“Maybe we should leave him be,” Kane said. “I don’t want to bother—”
“You’re not.”
Taking his hand, Angeline helped his hand find its way back to Theo’s face, and their fingers rested together around the boy’s sleeping cheeks. Theo murmured happily, and when his eyes fluttered open, Kane trembled slightly. Holding his breath, he saw the boy’s eyes grow wide.
Theo first looked at his mother, Angeline glowing under the warm aura of the night-light. Kane watched as Angeline gave his cheek a tender pinch, and then both sets of green eyes gazed up at Kane. Theo scrunched his face, but then he clapped his hands together. His words came out like garbled nonsense, but he spoke with a smile and pointed at Kane.
“See?” she said as she nudged his ribs. “He already likes you all over again.”
Kane couldn’t argue with her, and when he tickled Theo’s belly, the boy erupted into a series of giggles.
“Do you want to hold him?” she asked in a low whisper.
It had been so long, and Kane’s yearning for his family was on the point of bubbling over. Nodding slowly, Angeline parted the blankets and brought the boy into Kane’s waiting arms. Holding him close to his chest, Kane was surprised for a second, half expecting to still feel the nearly weightless infant. But Theo was sturdy and strong. No son of Angeline’s could be anything but.
“He’s…he’s…” Kane was suddenly at a loss for words, and Theo also fell silent. His tiny brow furrowed as if in deep thought, and his pudgy fingers caught hold of Kane’s nose. Parting his lips to draw in a deep breath, Theo finally laughed again, and Kane relaxed against him. “Bring it in, little man,” Kane said.
Easing Theo into a hug, the boy rested happily against Kane’s shoulder, and as he glanced over at Angeline, he saw her smiling as her eyes glistened with tears.
“Remember when I used to walk him around the room to put him to sleep?” Kane asked.
“Of course,” she said with a light laugh.
On cue, Kane’s hold intensified, and he started to pace, gently bouncing Theo with each step. Kane was careful to navigate around the toys and the rocking chair. He pictured Angeline sitting there for hours on end, the picture of perfect motherhood. Hours, days, and years—time that he would never be able to get back—were lost. However, fleeing the club was all about moving forward, and even if he couldn’t reclaim the past, he could grab the future with both hands, hang on tight, and never let go.
“What do you say?” Kane asked Theo, nearly believing that the kid could read his thoughts. However, Theo had settled back into sleep, his warm breath surrounding Kane’s neck. Kane stood at the window, the moonlight washing over him. When Angeline slipped to his side and touched his back, Kane knew that he was finally home.
“It’s easier now that he’s older,” she said.
“Yeah,” he said. “Everything’s going to be.”
Angeline held her tongue and gently took Theo from Kane’s arms. “I’ll put him back down,” she said.
Kane offered no objection as Angeline placed him back in the crib, rearranged the blankets, and pressed the stuffed cow to his tiny side. Theo hugged the toy as Kane hovered over the crib.
“What are you thinking?” Angeline whispered.
Kane smiled happily. Part of him wanted to lift her into his arms and twirl her around, screaming in joy at the top of his lungs. But now that he final had the chance to be a father again, the last thing that Kane wanted was to make a move that might startle the kid. Instead, he opted to take Angeline’s hands, his voice coming out easy and contented.
“He looks like you,” Kane said. “Only like you.”
Angeline blushed and turned her eyes away. Her hands held his tighter, and even though he knew that she was glad, surprised but happy to have him back, something in her gaze told him that she was still worried that Noel would ruin this like he had ruined everything else and smash the dream that was only just coming back together.
“Let’s talk,” she said.
Closing the door behind them, Angeline led Kane to her bedroom. Sparse and clean, Kane instantly took note of the fact that one side of the bed was rumpled, the blankets turned over. The other side was untouched.
“You never were a cover hog,” he said, trying for a joke.
Angeline moved away from him and smoothed the crisp side of the bed with a tender hand.
“I kept it waiting for you,” she said. “Hoping that…”
Her shoulders started to shake, and Kane hurried to her side and gathered her in his arms. “You don’t have to hope anymore, Angel,” he said. “I’m right here.”
Her voice was muffled as she spoke into his broad chest, his hands running through her hair and his lips kissing the curls before he cupped her face in his palms. Angeline had no choice but to meet his eyes. “He’s so like you, Kane,” she said.
Wondering how that was possible, Kane urged her to fill in the blanks. Angeline held his stare as she spoke.
“He’s stubborn,” she started. “Wants ketchup on everything. Maybe it makes me a bad mom or something; but, nine times out of ten, I give in.”
Kane shook his head, his heart pounding furiously at the reality of having her so close after so long, and he kissed her brow.
“Shouldering all this alone?” he said. “So far from home? That doesn’t make you a bad mom.”
“Then, what does it make me?” she asked.
Answering her question with a deep kiss, their tongues swirling together, Kane dragged his hands down her back and wrapped his arms around her waist.
“Makes you the best,” Kane said. “But I didn’t need to see Theo again to figure that one out.”
Angeline wiped her eyes and laughed into his shoulder, hugging him closer. “But he’s also got a heart of gold,” she said. “Sometimes…I mean…I try not to…”
She started to turn away from him, but Kane kept her in his arms as his warm whisper hit her ear. “Try not to what, Angel?” he asked.
“Not…not to cry,” she said. “Theo keeps me on my toes most days; but, there are days when I can’t help it. Not having you is like a nightmare.”
Kane groaned at the thought of her sad, and he started to tell her that she’d never be lonely again.
Then, she dared to look at him again, pride replacing the sorrow in her stare. “But then Theo holds my hand,” Angeline said. “For such a little man, he’s super strong. And I thank god that…that somehow he got that from you.”
Overwhelmed by her presence and her words, Kane kissed her again and lifted her in his arms. Carrying her back to the bed, he eased her down to the place where she had dwelled in loneliness for far too long. Then, he flipped the rest of the blankets aside and sat on the side that she had kept waiting for him. “Don’t sell yourself short, Angel,” he said. “It’s all you.”
Angeline shot up and clung to him. Kissing his stubbled face, Kane could feel himself growing hard. Needing her again, now, he tore at her buttons, and Angeline stripped his t-shirt away. As soon as her hands hit his back, Kane couldn’t help but wince. Angeline suddenly pulled back and looked at him with her wide green eyes, her face a mask of worry. “Kane?” she asked in a quivering voice. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
It was the past. This was now.
“Nothing,” he said, trying to assure her as he moved to kiss her again. However, Angeline would not be swayed by her need to see the secret. So, he reluctantly turned his body to show her Noel’s damage.
As soon as she saw the marks on his back, scabbing over but still throbbing with the pain and the memory that he only wanted to suppress, Angeline gasped and grabbed his arm.
“It’s no big deal,” he said. “I’m really okay.”
“No you’re not, Kane!” she said. Her fingers were tentative as they explored his wounds, and when he found her eyes again, Angeline was most definitely all business and no pleasure.
“I want you tell me what happened, Kane,” she said. “All of i
t.”
He tried to shake his head, wanting her, needing her to believe that they could leave it all behind and make a fresh start with Theo, but Angeline’s eyes were insistent. Instead, he lowered his chin to his muscled chest, sighed, and said, “If anyone deserves the truth, Angel, it’s you.”
CHAPTER THIRTY THREE
It was far worse than she ever could have imagined.
Lillian taking her lead without a loved one to care for and her mind focused on nothing but profit was one thing. Sure, it stung, and Angeline wondered how she could have ever admired the doctor. But most people weren’t what they seemed. Noel White certainly wasn’t. So, why should Lillian be any different?
On those long nights when she couldn’t stop the tears, when Theo took her hand, she had imagined him beaten for any transgression, real or something sick and unwarranted in Noel’s depraved mind. But what he had made her do, the vile feel of his wicked cock between her legs. That was something that Kane would never have to endure, and she was able to take some comfort in that.
Until this moment.
“He…he raped you?” she asked, her voice cracking around each word.
Kane smiled, and she could see that he was on the verge of spinning a story to put her mind at ease. But she wasn’t having it.
“Why?” she moaned. “How…how could he?”
“It’s gonna be alright, Angel,” Kane said. “It is—”
“How could he hurt you like that?” she demanded. “Isn’t he…I mean…I’m one thing but—”
“Don’t you ever talk like that!”
She flashed back to the way it felt when he had taken her with a lie. However, that was a strategy. A play meant to tear them apart. But this?
“I…I got in the way of some business,” Kane said. “With one of the girls.”
Angeline could almost see him only wanting to save someone from another version of her night with Noel, and she nearly smiled when she thought of him swooping in to save the day.
“Of course you did,” she said, as she tentatively touched his chest. Kane grabbed her hand and kissed her fingers. Even as she longed for more of his lips, she held back and forced him to finish the story. When she learned how Noel had tried to drown the poor junkie in his piss, new hatred for the man sprouted around her heart.
“He was way out of line, but he’s still in charge,” Kane said. “So he…I don’t know.”
Hanging his head, Kane seemed to want to drop the subject, but Angeline could think of nothing but her lover violated. Noel’s rage was on account of her chancing upon him in a clinic, healing his hand, and needing his help. Kane might be in command if she hadn’t darkened his life, and he certainly wouldn’t have been raped at his so-called mentor’s hands.
“He did it because of me,” Angeline said.
Kane lifted his eyes and started to grab her face, but Angeline pushed away from the bed and moved to the window. Pressing her palm against the glass, she realized that all that had happened had brought her Theo, and she wouldn’t trade her boy for anything. But the price that Kane had to pay simply because he looked at her, liked her, loved her, was too much for any man to bear. Even Kane.
“You shouldn’t have come here,” Angeline said.
Racing to her side, Kane tried to bring her back to his eyes, but Angeline held her ground.
“You were doing fine before me,” she said. “You need to forget. I’m trouble, Kane. I’m—”
“Stop talking!” Kane pulled her away from the window, and she fell back in his chest as he stroked her hair and kissed her cheeks. “I came here to hold you,” he purred. “Just hold you.”
Wanting nothing more than to live in his embrace, Angeline pressed her body to his and tried to believe that everything could work itself out. She was nearly there when Kane’s fingers reached under her skirt and grazed her quaking thighs.
He easily slid close to the desiring warmth that coursed through her veins before settling about her aching pussy. Angeline started to drive into his hold when the thought of Noel bending him over and ripping him apart made her heart skip a beat. Fighting her need to have him in the bed that she had struggled to keep warm, Angeline pushed him back and shook her head.
“I know, Kane,” she murmured.
Clutching her face again, her own juices warm and slick on his hands, he smiled as he said, “Know what, Angel?”
She took his hand and said, “I know what it is to have him inside you when you just want to get away.”
Kane tried to shrug her words off, but she wouldn’t let him break way until he confessed. “It hurts,” he said plainly.
Angeline remembered the pain all too well, and she never wanted that for him. But his back and his truth told a different story, and so she had to hold him and try to comfort him—even though she knew that it would probably be the last time.
“Listen to me,” she whispered. “All the bad things are because of me, and—”
“No, Angel.”
“—if you really want to run away,” Angeline continued, “and if you want freedom, then you have to… you have to steer clear of me.” She had kept the bed waiting, longed for him beside her for more nights than she could count. Now, she had him, but she had to let him go. “Kane…”
He scooped her up into his arms and silenced her with a fast kiss. Lingering around his lips, she eased her arms around his back, minding his wounds. She nearly forgot them until their mouths parted, and she fixed her eyes on his. “I’m poison,” she said. “I’ve infected you enough.”
He gripped her arm tighter. “What about Theo?” he asked. “You say he’s like me. Doesn’t he need his father?”
Like Kane, he needed to be safe, and while she had no doubt that Kane would lay his life down if any threat came her boy’s way, Noel was too hard a force to fight. As she started to speak her fears, Kane pressed her to his chest and muttered into her hair, “I’ve fixed it. I can be smart, too.”
Looking up at him, she started to ask what he had done and why he was so sure of his plan, but Kane just brought a single finger to her lips and smiled with his eyes. “I came here for you,” Kane said. “And you…you need to trust me, Angel.”
She wanted to. More than anything, she wanted to believe in him and know that the worst was over. Angeline had seen him with Theo again, and she suddenly understood how her son was able to nod off in his protective embrace. Angeline could do that too if given the chance. However, if he was here to look after her and care for her, she needed to start by returning the favor.
“Lie down,” Angeline said.
Kane followed her order and fell to the bed. She stroked his face and kissed his lips before she started to pull away.
“Angel—”
“I’ll be right back,” she said. “I promise.”
Kane curled his hands behind his head and smiled as he waited. She touched his taut chest one more time before flying out of the room. Mindful of her steps, as she passed the sleeping bodies behind closed doors, she poured ice cubes into a bowl, snatched a cloth, and hurried back to his side. All tension left his mouth at the sight of her, and as she sat on her side of the bed, she ran her fingers through his hair and kissed his head.
“Turn over,” Angeline said.
Doing as he was told, Kane shifted to his chest, and Angeline looked away for a moment when Kane gave her the chance to fully absorb the damage to his flesh. It should never have happened, but there was no way of turning back the clock. Kane wanted to live in the present, and Angeline wanted nothing more than to heal him again. It was her first gesture of love—and repeating it was all that she could think of as he lay at her side.
“I want to make you feel better,” she said.
Capturing a few cubes in the cloth, Angeline stared to drag the ice down his battered back. Kane tensed and the cubes melted as soon as they touched his hot flesh; but, Angeline kept going, fighting to heal him and make him whole again. Kane gripped his pillow and moaned when the melting move
d to his waist, and his body curled around the bed.
Angeline could sense that the cold water had hit his cock. When he reached behind his head and started to play with her hair, she knew that his lust and his love for her was not dampened in any way. However, she kept cooling him down. “Just rest, Kane,” she said. “I’m taking care of you.”
He collapsed into the sheets, and as he gave over to her ministrations, Angeline focused hard on his flesh. The thought of Noel touching it became something more than a wicked ploy. The son of a bitch had taken what was hers. Angeline’s name on Kane’s shoulder and his body writhing under the ice, made her want to do what he had tried to do for her.
SECRET BABY AT THE ALTAR Page 20
