His Angel: The Wounded Souls Series

by Leah Sharelle

  There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do for my wife, and if she asked, I did it, simple as that. What she wanted now, I couldn’t give her. The whole pregnancy had been a battle for her with the constant sickness. She had even been admitted twice to the hospital during the later months and hooked up to a drip. The constant vomiting took its toll on Stella. Her small body hardly coped with the last nine months. I fucking hated seeing her suffer and hated that there was nothing I could do but watch her go through it. For a man like me, that was unacceptable. At the seven-month mark and her second hospitalisation for dehydration and exhaustion, I told Stella this was going to be our only child. I didn’t have a desperate need to populate the planet with my offspring. I did, however, have a desperate need to live the rest of my days with my wife by my side.

  “Honey, you are in the best place right now. Before long, we will take our son home with us and start another phase of perfection.” I grabbed the face flannel from the table next to Stella’s bed and wiped it across her cheeks and forehead.

  “You’re still convinced he is a boy,” she said, her smile weak just like her voice.

  I looked over at the doctor at the end of the bed, and he had an expression that had my hackles up.

  “Stella, I need you to push with everything you’ve got with the next contraction. The last one you didn’t do so well, so I really need you to push hard.” There was an edge in the doctor’s tone.

  Something was wrong, and I could feel it. I pushed my fears aside and focused my attention back to my wife. I grabbed her hand and pressed my lips to her soft skin.

  “Honey, I know he is. A guardian angel whispered it to me,” I said with a wink. I never told Stella about my ‘encounter’ with my deceased brother. I figured with what I had to do to Rogue, telling her that I saw and spoke to Carson would be just a little too much for her to cope with. Fuck, I was having a hard enough time dealing with it all. The only thing that got me through the weeks after that night was the love of this beautiful woman.

  Suddenly, the screeching of alarms filled the room. As the doctors and nurses started yelling at one another, I noticed Stella’s hand felt limp in mine.

  “Stella!”

  “Love our boy, Handsome. Make sure he always knows he is loved.”

  “No, no, no, no, no,” I screamed, fear like I had never felt gripped me. Right in front of my own eyes, I watched the only person who would ever own my heart slowly close her eyes, the sweetest smile gracing her beautiful face.

  “Loving you has been my greatest gift,” she whispered as the shrill of another alarm penetrated my ears.

  “Doctor, both mum and bub’s heartbeats are dropping,” a nurse called out from somewhere in the room. It sounded close, but all I saw was the life draining out of Stella.

  “Get him out of here,” one of the doctors shouted sharply.

  In a blur, I was shoved towards the door of the operating room. Stella’s doctor had not wanted to take any chances due to her high-risk pregnancy, so instead of the birthing suite, they chose the OR for the delivery.

  “Stella, fight, Honey, fight for me. Don’t you leave me, Stella!” I shouted hoarsely, the words feeling so familiar. I begged her not to leave me once before as I held her bleeding and beaten body in that filthy, abandoned car park months before.

  It took four well-built orderlies and two security guys to shift me from the room. I was fighting to shrug out of their hold when the huge door shut, and the last thing I saw was the pale face of my honey lying limp on the bed.

  “Honey, I love you! Fight!” I bellowed one last time before I dropped to my knees. Wetness covered my cheeks as I knelt on the cold, hard floor. Helplessness washed over me, and it was as if all the blood in my body froze instantly.

  Please, not my honey. Don’t take her from me, I prayed over and over again. I raked my hands through my long hair, and a guttural sound left my throat as anguish, pain, and devastation pulsed through me. My head fell back on my shoulder, and the bright fluorescent lights blinded me.

  Please, save her, Darth. She is my fucking world, and I am nothing without her.

  The light above twinkled off, then on again. It was so quick that I wasn’t sure it even happened.

  I got you, brother. She is coming back to you, I heard my brother’s voice reassure me.

  I stayed there on my knees on the cold floor and cried, believing that Darth was there with my wife and son, guiding them back to me.

  ———

  “Oh, Booth, isn’t he magnificent?” Stella marvelled over our son as she proceeded to count his little fingers and toes for the tenth time.

  After I was shoved out of the room, I waited for an hour before the nurse came out to tell me the news that my wife and son were alive. It was the longest hour of my life, one I never wanted to repeat.

  “Just like his mum,” I said quietly, never taking my eyes from the two people who held my heart and soul. I was sitting on Stella’s bed with her body snuggled up against me and my arms wrapped tightly around her and our boy. Her head turned slightly so she could look at me.

  “Handsome, I’m fine. Please, don’t take any of this on. Everything turned out. We have a son, and he is right here with us. So am I.” Her sweet voice calmed me, as did her words, but there was still a ball of fear that churned in the bottom of my gut.

  “No more babies, Stella. I nearly lost you again, Honey, and I can’t go through that terror again, not for anything,” I admitted, hoping like hell she agreed. There was one thing I could not do, and that was saying no to my wife. If she wanted another go at this— Shit a brick!

  “Don’t worry, Booth. I think this little guy is enough for us. We can just spoil him forever. Is that okay with you?” Stella pressed a kiss to my jaw, and relief speared through me.

  “Yeah, Honey, we can do that. How about a name? We talked about names every day for the whole nine months. What do you want to call him?” If she tried to get me to agree to name him Vincent again, that was a definite no. I held my finger to my son’s tiny hand, and he grabbed hold of it in a surprisingly tight grip, making me smile. My boy was a strong little fella.

  “I think he looks like a Gabriel,” Stella suggested. “Gabriel Kurt Booth.”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat. Giving our son the middle name of the man who saved her, Charlotte, and Shiloh was a fitting tribute to my fallen brother.

  “I think that is perfect. He had a guardian angel helping him come into this world, and the same guardian angel brought you back to me.” I leaned in and kissed Stella softly on her lips. “I love you so much, Stella. Thank you for this life and for loving me.”

  “There’s nothing else I want more, Handsome,” she whispered against my lips, giving me one more kiss before turning back to watch Gabriel sleep.

  I snuggled my wife and son closer to my chest and sighed contently. Everything I needed was right here in my arms. And that was that.

  Steel & His Beauty

  “You are Daddy’s girl, aren’t you, little Meagan?” I murmured softly at my two-month-old daughter.

  Her beautiful brown eyes widened as she stared up at me. From the second Meagan was born, she rendered me speechless. When the doctor put the six-pound bundle in my arms, I fell so fucking hard in love that it made my head spin.

  I thanked the Lord above every day that he gave my baby girl the same eyes as her mother and the same brown hair. But her attitude was all me. Nothing fazed her, feed time was easy, playtime was a joy, and sleep time was a breeze.

  She hardly ever cried, although Mia said that was only because I was always holding her. The way I saw it, why did she have to cry?

  My girl was the boss of me, and if she wanted to be held, then fucking hell, I was going to hold her. If people had a problem with that, I didn’t give a shit.

  “Steel, isn’t she supposed to be napping?”

  I turned around at the sound of my wife’s voice. My breath caught as I took in the sight that was my beauty. Her hair was l
onger now, falling to the middle of her back, and the chocolate colour shone as did her eyes, although not with the love and adoring affection she normally bestowed on me. Nope. She was pissed off.

  “Here’s Mummy, baby girl, and she doesn’t look too happy with Daddy,” I spoke quietly to my daughter, then laughed when Meagan answered me with a gurgle and a spit bubble.

  “Steel, I am serious. Meagan needs to learn to self-soothe. When she does cry, you get her straightaway,” Mia scolded me like I was the child and not Meagan.

  I turned my eyes to Mia and nearly swallowed my tongue. She was dressed in the tightest spandex workout shorts, which barely covered her luscious thighs, but it was her feminine mound that had my attention. The tight spandex hugged it so delectably I swore it outlined her lips.

  “Hey, Stud, my eyes are up here,” Mia prompted me with a click of her fingers, pulling me out of my sexual fog.

  I growled, which caught my daughter’s attention, and her pretty eyes widened, but she didn’t cry. Not my baby girl. Nope. She was used to the sound of her daddy growling.

  With a sigh, I stood from the rocker. Meagan grunted when I shifted her to my shoulder. She didn’t need to see me argue with her beautiful mother.

  “Beauty, I don’t see why she needs to cry before I pick her up.” This wasn’t the first time Mia had told me off for holding Meagan all the time, and it was starting to annoy me. There was no need for the baby to cry. Before she was even born, she had a rough go at it—Rogue attacking Mia when she was pregnant and being a target when Tori and Shifty were killed. On those two occasions, I was helpless as I watched my woman fall to the ground after Rogue kicked her in the stomach and watched through my scope when a bullet passed inches from my woman’s body only to hit Tori. Each time, there was nothing I could do, and that was something I could not accept. I would not accept standing back and watching my child suffer, whether it was from lack of sleep, hunger, or just having a cranky moment.

  “Steel, it’s not just that. You don’t let anyone else hold her. Even I have a hard time getting a turn. If I weren’t still breastfeeding Meagan, I don’t think I would get to cuddle her at all.” Mia walked over to me, her big breasts swaying as she leaned over. Her tits had me so mesmerised I hardly registered her taking Meagan from my arms.

  I let out another growl. Her tactic of showing her milk-swollen tits to take my daughter from me just earned her a spanking.

  “Mia, when I let other people hold her, they don’t give her back. Charlotte walked outside with her the other day and without a hat on her little head. There was a breeze, Beauty,” I said, fanning my hands, making my point very valid. I decided not to answer her other question since I didn’t think Mia would take it well if I told her she had nine months of holding our baby.

  Carrying, holding, it was all the same, I concluded silently.

  “Really, Steel? It was breezy? And what about me? What is your excuse for not letting me hold our daughter much of the time?” Mia asked, her foot tapping on the floor in time with her hand on Meagan’s back.

  Meagan doesn’t like it like that, I thought to myself.

  “You know she prefers a rubbing motion. The palm pat makes her fussy.” And to prove my point, Meagan started to grizzle, her little head moving back and forth on Mia’s shoulder, and then she did something that made my chest puff out.

  “Steel! Our daughter just growled. Okay, that’s it.” Mia turned on her heels and headed out of our suite of rooms.

  “Hey, where are—”

  “Do not move from that spot. Do you understand me, Cooper Steel?” Mia ordered me just before she exited the room, taking our daughter God knew where.

  I paced the room, but when one full minute had gone by, I decided that time was up. Mia was gonna have to understand this was the way it was, and she would have to deal with it. Having made up my mind, I went to go in search of my girls when Mia stomped back into our room minus our daughter.

  “Where’s Meagan?” I asked in a panic. Jesus H Christ, what was my woman playing at leaving her all alone.

  “She is with Creed, and that is where she is going to stay until you hear me out and listen to me.”

  Yeah, like that is going to happen. The woman was nuts if she thought I was going to let Apollo babysit my kid. The man had only a ninety-seven percent success rate hitting a target a thousand yards out! The last time he got in the ring with Mannix, he got his arse kicked, so he was the last person I wanted looking after Meagan.

  “Hold that thought, Beauty. Be back in a second.”

  “Steel, please, don’t… we need to talk about this, babe,” Mia begged in a voice I hadn’t heard from her in a long time, not since that time she called me drunk and begged me to love her. That memory still gutted me, and I still fucking hated that I caused her so much pain. Yeah, sure, I had made it up to her one hundred times over since then, but it still burned when I revisited it, which was not often.

  “Mia, you don’t understand,” I tried to explain the gut-wrenching fear I experienced every time I thought about something happening to our daughter, but Mia stopped me with her stunning smile. It was a sad one, but no less beautiful.

  Mia walked up to me, reached her hands under my cut, and settled them on my back.

  I inhaled deeply at the exquisite feeling of her soft hands on my skin. I liked to hold Meagan to my bare chest as much as possible because the nurses at the hospital said it was the best way to bond with your baby. I left the cut on because, well, I was a fucking stud, and my wife loved it when I wore it with no top underneath. I brought my attention back to Mia when her nails pressed into my skin.

  “Help me understand, Cooper. Talk to me, babe,” Mia encouraged, the sweet smile that was all for me faltering slightly.

  I leaned my forehead against hers and sighed loudly.

  “I don’t know if it will make any sense when I say it out loud,” I admitted. The reason certainly sounded very reasonable in my head, justifiable and perfectly logical.

  “Please, Cooper.”

  “It’s just that, when Shiloh was born, I fell in love with her. She was everything, her safety and her needs. I really love her, you know?”

  Mia nodded but didn’t say anything, just waited for me to continue.

  “Then Meagan was born and, Beauty, holy fuck! That tiny creature, the second I laid eyes on her, my whole world settled, calmed. My love for her brings me to my knees. We made that bundle of beauty. You and me, Mia, our love created perfection.” I paused long enough to press my forehead against hers and continued, “I hate having her out of my sight, and I hate anyone else touching her. She could have been taken from us before we even got to have her, Beauty. I hold her all the time so she will grow up knowing she was loved from day one. So she never has to feel what her mum felt from her parents. I get up to her so you can rest. You birthed her, Beauty, struggled to bring her into this world for me, so the least I can do is do more so you don’t have to.”

  I tried to explain what was going on in my head the best way I could, but how could you tell the woman who not only owned your heart and soul but also gave you the greatest gift any man could ever pray for—a gift I would never be able to repay her for. She gave me all that, and all I could give her was me.

  Mia looked up with tears in her chocolate eyes, which shone brightly with love.

  “So… it’s not because you are avoiding me or don’t trust me with her?” she asked timidly.

  What the fuck? Was that what she thought? Holy snapping duck shit! How did I manage to fuck this up? Is this what my over-protective actions had her thinking?

  “Beauty, what the hell are you talking about? There is no way either of those things ever entered my mind,” I rushed to assure her.

  Jesus, Steel, you might be a stud, but fuck, you are stupid sometimes.

  The thought stayed that—a thought. Admitting that aloud would not be beneficial at that moment.

  Mia refused to look at me as she twirled a length of her hai
r around and around her finger, a dead giveaway something pretty stupid was about to come out of her mouth.

  “I haven’t woken up wrapped in your arms for weeks, and every time Meagan needs a nappy change, you practically rip her from my arms—if I am actually holding her at the time because usually, she is with you. I haven’t been able to take your prosthesis off because you sleep with it on so you can jump out of bed the second you hear the baby stir. I only get to hold her when I feed her, then you take her back again and walk off with her, leaving me alone.” Mia’s long speech was made in a tight but sad voice. She sounded rejected, alone, and I did that to her.

  Feeling lower than a snake, I wrapped my arms around my beauty and silently counted to ten. Taking that time, I calmed my inner turmoil. It was time my wife and I got on the same page.

  Taking a deep breath, I went about fixing what Mia thought was but wasn’t broken because Mia and I could never be broken. My woman had put me back together nearly a year ago now, and I was staying that way.

  “Oh, Beauty, I thought I was doing the right thing. I never meant for you to feel left out or unwanted, and there were never any thoughts in my head about not trusting you. Meagan’s birth was not easy on you, and afterwards, you were so tired and seemed a little sad. I thought if I did as much as possible and took a load off your shoulders, all you had to worry about was feeding her and resting.” I lifted her cheeks in my hands so she was looking at me, and my heart shattered at the fat tears raining down and hitting my hands.

  “I am so sorry, Cooper. I have been so emotional since Meagan was born. I know you are doing everything for me because you love me, but I feel so useless as a mother. We hardly cuddle anymore, and there is no better place than in your arms. It’s my happy place, and I miss it. Oh, my God, I sound like a crazy woman,” Mia rambled.

  Instantly, I felt like shit. In my attempt to be the perfect husband, I’d missed Mia’s struggle. The doctor warned us about the baby blues and postnatal depression at the hospital. I honestly believed that would never happen to Mia. After all, she had me. I guess I got shit arse backwards—again.