“Gabriel,” I whispered.
His smile left his face and he moved his hand up my back, tracing the ink that he had memorized like I had his. He was there for every single tattoo. It was a rule of his.
“Becky, I promise you that I’m not going to do anything stupid and get myself killed tomorrow.”
I raised my brow, though my favorite vein itched with his words. “You? Not do something stupid?”
“All my stupidity is calculated, measured,” he said, voice light and gaze heavy. “And all my decisions center around coming back to my wife so she can abuse me.”
“I’ll abuse you extra well tomorrow if you let me come with you,” I said.
“I would,” he replied, eyes dancing with demons. “I’d be happy to have my warrior princess on the battlefield. But you’ll make the other guys look bad, give them a complex and it’ll be a whole thing.” He kissed my nipple. I shivered as he grazed it with his teeth. “How about you get the next war?”
I glared at him. “There’s not going to be a next war.”
His face turned serious. “Not like this, babe. It’s the end. I promise, Becky.”
It was the end.
One way or another.
Lauren
I was painting when he walked in.
Hands settled on my hips and he rested his head on my shoulder, watching the movement of my brush.
You’d think with everything that was going on, I’d be painting something red, angry, violent. That I should be angry for what was happening right now, that I had to go through something else where I had to entertain the thought of losing another person I loved.
Burying Anna was agony.
But Gage shared that agony with me. He didn’t try to take it away, didn’t make it better. He just shared it. He gave me all different kinds of agony. Beautiful pain. He gave me a beautiful son. A beautiful life. Sometimes, for that beautiful life to stay, it had to become ugly. Agonizing.
So I wasn’t angry.
I was scared. Terrified.
But I trusted that my husband would never make a decision that had the possibility to take him away from us. That he would choose the path of least pain. I trusted him with my life.
So I wasn’t painting angry. I was painting peace. Soft watercolors. Gentle strokes.
“It’s beautiful, baby,” Gage murmured.
“It will be,” I whispered, putting my brush down and turning so he could press my front to his. “It will be soon. But it’s going to get ugly, isn’t it?”
Gage’s face tightened with fury, his hands flexing to the point of pain on my hip. I watched him fight his demons, the past clawing at his throat. “It’s gonna get ugly,” he agreed, releasing his grip.
“But we’re gonna get through it.” I moved my hand to cup his face, saying what he thought he had to say to be strong for me. But screw that. This man had been strong enough for me. Strong enough for himself. And he had to be plenty strong for tomorrow.
A cry sounded from the nursery.
I moved my hand. “I got him.”
He snatched my wrist and killed my palm, not taking his eyes off me. “I got him.”
I smiled, letting him go and be with his son.
I picked up the paintbrush and painted a little more beautiful.
Then I went to find my family. Nothing I painted could reproduce what I found. Gage, sitting in the rocking chair, our son in his arms, fast asleep. His little hand was holding one of his large, scarred ones.
I walked over, wishing I could freeze this moment, wishing I could protect my strong, scarred man from what was to come. Wishing I could protect myself. My son.
But all I could do was gently lift our baby from Gage’s arms.
His eyes opened the second I grabbed him. Of course he wasn’t going to let anyone take his child from his arms. After what happened in the life he had before, I understood his crazy protection. Why, for the first few months of David’s life, he was wired tighter than he had been when we first met. Once I’d been cleared for sex, he did not go gentle. No, he went hard, brutal, trying to fuck his demons out.
And I let him.
Slowly, he got as calm as he could, easier with David. But he still loved him with an intensity that was born out of a place of fear.
But wasn’t all love born out of fear?
Because we found a person that rocked our core, the first thought would always be terror at losing them, at losing the part of ourselves we’d take with them.
So love was fear.
I’d never loved my husband or my son more than I did this night.
Macy
Hansen did not come to bed until late.
He stayed up. Looking at whatever intel they’d accrued, studying it. I didn’t interrupt him. Because I knew he needed it. I knew he needed to feel like he had every single piece of information. Every part of the puzzle.