SECRET BABY AT THE ALTAR

by Claire St. Rose

  “What, honey?” he asked, trying to keep it light.

  And then she told him that she was selling pills on the street in the hope of meeting the next month’s bills.

  “You what?” he asked. “Why would you…?”

  Sure her dad was sick. And she wanted to help. But this? It wasn’t her. It couldn’t be her. Too many things could go wrong if she happened upon the wrong guy and—

  “I think I’m gonna get caught, Kane,” she said. “I tried to be careful. But…”

  Tears started to stream down her face. In that moment, he could do nothing but hold her. His mind filled with the idea of her in cuffs, behind bars. It was not going to happen. Not to her.

  “I’ll handle it,” he said as he took her head in his hands.

  “Kane, I—”

  Shushing her with the force of his kiss, he ordered her to hand over her stash. She hesitated for a second, but then he promised that he’d see to the pills and get her the cash.

  “But won’t you be in danger?” she asked, bunching his t-shirt in her shaking hands.

  “Maybe. But I’ll risk it for you,” he said.

  Her injured father would get his treatment. He could do that much.

  “Kane—“

  “This way you’ll stay safe,” he promised. “I want to do this for you. Trust me. It’ll all be good.”

  And then he got caught, and he would serve five years, with good behavior, for his drug dealing. His club groaned, told him he was weak, but the news from Angeline that her father was improving was good enough for now.

  During their last moments in the courtroom, the seconds where she had flung her arms around his neck, Angeline promised to visit him every week.

  “No.”

  Angeline shook her head as he cupped her chin in his hands and smiled into her wide, green eyes.

  “I don’t want you to see me like that,” he said.

  “But—”

  “Please, Angel?”

  Her shoulders sagged as she accepted her own sentence. Kane asked her to stay away until the moment of his release. When he saw her next, there would be no barriers, no fear. Reluctantly Angeline agreed to the terms and let him go.

  ***

  Five years. It felt like a thousand lifetimes without her, but now it was time. It was his moment of freedom, and Kane was more than ready to take her back into his arms.

  His Angel.

  Kane stepped through the prison gate, his eyes darting in every direction. He didn’t see Angeline. He saw no Blood Brother ready to bring him back into the fold.

  He only saw Jeremy, his actual brother, wearing a suit and tie. He hesitated for a second before taking hold of Kane’s arm.

  “Good to see you,” Jeremy said. “You… you look okay.”

  Even as is felt like a lie, Kane fell into his brother’s embrace. Jeremy knew nothing of laying his life on the line. He was a CPA. But he had visited on a monthly basis, and when Kane asked him to check in and report back on Angeline, he returned with the news that her father just kept getting better. So it had all been worth it, and as they sped away from the prison, Kane asked if she was waiting, thrilled at the reality of his release.

  Jeremy just held the wheel tighter and hit the gas. Kane took note of his clenched jaw and saw his knuckles grow white.

  “Jem?” he asked. “Where is she?

  Jeremy brought the car to a curb, sighing as he hit the brake.

  CHAPTER TWO

  “Angie? You okay, honey?”

  Snapping out of a daydream, the same fantasy that played in her mind in a continuous loop, the one that would never come true, Angeline Wilkins turned away from the sink. With the water still running, her hands dripping, she saw her father sitting over his finished dinner. He carelessly tapped his fork against the edge of the plate as he stared at her under bushy brows, his weary gaze full of worry.

  “Angie?” he asked again.

  “What? Oh. It’s nothing, Dad. I’m just… tired.”

  Exhausted was more like it. Angeline hadn’t slept, truly slept, in five years.

  “Well, here,” Brent Wilkins said as he started to struggle to his feet. Pushing up from the table, Brent grunted as he rose. His cane rested against the cupboard. She had moved it, thinking only of her own desire to sit and pick at her food. In her haze, Angeline had failed to return it to his side. Now with his legs needing, Angeline forgot the running water as she hurried towards him.

  “Dad—”

  “I’m good,” he said as he waved her off. Angeline held back. It was good for him try things on his own, and the physical therapist always said that babying him was the worst kind of help. So she stayed still, biting down on her tongue as he gained his footing and started to limp.

  “See?” he said. “Almost as good as new.”

  He was walking. Shuffling really, but it was still progress.

  “Now since you washed,” he started, “Let’s say I—”

  Before either of them could stop it, Brent started stumbling to the ground.

  “Dad!”

  Lurching forward, she awkwardly collected him her arms. Summoning all of her strength, Angeline held him against her chest.

  “Son of a bitch!” he groaned. She hated seeing him like this. Because it just wasn’t him. Her father was a proud man, a one-time marine who had passed through Strait of Hormuz without a scratch. Civilian life brought its own battles; Brent lost his job and his wife in the space of the same year, and he had a teenage daughter to boot. But this was a man who could lick any adversary. Brushing away his sorrow, he started a small construction company, kept and paid for the house in which they now stood, and saw that Angeline never went without.

  “I got you, Dad,” she said. “Just lean into me.”

  Casting a quick glance at his eyes, she saw a mix of embarrassment and frustration. Those were supposed to be his words, had been in his words, and while Angeline took some pride in returning the favor, she knew that it was the last thing he wanted.

  Brent was spent even before she got him back to his seat.

  “God damn,” he muttered. “I almost had it that time.”

  But that wasn’t true. As much as she hoped that the magic bullet had finally hit its target, he would never be whole again.

  She would never tell him that.

  “So close, Dad,” Angeline said. “Maybe next time. I’m sure of it. Want some coffee?”

  When he stayed silent, Angeline started to clear his plate. Suddenly his hand, much stronger than his legs, crushed under the wheels of a backhoe, seized hold of her wrist. She waited as his eyes drifted towards hers.

  “I can still do some things without your help,” he barked.

  “I know, Dad,” she said. “Just trying to be nice.”

  Angeline backed away from the table. When he shifted in his seat, she feared that he would try to stand again. And fall. If she was fast, she could snatch the dish away and hurry back to the sink like nothing had happened. But that might hurt him even more. So she hung back.

  “Here.”

  Brent lifted his plate slowly and offered it to her.

  “Now you only have to make one trip,” he feebly joked.

  Angeline smiled as her fingers surrounded the ceramic, and she patted his arm.

  “Thanks,” she whispered. “That’s a big help.”

  Brent formed a small fist and gently banged it to the table before folding his arms across his chest.

  “Someone said something about coffee?” he asked.

  “I’ll get right on that,” Angeline said.

  Back at the sink, she rinsed the plate and filled the carafe. As the grounds became liquid that trickled into the pitcher, Angeline’s thoughts turned to a different pot of coffee.

  ***

  “So tell me again. What’s with the salt?”

  Kane slipped his arm around her waist, and she sank into his chest. His hold was strong and tender, and she curled her head towards his lips. Kane’s unshave
n cheeks brushed against her face. She wanted nothing but his mouth, his tongue. But as she tried to claim them, Kane eased her away, smiling.

  “You gotta answer my question,” he said.

  Tilting her head one way than the other, Angeline started to speak when he reached behind her head. Releasing her bun, he sent her hair spilling around her shoulders. Sighing as he stroked her locks, Angeline started to press closer when she shook her head wildly with a mischievous grin.

  “You like it black, right?” she asked.

  Kane nodded, and she lightly touched his cheek.

  “So the salt will smooth it out,” she promised. “It’ll be like nothing you’ve ever tasted.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.”

  As he gathered her in his arms, Angeline pressed her palms to his chest.

  “I promise you’ll like it,” she said in a sultry voice. “You just—”

  “And you’ll like this.”

  As he took her mouth, Angeline drank in his kiss. Kane was always so sure that he could read her mind. Maybe he could. But that didn’t mean he always got to have the last word.

  “Sit.”

  Kane laughed as she struck a far more forceful tone.

  “I’m being serious,” she said. “A nurse knows when you need to take your medicine.”

  Throwing his hands into the air, Kane backed away, shaking his head.

  “Don’t want to cross a pro,” he said as he returned to the table. As he brought one broad limb over the other, he shot her a smile.

  “So do your thing,” Kane said.

  Angeline delighted in the chance to prove her point. She poured out two cups and sprinkled the salt into the simmering mugs.

  Kane grimaced as she handed him the coffee.

  “This is crazy,” he said. “You know that right?”

  “I do,” she said. “It’s wild.”

  Setting her mug aside, Angeline kissed him quickly and lingered. Kane’s lips swirled around hers. Soon they would move to her bed. She pictured him stripping her slowly, his mouth leaving hers in search of her breasts. When he kissed her there, Angeline felt like she would explode. But it was nothing compared to the feel of his hands as they pressed her to her back.

  Not yet…

  “Okay,” he said. “One taste.”

  He sipped his coffee slowly. Angeline’s hands lovingly caressed his thigh as he swallowed her concoction. Kane’s face was impenetrable, and then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Wow,” he said. “That is different.”

  Angeline narrowed her eyes.

  “Different how?” she asked. “Different good? Or bad?”

  Kane finished his coffee in a single gulp. He took her hand.

  “Different like you,” he said. “Different perfect.”

  And as she had hoped, Kane carried her to bed. His mouth met her breasts, gentle and firm. Angeline ran her fingers through his wild hair. Pulling his t-shirt over his head, she basked in the feel, the sight, of his muscled arms. When they held her close, she sank into his chest. Kissing up his flesh, she stopped at the promise of his mouth and smiled.

  “This is all that I want, Kane,” she said.

  “And is that good or bad?”

  He said nothing else, only caressed her sides as he kissed her again. Lowering his fly, Kane started to work his way under her skirt. The tip of his cock was on the precipice of her mound.

  “Are you going to answer me?” Kane asked.

  “I thought I did that,” she said. “This is everything…”

  Angeline started to guide his tongue back to her waiting cunt, longing to feel his kiss about her soft folds. He licked her pussy before stretching his eyes back to hers.

  “So good or bad?” he asked.

  It was good when he held her like this. Bad when she thought of his life in the club, the grease and the roar that was his daily bread, always threatening danger.

  Worse when she thought of how she might prove the greatest danger of all.

  “I… I want it to be good,” Angeline whispered.

  Kane hovered above her, propping his body on his taut elbow as he traced her eyes with a single finger.

  “Just want?” Kane asked. “Is that it?”

  Angeline twisted her head around her pillow, ready for his return, when he held her head in his hands and brought her face close to his.

  “What if you start to want something else?” Kane challenged. “What do I do with you then?”

  Angeline wrapped her arms around him. Her lips ran down his neck, and she settled her kiss against his chest.

  “Kane?”

  Peering into his eyes, she took his hand. Kane kept her close, and Angeline’s cunt buzzed around the feel of him in her arms…

  “I’ll never want anyone but you.”

  ***

  “Angie! The water!”

  It was sloshing over the sink, and Angeline moved fast in search of a towel. Finding one, lifting it from the hook, she started to mop the excess from the floor. But it kept coming.

  “Angie, turn off the damn water!”

  Bolting to her feet, she stopped the flow and stood before the sink with heaving shoulders. Kane wasn’t here—would never be here again.

  And still, she had betrayed him.

  “Angie?” Brent asked. “You want to talk about it?”

  She wanted to understand how he could be hers, only hers. The feel of Kane’s phantom fingers still passed across her flesh, and she started to fall into the memory. He hovered over her, taking her slowly. That was his way. He never took her by force.

  Never.

  Five short years. Nothing in the scheme of the life that they would ultimately share. She could do it standing on her head. Would do it.

  “Angie, you can tell me,” Brent said.

  He shifted to the chair closest to hers, and Angeline raised her eyebrows in the face of his progress. Maybe he was getting better. Slowly. It was—

  Brent took her hand and smiled.

  “It’s okay,” he said.

  With a weary sigh, Angeline finally turned off the water.

  “No, Dad,” she said. “No it’s not.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “Jem!”

  With the car stalled under his knees, Jeremy paused. Kane had survived the showers and the fights in the yard. But Angeline was always okay. That thought kept him going.

  So why wasn’t she…?

  “Jem?” he asked again.

  No answer.

  Something horrible had to have happened to her. No other reason for her absence. Had she sold more pills without his protection? Angeline was no fool. But in the glaring light of her father’s injury, maybe she threw caution to the wind and made like a dealer looking for new marks. In Kane’s world, it was skinny boys and skinnier girls in search of a quick fix. Kane never dabbled in the stuff, but he could point them in the right direction. Angeline was different. She just needed a fast buck to help her dad.

  And maybe she had had made the worst call.

  “Kane,” Jeremy started. “You need to hear this and—“

  But Kane didn’t as he kept talking.

  “Where is she?” Kane demanded.

  Kane’s mind filled with all the ways in which she might be hurt. Best case scenario, she was languishing in some cell. He had money, funds that he had sent Jeremy’s way in the wake of his incarceration. Jeremy only had to give the word, and Kane would bail her out. But what if she had fallen in with the wrong crowd? His own crew would never dare, but there were other clubs that might use her. And if a nurse with access fell into their hands, Angeline would be lost to herself as well as him.

  Jeremy stayed silent, and Kane pressed him.

  “No,” Kane said as his pulse quickened. “Just don’t tell me…”

  He couldn’t stand the idea of her caught, trapped. Kane pictured her torn apart if she failed to make her quota. And there was no way that she ever could. He, she had been caught
by accident. The doctor she worked for was already being eyed for fingering his patients under a local anesthetic. The man was serving his own time, and Angeline should be in the clear. But what if there was no letting it go? What if it was known that she was able to find drugs and bring them to the street? Kane was locked up, and even as his club and Jeremy promised to look after her, they could only do so much.