by K. C. Crowne
If either of the men pulled a gun, Ellie would be terrified. She was scared now, but now that I was here, she seemed better. She wasn’t stupid; she knew we were in trouble, but in her mind, her daddy could handle it.
I thought about my brothers and Gerald, close enough to yell for, but if I chose that route and they couldn’t get here quickly enough, the ex-Marine would have ample time to shoot me in the head. Or shoot Ellie.
The fucker had me up against the wall, and he knew it.
Kyle glanced over my shoulder. “I see you were smart enough to leave the rest of the boys at the ranch. Smart – didn’t want things to get messy.”
“Daddy, when can we go home?”
“Soon, baby.”
“Sooner if your daddy behaves himself,” Kyle said to her, his voice sweet like it had been at the fair. “Now, why don’t you come inside. We’ll sort this out in there.”
I rose, looking around. I didn’t see Gerald. But the man was good – no doubt he was watching, waiting. El’s hand in mine, we walked toward the front door. Kyle’s man entered first. Kyle stepped aside, still grinning, making an exaggerated sweep toward the entrance as we approached like he was some kind of butler.
The interior of the home might’ve been nice at one point, but that had long passed. The carpet was ruined, the paint was stained and cracked, and the smell of mold was thick in the air. Trash lay strewn about, a lot of it left by the current occupants, from the look of it.
“Josh,” Kyle said. “Take little Ellie down the hall. We’ll come find you when we’re done having our discussion.”
“You got it, boss.”
“Not a chance,” I said, scowling at Josh. “She’s not leaving my sight.”
“Trust me,” Kyle sneered. “You don’t want her to be here for this.”
He was speaking sense. As much as I didn’t want to leave her under the watch of some prick, I knew there was a good chance of things getting very dirty between Kyle and me. And with any luck, Josh wouldn’t be the only pair of eyes on El.
“Fine.” I squatted down and threw my arms around El. “I’ll be seein’ you soon, baby. Don’t you worry.”
The expression on her face was pure fear and all kinds of confused. It broke my heart not to be able to whisk her out of there and back to safety.
“Okay Daddy,” she whispered, her bottom lip trembling.
“Don’t be scared, okay?” She nodded and I kissed her cheek. “It’ll be okay.”
“Come on, kid,” Josh said, nodding toward the hall.
She followed him, glancing back at me, into a room at the end of the hallway. My gut tightened as she stepped out of my sight.
“She’ll be fine,” Kyle told me. “Not sure if I can say the same for you.”
I sucked in a breath and faced him, a sneer on my face. “Now what?”
He moved to a chair in the corner of the room, but he didn’t sit normally. Instead, he perched on the seat like some kind of stone gargoyle, both feet in the seat, knees in front of him. Then he reached behind him and took out a silver pistol.
“We’re waiting for someone. You’ll get all the answers you want once she’s here.”
“Sam?”
“She’s what this is all about, tough guy.”
Before either of us could speak, the growl of an engine approached. I recognized it as Silas’s giant truck and frowned. He’d ridden with Travis, so Sam must have taken it.
“And there’s the guest of honor,” he announced happily. “Now that she’s here, the fun can begin.”
“Whatever you’re planning, you’re not going to get away with it.”
He just smiled a smug smile that I wanted to beat off his face. The engine stopped. Kyle waved toward the door with his gun. “Go on and greet her. We got a lot to talk about.”
I narrowed my gaze at Kyle before I stepped to the door and opened it. Sam was there, a wide-eyed expression on her face when she saw me.
“Chance!” She threw her arms around me, and I did the same. We let go of one another, my hands staying on her shoulders. “Where’s El? Is she alright?”
“She’s down the hall. And she’s fine. For now.” Sam let out a sigh of relief.
“Enough!” Kyle shouted.
We both turned to see him still perched on the chair. The cool, collected attitude he’d had before vanished as rage twisted his features.
“You two touch again, so much as fucking look at each other, and you’ll pay.”
I didn’t want to take any chances. Kyle was dangerous, unhinged, and making him feel like he was backed into a corner was the fastest way to risk him doing something stupid and deadly.
“Sit the fuck down now,” he ordered, gesturing with his gun to a ratty couch.
Being careful not to glance at Sam, I led the way to the couch. We sat on opposite ends on the couch, which sat across from Kyle. I did a quick survey of the room, looking for something, anything I could use as a weapon. On the coffee table was a heavy ceramic ashtray, one that might do some damage if slammed into the side of someone’s head. I filed away the information before turning my attention to Kyle.
“As much as I want to savor this, seeing you both here together, knowing what kind of shit you’ve been up to, it makes me want to finish this right now.”
“What do you want, Kyle?” Sam asked, her voice steely. “What’s this all about? You said you wanted me back. I’m here. Why keep Chance and Ellie now that you have me?”
He stared at her as if she’d grown an extra head. “You hurt me, Sam. I track you down, find out you didn’t even wait a month before shacking up with someone new. You have any idea how that feels? To love someone and find out you meant so little to them that they can forget about you so fast?” He shook his head. “Of course you don’t know. You’re too busy playing house with your fucking cowboy boyfriend to care about anyone’s feelings but your own.”
“Kyle,” Sam said, her voice even and steady. “I understand how you feel. And I know—"
“You don’t know shit!” His voice came out with a barbed-wire edge, his face twisting into an even more unhinged expression. He was losing it quickly. The time for talk was over.
Kyle raised the gun at me, his hand shaking with anger.
“Easy now,” I said, holding my hands up defensively.
But his eyes were on Sam. “You hurt me, Sam. And now, I’m going to make you hurt in the only way you’ll understand. I’m going to make you watch your cowboy bleed out right in front of you.”
“No Kyle!” Sam shouted, rising to her feet automatically. “Please!”
A twisted grin formed on his face. “Say goodbye, sunshine.”
He cocked the gun, and my body tensed as I prepared to make a move, but a heavy thud sounded from down the hallway, interrupting Kyle’s intent.
“What the hell was that?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder down the hall.
Another thud followed. I wasn’t about to wait around for another chance. Kyle was distracted. Sam leaped away from the couch and grabbed the ashtray on the table, lunging toward Kyle and swinging. The bowl connected, smashing against his head and shattering into a hundred pieces. Blood trickled almost immediately from the cuts.
The gun dropped, and Kyle stumbled backward, holding his face. “You fucking bitch!”
He gathered himself enough to make a go for the gun, but I was already on it. I swiped it up and took aim at Kyle, firing two quick shots, both hitting him square in his chest. Sam let out a scream and covered her mouth with her hands. The color drained from his face, and he fell back against the wall, a red stain spreading out. His eyes were open, the expression of shock and anger his death mask.
I took a deep breath, clicking the safety back on and laying the pistol on the couch cushion behind me.
“Oh my God,” Sam said, her eyes wide as Kyle lay in a heap in front of her. “He’s dead.”
I rushed to her and put my hands on her shoulders, forcing her to look at me. “Are you okay
?”
“I’m fine. I’m fine.” She looked me up and down. “Are you?”
“I’m good.”
We didn’t get a chance to say anything else before the roar of engines approached, sirens wailing in the distance.
“Ellie!”
Sam and I said the name at the same time, rushing down the hall together to check on her. The door to one of the bedrooms was opened, and Gerald was standing in the center of the room. El was next to him, a big smile on her face.
“Daddy!” she said as soon as she saw me.
I hurried into the room and quickly realized what the noise had been. The window was open, and Josh lay in a heap, slumped in the corner. His chest rose and fell steadily. He’d been luckier than Kyle.
“She’s alright,” Gerald assured me. “Got here just in time.”
“You’re more right about that than you know,” I said. I hugged El hard before looking her over to make sure she was truly fine. Next was Sam, giving her a hug of her own.
“You should have seen it!” Ellie exclaimed, her eyes excited. “He came in the window and kicked the bad man right in the face!”
“I was watchin’ from a distance,” Gerald told us, dusting his hands on his pants. “Decided to make my move when Kyle looked on the verge of doin’ something dumb.”
“Perfect timing,” I said. “It’s over.”
Gerald raised an eyebrow. “Is he…?” Sam nodded. “Alright. And it sounds like the rest of the boys are out front. Doubt the cops are too far behind.”
“We need to get her out of here,” I said. “I don’t want her to see what’s in the front room.”
“There’s a back entrance,” Gerald told me. “We can leave through there.”
We hurried down the hall. I carried Ellie, holding her face against my shoulder so she wouldn’t see Kyle. We hurried around the house and walked right into a wild scene of Walkers and cops all packed onto the front lawn. Cops poured into the house, and I knew it was only a matter of time before they swarmed us, firing questions left and right.
Before we were all swept up in the commotion to come, there was something I had to say. I took Sam’s hand and turned her toward me.
“I love you, Sam. I love you like mad.”
“I love you, too.”
We kissed in the middle of the chaos, so close to having lost each other forever, there was only love.
Chapter 26
SAMANTHA
Three weeks later…
Detective Williams stood across from me in the lobby, flanked on both sides by two of his uniformed officers. Spread out on the coffee table was a collection of newspaper clippings, along with some jargon-heavy internal documents I couldn’t make heads or tails of.
“I just want this to be done.”
“We both do,” Chance seconded. He was seated next to me, his hand in mine.
“I get that. And it is – almost. Keep in mind that you killed someone, Chance. Even when it’s done in self-defense, there’s a whole mess of legal stuff on the other side. Sometimes you have to go to court to prove you did it with cause.”
My gut tensed. When Detective Williams had called and told us that he wanted to stop by for a talk, it was the kind of news I feared. What if Chance had to go to court? Even worse, what if he had to go to jail?
“I did what I did because I didn’t have any other choice,” Chance stated, his voice lined with anger. “It was him or us.”
Detective Williams nodded. “I understand. But I’m gonna tell you right off the bat, I ain’t here to put you and your family through a different kind of hell than you’ve already been through. I’m here to give you some good news.”
“Good news?” I asked. “What kind of good news?”
He placed his fingertips on one of the newspaper clippings, turning it around to face Chance and me. In the Houston Chronical was an article with the headline “Interstate Kingpin Killed in Shootout.”
“Wasn’t a shootout,” Chance negated, frowning. “I shot him, and that was that.”
“Now,” Detective Williams said. “Don’t sell the little lady short – we saw the wound on the man’s head from the ashtray.” He winked at me. “Anyway, I’m here to tell you that you aren’t gonna be dealin’ with any of that nonsense. I know what happened, and I wasn’t just gonna stand by while your family got sucked into some nonsense legal BS. So, I pulled some strings, had the case expedited.”
“You did?” I asked.
“Sure did.”
“So, it’s over?”
“It’s over. The world’s a safer place with Kyle Wexler gone, and this is my way of sayin’ thanks.” He rose, extending his hand to me, then Chance. “You both have a good, peaceful life.”
“Thank you, Detective,” Chance said, shaking his hand.
“I’ll see myself out,” he said. “Your mama promised the boys and me a little blueberry pie to go – assuming we weren’t here to be a headache.”
He placed his cowboy hat back on his head, tipped it, and headed out with the two officers. When the door shut, Chance and I threw our arms around each other.
“Thank God,” I said, near tears. Happy tears, but still. “I was worried.”
“Don’t need to think about it anymore,” he said, as if not wanting me to finish the words. “It’s over. We can put all that behind us.”
We stepped out of the hug, Chance taking my chin in his hand and placing a soft kiss on my lips. “I love you, baby.”
“And I love you.”
He smiled. “I think with this good news, it’s time for some more.”
I raised my eyebrows, knowing what he meant. “You want to tell her?”
The smile stayed on his face. “I think it’s time. Hell, it’s long past time.”
I grinned right back. “Then let’s do it.”
Hand-in-hand, we left the study and made our way to the front of the house. Word had gotten around that I was pregnant with Chance’s baby. After my slip-up, there was no way to keep it hidden. But there’d been an agreement among the family that no one would say anything to El until we were ready.
“How’s she been?” Chance asked. “Since the whole Kyle thing?”
“She still doesn’t know what happened,” I said. “And I think it’s a good idea to keep it that way.”
“Right. Maybe when she’s older we can tell her what happened. But for now, the less she knows, the better.”
I was beyond ready to put all that out of my head. But a thought occurred to me as we meandered down the hall. “Oh!” I said, grabbing his arm. “Hold on!”
“What?”
Without saying a word, I hurried up the stairs to my old room and threw open the closet. Inside, among the clothes I hadn’t yet brought over to Chance’s place, was a small brown bag, the top stuffed with festive tissue paper. I grabbed it by the handle and hurried down.
“What’s that?” Chance asked, his eyes on the bag as I descended the stairs.
“A little surprise I made for El.” I flashed him a smile.
He laughed. “Alright, one big surprise deserves another, I suppose. Now, let’s go find her.”
We didn’t have to look long. We stepped outside and saw El in front of the lake, playing happily with a few other kids her age. Over the last few weeks, I’d taken her into town, letting her meet some of the other kids around Patterson at the park. And she didn’t waste any time making some new friends.
“Yo, El!” Chance called.
El froze and turned her attention to us, waving dramatically. “Hey, Daddy!”
“Come on over – got somethin’ important to tell you about.”
“Can it wait?”
“You’re going to want to hear this,” I said with a teasing smile. “And there’s a present for you, too.”
“Alright!” Her face lit up at the mention of a present, and moments later, she was right in front of us.
We each took one of El’s hands, leading her through the house. Plenty of the f
amily was out and about, and we said our hellos as we headed toward the back. I was pretty sure they were all wise to what was going on – I’d shown more than a few of the Walkers the surprise I’d made for El, and seeing the bag in my hand was enough for them to know we were about to break the big news.
The three of us sat down at one of the tables, and Chance and I regarded one another. El flicked her eyes between us, clearly curious.
Chance cleared his throat. “El, how many times have I told you that you comin’ into my life was the best surprise I could ever hope for?”
She smiled. “A bunch of times.”
“That’s right. And it doesn’t stop bein’ true.” He nodded to me. “Same with Sam, right? She was a surprise, right?”
“A really good surprise!” Ellie agreed. I couldn’t help but beam, giving her little hand a squeeze that she returned.
“So,” Chance continued. “The lesson is surprises can be really nice, right?”
“Right!”
“Glad to hear it. Because we’ve got another one for you.”
Her little brow furrowed adorably. “What kind of surprise?”
I smiled at Chance, letting him know I was ready to jump in. I took a deep breath, ready to say it. “The kind of surprise that means you’re going to have a little brother or sister.”
El appeared confused at first, and I worried for a second that she might not take the news well. But her face quickly lit up. “Are you serious?”
“Serious as it gets, little lady,” Chance beamed. “Sam’s gonna be a mommy, and you’re gonna be a big sister.”
Her jaw dropped, her eyes round as dinner plates. “No. Way!”
“Way,” Chance said, chuckling. “You think you’re gonna be ready for this?”
“When?” she asked.
“Not for a few months,” I told her. “Around seven or eight. But he or she’s going to be here before you know it.”
“Eight months?” El asked, frowning. “But that’s gonna take forever!”