Whiskey: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 7)

by Giulia Lagomarsino

  “Listen, I understand that you’re not supposed to tell me anything without a doctor here. I know this, but please, try to understand that he’s my whole life.” My voice cracked and tears slipped down my face. I tried to pull myself together, but my body was done. I was breaking down. Her sad, pitying face just made everything worse. “Please,” I whimpered. “Just tell me.”

  “Ali.” It was faint, barely a whisper, but it echoed around the room like a shot. I spun around with blurry, tear-filled eyes and looked into Chris’s dark, stormy eyes. He was awake. I rushed to his side, practically shoving Gabe out of the way to get to him. I gripped tightly to his hand, on the verge of crying hysterically when he squeezed mine back.

  “You’re awake,” I cried. “I thought I’d lost you.”

  He struggled to lift his other hand and placed it against my wet cheek. His voice was rough, but there was a hint of teasing in it. “I told you I’d always come back to you.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Chris

  THREE YEARS LATER…

  I was a fucking wreck. I was snapping at everyone that came within five feet of me and needed something. Everyone knew what was going on this week and I swear to God, they were all pushing my buttons just to see how long it took me to snap. I paced around the Reed Security building, holding my phone in my hand, waiting for the call that would forever change my son’s life.

  For the first two years after I was released from the hospital, Axel had been training with Reed Security. After everything that happened with Slasher, Axel was determined to join the military, but he didn’t want to follow in my footsteps. He aimed higher. He wanted to be a fucking Navy SEAL. He trained with Knight every opportunity he had and was pushed way beyond his limits because Knight knew what it would take for him to make it through BUDs and then SEALs training. He had just completed his final week of training and I was waiting on his call to let me know if he made it or not. I think I was more nervous than his mother. I wanted this so badly for him that I could taste it.

  “Chris.”

  “What?” I snapped as I turned around and stared at Gabe. The fucker had become like a surrogate brother to Ali and I couldn’t shake the man. He was her shadow wherever she went. Half the time, he knew her work schedule better than I did. He was even in the room with her when we had our kid a few months ago. Ali was only eight months along, but she had gone into labor early and I was on a job. I was an hour late for the birth of our daughter, Elizabeth. Gabe had taken my place in the room and was now practically her second father. She was his little Lizzie and it pissed me off how close they were already.

  Still, I couldn’t be too hard on the man. He had gone from distrusting Ali to becoming her protector. After all that Ali had been through, I didn’t mind another set of eyes always being on her. Especially when I couldn’t always be there. If I had to be out of town, he was always at the house, watching over her or calling to check up on her. Any other man might consider that they were having an affair, but I knew better. I was the only man Ali ever looked at with those beautiful bedroom eyes. I would never have anything to worry about with her. Except maybe that Gabe would be buried right along next to us. That would be taking it too far.

  “Dude, your wife is here with Lizzie. Chill the fuck out. She’s having a rough day, so try not to be such an asshole,” he growled.

  My shitty attitude immediately morphed into concern at his words. I ran to the lobby where I knew she would be waiting and wrapped her in my arms when I saw the tears streaming down her face. “What is it? What happened?”

  Her hiccuping sobs made a sharp pain rip through my chest. Something terrible had happened and I had no clue what it was or if I could even make it better, but I would do anything to try.

  “I…tried on my jeans…this morning,” she said between sobs.

  “Okay?” I said, unsure where she was going with this.

  “They didn’t fit,” she cried.

  I rubbed my hands up and down her arms, trying to figure out what the hell I was supposed to say to that. “Well, you just had a baby, honey. The fat doesn’t just go away.”

  “The fat?” she screeched. “Why would you automatically assume that my pants didn’t fit because of the fat?”

  “Because you just had a baby?” I said slowly.

  “But why couldn’t you assume that they didn’t fit because I had lost so much weight?”

  Ah. This was one of those trick questions that I learned about while she was pregnant. It ranked up there with Do you think I’m eating too much? Or Do I look like I’m carrying twins? I learned early on that there were certain questions that you just didn’t answer. Unfortunately, I was distracted today and didn’t really think about her statement until it was already too late. Time for some creative maneuvering.

  “Honey, I know exactly where all the fat is on your delectable body and trust me, it’s in all the right places. I love your curves and if you never lost the weight, I would be a happy man. But I want you to be happy with yourself. If you want to lose the weight, you go for it. If you need to go buy bigger pants because this beautiful body that gave me such a beautiful daughter has grown, then we’ll go buy you a whole fucking new wardrobe. Either way, nothing’s going to stop me from craving every inch of you any time I can have you.”

  I nipped at her earlobe and pressed my growing erection against her. I wasn’t lying. I loved her curves and every inch of her body, no matter how much it had changed. Her breasts were bigger, her ass was bigger, and her hips had this perfect sway to them. Yeah, she still had a pouch from where she carried our daughter, but I didn’t give a shit. That softness just reminded me of all she went through to give me a family. If I had to remind her every minute of every day how much I craved her, I would make it a priority.

  “Chris,” she sniffled. “You always know the perfect thing to say,” she murmured. I had a secret weapon though. I didn’t just come up with this genius on my own. Maggie had a running list of things that she wanted Cap to say to her stuck on the fridge. Any time I was over there, I looked at the list and studied any new entries. Call it research on the female mind. After all, a man had to take advantage where he could.

  “Baby, I love you and I always will.”

  I pressed my lips to hers and gave her a slow, tantalizing kiss that I felt all the way down in my groin. Shit. I had to stop this before I mauled her right here in the lobby. I should at least ask Gabe to watch Lizzie and take her to the training room. We could definitely have some fun there.

  “Have you heard from Axel yet?” She asked against my chest.

  “Not yet. I’ve been going fucking crazy, waiting for his call.”

  I heard Gabe’s phone ring and saw him bend down to play with Lizzy as he answered. “Oh, hey, Axel. How’s it going?”

  My gaze swiveled to Gabe’s and I glared at him. Did I mention that ever since he saved Ali’s life, Gabe had also become somewhat of a hero to my son? Yeah, it didn’t matter that I taught Axel how to use a gun and that had he not shot Slasher in the head, his mother could have still died. Nope, none of that mattered because Gabe had been the one to take a bullet for his mother. Well, in the vest. That shit didn’t really count. He wasn’t actually shot.

  “No shit? That’s fucking awesome. No, he’s right here. Hold on.”

  Gabe grinned as he handed over his phone to me. I glared at him as I snatched the phone out of his hand. “Axel?”

  “Hey, Dad. I’m in. I fucking did it!” he shouted.

  A huge grin split my lips as I pulled Ali in close to me and squeezed the life out of her. “You earned it, kid.” Moisture filled my eyes and a lump formed in my throat. I was fucking over the moon filled with pride at my kid. He had gone through fucking hell to make this happen. It was the one thing he wanted more than anything in the world. “So, now you’re a SEAL.”

  “Yeah, well, I still have like thirty more weeks of training before I’ll be deployed.”

  “I’m sure your mom will
be happy to hear that.”

  “Dad, I couldn’t have done it without your help. I don’t know if I ever said it, but all you and everyone else did for me, you saved my fucking life. I’ll never forget that.”

  I unwrapped my arm from around Ali and shoved my hand through my hair, pushing my cowboy hat off in the process. This kid was too much and everything I could ever ask for in a son. “I love you, kid.”

  “Love you too, Dad. And every time I’m deployed, I’m gonna be fighting for the same thing you gave me. Freedom. You’re the reason I am who I am today.”

  Now I was fucking crying. This kid was shredding me and he didn’t even know it. It felt like razors were cutting my throat as I tried to croak out some kind of response. I was so choked up, I couldn’t say a fucking thing. Gabe snatched the phone from my hands and raised an eyebrow at me.

  “What the fuck did you say to your old man? He’s fucking crying over here.”

  Gabe looked up at me and gave me a chin lift. No doubt, he would fucking rag on me later for being such a pussy, but right now, he understood why I was so emotional.

  “Yeah, I’ll tell him to check his phone. Be good, kid. Here’s your mom.” Gabe handed the phone to Ali and shook his head. She moved across the room, gushing on the phone with her son. “He’s been trying to call you all morning. He said your phone kept going to voicemail.”

  I pulled it out of my pocket and realized that it wasn’t even on. Fuck, I had turned it off somehow. I turned it back on and saw that I had at least fifteen voicemails from Axel.

  “I’m giving you one day,” Gabe stressed. “One day to feel this and then I’m telling all those fuckers how you cried like a fucking baby because your kid became a SEAL.”

  “You know what?” I smirked. “I don’t even fucking care.”

  “Care about what?” Ali asked as she stepped into my arms.

  “He’s making fun of me because I started crying when Axel was talking to me.”

  “Well, you know it does kind of take away the whole badass vibe you’ve got going. You’re not going to cry on your next job, are you? I don’t think people are going to be scared of you holding a gun and crying.”

  “As long as Axel isn’t on the phone telling me that I saved his fucking life, we’ll be good.” I looked into her eyes and tried to convey how much I loved all that she had done for our son. “He’s a great fucking kid, and I may have helped him become a man, but everything he is, all that’s in his heart is because of you.”

  “Chris, I hate that we missed out on so much time together, but there’s not a day that goes by that I’m not thankful to have such a wonderful man in my life. I couldn’t have asked for a better, stronger role model for our son. I love you so much.”

  “I love you, too Ali,” I whispered fiercely.

  “Alright. Enough.” Gabe crossed his arms over his chest, rolling his eyes in disgust. “You know, all you fucking women make us a bunch of pussies. I’m just saying,” He yanked up his pants like he was trying to be more manly and puffed out his chest. “We’re supposed to be protectors and fierce men who hold weapons and say shit like don’t fuck with me. Then you walk in with your cute little baby girl and your kid calls and one of the most lethal men in this building is a fucking puddle of mush on the floor. I’m just saying, that shit has to stop. You’re gonna ruin our reputations.”

  He walked away and I tugged Ali into me again. “What do you say we get Gabe to watch Elizabeth? It seems I have a reputation to uphold and I know just how to do that,” I smirked at her.

  Ratings on Amazon help me to spread the word about my books and allow me to keep writing. Please take a moment and write an honest review of this book on Amazon. Watch for upcoming books in the next series, Reed Security.

  For The Love Of A Good Woman Series:

  Jack: A romantic comedy

  Cole: A romantic thriller

  Logan: A revenge novel

  Drew: A new beginnings romance

  Sebastian: A mystery/thriller romance

  Sean: A Love Triangle Romance

  Ryan: A Contemporary Romance

  The Reed Security Series:

  Sinner: A Reed Security Romance

  Cap: A Reed Security Romance

  Cazzo: A Reed Security Romance

  Knight: A Reed Security Romance

  Irish: A Reed Security Romance

  Hunter: A Reed Security Romance

  Whiskey: A Reed Security Romance

  Lola: A Reed Security Romance, Nov. 18, 2018

  Ice: A Reed Security Romance, Dec. 18, 2018

  Also coming soon: The Cortell Brothers- series still to be named

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