Flick let out a little breath. “Okay, I agree.”
“Good girl,” Alec murmured. “Beau is gonna carry you upstairs, and Mia will help you get settled. Once you are, you’re going to tell me what’s going on. Everything. Then we’ll know what we’re up against. Understood?”
“Yes.”
“And this bears repeating so I’m sure you get it, you are safe here. My brothers and I are going to see to that, okay? You’re here, under my roof, my protection, and I don’t take that lightly. Once you become a Malone, there ain’t no getting out. And nobody fucks with the Malones.”
“I’m not a Malone.”
“Baby girl, you are now.”
And with those words, words he felt deep in his gut, words he should have spoken, West knew he was lost.
Beau moved through the house and West followed, aware the others were doing the same.
“Jaret,” Alec ordered. “Call Tanner and Raid. Family meeting in an hour. Butch, when Maddox gets here, get ready to go back to Flick’s place to collect her belongings.”
“Beau, this bedroom.” Mia moved ahead and opened the door of the bedroom next to her and Alec’s.
Nope. That wouldn’t work for him.
“Other end of the hall,” West commanded.
Mia turned to frown at him. “I need to be able to hear her if she needs me.”
“Other end of the hall,” he repeated himself.
Alec gave him a warning look.
“West, she could have nightmares,” Mia whispered. “She might need me in the night.”
“And you need your sleep, not to be getting up and down all night,” he countered, glancing meaningfully down at her stomach.
“It will be good practice for when the baby comes then, won’t it?” she retorted.
“Mia, he’s right,” Alec told her. “You won’t be getting up to help her.”
West relaxed slightly, knowing he’d won that battle. Not that he intended her to be alone to fight her nightmares. Nope. That had just become his job.
He wasn’t sure when the mind shift had happened. But it had been clinched by the look on her face. Scared and in pain.
She needs us. She needs me.
He would be there for her. He figured she was probably too hurt and in too much shock to put up much of a protest right now. And by the time she got around to it, he’d be firmly in her life. And he’d go from there.
She needs us.
He’d failed someone who needed him once. Someone he’d loved. Someone he was supposed to take care of. He wasn’t going to fail Felicity.
“I’ll be doing it,” Alec stated firmly.
“What?” West barked. Alec looking after her was not part of the plan. At all.
Felicity groaned. Her good eye darted from him to Mia to Alec.
“Sorry, sunshine,” he murmured soothingly to her before he turned to Alec. “You’re not getting up for her.”
“Alec, I don’t think that will work,” Mia told him.