Death Dwellers Motorcycle Club:: Fifteen Bad Boy Biker Books

by Kathryn C. Kelly

  “What do you want?” she asked, all joking aside.

  “When the baby’s six weeks old, go away for a weekend with me.”

  She stilled at the unexpected request, a defining moment in their relationship. Before she agreed to such a monumental step, she should gauge how he adjusted to the baby. She should wait until her new feelings settled inside of her. Admitting her love for him to herself left her vulnerable.

  “Cam—”

  “Please. By then, we’ll need the break. Just for a weekend. We can have alone time to explore each other.” The gentle regard in his eyes weakened her. “Please,” he added again.

  Maybe, she was making a mistake, but she couldn’t deny the fierce need in his voice. “Okay,” she answered, knowing she was agreeing to taking their relationship to the next level at that time. If he was still around six weeks after the birth of the baby, she wouldn’t be able to resist him.

  He pressed his lips against her forehead. “Why don’t you relax in a bath while I see to the kitchen, sweetheart?”

  “You don’t have to do that. We can clean together, as we always do.”

  “That reminds me. Did you ever get someone to repair the lock on your basement door?”

  “No. I’ve been so busy at work. But it’s a safe neighborhood. We have private patrol.” Mr. Caldwell, president of the Death Dwellers MC, also had one of his bikers watching out for her. As his wife’s OB, he’d taken Jordan under the blanket of his protection. “Nothing will happen.

  “Doc, if you don’t have that lock repaired by next week, I’m doing the job myself.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll call someone.”

  “Good. Now, relax in a bath while I clean, then we can meet back in the family room to watch a movie together.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me,” she responded, wondering how she’d gotten lucky enough to have a man like Cameron Baptiste walk into her life.

  Two days later

  Washed up and changed into scrubs, Cam strode behind the nurse leading him to Jordan’s delivery suite. He’d been in the middle of discussing a case with Knox at their firm, when Jordan called and said her water broke.

  Her baby wasn’t due for another two weeks and the stubborn woman still hadn’t gone on maternity leave. She’d been seeing patients when she’d become one herself. Viola, her nurse at her practice, rushed Jordan to the medical center.

  “Here she is, sir,” the nurse said, opening the door and ushering Cam into the room.

  Already hooked up to monitors and having an IV line running, Jordan turned her head toward him. Her beautiful face lit up and Cam felt a smile involuntarily curl his lips. Jordan was such a strong, independent woman. To know that she wanted him there—maybe even needed to lean on him a tiny bit—sent his protective instincts into overdrive.

  He’d never trample on her sense of accomplishments, but he intended to prove to her that he was in it for the long-haul, as he’d told her. He’d pick her up when she was down. Carry her when she fell.

  Standing at the side of her bed, he leaned over and kissed her forehead. Despite the kiss they’d shared two days ago, he didn’t want to take advantage of the situation. He respected her boundaries and understood her reasoning.

  A new baby would be a huge life change for her, so she needed to adjust. He’d never been a father before. However, as she recovered, he’d use the opportunity to show himself worthy of her and her daughter. He already had a flower shop on notice, intending to fill her suite with roses, balloons, tulips, and carnations to celebrate the birth of her little one.

  Taking her hand, he glanced around at the surroundings. The room resembled a private bedroom with lamps, cabinets, a TV, and soft, background music. If he hadn’t walked through a hospital to get here—and watched the nurse open a wooden cabinet and reveal medical supplies—he wouldn’t have guessed it was a hospital room.

  With a groan, Jordan closed her eyes and pressed back against the pillow. Her hand tightened on his with surprising strength.

  “Contraction?” Cam asked.

  “Yeah,” she gritted.

  “They’re five minutes apart, Doctor Will,” the nurse said, turning away from the monitor “It won’t be long now.”

  Seeing Jordan relax told Cam the pain had passed.

  “Are you sure you don’t want any pain medication?” the nurse asked.

  “Positive,” Jordan said with a weary smile. “I’ll be fine.”

  She wore no make-up and had a scarf tied around her braids. With her dusky skin and grayish-brown eyes, she usually had an exotic look, but right now she looked tired. Her delicate skin was darkened under her eyes.

  She shoved the covers aside and sat up. It surprised him to see she wore an ordinary hospital gown. He didn’t know why. She was as down-to-earth as she was accomplished.

  “Are you sure, ma’am?” the nurse asked.

  “Positive,” Jordan responded.

  What had he missed?

  The nurse began unhooking Jordan from the monitors, horrifying him.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded.

  “I’m going to walk.” Jordan swung her legs over the side. “Hopefully, speed up things.”

  He rushed to her side, assisting her to her feet as she grabbed the IV pole. “Should you do this?”

  A sheen of sweat coated her skin. “Yes. I’ve had a very healthy pregnancy,” she explained, relaxing against him for a moment, before starting forward.

  Knowing nothing about pregnancy and childbirth other than the videos he’d watched in preparation for Jordan’s delivery, Cam kept his mouth shut. She walked the length of the hallway, and he stayed at her side, stopping when she did and giving into his urge to wrap an arm around her waist to steady her. Jordan didn’t protest, leaning into him when she had contractions. After ten minutes, he guided her back to her room and helped her back into bed.

  Her body tensed and she released an agonizing moan.

  “Jordan, baby, what can I do for you? What do you need?”

  She gave a wheezy laugh. “I need the baby to be born.”

  Once she was hooked back up to the monitors, he thought that the baby was surely coming, but nothing seemed to happen except more contractions. By ninety minutes later, Jordan’s face looked drawn and completely exhausted. It seemed to him that she wasn’t gripping his hand with as much strength as she had before.

  She didn’t look right, no matter how reassuring the nurse was. She kept coming and going, and besides, she didn’t know Jordan the way he did.

  When a contraction passed, and Jordan did little more than moan, he pressed the bell. When the nurse returned, Jordan hardly opened her eyes. “I’d like you to summon the doctor immediately,” Cam ordered.

  She opened her mouth, but Cam gave her a look, and she slipped out the door.

  A few minutes later, they had the bad news. Jordan had developed fever and the baby’s heart rate was dropping. Instead of the natural childbirth she wanted, she’d need an emergency C-Section.

  A moment of fear passed over her face at the announcement, but she nodded.

  Cam squeezed her hand. “You both will be fine,” he reassured her.

  “Will you come in with me?”

  He smiled down at her. “Any time you need me, I’ll be there.”

  “We’ll prep her and then bring you into the room,” the nurse explained, overhearing their conversation. Two other staff members transferred Jordan to a gurney and moved all the equipment.

  Unease slid into Cam. Jordan was his, and he didn’t want her to suffer even a moment of pain or worry.

  But he could only watch as she was wheeled away, counting the moments until he was at her side again.

  Ten minutes later, he found himself sitting on a stool, next to Jordan, in the operating room, where she lay on the table. A raised sheet obstructed their view from the tasks of the doctor and nurses.

  A plethora of emotion masked Jordan’s face. Anxiety and fear, but, most of al
l, pure happiness. Cam recognized each feeling because he was experiencing the same. He’d met Jordan as she was entering her third trimester. Her pregnancy became as much of a priority to him as it was to her. She’d even permitted him to accompany her to one of her checkups, allowing him to experience the wonder of hearing the baby’s beating heart and to see her movements through the 4D ultrasound.

  From that moment on, he’d felt as if Jordan’s baby was his baby, too. He’d known he’d give his life to protect both of them.

  “I’m about to do the incision, Jordan,” her OB called.

  “All right,” Jordan responded.

  Cam and Jordan exchanged glances, their intimacy growing at sharing this beautiful time together. Grabbing her hand and squeezing, he brushed his lips over hers.

  “Are you ready, sweetheart?” he asked gruffly.

  She nodded, then smiled weakly at him. “Are you?”

  “I’ve never been more ready in my life,” he answered with confidence.

  “It won’t be long now,” the doctor said.

  Curious, Cam stood and peeped over the sheet. He flinched, swallowing hard as the doctor removed a wet, sticky little infant from Jordan’s exposed womb. They cleared the baby’s airwaves and cleaned her small body, ignoring her angry cries that indicated a set of powerful lungs.

  A nurse laid the tiny girl on Jordan’s shoulder.

  “She’s here, Cam,” Jordan said around tears, holding her daughter close to her.

  “She is,” Cam replied, his being overflowing with fierce possessiveness. This was his family. He’d never leave them, as his father had left his mother to raise him as a single parent.

  Jordan might not know it yet, but Cam intended to spend the rest of his life spoiling them and loving them and protecting them.

  “Would you like to cut her umbilical cord while we finish up with Doctor Will?” one of the nurses asked.

  “Yes, of course,” Cam said without hesitation.

  Once the baby’s cord was severed and tied, and she was wrapped in blankets, Cam held her, staring at her sweet face. She yawned, and he chuckled. Although she wasn’t his biological child, the lump in his throat threatened to choke him. He’d never known what instant, unconditional love felt like, until that moment.

  “We’re about to wheel Doctor Will away to recovery, sir,” the same nurse who’d asked about the umbilical cord, informed him. “You can accompany your daughter to the nursery.”

  His daughter. He rolled those words around in his head as he walked to Jordan’s side. He had something to tell her before they took her away.

  Jordan reached for the baby.

  “Our daughter,” Cam murmured, placing the child in Jordan’s arms.

  Instead of contradicting him, Jordan’s adoring regard told Cam what he needed to know.

  “Our daughter,” she echoed.

  “I vow to you and her, from this day forward, I’m going to love, support, honor, and cherish her as though she was my own flesh and blood.”

  “You’re the best thing that ever happened to us,” Jordan whispered in return, handing the baby to him as a nurse removed the brakes from the gurney.

  Another nurse took the baby from him and placed her into an incubator. The words, I love you, sat on his lips. Instead of shouting them to Jordan, Cam decided he’d tell her tomorrow.

  He didn’t want her to think the heat of the moment had led to his declaration. He planned to spend the rest of his days with her and he didn’t want her to have a doubt in her mind about his sincerity. He already had the ring in mind he wanted to purchase for Jordan.

  From this day forward, he wasn’t only Dorothea “Dot” Baptiste’s son. He was Jordan Will’s mate and father of a little girl.

  Jordan stared in awe at her new daughter, Ava Jacqueline. She’d already counted her little fingers and toes. Already studied her every feature and imprinted it in her brain.

  She was exhausted, still a little groggy and in pain, but she was also elated to meet her baby girl. After months of planning—not to mention the near-death experience with the infant’s father that brought Cam into her life—Ava had finally come into the world.

  Jordan smiled at her swaddled baby, her eyes misty. The nurse had promised to return to the room and bring Ava to the nursery so Jordan could rest. But after tonight, they wouldn’t be separated.

  Her doctor was hinting at five days in the hospital due to Jordan’s infection. The idea made her snort. She was a healthy woman, and she had every intention to be home within two or three days.

  Floral bouquets and balloons filled her room. Between the surgery and her arrival from the recovery room, Cam had had an entire flower shop delivered. She swallowed hard, thinking about him.

  He stayed with her every moment, leaving her only to go with Ava to the nursery, just the way a father would do. And he’d looked as proud as any father. In fact, the medical staff referred to him as the father of the baby. Jordan didn’t bother to correct them, so happy he’d been there.

  Early in her pregnancy, she had planned to have Roxy with her. But now she’d been through labor…she was so grateful that Cam had been with her. The nurse told her that Cam had insisted on calling in the doctor when Jordan had weakened.

  Maybe saving Ava’s life, the way he’d already saved hers.

  Smiling dreamily, she traced the curve of Ava’s cheek with one finger. “Your Aunt Roxy is going to love you,” she whispered. Cam had called Roxy the moment they’d reached the room, and Roxy had surely informed all the women at the Death Dwellers MC.

  Jordan would have more than enough visitors to fill up the void she felt at not having her mother. Her baby wouldn’t have a grandmother, but that’s the way life worked.

  Jordan hadn’t spoken to her mother in years and certainly had no intentions of contacting her now. In fact, the very thought brought a wave of fierce protectiveness. She would keep Ava safe from anyone like that.

  At that moment, her door opened and she forced herself to look away from her sleeping daughter. Knowing Cam wouldn’t return until the morning, she expected to see the nurse. But two men swaggered toward her. Two men she’d prefer never to have seen again.

  “Well, well, if it isn’t the good doctor,” Stein Ward sneered. Now that Sulley was dead, Stein was the oldest brother in that no-good family. “With my newest niece.”

  Silton, the youngest, grinned, flashing jagged teeth and a crooked smile. He had an arrest record a mile long.

  “Get out,” Jordan demanded, tightening her hold on Ava. Alarm and adrenaline rushed through her. In the face of danger, her pain fell away.

  Stein dropped into the seat closest to her bed and nodded to Silton, who made his way to the other side of her. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. You see your daughter is the last link to our poor, deceased brother. We intend to be in her life.”

  “I don’t think so,” Jordan spat, her mind racing. Since the Sulley Incident, Mr. Caldwell always had a biker or two watching out for her. They’d escorted her to the hospital when Jordan went into labor. Where were they now?

  Silton scratched his bumpy cheek. “Wondering about your biker friends, huh?”

  She glared at him.

  “Everybody needs a piss break now and then,” Stein informed her.

  “What do you want?”

  “Cooperation,” Stein said, raising a booted foot to her bed and putting it on the white coverlet. “Bad knee, baby. Have to keep it elevated.”

  What an ass. “Go away,” she ordered.

  Silton leaned forward and raised his hand to touch Ava. Growling, Jordan knocked his hand away. She adjusted her daughter in her arm, reaching for the device to summon the nurse. “I’m getting security.”

  Stein shot out of his seat and yanked the intercom away, throwing it out of her reach. “You’re not doing anything we don’t tell you to do.” He paced to the foot of her bed and turned a look of hatred on her. “We’ve been waiting for the day you delivered.” He gave her a sly lo
ok. “A successful bitch like you won’t miss a few dollars, given to your baby’s uncles. We’re family, after all.” He pretended to think, snapped his fingers, and grinned. “But this baby…this baby is worth more than a few dollars.”

  “What are you talking about?” She tried to keep her voice even, to stay strong in the face of the danger they presented. Still weak and tired from giving birth, she wasn’t up for this.

  Silton plucked a pink carnation from one of the bouquets and sniffed. “Leverage to get whatever the fuck we want from you for as long as it amuses us.”

  They could threaten her however much they liked. All she had to do was go to Mr. Caldwell. No… She didn’t condone murder. She should call the cops, not the bikers.

  On the other hand, Silton and Stein might post bail and come after her doubly hard. The two remaining Wards were as much a threat to her as their brother had been.

  And this wasn’t about her. This was about Ava now. She had to protect Ava.

  God, what a fool she’d been, to ever give Sulley the time of day. His electrical company had repaired faulty wiring at Jordan’s practice. At first, he’d been sweet and charming. When he’d invited her out, she’d taken him up on his offer.

  Then, she’d ended up pregnant, and he’d turned into an abusive asshole. After getting a restraining order against him, he’d decided to kill her and would have if it hadn’t been for Cam, Knox, and Mr. Caldwell.

  “I can read every emotion on your face,” Stein declared. He pulled up his cell phone and shoved it in front of her face.

  An image of Mr. Caldwell raising his gun greeted her. Stein’s thick finger scrolled left and a photo of Mr. Caldwell firing his gun appeared. The next image panned out, showing Mr. Caldwell holding a smoking weapon at the very moment the bullet hit Sulley’s head.

  Before she could react to that horrific image, Stein swiped his finger again to an image of Cam protecting her with his body.

  The phone disappeared into Stein’s pocket. “We were there in that parking garage when Sulley was killed. He needed us to help get rid of your body once he finished you off.”