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“Farren!” he shouted and rushed to her side. He took her hands, frantic. “What happened? Are you hurt?”
She shook her head. “I’m okay, I’m not… hurt… exactly. I’m…” She gasped as another shooting pain bounced through her. “Having a baby!” she bellowed.
Then all of their eyes were saucers, and Rogan picked her up from the floor in his arms.
“Rita, get the door,” he ordered, and he rushed Farren out to his truck to drive her to the hospital.
Worry and joy warred through him as he held her hand and cursed the Houston traffic on the drive there, but they finally made it and she was taken straight back to Labor and Delivery.
***
Five hours later, Farren was holding her six pound, seven ounce, twenty-inch baby boy. She never knew she could feel so much love in her heart, but it was as if it had grown a whole new chamber that was completely filled to the brim.
Rogan had remained by her side, never leaving, not even to eat, and she looked up at him as he stood next to her hospital bed, stroking her hair and the top of the baby’s head.
When a quiet voice entered the room, Farren and Rogan looked up to see Elaina Evans coming in with a basket topped with blue balloons.
“Is it okay if I come in?” Elaina asked, looking for Farren’s answer more than Rogan’s.
“Sure, come in,” Farren welcomed her.
Elaina came to Farren’s side, setting the basket on a table by the window, then approached Farren and looked into the sweet, sleeping face of the tiny little person curled up tightly against her. The sight was enough to melt even the hardest of hearts, and Elaina cooed and babbled as she grabbed the baby’s tiny little hand.
“What’s his name?” Elaina asked, looking up between the faces of the proud mama and papa.
Rogan looked down to Farren and nodded. Then they both looked back to Elaina.
“We named him Harley,” Farren answered.
“Harley,” Elaina repeated with a smile, looking back into little Harley’s eyes that were now opening.
“Harley Craigan Rayner,” Farren added, softly. “Would you like to hold him?”
Elaina nodded her head with tears in her eyes. She took Harley Craigan into her arms just as Gramma and Shea came in with take-out food.
They all mingled and laughed, oohed and ahhed, ate, and hugged, and one by one they all left until it was just Farren, Rogan, and their baby who was sleeping peacefully in the bassinet next to Farren’s bed.
“I love you, Farren,” Rogan told her, wrapping his arms around her and kissing the top of her forehead. It wasn’t the first time he’d said the words, but it always felt like the first time each time he did.
“I love you too, Rogan,” she returned, cuddling into his arms.
And as he held her, and they watched their baby, with so much love in her heart Farren finally understood how it felt to know beyond the shadow of a doubt that it was possible for someone to never, ever want to leave.
Continue reading the Boss Series
Keep reading now for a sneak peek of the first chapter of Boss Unavowed.
ONE
A haunted moan could be heard from across the hallway as Farren held and rocked little Harley for his routine two o’clock a.m. feeding. The sound yanked her out of a sleep-deprived haze, and wild panic pierced through her chest as she sprang from the gliding chair, placed Harley in his crib, face-down in case he spit up his just-eaten food, and rushed into the bedroom she shared with the father of her child.
Rogan lay paralyzed in his bed, a nightmare of his past consuming his mind, holding his consciousness hostage. He was unable to wake, unable to escape the horrors that replayed through his memory, forcing him to relive those fateful moments that had changed him forever.
Sweat drenched the pillow and sheets beneath him, and when Farren reached his side, she threw the blanket from atop his body and cupped the sides of his face.
“Shhhh, shhh, shhh,” she said, trying to soothe him, and his eyes flew open as a violent intake of air filled his lungs.
He shuddered beneath her fingers before her face came into focus. T
