Invincible (A Kingpin Love Affair Book 3)

by Beck, J. L.

  “None of that dirty-talking shit at my grill,” Zerro interrupted Devon while setting a bag of chips on the table. I eyed it curiously, my stomach rumbling. I was hungry again, and I had just eaten before we left the house.

  Without even thinking about it, I grabbed the bag of chips, getting myself a handful. Zerro watched me, a deep dimpled grin on his face as he shook his head.

  “What?” I questioned shoving a chip into my mouth.

  “Nothing, you just eat like you’re pregnant or something…” I smiled to myself not wanting to give our secret away.

  “Did you just call my wife fat?” Devon joked, butting into the conversation. Zerro laughed, raising his hands as if to say he hadn’t anything of the sort.

  “Nope… not at all.”

  “He did…” I pretended to sniffle. It was a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by those who cared and loved you.

  “Men,” My father’s deep voice met my ears and I swung around to see him and James, Bree’s father, both standing in the doorway. They were on their way outside, both carrying a handful of bags. Before my dad could take another step, I was crossing the patio to hug him.

  “Hi, sweetie,” he mumbled into my ear, wrapping one arm around me to hug me back as James walked past us. Moments like these made time stand still. Having gone from not having anyone to having someone at every turn was far more than even I deserved.

  “Are you taking good care of my daughter, son?” Frank asked in his FBI boss voice. It was deep and held an authority to it that almost made me laugh. How he thought he could come in here and play that shit, I didn’t know.

  “Send some of that voice to me, Frank. I wish I could talk to Zerro that way,” James added. Unable to hold my laughter in anymore, a snort came out.

  “You wish, Pops,” Zerro said, slapping James on the back. James laughed a deep hearty laugh as he sat the bags down on the table, making his way over to Bree and grabbing Gia.

  Now that everyone was here, I was bursting at the seams to reveal our secret. I nudged Devon in the arm as he then looked at me sideways before lifting an eyebrow.

  “Now,” I said, returning the same look he just gave me as I stood there with my hands on my hips.

  “Can I get everyone’s attention,” Devon called out. Everyone turned to him all at once, my father’s eyes bleeding into the back of his head.

  “Oh, you got my attention, boy…” My dad grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest. He had given Devon the fifth degree about love, marriage, and commitment.

  “Good, I’m glad I got your attention, old man.” Devon turned, throwing a wink over his shoulder. I was a bundle of nerves, but it wasn’t the kind that caused anxiety. This was the good kind, the kind that had you jittery to see what would happen. Frank glared as everyone gathered around.

  “Don’t hold us all up now. Spill the beans or shut up. I got grub to eat…” Zerro complained, Bree giving him a look that said, keep that attitude up and your ass is grass. With an arm around my waist, Devon moved us so we were facing the crowd.

  “We have an announcement that we would like to make…” Devon peered down at me, his green eyes shining brightly in the light.

  “We would have told everyone sooner, but we wanted to wait in case something happened. Now that we have gotten the all clear, we can finally share this news with everyone.”

  “We’re PREGNANT!!” I couldn’t contain the excitement in my voice. My father’s face paled, Zerro shook his head, a huge smile marring his face, and Bree all but ran across the grass wrapping me in a one arm hug.

  “Congratulations. Now Gia will have a little playmate.” I nodded my head in agreement, tears in my eyes as she released me. Devon still had a hold on me, and as I pulled from his touch, I walked over to my father.

  “My little girl is going to be a mother?” he stated in shock.

  “Yup.” I patted my belly. His eyes drifted down to my hand. Then something happened that I never expected. One single tear escaped his eye.

  In that one tear, I found my own happiness. I let the fear, the hate, the sadness, and the past go. Inside of me grew a blessing far greater than anything I could have asked for.

  The past had become a distant memory and the future… well, it was looking more and more blissful with every passing second.

  Our love story had started in heartbreaking tears and restarted in joyous ones. I hadn’t just gotten my happily ever after… I had gotten a love so strong it could withstand the tests of times.

  Devon paced the living room floor, his emotions all over the place as I sat there with tears in my eyes. Since coming home from the doctor’s office, I had been waiting patiently for him to get home from work. I had something I needed to tell him, but it wasn’t something you could just tell someone over the phone or through a text. This was the kind of news that, without a doubt, would change both of our lives.

  “Teg, what’s wrong? Why are you crying, baby?” He came to a stand still directly in front of me. His knees hit the floor with a loud whack, and I wanted to reach out and comfort him.

  Was there a true way to express how I was feeling right at this second? When I looked at him, I saw my everything. Now… Now, there would be more than one everything.

  “I… I have to tell you something.” I kept my voice calm and neutral unsure of which way this would go. His dark green eyes bled into mine as a trickle of fear showed in them.

  “Go ahead,” he said, clasping my hand in his own.

  “I’m…..” I stumbled over my words.

  “You’re what?” Devon pleaded for an answer.

  “I know we wanted to wait a little bit longer, and I don’t know how you will react, but I’m pregnant…” Hesitation laced every word that left my lips. In a flash, his eyes went from dark to relief, and then acceptance and love flowed through them.

  “You’re… you’re pregnant?”

  I nodded my head yes, tears leaking from my eyes.

  “You know what this means, right? It means now I have more of you to love and you have more of me. Inside of you, you carry the love we share, baby. Nothing is more magnificent than having a part of me growing inside of you.” Our love had created a blessing of epic proportions.

  “I love you, Teg…” he said softly as he placed his lips against my forehead.

  “Teg, did you hear me?” Devon’s voice pulled me from my thoughts as he made his way over to me.

  “No… No. What did you say?” I asked as I smiled up at him, my father walking off. “I asked you if you thought there were aliens out there, and if they were, do you think they do stuff like we are doing right now? If they could possibly be as happy as I am to have you?”

  I struggled to answer his question, snorting in laughter. “There might be, Dev, but even if there were, no one could possibly be as happy as I am to have you.”

  No longer were we invincible for just a mere moment…

  We were invincible—forever.

  # # #

  THANK YOU FOR READING THIS BOOK, INVINCIBLE. IT MEANS THE MOST TO ME, WHETHER YOU’RE A CURRENT FAN OR SOMEONE WHO JUST PICKED UP THE BOOK. WITH THAT SAID, IF YOU GET THE CHANCE, PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW. EVERY REVIEW COUNTS, AND I DO READ EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THEM—THE GOOD AND THE BAD.

  ~

  Read on for TWO sneak peeks of books to come. One by yours truly and one by the talented author, B.B. Reid.

  SNEAK PEAK—PROJECT: KILLER

  By J.L. Beck

  Prologue

  Killer

  IT ALL STARTED with a kiss. It wasn’t one of those sappy ass ones where there is affection and sparks flying and you just fucking know they’re the one for you. No, this was a different kind of kiss. It wasn’t a spark, but a simple touch of one’s skin against another. I would like to think somehow that simple gesture had triggered something into motion. That somehow that one kiss had signified our entire being of life—it didn’t.

  The kiss meant nothing, and the feelings formed from within because of it
meant nothing. Every time I thought of Maggie, the way her brown hair billowed in the wind, the way her small hands clasped mine, it reminded me of the illness, the death that plagued me. It reminded me of the clock that slowly ticked inside of me.

  I was dying, and there was nothing anyone could do. There was no cure, no miracle for someone like me. After all, millions of people lost their loved ones, so what would one more loss be? What would I not dying do for the world? Nothing.

  Eventually, I would be replaced. The school would get a new student, the teachers would forget I ever existed, and Maggie—sweet little Maggie would move on and find someone new. My parents would have another child and life would be normal. Normal for everyone but me.

  See, I wouldn’t get to live such a lavish life. No, the life I would live would make me wish that the cancer had killed me. That it had eaten away at everything that made me who I was. Why, you ask? Simply because the person I was being morphed into, the man they were making me be was anything less than death. He was ruthless, angry, and hateful. He thought for no one but himself. He was careless, his needs only being met with sex and violence.

  His memories would be wiped away, yet a small girl with red cheeks and brown hair would still find her way into his dreams. He would grow to hate the little girl for not being able to remember the memories or where she came from and it would drive him insane.

  He would eventually become one of the world’s most trained fighters. Genetically mutated to the government’s liking. Turned into something he never wanted—something he never should’ve been.

  Now you see that his legacy or the memories of who he was would never be remembered simply because there was nothing to remember about a twelve-year-old boy who should be dead. No family, friends, or loved ones to care.

  He was a killer and I am he.

  CHAPTER ONE

  MAGGIE—THE PAST

  I HATED WHEN the other kids laughed at him. They would push and shove him, not even caring that he was sick. Sometimes, I wanted to push them back or scream at them to leave him alone. Except I knew no one would listen to me. They never did. Instead, I sat in the background waiting until the minute I could swoop in and care for him.

  He was taller than the other kids were, even at the age of sixteen, and just as cute. It didn’t matter to me how his skin was almost always ghostly white or how he would much rather not be wearing jeans but something that didn’t cling to his body. To me, he was perfect.

  “What’s a matter, Diesel…? Maggie not make you your breakfast this morning?” Roger, one of the biggest bullies of them all, mocked Diesel. This was a normal occurrence on the bus. Every morning the same conversation would take place. I was starting to wonder when it would stop. Diesel ignored him like always and stared out the window. I watched from the seat across from him as Roger took the seat behind him and shoved his knees into the back of the seat.

  Fury grew deep within me. Diesel had told me many times that me sticking up for him just made things worse and how there was nothing worse than a girl sticking up for a boy. It was against the rules. One would say I was a rule breaker.

  “Knock it off, Roger,” I murmured. Diesel’s steel blue eyes turned to mine shooting daggers at me. I could tell by that one single look, I had angered him.

  “Awe, what was that you said, Maggie? I couldn’t quite hear you—then again, most of us never do.” He belittled me, laughing as his friends joined in on it.

  “Just leave her alone,” Diesel exclaimed giving them the satisfaction they wanted. They wanted him to talk to stick up for me—for anything—simply because it showed he had a weakness for something.

  “You guys hear this… He wants us to leave Maggie alone.” Roger mocked some more, and I did whatever I could to not turn toward Diesel to see his expression.

  You’re a weakness to him. They will use you to get to him. I repeated the same words over and over again in my mind.

  I became momentarily distracted as I talked myself out of sticking up for him again. So much so, I hadn’t noticed Roger had slipped into my seat. His eyes were a deep brown and had most of the girls in the school falling at his feet. All except for me. I knew the meanness that was just under the surface.

  “Maggie…” he hissed, one of his fingers gripping at a lock of my hair. A tingle of pain radiated through my scalp as a soft yelp left my lips.

  “Leave me alone, Roger.” I kept my voice stern and strong not wanting him to think his hair pulling had gotten the best of me.

  “Leave you alone…?” he mocked, a sick smile forming on his face. If Roger weren’t such a dog, one would consider him cute. He had that beautiful sandy brown hair. He was tall and played all kinds of sports. His parents could afford it, unlike Diesel’s or mine.

  “Roger, this is taking it a little far,” Diesel said. You could hear the panic in his voice. Even if he said we weren’t friends because a dying person couldn’t make friends with someone in such a short amount of time, I knew I meant something to him.

  “Does it bother you when I touch her, Diesel? Are you jealous?” Roger mocked, his hand slipping onto my leg. I was wearing a skirt, which was a bad wardrobe choice for the day. I swatted his hand away, only for him to bring it back and grip my thigh hard.

  “Let go of me,” I said through gritted teeth. Roger had never taken it this far. He had never tried to instigate in a physical way.

  “Roger, let go of her.” There was vengeance in Diesel’s eyes, and his voice was strong. He moved to the edge of his seat and leaned over and gripped Roger’s shoulder.

  “Get your hand the hell off me, cripple…” Roger rolled his shoulders forcing Diesel’s hand to fall away. I gripped Roger’s wrist prying it from my thigh.

  “If you ever get done playing with the crippled boy… you know where to find me,” Roger whispered in my ear causing my hair to move. I could feel the heat from his breath against my skin and it just made me sick.

  Without a word said, I turned away from him and toward the window waiting for him to leave. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched him watch me for a mere second, his eyes eating away at my body, and then as he slipped from my seat and into his regular seat a ways back.

  I released the breath I had been holding and allowed fresh oxygen to filter into my lungs. Roger was a monster. The living, breathing kind your parents forgot to tell you about. The kind that had the power to make your life a living hell day in and day out. He did just that.

  “I told you not to stick up for me.” Diesel’s voice was right next to me, and as I turned around to see where he was, I came face to face with him. His dark hair was long and slung back in a ponytail. He was looking at me with anger in his eyes, anger I had never seen.

  “Well, I told you I wouldn’t let them pick on you anymore. They don’t know what they’re saying. They’re dumb.” They didn’t know the reason Diesel was sick or why he didn’t talk to others. They didn’t know it was because of the cancer that surged through his veins.

  “They know what they’re saying, Maggie,” he scoffed, his attention going back toward the front of the bus. “You always try to see the good in people. You always try to protect the weak. What you don’t understand is I don’t need protecting.” He turned back toward me, his eyes boring into mine.

  “You can’t save everything. You can’t save me,” he hissed out. My gaze slid down to his clenched fists, his body built up with aggression. I understood why though. I knew he didn’t want to be protected, and he didn’t want even one friend if there was a chance he would die—and there was. Friends meant when you died you would leave someone behind. You would have a reason to feel guilty about your death. He didn’t want that.

  “I don’t want to save you, Diesel,” I murmured.

  “Yes, you do. You. The doctors. My parents. They all want to save me. Everyone wants me to live except myself.” There was so much agony in the words he was saying. It was as if he knew his fate and that fighting it was inevitable.

  “That is
n’t true—” My words cut off as his hand landed on my knee gripping it. He wasn’t hurting me, but he easily could. Even if he was sick, he still had strength.

  “It is true. Believe me when I say it’s true. I know what you all think. I know you assume sticking up for me makes it better, maybe you even think if you’re nice to me, when I die, God will grant you something special.”

  “That’s not the p—” My words were cut off again as he squeezed my knee. Pain radiated up my leg, and I bit my lip to stifle the cry that wanted to escape my mouth.

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Maggie. I don’t want to do anything to ruin you, but whatever you think is going on between us, isn’t. Whatever help you think you can offer, you can’t. In the end, you only hurt yourself and bring more attention to me. Attention I have no need to seek.”

  My mind was blank. Like a chalkboard that had been wiped clean. I had nothing to say—at least nothing worth saying. He didn’t care. He didn’t want support, and even though it broke my heart to see others beat him with their words and hands, there was nothing I could do to save someone who didn’t want to be saved. He was right… I was putting my nose somewhere it wasn’t needed. I had been for six months now.

  “Do you understand me?” he asked softly. His voice caressed my body in a blanket of warmth. He didn’t realize the good he could produce.

  I nodded my head, willing the tears on the verge of slipping from my eyes away. Be strong.

  “Good,” he said satisfied with the conversation. His hand slipped from my knee. I had to force myself not to rub the pain out of it.

  The rest of the bus ride consisted of me sitting in the far corner of my seat staring out the window pretending his body heat wasn’t what I was feeling next to me. I was forcing myself to not lash out and say something to him—something that would only push him further from me.

  As we pulled up to the school and the bus stopped, my heart felt as if it were going to beat out of my chest.