there was no stopping him.
He hitched me up on the railing and I curled my legs around him. “I hope your parents don’t decide to stop by.”
He chuckled while he undid the bikini strap at the nape of my neck and it fell forward. “Have they yet?” No, and we’d been here three days. “Mom knows better than that. The damage it would do to her to see me eating you out.”
“Oh, my God.” I didn’t even want to imagine it.
He ran a finger down between my breasts and I shuddered. He leaned in and nuzzled my neck and my fingers curled into his hair as I tilted my head back. “Don’t worry, baby. Our villa is off-limits. Why do you think Luke and Roman came with us?”
“I thought you wanted them to have a vacation. I mean, Roman did save my life and Luke killed Lily.” The bullet hit my shoulder, but it could’ve easily been my chest if Roman hadn’t dove on top of me. I’d been knocked unconscious by the impact as my head hit the tile, but unconscious was better than dead.
“Vacation?” Crisis laughed as he unsnapped the back of my bikini and tossed it to one of chaise lounges. “Fuck that. They’re here to make sure no one comes near our villa while I’m fucking my girl.”
He nipped my neck then trailed kisses up to my mouth. I moaned when his mouth crushed mine, both hands cupping either side of my head and he took what I’d given him. Me. Every part of me he knew, the bad, the good, the tainted, and there wasn’t a moment I wondered if he accepted all of them.
He did.
“Fuck, Haven,” he mumbled against my mouth. “I love you.” He picked me up off the railing. Without taking his mouth from mine, he lowered me onto the lounge chair. He broke away for a second and ripped off his shorts. “Lift.” He had his hands on my bikini bottoms and slowly slid them down.
That had been a point of contention. With the tickets for my Christmas present was the bikini, one that was bright pink and left little to the imagination.
Of course, I refused to wear it, and wanted to go pick out a one piece. He’d been too accommodating and I should’ve known. We went and picked out a black one piece that wasn’t sexy, but simple. I liked it. He said it was fine for a nun, but he let me have it.
It never made it to the island. I dumped all my clothes from the suitcase the first day and it was gone. Crisis had been standing on the other side of the room with those dimples and brilliant blue eyes blazing with mischief. Then he pulled the pink one from his suitcase and tossed the two pieces to me.
“I want you to wear it.” Then he strode over to me and crouched as I sat on the floor, clothes all around me. “Please. It’s sexy as hell on you and this will be the only vacation that I don’t have to worry about other men eyeing up my girl.”
So, I gave him that because I loved him . . . well, and he’d said please, then made love to me on the floor.
I parted my legs as soon as the bikini bottoms slipped off my feet and he crawled up the lounge chair. Butterflies lifted, goose bumps sparked and between my legs clenched just before his mouth kissed my inner thigh.
My breath hitched as his tongue slid over me. “Jesus, you’re wet.”
“I was in the water.”
He lifted his head and grinned, his finger replacing his tongue as he trailed it down between my lips. “Oh baby, I know you’re wet for me. I know how you taste on the tip of my tongue. I know how you feel on my finger. And my cock . . .” He sat back and took hold of himself. It was throbbing and ready. “It sure as fuck knows.”
I raised my brows. “And what does your cock say right now?”
He shimmied up closer, his weight on his arms on either side of my head. Then he lowered his weight on top of me and my hand went into his hair while the other went to his ass and squeezed.
He had the best ass and I took to touching it whenever I could. There were definitely no complaints from him except when he was trying to teach me how to swim.
The tip of his cock was between my legs and I lifted my hips to meet him. He groaned, and before I could get my legs around his waist, he was inside me and his mouth was against mine at the same time.
Then he made me his, like he always did. Not that I was anything but. It was a carnal connection that released when we came together. It was an inferno of desire that thrummed through both of us, but it was also the rare beauty of peace and tranquility.
He made love to me in the chaise lounge, then I made love to him until we saw the sun lower over the horizon.
He leapt to his feet. “Babe, we have to go.” Grabbing my hand, he hauled me to my feet and pulled me into the bedroom that was open to the deck. Its sheer white curtains lightly swayed in the warm breeze.
I went into the bathroom, washed my face then put on mascara and lip gloss. I took my dress off the hanger on the back of the door and slipped it over my head, then did up the tiny buttons in the front. There wasn’t much I could do about my hair, so I loosely put it back in a messy clip.
When I came out of the bathroom, he was already dressed in a pair of charcoal gray linen pants and a white short-sleeved shirt. His hair was untidy and exactly how I loved it. He looked sexy as hell and I was thinking about undressing him slowly.
His eyes roamed over my outfit from top to bottom. I noticed he lingered on my thighs, he loved my thighs. “Ice, you can’t wear shit like that and seriously expect me to keep my cock in my pants.”
Laughing, I walked up to him and put my arms around his neck. I was wearing a white sundress with spaghetti straps, and a tight bodice that flowed into a mid-thigh simple skirt. It wasn’t revealing, but I was getting that any dress I wore, he thought was sexy as hell on me. Rarely did we make it to wherever we were going without the dress coming off me first, making us always late.
I leaned against him and his hard cock pressed into me. “Then don’t,” I whispered into his ear.
He groaned and put his hands under my ass. “Love you hair like that, baby.”
I smiled. “Does it look like I just had sex?”
“Fuck yeah. But they all know that’s what we’ve been doing since we arrived, so no point hiding it.”
“Want to be late?” I urged.
“No,” he growled. “For once in my life, I’m not being late. Not to this.”
I didn’t pout because . . . well, I didn’t pout—ever, but I did run my fingers up through his hair and gave an exaggerated sigh. He got that annoyed crease between his eyes and I leaned forward and kissed it. “Okay. But know I’m really wet and it isn’t from the water.”
He growled. “Let’s go.”
He latched onto my hand. His determination was kind of cute; instead of him being the one to delay and not worrying about keeping others waiting, it was me. And I wasn’t necessarily delaying. I was soaking up every moment in order to put into the compartments and be able to open and enjoy the memories anytime I wanted.
“The sun isn’t going to wait for us,” he said as he led me through the bedroom.
The warm breeze sifted through the open doors. It was filled with the warmth and love that surrounded me. Not just Vincent’s, but his family’s . . . my family’s.
I stopped to peer into the mirror at the dresser.
“Haven. You’re perfect. You’re my perfect.” He smirked. “And I’m yours.”
I bent down to grab my sandals when he tugged, throwing me off balance so I landed in his arms. “Barefoot baby. And soon pregnant if I have any say about it.”
My heart skipped a beat at the thought; we’d decided not to use condoms anymore, so that was a possibility, although I was clear that even if I did get pregnant, I was finishing school. He was good with that. He knew how important it was for me to get a degree.
Our argument had been over him wanting to buy out Kite so we could have the condo to ourselves. Of course, I was uncomfortable with him paying for everything and I had nothing to contribute.
I had a feeling t
hough that Kite would move out soon anyway. I’d noticed he never brought chicks home anymore and I guessed it was because of what happened with Lily and me.
Crisis had proposed to me two days after I was shot in the hospital. I’d had years stolen from me and I wasn’t wasting what I was gifted. And he was a gift. I loved him. He was my best friend and my lover.
I smiled, reaching up and cupping his cheek and he leaned toward me, his brilliant blue eyes dancing with playfulness. “Then we better go get married first.”
“Fuck yeah.”
Then he picked me up, threw me over his shoulder and jogged down to the beach where his parents, Ream and Kat, her brother Matt, Kite, Logan, Emily, Isabelle, Dana and Dillon, all waited. Luke and Roman stood on the outskirts, but I was glad they were there, too. The only two missing were Deck and Georgie, who, according to Vic, declined the invitation; they were on an extended vacation.
Crisis carried me to the altar, and I heard a few chuckles at our grand entrance. Then he slid me down his body to my feet, rested one hand on my hip, the other on my ass and kissed me. It wasn’t a gentle kiss. It was deep, dirty and sexy and without a hint of concern that everyone was watching.
“Are we doing the ceremony backwards today, young man?” the officiant said.
We separated, although not by much. Our lips merely unlocked. Then Vincent ‘Crisis’ Wesson married me as the sun went down on the beach, barefoot with our family around us.
The End
To the readers,
Thank you for reading ‘Shattered by You.’ I hope you enjoyed Crisis and Haven’s story. I’d love to hear your thoughts and opinions, so please if you have a moment leave a review. Your feedback is very helpful and appreciated.
I’m humbled by the kindness readers have shown me since the beginning of this series. Thank you is never enough, but know that it means the world to me.
Hugs,
Nashoda Rose is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author who lives in Toronto with her assortment of pets. She writes contemporary romance with a splash of darkness, or maybe it’s a tidal wave.