by Smith, T. O.
I shook my head against his chest. "Cole, I love you. I realized I love you when you were shot." I mumbled into his chest.
He laughed in relief. "Fuck, here I am freaking out and you love me, too.” He whispered. “You've loved me since . . . fuck."
~*~*~
The door to the room flew open, crashing against my wall. Cole shot upright in bed as my eyes snapped open. "The DM have showed up here and at Drake's. Fucking get her to safety!" Travis hollered, pointing at me as he rushed back out of the room.
Cole jumped up, grabbing his gun and yanking his clothes on. He threw me a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, and I yanked them on quickly. He handed me my gun and lifted me up into his arms, running out of the back entrance. He ran us into the woods and we sat down behind a bunch of bushes. "Cole, you need to go-." I started, but he cut me off.
He shook his head with a hard look on his face. "No." He snapped at me as gun shots started firing. I winced. "I won't make the mistake of leaving you alone again."
I rolled my eyes at him. "I doubt anyone is going to find me here." I told him. “You need to be out there with our club.”
He glared at me. "Amelia, shut the hell up and stop arguing with me. I'm not fucking leaving you alone, not again.” He snapped.
The gun shots got louder. I hated not being able to see what was going on. I hated leaving the crew behind to defend themselves. I knew they had Travis and Katie, but Cole and I were the president and vice president. We should have been there fighting alongside them, not hiding out here in the woods. Fuck, Cole and I had chosen the worst time for me to get pregnant.
After a while, the gun shots stopped. Cole's phone vibrated in his hand, and he answered it almost instantly. "What's going on?" He demanded to know.
"We've got the president, and everyone that showed up here that's not dead is injured.” I heard Travis say. “We've got a fucking mess. Stay hidden. I think I hear sirens – meaning the cops are on their way."
"You can't fucking take the fall for this!" Cole roared. "All of you will go to fucking jail!"
"Amelia fucking needs you, Cole." Travis snapped at him. "So fucking stay hidden. You weren't involved in this. You don't need to be locked up when she's pregnant, Cole. So, stay out of the way, and don't come out into the open."
Cole brought the phone down from his ear, sighing. He dropped his head into his hands. "It's a mess." Cole muttered. "It’s all a goddamn mess."
"Everyone get on the ground on your stomachs and put your hands behind your backs!" I heard someone holler, alerting Cole and I that the cops had made it to the club house.
Cole stood up and pulled me up into his arms. "Come on. We've got to get out of here in-case they decide to search the property."
"Cole, we can't-." I started, but he cut me off again.
He sighed. "I don't want to, but my dad is right. He'll handle everything. The crew trusts him and Mom, and they trust their decisions. We'll be okay, and so will they." He assured me.
Cole carried me through the woods, making sure his tracks couldn't be seen. We had failed our club, and we had just begun reigning as president and vice president. Nothing could get much worse than this shit.
~*~*~
When we finally got back to the club house, the cops were dragging people into the back of cars. "What's going on?" Cole snapped at an officer, playing stupid like he didn't know what had just happened on our grounds.
"Well, apparently, your crew took it upon themselves to kill and hospitalize people. You want to join them in prison?" The officer snapped back at Cole.
Cole looked around, his face morphing into shock. It was sincere shock, too. No doubt about it, the cops would make sure we never stepped foot on the club house property ever again. There were a good twenty people lying dead on the ground. Blood was everywhere.
Cole sighed and looked over at Lisa – the FBI agent that was the mother of Drake’s daughter. She walked over to us, a sad look on her face. "Cole, they'll be locked up for a long time." She told him sadly. “There’s nothing I can do except to talk them into being good while they’re inside so they can be considered for an early release.”
He nodded, sighing. "I know. How is this going to affect me and Amelia?" He asked her.
"You'll be pulled in for questioning, but Drake told me to pull some strings to make sure you two don't go inside for this, especially since you two weren't at the shooting."
Cole nodded and stepped into the club house, heading to our room. He set me in the wheel chair and grabbed a duffel bag. "We'll have to stay in a motel for a while until we find out what they're going to do with the club house." He told me.
I sighed. "I figured as much." I muttered.
Our whole world was now completely flipped upside down, and we couldn’t do anything about it. The good news was that the DM problem was dealt with, but at the same time, ninety-nine percent of our club just got locked up.
He packed clothes for both of us and then pushed me outside to his truck. Lisa and a cop walked up to us as Cole was helping me into the truck.
"Where were you at the time of the shooting?" Lisa asked us, seeming a little annoyed at the cop standing with her.
"We went in the woods to fuck." Cole told her. I scowled at Cole, but he sent me a smirk. "We didn't hear the shooting going on."
She nodded, writing it down. "Can I get you both to sign?" She asked, holding out a clip board.
Cole and I signed our names to the piece of paper. "Can I talk to my dad and mom before they go?" Cole asked Lisa.
She nodded, and Cole asked her to stay with me while he talked to them. She looked at me. "It's just you and Cole for a while, huh?" She asked.
I sighed, nodding. "It seems that way. At least this way the baby will be safe for a while." I murmured.
She nodded. "They won't come after you guys with it just being you and Cole. Besides, knowing Drake, he'll put protection on you guys just to be sure you two are protected since the rest of your crew is gone except for what's up there with him."
My eyes widened at her. "You know?" I asked her, cocking an eyebrow at her.
She nodded. "Olivia is up there with him at the moment. He got an ear full when I found out she was in danger, but he protected her. I'm driving up there later today to make sure for myself and to meet this Holly girl. She's messing with what's mine." She muttered at the end.
I smirked at her. "Still hung up over him?" I asked.
She laughed a little. "Honey, Drake and I have this on-again, off-again thing going. He's been messing around with Holly though, and I'm not okay with that."
I smiled at her. "If it makes you feel any better, when he first found Holly again, he was ready to end her life."
Lisa smiled a little. "Okay, I have to admit that does make me feel a bit better.”
I laughed lightly as Cole came back over and kissed me. "Come on. We need to get going. Mom's about to throw one of her bitch-fits, and I don't want to be here when she does.”
He gave a nod to Lisa in thanks and slid into the driver’s seat. When we got to the motel, Drake and Carlos were sitting in the parking lot waiting for us. Cole leaned out of his truck window, cocking an eyebrow at the two men. "What are you two doing in town?" Cole asked them.
"Lisa told me you two were out here alone, and she thinks you could use some protection, so we rode down here to force you to follow us to our club house. So, let's go." Drake said, not giving either of us room to argue with him. He had made up his mind, and that was that.
Cole sighed and leaned back in the seat. "Alright. It's better than spending what money I have left after all of Amelia's hospital stays." He retorted, turning the truck back on.
I glared at him, and he smirked at me. I sighed, rolling my eyes. Leave it to Cole to say something like that.
He leaned over and kissed me. "I love you, baby."
I smiled at him, my heart melting instantly at his words. "I love you, too."
Despite our current shitty situation
, I still had Cole and our kid. As long as I had those two, I could deal with almost anything, I was sure of it.
Epilogue
I clenched Cole's hand in mine. "I fucking hate you." I spat at him, sweat dripping down my face.
He wiped a cool rag against my face, wiping away some of the sweat. "You're going to be okay, baby. Besides, you should be okay with labor by now since you put yourself in labor so many fucking times." He smarted off, pissing me off even more.
I glared at him. I swear if I could kill him with my eyes, he would be dead. "Yeah, but I wasn't at almost ten fucking centimeters!" I shouted at him.
He grinned down at me. "Save all of the energy for when you need to push." He told me, struggling to hold back his laughter.
I reached up and yanked his face down to mine by the collar of his shirt. His eyes widened in shock. "If you don't get rid of that amused look on your face right fucking now, I'll shoot you with your own fucking gun after I have this baby." I snapped.
Yes, we still didn't know what I was having. I didn't want to know. The little kid seemed pretty strong anyway considering everything it had been through.
Cole burst out laughing. I wanted to punch him. He shouldn’t have been finding the situation so amusing. I was in a fuck ton of pain, and I was irritable.
The midwife came into the room before I could reach up and strangle him. "I see you two are having fun." She remarked, smiling at us.
"I'm going to strangle him." I snapped at her. "I'm not joking either. If I wasn’t in so much pain, you would be sending me to jail for murder and putting him in a fucking body bag."
She smiled, already used to my attitude by then. "Okay, honey, I'm going to check you to see if you're ready to start pushing. Do you feel any urges to push?" She asked.
"Yes, for about five minutes now, I think." I told her between clenched teeth as I got another painful contraction.
I clenched Cole's hand tightly. He whispered soothing words in my ear until it passed. "Okay, sweetheart, you're ready to start pushing." She looked at Cole. "I need you to help her push. I assure you, she will get tired very quickly."
Cole gave her a curt nod, his amusement gone, and the seriousness of the situation taking its place. He gave me the sweetest smile ever that had my heart melting. "You can do this, baby. Just think about being able to hold our kid after it’s finally out."
I nodded, taking a deep breath. I put my feet in the stirrups, and Cole put a hand under my upper back. "Alright, you need to put your chin against your chest and push every time I tell you, okay? I’m going to count, and you need to push for that amount of time.”
I nodded. "Okay, one, two, push." She demanded.
Cole helped me push, and I clenched the rails of the hospital bed in my hands tightly as I pushed. "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Good. Relax. Get ready to do the same thing with the next contraction." She said.
I was already breathing heavily, and I was in ten times more fucking pain than I had been before. Cole stood beside me encouraging me with every push, and even pushed me when I started getting too tired.
This went on for about an hour, and then the intense, painful pressure I had been feeling before was gone. I heard a cry a moment later, and Cole grinned the biggest smile I had ever seen him smile as they placed her on my chest to clean her. She was screaming her little head off, but the noise didn’t bother me. I was so entranced by my beautiful little girl that nothing could have bothered me at that moment.
Cole cut the umbilical cord, and they took her over to the thing to weigh her and finish cleaning her up. Cole leaned down and kissed me deeply. "We have a baby girl." He told me, grinning widely, excitement clear in his voice.
I nodded, joyful tears spilling down my cheeks. He continued kissing me. He couldn't contain his grin, and honestly, neither could I.
~*~*~
I woke up, yawning instantly. My entire body hurt from giving birth, but I could honestly say it was the best experience I had ever been through. I was in a post-partum room that they had moved me into about an hour after I had given birth.
I looked over to see Cole sitting on the chair beside my bed holding our daughter in his arms and feeding her. I sat up slowly, and Cole looked up at me. "Morning, baby." He murmured quietly.
He looked tired, but the happiest I had ever seen him. "Have you been dealing with her all night?" I asked him, rubbing my eyes.
He nodded. "It's really not that bad. I just wake her up every two hours and feed her an ounce or two or formula. She sleeps through it all – diaper changes and everything." He told me.
I held my arms out as she let go of the bottle, and he got up, gently placing her into my arms. I smiled down at her. She was gorgeous. She had a little bit of dark hair on her tiny head. She was so light in my arms; she felt so fragile.
Cole laid down on the bed beside me and rubbed her cheek with his thumb, smiling softly. "What do we want to name her?" He asked me.
I shrugged. "I don't care. What do you want to name her?" I asked, not taking my eyes off of my beautiful baby girl.
"Hayley." He said softly. "I want her name to be Hayley."
"Hayley." I said. I smiled at him. "Hayley June Louis."
Cole and I had gotten married a couple of months ago. He had wasted no time in asking me to marry him, and no time to bind me to him by giving me his last name. Not that I minded; it was nice officially being Cole’s.
He nodded at me. "It suits her." He kissed me. "You know we're going to have to take her when we visit Mom and Dad at the prison. They'll want to see her."
I nodded. "I know." My heart panged at the thought of my mom. She died two days after my wedding. She had been beaten to death while in prison. I hated that I had never let her apologize to me, nor had I forgiven her before she died.
Cole grabbed my chin and forced me to look at him. "Don't think about her." He said softly. "She knows you loved her."
I sighed and looked down at Hayley. I rubbed her soft cheek and smiled softly. "I promise I'll be ten times better to you than she was to me." I whispered to her.
Her little mouth opened in a yawn as she opened her big blue eyes. I grinned. "Well, hello there, gorgeous." I murmured.
She looked a lot like Cole. Cole and I had looked at some baby pictures of us so we could determine who she looked more like when I actually had her. She definitely looked like Cole. There were certain parts of her that were definitely from me, but Cole's features stood out on her the most.
"She looks like you." I told him.
He grinned at me. "Oh, I know." He said cockily, grinning.
I rolled my eyes at him. I looked back down at Hayley, and Cole wrapped his arms around me. "I love you." He whispered in my ear.
I turned my head so I could kiss him softly. "I love you, too." I murmured against his lips.
Coming Soon
Bloody Black Skulls
Hayley was seventeen when she was dragged into the mess known as the Bloody Black Skulls. She had one sister and two brothers, and all of them were ruthless and scary as hell. Anyone who crossed one of their paths tried to keep their heads down and their mouths shut.
Being like this was a requirement for Hayley, being as she was the one that had to take over the Bloody Black Skulls and be their president.
When Cole and Amelia - Hayley's parents - stepped down from their spots, it was up to Hayley and her oldest brother Jordan to make things right and get them out of all of the mess their family had dragged the club into.
Their plan could very well go to crap, however, when Hayley almost runs over a man left in the road for dead.
Coming September 30, 2017
Under His Protection
Randi has practically run her life into the ground, and has been running from the same man for a couple of years.
Sean DeSora is an FBI agent and enters into Randi's life using his cover name. What originally started as a way to close a case, soon turned into something much
more, and he found himself protecting Randi by any means necessary.
Yet, Randi doesn't know his real name, and when she finds out, it could very well make or break the relationship they formed.
He won't give up on her, though, and he is more than determined to protect her from those who want to harm her.
Join Randi and Sean through their ups and downs, through lies and truths, and through heartbreaks.
About the Author
T.O. Smith is a self-published author through Amazon and CreateSpace. She loves interacting with her readers, and sharing her books with the world.
She has been writing since she was thirteen years old, and has loved it ever since. Writing has been her biggest dream for a very long time, and she’s worked hard to achieve it.
She has three published books, making Black Skulls her fourth. Helping Lilac, Bloody Royals, and Rescuing Eloise are her first three published books.
T.O. Smith can be found on Wattpad under the username lightthecandle, and she also can be found on Facebook as T.O. Smith.
