by Zoey Parker
Emma told her, then added, “But the pregnancy test came back negative.”
“If you don’t mind, I’m going to confirm that. You are going to need some medication for all your bumps and bruises. I don’t want to give you anything that could potentially hurt you.”
Emma found herself frowning. “I hate to say this, but with everything that happened to me tonight there is no chance that a baby would stick around.”
The doctor shrugged and patted her shoulder. “Better safe than not.”
It was, Emma decided, a good thing that the doctor had taken that test. At the end of the day all she could prescribe was a few tablets of Tylenol.
“What?” Kellan asked, having returned to the room after his hip had been stitched up. “What do you mean Tylenol?”
The doctor took a deep breath and shared a look with Emma. Without another word she stepped out. Emma reached for Kellan’s hand. There were a million ways she might have been able to tell him what was going on. Poetic statements and flowery phrases that might have worked with a different kind of man, but none of them were for Kellan.
“I’m pregnant,” she said softly. “I’m going to have a baby. If you want to, we are going to have a baby.”
He stared at her with open-mouthed disbelief. “What? How?”
She raised her brow at him. “I was pretty sure you understood the mechanics of the whole thing.”
He took his hand out of hers and walked in a little circle. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to say. Emma, I love you, I meant it when I said it and I mean it now, but I would be a terrible father.”
“Why?” she asked as gently as she could. “What makes you so sure?”
“My father—”
She cut him off because she didn’t want to hear it again. “Your father was his own person. He was a terrible person but he wasn’t you. My father was a biker, a high school dropout, a criminal, a killer, and a thief. Of all of those things, I’m only one of them.”
He opened and closed his mouth several times. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Get over yourself,” she said flatly. On a different day she might have held her arms out to him and let him cry, but it had been too long a night with too many emotions for her to hold his hand through this particular one. “Because you are going to be a dad.”
He flopped down into a seat and held his head in his hands. He was shaking and she could see it. She made a small sound. Apparently she would have to do some handholding anyway. She held her fingers out to him and motioned him over.
“Kellan, I love you. I love you so very much. You are stubborn, and difficult, and arrogant, and you manage people the way other people manage money. But you think very little of yourself where it matters most. You rushed in to rescue me, to do the thing that needed to be done even though you didn’t know what might happen to you. If that’s not fatherhood material, I don’t know what is.”
“What if I mess up?”
She gave his fingers a squeeze. “Then I’ll be there to set it all right.”
“I don’t know if I am ready.”
She pulled him towards her, and placed her lips gently against his. “You’ll be ready.”
For the first time since she told him the news a flicker of hope and happiness moved across his face. His lips teased up in a tiny grin. “You know, if we weren’t already married, I’d ask you to marry me.”
“Well,” she said, her lips splitting into a truly amused grin, “it’s a good thing we already got that covered.”
Chapter 19
The smell of burgers and hot dogs wafted through the deep summer heat nearly a year later. Rocco, whose fur had almost recovered from the cast he had hobbled around in for too many months, circled the grill with his tongue lolling out of his mouth. His tail thumped against the dirt in hope.
“What do you want?” Kellan asked, flopping down in a nearby chair and resting the heel of one foot on the toe of the other. “You know burgers are bad for you. Emma says so all the time.”
“What?” a low country drawl said as the meat flipped on top of the grill. “A li’l bit’a meat never killed none of my hounds I tell ya. Gave them just a little bit with their dinner. Besides, what is in all that fancy meat at the grocery store? Tofu? Naw.”
“Whatever you say, Wayne.”
The man turned around, the Prospect patch clear on his chest. His shot hair was half hidden beneath an honest to god cowboy hat. He tipped it in Kellan’s direction and gave a big grin. “I mean, what would happen if I just happened to drop a piece on the ground?”
Rocco circled around, his tail flopping back and forth, back and forth. He gave a yip of demand before a fat piece of meat rolled of the grill and landed at his feet. Rocco was just about to demolish it when a golden blur beat him to it.
Kellan laughed. “Look at that, old dog, the pup beat you two it.”
The younger dog, who had the look of a golden retriever and something far hairier rolled, onto his back, and onto the discarded burger.
“Samantha!”
The pup, hearing her name called with a very stern voice, sprang to its feet and rolled over. A large hunk of food clung to her fur. She gave a shrill and youthful bark before charging across the yard towards the open backdoor and the woman who stood there. His heart did a slow twitch in his chest that made him feel breathless.
The real Samantha was locked up in the women's state prison. Apparently she had been helping the brothers sell of plenty of young pretty girls to the highest bidder. Kellan hadn't understood why Emma had wanted to name a good dog after such a horrible person, and when he had ask she had just fixed him with a smile and shrugged. “Because she's a bitch.”
His woman had the strangest sense of humor.
Emma had tossed her hair into a messy tail at the top of her head, decked out in medical scrubs. A simple golden band sat on her finger, matching the one that sat on his. Her work outfit was pink, and made her face look flushed and happy. Though that might have also been because of the baby positioned on her hip.
The hair was as black and curly as his own, but the eyes that twinkled out of that tiny, round face were the same blue as Emma’s.
“Can you come help me?”
It wasn’t really a question, and they both knew it. He tilted his head at Wayne and raised a beer in salute. “Man the grill. My woman wants me.”
Wayne tipped his hat again and called out for Sargent, a middle-aged man whose arms were speckled with Naval images, including the Marines symbol on his visible bicep. He dragged a much younger man, nearly as skinny as Kellan’s thigh, to plop down around the grill in camaraderie.
He headed inside, taking his time to get there. He paused long enough near the back door to tell Phantom to make sure the new guys didn’t set anything of fire. There were only six Beasts now, and he didn’t much want to lose any of them. There had been enough of that.
“Hey,” Rudy said when Kellan stepped through the door, “your wife was looking for you.”
“So I heard, where’s yours?”
“Being a whale,” Hannah called from the living room. She hefted not only herself and a child, but a very pregnant belly. “My feet feel huge.”
“You should be resting.” Rudy tried to guide his wife into a chair, but she was having none of it.
“I’m pregnant, not dying. I want a salad and five hamburgers.” She placed a hand on her back. “Kellan, Emma was—”
“Looking for me, so I hear.” He stopped and gave Hannah a kiss on the cheek. “Don’t you let this big oaf push you around.”
“Never.” She winked at him and motioned him on. “Get on with you, Emma looked ready to throttle something.”
He made his way down the hall and found Emma in the bedroom. For a moment all he did was watch her. Childbirth and a comfortable life had added a bit of curve to her hips. He fought an urge to bury his teeth in them. Being a mom definitely suited her.
The baby was laid out on the bed, a d
iaper and diaper cream laid up next to him. He had one foot gripped in one hand, and was currently trying to bring it to his mouth.
Emma adjusted her ponytail, plopped her keys into a bag, and turned to him.
“You rang?” he asked, leaning casually against the doorway.
“Took you long enough,” she fussed. She was distracted as she turned to look in the mirror. “It’s your turn to change Leon. I need to get ready for work.”
Kellan smirked and wandered over to the baby, tugging the plump foot out of his toothless mouth. “Hey there. Hey there, little guy.”
He took his time with Leon. It had taken him weeks to master the act of putting a diaper on a squirming baby. Kids, he had decided after the first month, had no desire to wear clothes or do much of anything. When everything was back where it should be, he hefted Leon up to give him a hug. Emma was watching him. There were tears in her eyes.
“What?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”
“You are such an idiot.”
He blinked. “I missed something. What happened.”
She slapped a hand against his arm. “You thought you were going to be a bad father. You’re an idiot.”
He laughed softly and wrapped an arm around her back, tugging her close. “I’m sorry.”
“I love you,” she whispered, pulling his head down to give him a kiss.
“I love you, too.”
THE END
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Books by Zoey Parker
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Blood Oath: A Motorcycle Club Romance (Satan’s Kin MC) (Alpha Inked Bikers Book 1)
I’m the ruthless biker here to wreck her world.
I’m making her choose between death and the devil.
Caroline can end up in my bed, or six feet under.
It doesn’t matter that she’s not cut out for this life, because she doesn’t have a choice:
I’m never letting her go.
CARSON
I’m not here to fall in love.
I’m here to f**k women and leave them in the dust.
Then I see Caroline: curves for days and bright red hair like a flame in the night.
And I take her for my own.
I know I’m not her knight in shining armor.
I’m her outlaw seducer, the devil who claims her soul.
But when she’s being forced into a life of crime, I can’t stop myself from protecting her.
She’s terrified of the choice I offer:
Either fall prey to the wicked man who’s dying to claw her back…
Or step into my world and do exactly as I say.
CAROLINE
Carson walks into my bar, tatted and scarred, and my heart pounds.
He’s not my type. He’s a bad boy who only wants to f**k and leave.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t feel his hands on me.
His mouth hard and demanding against my own.
Everywhere I look, Carson’s there.
And when I become part of a heist against my will, I have no one to turn to but him.
He’s my savior.
My protector.
The man who owns me body and soul.
Until I find out he’s no better than the man forcing me to steal.
I want to run, to scream, to beg for help from anyone who can hear me.
But all I can hear are the biker’s words in my ear:
“Never forget. You’re MINE.”
The Devil’s Chopper: A Motorcycle Club Romance (Inferno Hunters MC) (Owned by Outlaws Book 4)
She bought a one-way ride on the devil’s chopper.
The monster is coming to drag her back to the depths of the hell she escaped.
But he’ll have to go through me.
Because she’s fallen into my arms…
And I’ll slaughter any man who tries to take her from me.
PARKER
The night my fiancée died in my arms, I swore that I would never love again.
The tragedy turned my heart to stone.
Inked my soul as black as night.
I’ve spent years like this.
Drinking, fighting, and f**king the pain away as a patched brother of the Inferno Hunters MC.
But when I meet Ellie, everything changes.
I want her in my bed.
In my arms.
On my motorcycle.
Ellie deserves better than a broken man like me.
But that doesn’t stop me from making her mine.
And when her filthy ex tries to claw her and her baby daughter back?
I swear one thing:
I’ll get them back or I’ll die trying.
Because Ellie has turned my heart of rock into a living, beating one.
One that’ll love her until my dying breath.
ELLIE
After my divorce, I swore off men.
What good did a man ever do me?
None – until Parker walked into my diner.
He protected me from my abusive beast of an ex-husband…
And showed me that there might be some good left in this world.
With dark eyes and a voice like sin, the gorgeous biker makes me want to abandon my oath to keep away from men.
And when he touches me?
I can hardly remember my name.
The bad boy makes me want to believe in happily ever after.
But, of course, that’s when my ex-husband pounces, relentless in his thirst for revenge against me.
He holds me and my baby girl hostage, with who knows what kind of vicious, bloody vengeance looming as the next step in his plan.
I can only pray my outlaw hero saves us in time.
I may have given up hope of ever finding happiness.
But if Parker finds a way to protect me and my daughter…
I swear to love him until the end of time.
The Devil’s Blaze: A Motorcycle Club Romance (Fury Riders MC) (Owned by Outlaws Book 3)
I have twenty-four hours to give her the baby she begged for.
LUCAS
Time is running out.
The window of opportunity is closing.
There’s only twenty-four hours left to do what I promised to do:
Put a baby in the innocent girl’s belly.
I thought she was kidding when she said it at first.
That she wanted me to get her pregnant.
So I made her say it again.
I wanted to hear those words out loud.
The kind a rogue outlaw biker like me never intended to hear.
I stared straight at her pink, pretty lips, her flawless teeth, her warm tongue, as she said it one more time:
“I want you to give me a baby.”
Right. F**king. Now.
JOSEPHINE
The door shut, and suddenly we were alone together.
I almost ran out screaming.
It took every ounce of willpower I had to keep myself glued to where I stood.
This wasn’t how I pictured my life going.
But the world has a funny way of throwing you a sickening twist when you least expect it.
Which is how I ended up here.
About to be owned by a biker.
Not just any biker:
A complete and total stranger. He could’ve been an angel or a devil, a saint or a sinner.
I had no idea either way.
I’d literally just met him.
But now, he was about to knock me up.
I wonder what I’d have done if I knew how this would all turn out.
If I could have predicted the bloodshed, the ch
aos, the horror, the death…
Maybe I wouldn’t have done what I did next.
Maybe I wouldn’t have stepped up to the cocky devil in the leather jacket, laid my hand on his chest, and said those six twisted, filthy, reckless little words:
“I’m ready to have your baby.”
The Devil’s Scar: A Mafia Hitman Romance (Owned by Outlaws Book 2)
I can’t say no when he tells me to bend over.
Going home with him was my first mistake.
But the bad boy set my insides on fire.
