by Chloe Walsh
Not so much.
I figured if I did the exact opposite of what my father had done, I wouldn’t screw the baby up too badly.
"I mean, obviously, I knew she was going to have a baby, but now that he's actually here?" Hope shook her head and laughed. "I'm in shock." Smiling up at me, she blurted out, "I need to go shopping. I am going to spoil the hell out of that little guy."
Her phone pinged then, causing Hope to squeal in delight and lunge for her cell. "Oh my god," she cooed, staring at the screen like she had just seen a miracle unfold. "Cam sent a photo." She bounced up and down on her feet in excitement as she cooed and awed at her phone. "He's got hair, Hunter, look."
Shit.
The kid was gorgeous.
"Look at those eyes," Hope squeaked in delight. "And that little button nose." She sighed dreamily again. "He looks just like the boys when they were babies."
I wasn’t sure which one of the boys Hope was referring to.
They all looked pretty damn identical to me.
"Everything is happening so fast," she whispered, biting down on her bottom lip. "Cam's a father. Teagan's almost due. I'm thirteen weeks pregnant, and the wedding's tomorrow." Hope shook her head and blew out a breath. "How the hell is it wedding time already?"
This woman needed to calm down.
Seriously, her brain worked on a different frequency to the rest of the world.
"Relax," I coaxed, placing my hands on her shoulders. "Everything's gonna be fine. The wedding – that's not technically a fucking wedding because they're already married – will go smoothly."
"Hunter," she chuckled. "Don’t mock them."
"I'm not," I shot back, grinning. "I'm stating a fact."
"Well, facts or not, Bridezilla has called me three times today," Hope laughed. "She wants to know if we're coming over to help her with some last-minute wedding favors she scoped out on Pinterest."
I cocked a brow. "She wanted to know if we'd come over?"
Hope flushed. "Okay, she demanded we get our asses over to the house to help with setting up."
"And?"
She flushed a deeper shade of red. "And she said we were the worst maid of honor and best man that ever walked the planet."
I grinned. "Sounds more like it."
****
Hope
"Well if it isn’t Bonnie and Clyde 2.o," Teagan snarled when Hunter and I finally arrived at their place a little after eight-thirty that evening. "Thanks for the support, guys," she continued to rant. "Expect the same kind of support from me when you get married."
"Don’t listen to her," Noah called out from beneath a mountain of paper swans. "She hasn’t been fed."
Teagan turned her death glare on her husband. "Hey, Noah," she growled. "Guess who else won't be fed if he doesn’t start supporting his wife?"
"Thorn…"
"And I meant that in a sexual way," she added. "Think about that."
"Jesus Christ," Hunter groaned. "You two are batshit crazy." Shaking his head, he stepped over piles of boxes of handmade paper swans that were scattered around the living room floor, and sank down on the couch beside Noah.
"Don’t sit on my swans!" Teagan screamed, looking horrified.
"Swans?" Hunter reached beneath himself and retrieved a discombobulated looking paper swan. "These are ducks, Teagan," he told her. "And fucked up ducks at that."
Looking comically wounded, I watched as Teagan pressed her fingers to her temples and attempted some deep breathing exercises.
"Ignore him," I told her, casting a warning glare in the direction of the two men who were snickering on the couch. "They are definitely swans."
"Really?" she asked, looking up at me with those big brown eyes of hers – that puppy dog expression that got her out of trouble on more than one occasion.
"I promise," I coaxed, wrapping my arm around her slim shoulders.
"I made a batch of doves, too," she announced, sounding much brighter now. "They're in the kitchen. Hang on, I'll go get them."
With that, she whizzed past me, a flurry of movement, moving faster than any woman at her late stage of pregnancy should have been able to.
Hunter's phone began to ring then, distracting me from paper animals, and I turned and watched him answer it.
"Yeah."
Pause.
"Tonight?"
Another pause.
"Location?"
Heavy exhale.
"I'm on my way."
My heart sank as I watched Hunter end the call and stand up.
When he turned to look at me, I knew.
He had to take care of business.
"I need to go out for a bit," he told me, blue eyes locked on my face, gaging my reaction.
"Do you have to?" I whispered as that familiar swell of fear rose up inside of me.
It was the same fear I felt every time I watched him leave after one of those phone calls.
The same fear that stayed with me until he walked back through the door in one piece again.
Noticing the worry in my voice, Hunter walked over to me. "You've got nothing to worry about," he whispered, just to me. "Everything's gonna be fine." He smiled down at me. "Same as always."
"Can't you just…not go?" I knew I was repeating myself, asking him not to leave, but this horrible feeling of dread had settled in the pit of my stomach.
"That's not the way this works, HC," he groaned, looking pained. "I can't not go."
"I'll go with him," Noah announced, jerking off the couch.
"No, you fucking won't," Hunter shot back. "Sit your ass back down."
"If you have to go, then take Noah with you," I urged, feeling a little better knowing that he wouldn’t be alone. "Please?"
Hunter stared hard at me for the longest moment before releasing a low growl. "Fine." He turned to look at Noah and said, "You're an asshole for this."
Noah grinned. "Happy to help."
"I'll be back in an hour," Hunter said, tone much softer now that his attention was focused on me. He pressed a kiss to my lips and said, "two, at the most," before turning around and walking away.
"Hunter?" I called out as I watched him walk out of the room with Noah.
"Yeah?" he replied, casting a glance over his shoulder.
"Stay alive." Forcing a small smile, I tightened my hold. "Please."
I watched him smile that dirty, boyish grin I'd grown to love.
"Sweetheart, you've got nothing to worry about," he teased. "I'm bulletproof."
Then he was gone.
And the worrying began.
****
Chapter Fifty-Four
Lucky
There's a sensation that ripples through a man's body when danger is present.
It's almost like a switch that flips inside his body, alerting and preparing him for the trouble he can feel is brewing.
The hairs on the back of his neck rise, his hands steady, and his emotions switch off as the survival instinct inside of him roars to life.
Everything around him becomes sharper – more vivid and clear.
His eyes, brain, and body all join force, and work harder to scope out the threat and eliminate it.
For me, that warning sign had kept me alive and in one piece.
But it failed me tonight.
Came just too little too fucking late.
The minute I stepped out of Noah's car on the outskirts of the Ring of Fire, and laid eyes on the men surrounding us with machetes and guns, I knew I was walking into something I wouldn’t be walking out of.
Not in one piece at least.
And I also knew that I was too fucking late to do a damn thing to stop it.
Gonzalez called to meet him here.
Said he had information on David.
I had been lied to.
I had been betrayed.
That part was obvious.
But the part that wasn’t obvious, the thing I really wanted to know, was why?
My only way out now
, and I was well aware that the chances of that were slim, was the way I'd spent most of my life living; fighting and killing.
"You need to get out of here," I warned as eight men closed in on us, all armed, all noticeably members of Gonzalez's gang. "Get back in the car, man, and drive."
"Like fuck I'm leaving you on your own," Noah snarled, eyes locked on the men moving closer.
"Noah," I hissed. "Get back in the fucking car and go!"
"I'm not leaving you here, Luck," he bit out. "It's not fucking happening."
"Then you're a fucking idiot," were the last words I managed to say before the men closed in on us.
I reached for my gun.
And then all hell broke loose.
****
I was thirty-one years old and I was ready to die.
I'd been ready for a long time now.
Making peace with my maker wasn’t something I was interested in doing.
In my eyes, my maker was the woman who'd given me life, and my mother had been gone for a very long time now.
I had no plans on trying to make amends with the man upstairs.
I would leave that to the men actually capable of redemption – the men who felt remorse for their actions.
Because I sure as hell wasn’t one of those men.
I had been beaten, stabbed, and was drenched in blood when they finally got the better of me.
With my shirt ripped clean off my body, I collapsed on my knees as the bite of a second blade cut through my chest, slicing me open.
Pinned to ground on his stomach with half his fucking face caved in, Noah continued to buck and kick against the men holding him down.
When the two men who were holding me up began to drag me away from Noah, I felt a flicker of hope inside of me.
This wasn’t for him.
He wasn’t going to die tonight.
Just me.
Noah's voice was all I could hear as he roared at me, and frantically tried and failed to fight his way off the ground.
"Take care of my girl for me, man," I called out before I was dragged through the dirt and gravel in the direction of the warehouse.
****
Chapter Fifty-Five
Lucky
You could tell a lot about a man from the look of his eyes.
You could tell even more about a man when he couldn’t look you in the eyes.
And right now, Gonzalez couldn’t look at me.
"Bolillo," he acknowledged in a tight tone when the men tossed me on the ground, feet from the roaring flames of the bonfire. "It is time."
Above the sound of the fire roaring and the conflict, I could hear Noah still roaring and calling my name, but it was the sound of a baby crying that really broke through my thoughts.
I wasn’t a squeamish man as a rule, I wasn’t a forgiving one either, but the sight of Annabelle cradling her screaming baby less than fifty feet from me, while one of G's men held a gun to her head, did some horrible fucking things to my conscience.
"A mother and baby?" I tossed out, glaring at the piece of shit that had clearly betrayed me. "The fuck you doing, G?"
Maybe it was impending fatherhood that brought the emotions out of me, but this was wrong.
Maybe it was knowing I would never meet my own child that made me feel for Annabelle.
Because I wouldn’t.
And Hope?
Fuck, I couldn’t think about it.
I couldn’t think about what this was going to do to her.
I needed to hold it together.
I would not crumble like a pussy.
"What needs to be done, Bolillo," Gonzalez bit out. He still wouldn’t look me in the goddamn eye.
"You fucked me over, G," I growled. "And for what?"
Gonzalez clenched his jaw and looked into the flames, but didn’t answer me.
Using every ounce of strength that I had left in my body, I forced myself to get up off that fucking ground.
I was not dying on my knees for any motherfucker.
And certainly not a turncoat bastard like him.
With blood oozing from my chest and stomach, I reached one hand into my pocket and pulled out my cigarettes.
If I was going out tonight, I was having a goddamn smoke first.
Weak to the bone, I put the box to my lips and pulled out a smoke, but I couldn’t light it. I was too fucking weak.
Gonzalez finally looked at me with stormy eyes and a masked expression. He muttered a string of curses under his breath before digging into his own pocket and pulling out his lighter. Flicking it open, he stepped forward and lit my cigarette.
A tall, weathered looking man stepped out of the shadows then, and I knew.
I knew exactly why this was happening.
Why I'd been summoned here tonight.
I'd been double-crossed.
"Mr. Casarazzi," the old man said in a light tone. "We finally meet."
Tilting my head to one side, I cocked a brow and stared at the ageing man in front of me.
So, this was him.
The famous fucking sperm donor.
My best friend's father.
Hope's grandfather.
David Henderson.
Shaking my head, I took a deep drag of my smoke and turned to Gonzalez. "What did he offer you?" I asked in a flat tone. "Thirty pieces of silver?"
Gonzalez didn’t respond, but his nostrils flared and he balled his hands into fists at his side.
"And you took it like the Judas bastard you are," I told him. "You have no honor, G. No goddamn loyalty."
"Now, now," David taunted, chuckling darkly. "Don’t be a sore loser, Lucky."
Clenching my jaw, I turned to glare at him. "You gonna kill me yourself, David?" I looked him up and down before sneering in disgust. "Or are you afraid to get your own hands bloodied?"
David grinned darkly at me. "Get the other one," he barked. "I want him to watch."
"Before we go any further, there is the matter of the girl," Gonzalez interrupted, eyes locked on David. "Your daughter."
"Daughter?" David threw his head back and laughed. "She's a result of a couple of hours of fun in a whorehouse. Nothing more."
Gonzalez stared hard at him for the longest moment before finally nodding stiffly to one of his men who strode off in the direction I'd come from.
Moments later, Noah came into my vision. He was surrounded by half a dozen men who were watching him warily while they wrestled to restrain him, and hold him back.
"You fucking monster!" Noah roared, glaring at Gonzalez.
The man who was aiming a gun at his temple, brought it down hard on the back of Noah's skull.
The move would have knocked a normal man out cold, but Noah wasn’t a normal man.
Snarling, he lunged forward and head-butted the asshole, knocking him clean off his feet.
Blood sprayed everywhere as Noah tried and failed to break from the horde of assholes holding him back.
"Now this one," David chuckled, gesturing towards where Noah was being forced to the ground by countless men. "Is a pleasant surprise." He locked eyes on my fallen friend and said, "Hello, son."
"Fuck you!" Noah lunged towards him, stopped only by the sheer force of multiple men as they struggled to overpower him and remain in control. "You're no fucking father of mine," he continued to roar. "Had one of those and he's buried not too far from here. You'll be joining him soon enough!"
"All brawns and no brains," David tutted. "What a shame."
Gonzalez raised his hand towards the man aiming the gun at Annabelle and ordered, "Take the child."
The toddler was ripped from Annabelle's arms and handed off to another man.
My stomach churned when I heard the feral scream that tore from her throat.
"Don’t hurt him," she screamed. "Please…. Don’t hurt my baby."
I moved to do something, any fucking thing, to stop this from happening, but my body failed me. Staggering towards her, I collapsed on my knees, taking a b
oot to the stomach in the process.
"Noah," Annabelle cried out then as the gunman aimed at her face. "Noah, please…take him home to his father," she strangled out. "You know," she begged. "You know…please, just take him home to Jordan –"
Bang.
She collapsed on the ground, lifeless, and with a steady stream of blood pouring from between her eyes.
The sound of that baby screaming out "Mama, Mama," broke something inside of me.
Something inside of me died.
I could hear Noah roaring out my name, begging for mercy, but I knew there would be none shown here tonight.
I sank back on my knees, and exhaled a tortured breath.
"I'm afraid this is going to hurt, Bolillo," Gonzalez announced in gruff tone seconds before he aimed his gun at my chest. "See you on the other side, my friend."
I kept my eyes on my best friend, and in this moment, I prayed for a different life for him.
A different outcome.
I could see it; the pain in Noah's eyes – the helplessness – as he watched on.
"It's okay," I whispered, my words barely audible, but I hoped he heard me. "Tell Hope I'm s–"
"No!"
The roar that tore from Noah's throat was the last thing I heard before my body was riddled with lead.
And then, there was nothing.
Nothing at all.
I could feel it; the life seeping out of me, as I lay on the ground bleeding out.
Tell her I love her.
Tell her I'm sorry.
Tell her I loved her in death.
When I closed my eyes for the final time, and embraced the darkness sweeping over my body, I saw her face.
Hope.
****
Chapter Fifty-Six
Hope
Something was wrong.
They should have been back by now.
He told me he would be back by now!
"Hope, you need to calm down," Teagan coaxed as she watched me pace around her living room like a deranged lunatic.