Текст книги "Kill Shot"

Three years later

“Are you ready, baby girl?” I asked my daughter, Way.

Her full name was Calloway Rhea Alvarez, but we’d shortened it to Way about two days after having her.

She was a full of life two year old with so much energy that it was hard to keep up with her at times.

“Yes,” Way agreed, running down the hallway to the garage before I’d even told her where we were going.

Shaking my head, I walked in the opposite direction, knowing the door was locked up high so she couldn’t get out.

“Reagan,” I called as I headed to her room. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, mom. I can’t get my dress all the way zipped, though,” Reagan called from behind her closed bedroom door.

“May I come in?” I asked, hand on the knob.

“Yeah,” she called.

Opening the door, I tried to ignore the absolute pig sty that she had going on, and stepped over the mess to walk up behind Reagan.

She’d really grown into her body in the last three years, and was already just as tall as I was.

Reagan had the majority of the zipper up, so all I had to do was do up the last three inches, and she was ready.

“You look great,” I said truthfully.

She turned to me, and smiled.

Her big brown eyes, so much like her father’s, shined with annoyance, however.

“I hate wearing dresses,” she muttered.

I snorted.

That was an understatement.

She hated them so much that I’d had to go buy the one for tonight.

“Let’s go. We’re already late,” I said hurriedly.

She sighed and slipped her feet into her Chucks.

I didn’t say a word, knowing there were some battles that just weren’t worth fighting, this being one of them.

“Mom, I think we should stop for ice cream after the banquet,” Reagan said behind me.

“Ice cream, ice cream!” Way shrieked from in front of us.

I snorted.

The kid was a fatty.

Literally, if anything sweet came in her general direction, and she was going to eat it, whether you wanted her to or not.

Me, I had to sit there and watch them do it.

Diabetes sucked.

“We’ll see what your daddy wants to do,” I offered.

I didn’t want to say yes and Bennett be too tired.

Last night had been a long one for him, and then he’d had to go to work this morning, followed by the banquet directly after work.

So I was fairly sure ice cream would be off the table.

Then again, Bennett was a sucker for his two girls.

I was tired, too.

But not for the same reason that Bennett was tired.

I hadn’t worked in a little over two weeks because I’d been on maternity leave.

Tomorrow night would be the big day for me and our newest addition.

“I’ll get her strapped in,” Reagan told me as we got to the garage where my SUV was parked.

An SUV that Bennett had bought when we’d found out I was pregnant with Way.

“Thanks, baby,” I told her, walking to the driver’s side and hefting myself in.

After getting Way strapped in, Reagan got in the front seat and buckled herself in, signaling her readiness to go.

As we drove, I realized just how lucky I was to be where I was today.

Three years ago almost to the date, I’d woken from a coma that resulted from Corrinne shooting me in the belly.

I’d been informed by the doctor, upon waking, that I would likely never carry a child to full term due to the fact that the bullet hole had torn my uterus upon entry into my belly.

We’d proved them wrong, though, much to Bennett’s absolute terror.

I’d gone full term with Way, and then had done it once again with this baby that we’d yet to name.

Mostly because the baby never cooperated with the ultrasound tech each time we’d tried to determine the sex.

“Mom, you just passed a cop going sixty,” Reagan said worriedly.

I looked down at my speed and winced.

“Oops,” I muttered, wincing once again when we I saw him flip his lights on and turn around. “Dammit to hell.”

Fifteen minutes late, and a three hundred dollar speeding ticket later, the three of us were hurrying inside.

Bennett, who was dressed to perfection in his dress blues, stood at the entrance with his arms crossed, and a stern look on his face.

“How many times do I have to tell you not to speed right there?” He asked grouchily.

I stuck my tongue out at him. “Apparently, you didn’t do it enough, because I got a speeding ticket by that rookie, Maus.”

He snorted. “That’s his job.”

“Fuck his job,” I snapped, handing his child to him and wrapping my hand around the railing, and painfully climbed the steps.

“It was stupid. She was only going five over,” Reagan said to her father, trying to defend me.

“Yeah, but she’s gotten a ticket there before,” Bennett shot back.

I rolled my eyes.

What would possess a cop to sit there, behind the trees, at the bottom of a hill?

It was inevitable that I was going to speed!

Wasn’t that entrapment or something?

“What are you doing out here, anyway?” I asked crossly. “This whole event is about you and the rest of the SWAT team. You should be inside.”

“I would be inside, had my wife not been late,” he growled, shifting Way to his other hip so he could open the door.

I went in, tossing him a glare over my shoulder, and stomped as well as I could stomp at forty weeks pregnant in high heels.

“You shouldn’t be wearing those,” he growled from behind me.

I tossed him the bird over my shoulder, causing him to laugh.

“Bite me,” I snarled.

***

Three hours later

“Did you check your blood sugar?” Bennett called from the bathroom.

“Yeah,” I said.

I checked it every night. And every afternoon. And every morning. And every time I was supposed to.

Geez!

“My feet are killing me,” I groaned, easing down onto the bed, and hugging a pillow.

I was in an improvised downward dog, with my knees up underneath me, on either side of my big belly, with the pillow holding my chest up high enough to allow my belly room.

I felt the bed dip behind me, and Bennett found the small of my back with his impressive hands.

“Ohhh,” I moaned when he started to massage me. “That feels like heaven.”

“What was that you were saying earlier about your shoes?” he asked, moving his hands in a miraculous way.

“Maybe you were right,” I admitted on a groan. “Lower.”

He moved lower, hitting the spot right above my tail bone. “Harder.”

Jesus, the man knew how to make me beg.

Then, suddenly, it wasn’t a massage anymore.

Mostly because I felt the bare length of Bennett’s erection press into the cleft of my ass, and I was a goner.

“God,” I said, pressing back into him.

His impressive fingers moved from my back, down lower to the apex of my thighs, where he moved his whole hand over the length of my core.

I could feel my panties getting wet with each pass of his hand.

“Bennett,” I panted.

“Yeah, baby?” He asked, moving his hand to the band of my panties, and slowly working it down over my ass.

They caught at the bend of my knees, but that was all he needed as his fingers found my entrance, and slipped inside.

“Fuck,” I breathed, that feels good.

He worked his fingers in and out of me, the wet sound of him moving in and out of me filling the still room air around us.

“You ready for me, Nox?” He rasped.

I moaned into my pillow in answer, and I felt the bed dip behind me, and then the wide head of his cock line up at my entrance and slowly ease inside.

“So tight and hot,” he moaned as he filled me, stopping only when he met the end of me.

I pushed back, urging him to go fast.

This pregnancy had turned me into a nympho.

All it took was a suggestive look on Bennett’s part, and I was ready to ride him like a crazed cowgirl.

I came even faster, much to Bennett’s amusement.

And right then was no different.

“Please,” I said, pushing back into him. “Please.”

He gave me what I wanted, but only barely.

He didn’t go all out anymore. Not this close to the end of the pregnancy. Then again not at the beginning or middle, either.

I couldn’t wait to have the roughness back after this baby was born, but the sweet Bennett was just as good as the rough one.

His hips eased into mine, filling me so completely that I didn’t even realize I was about to come until it was taking me over.

My channel pulsed around his cock, and I felt him go over the edge right along with me.

Hot pulses of his come splashing against my cervix, causing my eyes to cross in pleasure.

Long moments later, I came back to myself as Bennett ran his big hands up and down my back.

“I’m gonna miss this,” he said after a while.

I groaned when he pulled out of me, and then lifted my panties up to catch his release as it started to leak out of me.

“You coming so fast, and me not having to hold onto it for you to come, too. I’m lazy by nature,” he teased.

I snorted and got up, walking to the bathroom.

“You’re the most non-lazy person I’ve ever known,” I told him.

After cleaning myself up and fetching new panties, I walked back into our bedroom and rolled into bed.

My belly met Bennett’s side, and his hand immediately found my big belly where our child was now awake doing summersaults, as per his or her usual.

It never failed, the moment I was ready for bed that was when this child woke up.

Every single time.

The baby did a particularly forceful kick, right in the hand that Bennett had resting on my belly.

“I’m gonna miss this, too,” he admitted softly, pressing his bearded cheek into my neck and running his nose the length of it.

I didn’t answer, allowing my eyes to close, as I finally succumbed to sleep.

“I fucking love you, Nox,” I swear I heard whispered in my dreams.

***

Bennett

“I need you to take this, Bennett. I have to start helping your mom plant these flowers in her garden, and we can’t do that if we have to move around that big, ugly smoker of yours,” Lennox said stubbornly.

“Goddammit, Lennox. You don’t have to make every house have flowers. And you shouldn’t be doing it anyway,” I said, looking pointedly at her big belly.

She crossed her arms, and I moved closer until my belly met hers.

Which was getting further and further away the longer the pregnancy progressed.

The moment my belly met hers, I was kicked, causing me to smile when I was trying to be stern.

“You’re being irrational,” I muttered darkly to cover up my happiness.

She smiled, taking my breath away as she always did, and leaned forward.

Tonight was the big day for us. The day we’d welcome our third child into the world. And I was scared shitless.

I’d been the same with Way, but it was easy to forget the agony of being scared shitless when you had a healthy child, as well as a healthy mama.

Now, though, I could distinctly remember the worry and it wasn’t very fun.

“Please,” she whispered, pouting out her lower lip for emphasis.

Sighing, I turned to the smoker.

“I only have the Tahoe,” I tried. “It won’t fit.”

She gave me a look. “It’ll fit if you take Way’s car seat out of the back.”

I scrunched my nose. “It’ll get the Tahoe dirty,” I tried again.

“We’re getting it detailed tomorrow while I’m at the hospital. In fact, your mother’s taking it for us. It’ll be alright.”

“If I take it, then I won’t have the room for the other three people that were going to ride with me,” I tried one last time.

She gave me a pointed look, and I growled in frustration.

“Fine,” I muttered. “Max! Will you help me load this into the Tahoe?” I asked pointing at the smoker.

He broke off from my father, and headed straight for the smoker.

This afternoon, being my last day as a father of two, I was going out to get a drink with the rest of the boys, and would be spending some much needed guy time away from the estrogen fest of my house.

Plus, there would be a baby shower there and I just didn’t do well with explosions of baby shit.

Grabbing one side, we both moved the smoker to the back of the Tahoe before I crawled inside and unhooked Way’s car seat.

I ignored the mountainous mound of crumbs underneath her seat, and folded the entire seat forward to allow the smoker some room to sit.

Once we were done I turned to Max. “You think you can drive, too? I’ll meet the rest of you there after I drop the smoker off at my house.”

Max nodded, and I headed back to Lennox for one more kiss.

I found her on her knees in the dirt.

“Lennox Jane Alvarez, swear to God!” I growled, coming up behind her.

She threw some dirt to the side, hitting my foot as she asked, “What?”

“If you overexert yourself and go into labor, I swear to God I’ll spank your ass until you can’t sit down,” I growled.

She snorted. “You could try.”

I just shook my head, knowing this wasn’t a fight I could win.

“Did you check your blood sugar?” I asked.

I could hear her growl of annoyance at my question.

I asked it a lot.

Sometimes too much.

But I liked the effect it had on her.

“Yes,” she hissed.

“Give me a kiss, wench. I’ll be back in time for Way to go to bed, okay?” I asked, bending down.

She got up onto her knees and offered me her upturned lips, which I took without hesitation.

“I fucking love you, asshole,” she said, smiling up at me.

I grinned. “I fucking love you too, witch.”

She winked, knowing I wanted to call her something else, but also very aware of the fact that I wouldn’t say something like that in front of Way or my mother.

I touched my lips to my mother as I moved off, and said, “Take care of her.”

She gave me a droll look. “And when have I not?”

I scrunched my nose up at her, and finally caught Way, who was being chased around by Reagan seeing as Way had stolen Reagan’s iPod cord that she was using to charge it.

“Give me a kiss, heathens, so I can go,” I said, bringing Way’s belly up to my mouth so I could blow a raspberry on it.

She squealed, and I tossed her over to my father who caught her effortlessly.

Reagan was next, and I gathered her into my arms and gave her the same directions I gave my mother. “Take care of Nox for me, okay?”

She rolled her eyes. “Mom can take care of herself, but I’ll keep an eye on her and let you know if she overexerts herself, okay?”

Knowing that would be as good as it got, I gave Max a wave, and headed out to the house.

But it was only fifteen minutes into my trip home that I realized that I wasn’t alone in the car.

In fact, the longer I thought about it, the more convinced I was that I felt something slithering around at my feet.

“Fuck me,” I breathed, pulling the SUV over without making any sudden moves.

I about bit a hole in my tongue as I slowly eased the door open, and bailed.

Somehow I managed to look back as my feet hit the pavement, only to see a long rattle tipped tail ease back under the seat of my Tahoe.

“Holy fuck,” I breathed, after I realized I’d nearly just died.

Then I cursed myself when I realized that not only had I left my phone in the truck, but my sidearm as well.

Lennox may very well kill me for shooting her car up, but there was no way in hell that I’d get back into the SUV without being assured that the fucker was dead.

So there I stood, for fifteen minutes, as I opened every single door, and backed away to wait.

Downy and Luke rolled up five minutes later, and they were looking at me like I was fucking possessed.

“What the fuck man?” Downy asked, stepping out of Luke’s truck.

I nodded my head to the Tahoe. “There’s a fucking rattlesnake in the Tahoe.”

“Seriously?” Luke asked with a raised brow.

I nodded. “Lennox made me take the old smoker out of my parent’s flower bed. It’s in the back of the Tahoe; it must’ve been where it came from.”

Luke, ever curious, made his way to the open door to the Tahoe, took one glance in the backseat, and back pedaled like his dick was grabbed.

“Holy fucking shit, that thing’s massive!”

Then, like horrible fucking timing, none other than the rest of the Motley Crew pulled up, and they all piled out of Max’s Suburban.

“What’s up?” Max asked, easing up to the side of us without getting out.

I nodded my head towards my Tahoe. “There was a snake in the smoker.”

Max blinked. “Not shit?”

“No shit,” I confirmed.

“Well, what’re you going to do now?” He asked.

“Not a fucking clue,” I admitted.

So, one by one, the lot of us got out and tried to see the snake, which had taken up against the baby’s car seat that I’d tossed into the front seat.

“Shoot it,” Michael muttered.

“Grab the top of the car seat and pull the fucker out with it,” Sam suggested.

“Your phone’s ringing,” James said, stating the obvious.

“Maverick calling,” my Tahoe announced to me.

I reached in and pressed the phone button on the steering wheel, knowing I wouldn’t get too close to the snake, which meant getting anywhere near my actual phone wasn’t gonna happen.

“Hello?” I asked warily.

This was all her fault!

“Umm,” Lennox said. “I might, or might not have, over done it. And I’m currently standing in a puddle of my water that just broke.”

I squeezed my eyes tightly shut as terror gripped me in its claws.

“Get my dad to take you to the hospital,” I said quickly.

“I can’t. Your dad has cloth seats. We have leather. Come back and get me,” she said urgently.

I cleared my throat. “There’s no can do on ours. There’s a snake in there, and there’s no way I’m getting it out by myself.”

She was silent for a few moments before she started giggling. “I’m sorry.”

I ground my teeth. “You should be. It crawled out of the smoker.”

She hissed, and my stomach clenched with the sound.

“At least,” she breathed out roughly. “It didn’t come out when you were carrying it to the car. Or if you’d have left it, and I moved it. Things could be worse.”

“Get dad to take you to the hospital. Mom’ll have to watch the kids until dad can get home to get my truck. I’ll catch a ride with Max,” I told her.

She sniffled, and my heart broke to know she was in pain.

“It’ll be okay, baby.”

The men around me shuffled their feet, none of them liking the fact that a woman was in pain any more than I did.

“I know, Benny Boo Boo,” she sniffled. “I fucking love you.”

I winced at the use of the nickname she’d given me.

She’d watched How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days, and had ‘fallen in love’ (her words not mine) and had used the nickname in private ever since.

Now, though, I figured my free pass was gone.

“I’ll meet you there, baby. Love you too.”

Lennox hung up, and I backed away from the Tahoe warily, fishing my keys out of my pocket and handing them to Max.

“Thanks man,” I muttered, tossing him my key.

He narrowed his eyes at me. “What makes you think I want to deal with that?”

“Because your niece or nephew is on his or her way, and I’m not there yet?” I asked with a raised voice.

He waved me off. “Get out of here.”

Thirty minutes later, with five men in tow, I burst through the maternity wing doors and headed straight to the room I’d been told via Downy’s phone.

I got there in time to see them wheeling her down the hospital hall and straight into surgery.

“Over here!” Payton called, waving me over.

I ran to her and started stepping into the clothes she offered me.

I ripped the booties with the size of my feet, but Payton waved me onward. “It’s fine, just get them on as far as you can and let’s go.”

I left my sister with a kiss at the door of the operating room, and hurried through the glass doors.

“Mr. Alvarez, I assume,” a nurse fully garbed in her surgical gear asked lightly.

I nodded my head, looking over the nurse’s shoulder. “Yeah. That’s me. Is she okay?”

The nurse nodded, her eyes shining with humor. “She’s fine. They’re just getting to the good part.”

She led the way further into the room, and I nearly dropped to my knees at the sight of my wife’s belly gaping open with a diagonal line gaping open.

I swallowed thickly, forcing myself to move, one foot in front of the other, until I came to Lennox’s side.

“I knew you’d make it,” she whispered, not bothering to open her eyes. “The snake didn’t bite your wiener, did it? I’m quite fond of that.”

I blinked in surprise. “No, my wiener is all good.”

The anesthesiologist snorted in amusement.

“She could feel a little more than what we were comfortable with, so I shot her up with a nice cocktail about a minute before you walked into the room,” he informed me.

“Ahhh,” I said, understanding now why she was speaking the way she was.

“A little pressure!” A man’s voice called from the opposite side of the curtain.

Then, I kid you fucking not, I saw the man hop up over the curtain, and then saw my wife’s body forcefully rock as he came down on her belly.

“Head’s out!” A woman called in excitement.

Nausea boiled in my belly, and I looked down at my wife to see her smiling, and her eyes dilated until I could barely make out any color at all.

“You have a boy!” A woman crowed, and I came to my feet in an instant.

“A boy?” I asked excitedly.

The doctor held the blood covered baby up for me to see, and sure enough, he was a boy!

A very pissed off at the world, boy!

I dropped down into my seat once again, and looked down at my wife, who was smiling from ear to ear.

“Did you hear that, baby?” I asked in happiness.

She smiled from ear to ear, the black bar across her forehead that was measuring her temperature crinkled with her skin as she did.

“You’re welcome,” she said smugly.

I leaned down and placed my lips upon hers.

“I love you, baby. You’ve given me so many gifts that I don’t think I can ever repay you.” I told her softly.

She pressed her lips against mine.

“I love you too, Bennett. And you’ve done the same, if not more, for me. I think we’re even,” she whispered.

I looked down into her eyes as I listened to the wails of my crying son.

“No baby. But I’ll spend my life trying to make it so.”

And I would.

Forever.