by Avelyn Paige
“Okay, Grace, that’s enough. What are we doing here?”
Grinning, she claps her hands together with excitement. “Okay, I’m sorry. I’ve never done anything like this before.” She turns to Mr. Jackson. “I don’t work for DFPS anymore. But, before you left, your file was on my desk and I took a peek at it.” Jackson’s brow smooths out, and the same hope I’d seen on Natalie's face earlier is on his now.
He glances down at his son, and then looks back to Grace. “Do you know who my parents are?”
She grabs my hand. “Tyson Jackson, I’d like you to meet your biological father, Eugene Grant.”
Ty gapes at me as I gape at Grace. “What the fuck are you talking about, Grace?”
She places her hand on my chest. “Mr. Jackson has been petitioning the court to unseal his records. He was adopted when he was two years old, but his mother had surrendered him to DFPS as an infant.”
I cross my arms, trying to keep my voice as calm as possible. “I don’t have a son, Grace. My son died. He passed away before he was even two months old.” I’d told her this. Why is she doing this?
But she isn’t listening. “No, Eugene, she lied to you.” What did she just say? I stare at her, unable to breathe. “Your son never died. She relinquished him, claiming that she couldn’t care for him any longer. She gave him up to the state.”
A punch in the dick would’ve hurt less than those words. My gaze slowly moves to the man standing in front of us. I take another long look at him. His eyes are dark, like mine. He’s got several tattoos and a thin frame.
But it’s the ears that do it for me.
I’d always hated my ears. Well, I’d always hated my earlobes, to be specific. They were longer than most, and thick. When I was younger, I used to keep my hair long just to cover them up. Since I started going gray, though, that just made me look like an old man.
I stare at him in shock and awe. Is it possible? Did Gina really give away our son and then lie to me about his death?
“So…” He clears his throat, looking as shocked as I feel. “So you’re saying this is my father?” His hand is clutching at his chest as he stares back at me.
Grace reaches into her purse and pulls out a piece of yellowed paper and holds it in the air between us. “This is your birth certificate. The mother listed is Gina Marie Spicer.” My heart thuds against my chest, feeling like the world has just… stopped. “And the father is Eugene Robert Grant.” Her eyes meet mine. “Shane didn’t die. She gave him away.”
Feeling like I could pass out from the revelation, I drop my ass onto the loveseat and stare at the little boy across from me.
I clear my throat. “Who is this?” I ask, my voice hoarse with emotion.
“This is my son,” Ty replies, his voice shaky. “His name is Joey.”
My body trembles. Gina lied. I have a son. I have a grandson. I’m a fucking grandpa. How is any of this possible? I kissed my son on his forehead the night before I left, the last memory I had of him before Gina told me he’d died. Now, my boy has his own kid. My brain is on the brink of explosion.
I look at Grace, Natalie, and Kevin, barely able to wrap my head around how quickly things can change. Just a few months ago, I’d been a lonely man on the edge of fifty with nobody to come home to and only my club to rely on.
Now look at me. I have a woman, kids—a family for the first time in my life. The weight of it crashes down on me until the dam breaks under the incredible force of happiness I feel.
“Holy shit,” I mumble, burying my face in my hands.
“Howy shit.”
Lifting my head, I look at the toddler across from me. He’s finished his donut, and now he’s just grinning at me, knowing full well that the words he’d just repeated were ones he shouldn’t have said, and not giving a single fuck.
“He really is your grandson,” Kevin quips.
The laughter that erupts from my chest makes it hard to breathe. I don’t even care, though. Oxygen doesn’t matter right now. All the shit that had gone on in the past few days melts away, leaving only this little boy and me, and the fact that his father is the son I’d lost when I was only twenty years old.
As the others join in on my laughter, I look into Grace’s eyes, knowing this is just the beginning. I’ve only known her a few short weeks, and already she’s given me my family. My son. God, even thinking that word is strange to me. My son and I have a lot of catching up to do. A grandson. Kevin and Natalie are mine now. Hashtag saw to that with his paperwork. Everything that I wanted in my life is right here in front of me. Every fucking last thing.
All of that is enough to keep the joy of my laughter going, because I know that even after this moment, after the laughter has faded away, the joy I feel will stay with me. Now that we all have each other, the joy will stay with all of us.
I’ve found my home, and I’m never letting it go.
Lindsey
Seeing him lying so still in that bed will haunt me until the day I die.
Karma has always been larger than life. An impenetrable force to be reckoned with. Always at the ready to tear down the world and kick some ass. But that’s exactly why he’s here in this bed, with so many tubes and wires coming out of him, isn’t it? His need to protect me going too far over the edge, and now he could die and leave me forever. A forever I wasn’t sure I wanted until this very moment. Leaving me alone. Stuck here with an empty space where our child once grew.
I’d never thought much about having children until after I had finished college and settled down, but those two little lines on that test changed it all for me. Since then, I’d planned for our future, and how we’d tell my uncle when the time was right. I’d thought about what that baby would look like, and who he or she would grow up to be. And now... now that baby will never be, and any future babies will never come along.
We tried to save the baby. We tried to save your uterus, but the damage was too great. The doctor’s sorrowful words still haunt me.
Karma had so many hopes for the future, so many plans. When I’d told him about the pregnancy, and after we’d both gotten over the initial shock of it, he'd been over the moon.
From that moment on, he rarely left my side. He was my constant, gorgeous, yet annoyingly ever-present shadow. I couldn’t get near anyone without seeing him right behind me, which made classes fun. No one expects to see a beast of a man like Karma sitting in on a chick lit class. But he went with me, rolling his eyes every single second until it ended. He loved our baby, and so did I. And then it was ripped away from us both in a blink of an eye. Our little miracle made from love, just… gone.
Its absence throbs in my numb and broken womb. A womb that will never carry life in it again thanks to that bastard, Henry Tucker. He gets to rot in prison while I lost my child, and Karma’s life hangs in the balance, teetering on the scales of life and death. Henry deserved to die. Not my child, and not Karma.
How am I going to tell him about our baby? It’ll break him even more. It’ll break us. The last unbroken piece of my soul went with it. I have nothing left to cling to except for Karma. The last piece of my happiness.
The nurse adjusts the settings on Karma’s IV line before finally leaving the room. I stare at him from the side of the bed, wanting nothing more than to have him wrap me up in his arms. I need him to tell me it’s going to be okay. I just need him.
“You are the most amazing man,” I whisper, unable to stop the tears from falling down my cheeks. “And I need you to get better. I can’t do this without you, baby,”
A small crease appears between his brows. Can he hear me? That’s impossible. He’s got enough medication in his system to keep a grizzly bear down for a month. The sound of my voice may enter his ears, but he’s high as a kite. He’d never understand what I’m saying.
The machines in the room whir and beep, helping to keep Karma’s chest rising and falling with the help of a ventilator. It’s all so dismal. Finally, I can’t take it anymore. I gingerly move
to the side of the bed and settle my ass on it, careful not to jostle either of us. Each movement I make is labored with my own still healing injuries, but I have to be here for him. I have to be the one who tells him what we lost that day, and I have to be close to him when I do.
Inside, my heart screams for him. Every fiber of my being begs for him to open his eyes. I need so bad for him to open those beautiful green emeralds I fell for the first time they turned my way. But it hasn’t happened. He’s been like this for nearly a week.
Leaning to the side, I turn my body, fitting myself onto the bed beside him. It isn’t easy. There are monitors, cords, and wires everywhere, but nothing is going to deter me from placing my head on his shoulder when I say what I have to say.
Once settled, I place my hand on his belly and press a soft kiss to his furry cheek. “I love you so much,” I whisper. “And I’m so sorry.”
A sob rips through me, and even though I’d just taken my pain medication, it does little to numb the physical pain the sob causes.
“I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so fucking sorry.” Tears slide down my cheeks, dotting the white linen underneath our clutched hands. I give it a squeeze, hoping he returns it, but he doesn’t. And I still don’t know if he ever will again.
Read more about Karma’s story in Dark Desires.
The Series
Dark Protector
Dark Secret
Dark Guardian
Dark Desires
Avelyn Paige is a USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author who writes stories about dirty alpha males and the brave women who love them. She resides in a small town in Indiana with her husband and three fuzzy kids, Jezebel, Cleo, and Asa.
Avelyn spends her days working as a cancer research scientist and her nights sipping moonshine while writing. You can often find her curled up with a good book surrounded by her pets or watching one of her favorite superhero movies for the billionth time. Deadpool is currently her favorite.
Also by Avelyn Paige
The Heaven’s Rejects MC Series
Heaven Sent
Angels and Ashes
Sins of the Father
Absolution
Lies and Illusions
The Dirty Bitches MC Series
Dirty Bitches MC #1
Dirty Bitches MC #2
Dirty Bitches MC #3
Other Books by Avelyn Paige
Girl in a Country Song
Cassie’s Court
Geri Glenn writes alpha males. She is a USA Today Bestselling Author, best known for writing motorcycle romance, including the Kings of Korruption MC series. She lives in the Thousand Islands with her two young girls, one big dog and one terrier that thinks he’s a Doberman,, a hamster and two guinea pigs whose names she can never remember.
Before she began writing contemporary romance, Geri worked at several different occupations. She’s been a pharmacy assistant, a 911 dispatcher, and a caregiver in a nursing home. She can say without a doubt though, that her favorite job is the one she does now–writing romance that leaves an impact.
Also By Geri Glenn
The Kings of Korruption MC series.
Ryker
Tease
Daniel
Jase
Reaper
Bosco
Korrupted Novellas:
Corrupted Angels
Reinventing Holly
Other Books by Geri Glenn
Dirty Deeds (Satan’s Wrath MC)
Hood Rat
