by Ruby Carter
I sat next to Dani’s bed going on 6 whole weeks. I hadn’t left the hospital in all that time. I had a shower in the doctor’s changing room. One of the nurses, Betty, took pity on me and let me use it when she was on night shift.
Why won’t she wake up? I keep thinking she will never come back to me. I want to keep positive, but it’s been 6 weeks. 6 goddamn long weeks without her. It burns like a fire in my soul. If this is what it feels to live without her, I won’t be strong enough to survive it.
My men are trying to look out for me, trying to get me to go home, rest, change, but I have lost my patience with them. I have a short fuse at the moment. Flex keeps trying to get me to go home. What aren’t they getting? I am not leaving my woman. Not again. I physically couldn’t even if I wanted to. Dani’s mom keeps popping in to check on us both. When she first met me that night, she wasn’t the most welcoming to say the least. She blamed me and I welcomed it.
Zara and my men kept telling her we got there as fast as we could, but I took her anger on the chin. I needed it to fight for her. But I think she knows I love and adore her daughter. It's pretty obvious. I look over Dani, lying there like sleeping beauty. She looks so peaceful, even with the cuts and bruises over her face. She is the most beautiful woman I have ever laid my eyes on, with her chestnut hair fanning on the stark white pillow.
I think back to the first time I met her, when she said that she was broken and damaged. God, how wrong could she be? She may think she is broken, but I know she isn't. She is stronger and braver than most men I know. Scratch that, she is stronger and braver. She had her battles, but she is the one who fought and won! I won't let her have another one alone. Not while she's with me. I promise that to her and myself. Fuck me staying away from her. No-one could drag me away from her, the woman I love. No one!
When I look down to see her big doe eyes staring back at me, I take a second. I keep thinking I am dreaming, that I am seeing things, but my very own sleeping beauty has a woken up with tight grip on my hand.
I barely get out the words to speak to her, but I manage to choke out through the emotion that is clogging in my throat, "Sweetness…you came back,” with tears in my eyes, like a fucking pussy.
I don’t give a shit. I am glad she is staring up at me, like I am her world. Jesus, that makes me feel like the luckiest man on the planet, like a goddamn king. She just stares up at me and goes to talk or breathe but the tub’s making her breathe stop her. Just then, the doctor who saved her life comes in. "Right, Ms. Cooper. It’s ok. Try to remain calm, ok? I am going to remove your ventilator so you can breathe on your own."
She hasn’t moved her eyes from mine. I don’t think she has even blinked. She’s just looking at me with panic, relief, and tears in those big, green-grey eyes of hers. We don’t break eye contact. I just can’t believe she is awake.
"A… Axe. Drrrink," she begs with such a dry voice. I quickly grab the beaker of water with a straw for her to drink out of and press the straw to her beautiful, ruby red lips. She licks them to moisten them. God, this isn't the time to have a hard on.
I forgot about the doctor standing in the room. I don’t see other people in the room when it comes to Dani. I just see her.
"Right, Miss Cooper. Can you remember what has happened? You have been in an induced coma for 4 weeks and we brought you out of it 2 weeks ago. You lost a lot of blood. We nearly lost you there for while but we repaired the damage to your stomach wall. You and your baby are very lucky indeed. You should make a full recovery. It will be slow going, but plenty of bed rest. I estimate about another few weeks in hospital to recover. Are there any questions?"
I can’t move. I just stumble through the sentence and I kind of zoned out for a while after he said “baby”. "B-B-baby? I think you have the wrong patient, doctor." Dani tells him, all the color draining from her face. She looks even paler than before. My heart is racing while my mind screams “BABY?!” on repeat!
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Miss Cooper! I assumed you knew you were just over 8 weeks along. I am so sorry. Please forgive me?"
"T-thhhere’s nothing to forgive, doctor. Are you sure you have the correct medical records? I can’t be pregnant! I just can’t be." Dani is rubbing her wrists nervously and then looks at her stomach and back up at me.
Our eyes lock again this time, but I smile to try and put her at ease, because if I found out at another time and in another place, this would have freaked me the fuck out. But with Dani, my Dani, I have this happiness building inside of my chest. What man wouldn’t be proud? His woman, carrying his child. That’s two things I never thought I would want let alone have, a woman and a child on the way. God, that sounds so good.
I can’t say anything. The room is silent and the doctor leaves us staring at each other. “Look, Axe … I know this isn’t what you signed up for but...Well, we didn’t use protection, did we? But I want you to know that I don’t expect you to do this if you don’t want to,” she says the last bit as quiet as she is playing with her fingers. I can barely hear her and I don’t want her thinking those things.
“Dani, Sweetness. Yeah, I didn’t sign up for this. You are right. But I lose all my senses around you and I forgot to put on a condom. All I think about is how I want and need to be inside of you. But I always glove up, sweetness. But you have to listen and believe what I am about to say to you, baby. You’re it for me. No one can even come a speck close to you. I love you, Dani, and I know I fucking messed this up. I can’t promise I will always get it right or know what the hell I am doin’, but if you give me this chance to prove myself to you and our baby, I won’t let you down. When I thought I had lost you...shit, sweetness, I couldn’t breathe. My heart and lungs stopped working. You are my oxygen, baby. You give me so much strength."
I can feel the tears pooling in my eyes. I rub the heel of my palm into my eyes. ”You have to believe me b…”
“Axe! AXE! Will you shut up and get here and kiss me already!”
My woman wants my lips. My woman wants me and I am going to give them to her. I bend down to meet her cherry-hued, red, swollen lips that are aching to be kissed. I kiss her soft and gently at first and our kiss becomes more passionate, our tongues dancing with each other. We pull apart, breathing hard, trying to catch our breaths. We lean and rest our foreheads on each other. She looks into my eyes and they meet my soul. She says the words I have been waiting for, only from her. From my Pixie. From my sweetness. My Dani, the woman I love so much. She’s like my air. I can’t live without her. She is the mother of my unborn child.
“I love you, Xavier. I love you so much.”
Thank you so much for reading, and taking a chance on a newbie. I hope you all enjoyed Axe and Dani’s story as much as I do.
Love Ruby x
Read on for Chapter One to the next installment of the
Devils Reapers MC Series
Flex
Turn the page for a quick look at the next
Devils Reapers
MC Book
Flex
By:
Ruby Carter
~ Chapter 1 Flex ~
5 years ago…
Blood.
Blood everywhere. I have never seen so much blood, and I have seen a lot of it during my life in the club. But I swear on my cut I have never seen so much blood come out of one person, my stomach rolls just thinking about it.
I can't hear the rest of what the doctor is telling me. I zone out completely. It doesn't matter anymore. Nothing does... My world has literally broken in two. It’s stopped turning. I can’t think or breathe…
My brother, X, is trying to console me, and we have never had a bad word said against each other, but right at this moment, I want to punch him, strangle him, or kill him. I can’t decide which. It all happened so fast. I grab my best friend’s throat and I slam him against the wall, squeezing with both hands with all my might.
"Flex …. Flex, man. Get the fuck off me!" After a few minutes, I reluctantly let go of my best fri
end’s throat, as he’s gasping for breath.
I snap out of it just in time to see his face going red. He puts his arms around me, trying to console me, but I want to be alone. That’s what I am now.
"Brother, come on. We got your back. You know that. Do you want retribution, make them suffer? Or let it slide?" He says, baiting me, but all I can do is just nod and grunt at him. I can’t find the words. Not anymore. My life has lost its meaning.
All my brothers have surrounded me, trying to engulf me with their love, respect, condolences, honoring what I have lost.
But it doesn’t seem to affect me. Not one iota. I can feel myself sinking into darkness and I am being swallowed up by it. I don’t want it to stop because then I will feel something, pure hatred for myself. I fucking welcome it. No one can bring me out of this darkness. Not myself, my best friend, nor my brothers.
I should have been killed. It should have been me not her.
My wife is dead
And I killed her.
To be continued…
