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I want to be a father, most of all. I’m not my parents. I’m better than that.
Sara is mine. This baby is mine. And I don’t care what I am—I don’t care what she is, either.
This is all I need.
Chapter 30
Sara
I feel exhausted.
Good, but exhausted.
I’m aching all over—between my legs, my arms, my shoulders, my back, the bruises on my ass—but they’re good aches. They’re a reminder of the last couple nights I spent with Angelo making up for lost time.
I lean back in the passenger side seat of his rental truck. He grins at me and takes my hand, squeezing it gently. “Think they’ll show?”
“I doubt they have much of a choice.”
He tilts his head. “I don’t know. Cops don’t like to admit when they’re wrong.”
“Hence this whole stupid mess?”
“Pretty much.” He glances at me, grinning. “It’s good to have you back, my frigid princess.”
“Don’t start with me.”
“I mean it.”
I smile at him and kiss the back of his hand. “It’s nice to be back.”
In between sessions of extremely intense and sweaty sex, we spent a lot of time talking about our lives, about the future, about what we want from the baby, about everything. We didn’t come to any conclusions, but I know him a lot better now than I did before, and he’s exactly what I assumed: loyal, loving, demanding, intense, and beautiful.
And above all, overprotective and dangerous. In a good way, of course.
All my life I’ve been looking for a cliff to jump from. A leap of faith, an act of reckless selfishness that might prove I’m truly alive. I’ve been drifting from one thing to the next, walking along the proper path, never deviating, too afraid to fail and too nervous to do anything but mindlessly go forward, but it feels like Angelo is the clouds, he’s the wind whipping through my hair and the second of being yanked down to earth, he’s the scream on my lips, the exhilarating excitement in my veins as I plummet down, down, down, past where I was meant to be and on to something better. Something my own.
He’s my jump, my leap. And I can’t say what’s going to happen tomorrow, or the next day, or a month or a year from now, and that’s what I love so much about it.
Everything else, my entire existence, it was planned and perfected.
This is messy and wrong and dangerous.
And I need it so badly it hurts.
The parking lot outside of the U-Haul place is deserted. The place is depression incarnate, like something from a movie: weeds sprouting between cracks, plants growing up in the nearby grass, a rusting old truck with windows so covered in dirt they look tinted black. The building is abandoned. It’s hard to say when it shut down, but probably in the last year or so. The interior is barren, all the boxes and packing materials taken away to somewhere else, wherever closed stores go when their doors lock for the last time.
Another truck glides into the lot and pulls across from ours. It’s midday and we’re near a major road, but there aren’t any other pedestrians around. Only a gas station a half mile back, a storage facility, and this abandoned building. A good place for an ambush.
“Stay in here,” Angelo says and taps the gun at his hip as he opens his door. I wish he didn’t need that thing. “Come out if it’s safe.”
“Be careful,” I say, and he only nods at me as he walks forward.
I watch him, fear ringing down my spine. It’s a real fear, a visceral fear, the sort of terror usually reserved for thoughts of my baby.
I don’t want to lose Angelo in the same way I can’t imagine losing this child.
It’s strange, how fast I fell and how hard.
But I took my leap and I won’t turn back.
The other truck’s door opens and Misty Vance steps out. She’s in jeans and a denim jacket, her hair pulled back. I note a lack of a holster at her hip. She comes closer to Angelo and there’s nobody else with her. I wait a beat and hop out, approaching somewhat skittishly, wondering if Misty got turned and took over her partner’s position as the chief of police’s new lackey.
Misty nods to me and her eyes narrow at Angelo. “You have no clue how pissed off John is right now,” she says. “What’d you do to him?”
“How’s he doing? He healing okay?”
Misty’s jaw works. “You know what, if he didn’t deserve it, I’d kill you myself.”
“Good thing he deserved it,” Angelo says. “Why’d you come here? I thought we’d meet with Danny.”
“Danny got reassigned. John’s on medical leave.”
“I take it the chief’s cleaning house, huh?” Angelo glances at me. “You must’ve really spooked him.”
“What did you two do?” Misty asks, glaring at me. “The whole precinct feels like a graveyard right now. I tried to help you, but god damn it, Sara. You stirred up some serious shit.”
