Page 87 of Ravaged From Fate

Maddie Leaver, Axel’s pregnant fiancée – the girl I jumped in to protect by punching that journalist - is going into labor. Right now.

I look up from the screen and at Elsa’s shocked face. I mean, I knew the baby would be coming, but seeing the news like this makes it so real. Elsa waits for what I say next.

“It’s time,” I tell her. “I’ve got to see her. I’ve got to go back to Los Angeles and see the boys. You want to come, Elsa?”

My girl nods. “I’ll come.”

44

ELSA

Caspian turns off his pickup truck’s engine and then doesn’t move. I look over his shoulder out the window and past the parking lot to the tall building next to us. The hospital where Maddie Leaver, fiancée of Ravaged’s bassist, is about to give birth in. We should be in there right now by the rest of Ravaged’s side.

But Caspian still doesn’t move. He’s in no rush.

“You see those people gathered outside the main doors,” he says to me, pointing at a crowd lingering by the hospital only a few hundred yards from us.

“Yep. What about them?”

“See their cameras? Their phones? Their laptops? They’re paparazzi from all over the world,” Caspian says matter-of-factly. He’s being blunt and unemotional, but I know how much those people outside the hospital mean to him. They can ruin his life with one snap of their camera. “When we get out of the truck, that’s it. They’re waiting for me. If they catch a glimpse of you, that’s it. People will know all about you in a matter of minutes.”

“Of course that’ll happen.”

Caspian turns to me, his expression dark and serious. “I don’t think you fully understand what this entails, Elsa.”

“Yeah, sure I do. But it’s a price I’m willing to pay for being with you.”

“You’re willing to bet your life on it? The life of your family and friends? These people are vultures ready for you. I can try to get Ravaged’s manager, Lucas, to deal with them. Keep you as private as possible, but once those journalists find out that you’re with a member – former member – of Ravaged, then all bets are off.”

“I do understand the risk, Caspian,” I reply. “I want to face the unknown with you. Ravaged is your family, and I want to meet your family.”

Caspian stares at me for a minute before answering.

“Okay, then.”

“So my whole life is going to change, then, when I step out of this truck?”

Caspian nods. “Yeah.”

“Ah. And what will you do when this is all over and when Maddie has her baby? Go back to live in Los Angeles?”

A flicker of emotion passes through Caspian’s face. What is it? Shock? Upset?

We’ve spent the last few weeks talking all about the past and not about the future. We’ve mentioned Ravaged only once the other night. Everything has been about his beginnings as a drummer. Nothing about what is next for us. To be honest, it’s put me on edge, not knowing what comes for Caspian and me.

This is the conversation we need to have.

“I want to keep living in East Springs,” he says softly. “I want to live with you. If that’s what you want, of course.”

Bless Caspian for being so characteristically to the damn point.

He doesn’t waste words, does he?

“That’s what I want,” I reply.

“Good.”

“And will you go back to Ravaged?” I ask him. The question that’s been on the edge of my lips for days.