Rest & Trust
Page 33
Sadie put her arms around their son and lifted him to her breast. The boy turned to it almost right away and opened his mouth, looking like a hungry little bird.
“Hey, Noah,” Sadie crooned, her trauma seemingly forgotten. “I’m your mom. I apologize in advance for all the ways I’m going to fuck you up.”
They hadn’t picked a name yet. Everything she liked, he thought was too artsy-fartsy. Adrian? Was she kidding? And everything he liked, she thought sounded like an old man. How Jed sounded like an old man’s name, he couldn’t say. They’d been calling him ‘little dude.’ Noah wasn’t a name they’d discussed at all.
Sherlock watched over Sadie’s shoulder as she studied their boy’s body. Things were still going on down below, but whatever was happening, she didn’t seem to care. Leda asked her to push again—Sherlock was not remotely interested in understanding why—and Sadie just did it, staring at their boy.
He laid his hand on his son’s wet head. His son. He was wrapped around his woman and his child. His family. Complete.
“Hey, Noah. I’m your dad.”
~oOo~
Noah was born just before seven in the morning. By the end of the day, the entire Horde family had been through, and Gordon, too, and Sadie’s room had been standing room only. The nurses had given up trying to control traffic.
Sherlock wanted Sadie to rest, but she seemed to find energy in the happy attentions of their family, so after a little bit of grumbling about her not letting him take care of her, he shut up and let her have what she wanted: a room full of people.
Noah coming three weeks early, and Demon and Faith’s new boy, Jude—speaking of artsy-fartsy names—coming almost two weeks late, meant that the babies had been born only five days apart. Trick and Juliana’s daughter, Callista, born in December, was only four months old. And Ezra had just had his first birthday. They might as well turn the clubhouse into a playground; the place was overrun with small children.
It made for a bizarre contrast that he knew his brothers felt as keenly as he did. Maybe those who were fathers felt it most, but they were all affected. The SoCal Horde had changed dramatically over the past four or five years. When they’d voted to return to outlaw work, only Bart had had small children, his two oldest. Demon’s Tucker hadn’t really been part of the Horde family then. Most of the men had been single and not planning otherwise.
Now, of twelve patches at the table, eight had old ladies. Of those eight, five had young children. Bart and Demon each had three kids. Trick had two. Muse and now Sherlock were fathers. Ten children, the oldest of whom, Lexi, was ten.
The Horde was a family in a fuller, richer way than it ever had been. Even the unattached men had been affected by the vibe. They were becoming a club that preferred backyard cookouts to clubhouse bacchanals.
At the very same time, they were fighting a dirty, dangerous outlaw war. So far, they hadn’t taken any more losses, but they were approaching the last stand. They could all sense it coming, and they all knew it would be big and ugly.
They all had so much more to fight for now. And so much more to lose.
Everything.
~oOo~
After the visitor traffic finally petered out, Sherlock lay on the bed with Sadie and Noah. They weren’t sleeping, just resting, watching the baby sleep. He was just a little dude, not quite six pounds. But he was healthy and perfect and beautiful.
The door swung open. “Knock, knock.”
At his brother’s voice, Sherlock got up, just as a wheelchair rolled into the room. Thomas was pushing their mother, for whom the walk through a hospital would have been too much. The sticker on the side indicated that the chair was hospital-issue; somebody downstairs must have brought it for her to use.
“Mind some company?” Thomas asked.
Sadie sat up carefully, cradling the stirring baby, and answered, “Of course not. Come see.”
Their mom smiled and lifted her hands, and Thomas pushed her to the bed. Sherlock came around and helped Sadie hand the baby over, and they all watched while Grandma Patty cooed at her only grandchild.
Thomas looked okay. He’d stuck rehab out, doing the full ninety days, and he’d made it a few weeks on the outside before he’d relapsed. He’d called Sherlock, though, the very next morning, and had gone right back into rehab for another month. He’d been out again a couple of weeks. Even if this didn’t take, it was progress. Thomas was trying. For the first time ever, he was really trying. And Sherlock had the money to let him keep trying.
Thomas smiled down at his nephew. “You two still fighting over a name?”
“Nah. He’s Noah,” Sherlock answered.
“Oh, that’s a fine name,” their mother said. “A good, strong name. Hello, Noah. Noah, Noah,” she sang.
“Noah Thomas Holmes,” Sadie said. Shocked, Sherlock jerked his head around to her. Another thing they hadn’t discussed. He couldn’t ask with words if she was sure, not with his mother and brother right there, so he asked with his eyes. She smiled back at him and nodded.
Sherlock turned to his brother, who was staring, open-mouthed, at Sadie.
“What?” He looked at Sherlock. “You sure, bro?”
“Yeah. It’s a good name.”
“Well, shit.” He reached out and laid a finger on Noah’s hand. The boy’s fingers wrapped instinctively around it. “Well, shit,” Thomas said again.
“Language, Thomas,” their mother scolded.
“Sorry, Moms. Sorry, kid. I’ll do better.”
~oOo~
When visiting hours were over and Sadie finally looked as exhausted as she must truly have been, Sherlock walked his mother and brother down to the main entrance and said goodbye.
When he got back up to the maternity floor and walked past the nurses’ station, one of the nurses called out, “Mr. Ballard?”
He’d been getting that since they’d gotten to the hospital. He and Sadie weren’t married and didn’t have plans to be. It was her name they knew, so they’d been calling him by her name. The first few times, it had taken him a beat to realize they meant him; now he just stopped and said, “Yeah?”
“Got a late delivery. These are for Mrs. Ballard.” That was wrong, too, but not worth fighting.
She indicated an enormous floral arrangement—about two dozen red tulips. Sherlock knew who’d sent them without bothering to check the card.
Sadie had called to tell her father that he was a grandfather. It hadn’t sounded like the man had plans to rush over and meet his grandson anytime soon, and the flowers seemed to put a period on the question.
Sherlock couldn’t stand him. Sadie loved him and made a lot of excuses, or at least rationalizations, for why he was so reserved and aloof. But as far as Sherlock was concerned, the man was nothing but a weak suck who couldn’t deal with life as it was.
The tulips would make her cry; he knew they would. She’d decide that they were as good as a visit, she’d tell herself they were even better than a visit, because he’d sent her such meaningful flowers. And she’d know all the while that she was telling herself a story.
Yeah, Sherlock hated that asshole.
Their own yard full of new tulips, planted by her own hands, was more meaningful and beautiful than this glass vase of flowers that would be dead in three days could ever hope to be.
He was sorely tempted to throw the fuckers away. But he didn’t. He smiled at the nurse and took the vase.
Sadie was sitting up, nursing Noah, when he came in with the flowers.
“Oh!” she exclaimed softly. “Oh, those are from Daddy.”
“Yeah, I think they are. Didn’t check the card.”
“They’re his. He’s the only one besides you who’d know to send me tulips.” As he expected, her eyes got wet, and her face constricted as she fought tears. “They’re beautiful. I knew he wouldn’t do nothing.”
A fucking visit was what he should have done. Sherlock set the vase on the bedside table. All her other flowers were on the win
dowsill.
He sat on the bed and watched his son feed.
“How’s that going?” He nodded at Noah at her breast. She’d been really worried about being able to feed him.
“It’s so easy! And awesome! It feels…well, I don’t know. It feels good. Almost like I’m high. So weird.” She gazed at their son and brushed a finger over his cheek. “He’s amazing, isn’t he?”
“Yes. You both are.”
What an astounding thing had happened on this day. He had watched his child come into the world—literally seen it happen. He had even helped it happen, giving Sadie the strength she needed. And now, as the day wound to its end, he was watching mother and child fall in love.
She looked up at him. “I’m sorry I wasn’t stronger this morning. I wanted to do better.”
“This morning was the most amazing thing I’ve ever known. Don’t you dare apologize for needing me.”
“I always need you.”
“And I’ll always be here. Trust that. I need, too, little outlaw.” He put his hand on his son’s head. His other hand, he cupped around his girl’s cheek. “What I need is right here, and I’m never letting it go.”
THE END
COMING SOON
Calm & Storm
The Night Horde SoCal Book Six
THE SERIES FINALE
Having long ago lost the life and future he’d once dreamed of, Ronin Drago lives a quiet life alone. The Horde is his only family. As the club is engulfed in a tempest of violence and loss, as fissures develop in the foundation of that family, he encounters Lorraine, the woman who caused him his greatest pain and took his dreams away.
And he still loves her.
~oOo~
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