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Chapter Twenty-Two
“Will you stop fidgeting damn it,” Rose ordered as she straightened my tie for the tenth time.
When I snorted in response, she pulled at it harshly, in an attempt to rein in my anger. My eyes met hers, and I couldn’t help but release some of the tension I was holding in my body. Her face was serious and stern, and she wasn’t going to let me get away with acting like an asshole today.
No.Today was too important.
“Hate dressing up,” I murmured, pulling at the black suit pants I was wearing. The only bonus was that Rose had agreed that the boys and I could wear our cuts. She wanted us to look nice, but she knew how important it was for us to show up as a family, together in solidarity, and that’s exactly what our cuts expressed.
Unity.
Together we stand, together we fucking fall.
But no one would be falling today. We were going to win.
Allen had made too many mistakes, and in his greed and desperation, he’d screwed himself. At this stage, he’d be lucky if he weren’t arrested for not reporting a crime. He knew what had happened to Hayley. He was meant to protect her, to love and cherish her, and to keep the monsters at bay, but he hadn’t. He’d invited them into his home, and when they went after his daughter, he’d used it as leverage for his own fucking gain.
I wasn’t about to see Jayla left to the same fate.
I would protect her.
I would cherish her.
I would do everything he hadn’t.
“It’s time to go,” Rose murmured, drawing me from my daydream and back to the present. I looked over at her. She was stunning in a fitting red dress that hugged her body in a sexy but classy way. It fell right at her knee, revealing her tanned, firm legs that were an ode to her Italian heritage. When my eyes moved their way back to her face, a cheeky grin greeted me.
“Come on, big boy, we’ve got a little girl to claim.”
Nodding, I walked to her, slipping my hand around her waist and yanking her against me. Her hands went to my chest to stop herself from falling—not that I would ever let that happen. I’d seen Rose at her worst. The memories plagued me more often than they should, but it was a reminder that I always needed to keep my head in the game. She needed me, and so did Jay. Just as much as I needed them. I couldn’t breathe without her, just the thought of losing her had me suffocating, my lungs gasping for air.
“Jay called me Dad,” I whispered against her cheek.
Her tiny gasp had me pulling her closer. “When?”
“The night I went to meet Skins. She was sleepy, but she called me Daddy.” I could feel the emotion in my voice, it was cracking, and breaking with the intensity of just how important those words were to me.
“You are her dad.” She sniffed. “Sometimes life hands us the short straw when it comes to parents. Some people just aren’t meant to hold that role, but you are. You’re meant to be a father. With Jay, you went from walking to sprinting but you never wobbled or stumbled, you just did whatever you had to in order to keep up and I admire that.”
“Fuck,” I hissed, pressing my lips to the underside of her jaw. She held me tighter, so tight it felt as though our bodies were becoming one.
It was almost funny.
Neither of us had a good father figure in our lives. We’d both suffered abuse at the hands of the men who were meant to care for us, but we didn’t let that eat us up inside. It made us stronger, made us want to do better and be better. We knew what it felt like to be let down and disappointed, and now we’d been given this chance. A chance to be there for someone who could have been victim to the same fate.
My hand drifted around her body and I pressed my palm against her belly button. “Jay will always be our first child, our baby girl. But I don’t want to stop there. I want more…” I pulled back, looking into her eyes before adding, “… when you’ve finished school.”
A giggle escaped her lips, and her hand came down over mine. “I like that plan. I’m all in, Blizzard.”
“That means no toys for a while, ‘cause all you’ll be taking is my cock,” I warned with a smirk on my face.
Her eyes lit up. Rose liked to play. After everything that happened, we found it was something that helped us to build our trust together again. Now, though, it had become more.
“Oh, I think I might be okay with that.”
A growl escaped from deep in my throat, and I pressed my lips against hers. The kiss was so passionate that she stumbled back a few steps, her back hitting the wall with a thud.
“Oh for fuck’s sake, don’t make me get the hose.” Rose started to laugh against my lips as Chelsea tapped her foot impatiently in the doorway to our bedroom. “Optimus! Tell your brother to stop groping his woman so we can get this done. My feet hurt in these heels.”
