Chapter 16 LEO
LEO
“How are you holding up?” Emmett asked from his seat on the opposite end of my couch. Between us, Seraphina was swaddled and sleeping on a pink, fuzzy blanket.
“I’m tired.” I rubbed my face. “Remember those days at the clubhouse when we’d go on a bender? Ride and drink and get into fights and chase women, sleep for a few hours, then get up and do it all over again?”
He groaned. “Glad we grew out of that. It was exhausting.”
“Nothing compared to this.” I motioned to Seraphina. “She doesn’t sleep at night. Maybe an hour or two at a time. Then conks out the second the sun comes up.”
Which, after a week, had left Cass and me practically delirious.
She’d gone to lie down for a while, squeezing in a short nap after lunch and before the baby would wake up hungry. She’d told me to try and keep Seraphina awake but after an hour of playing with her toes and tickling her chin and doing whatever I could to entertain a newborn baby, I’d given up.
“Cass is drained.” We both were.
I’d taken the past week off of work but I was already planning on telling Dash that I’d miss next week too. I just couldn’t leave Cass alone to handle the baby on her own until she caught up on some rest.
Claudia came by every day, but it wasn’t like she stayed the night, getting up with Seraphina to help with the midnight feedings and pace the halls with the baby in my arms so Cass could go back to bed.
“Not that I have any experience, but I’m guessing it’s normal to be wiped these first few weeks,” Emmett said.
“Yeah. I’m sure.” I touched the tip of Seraphina’s toes.
It was nearly impossible not to touch her, especially when she looked so peaceful in her sleep.
Her nose was the cutest nose in history, her lips a precious bow.
Her closed eyes were two perfect crescents in a beautiful face. Open, they held a fist around my heart.
“You are smitten, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Look at her.” How could anyone not be totally enamored?
Emmett chuckled and tipped his beer bottle to his lips.
I mirrored the action, taking a long sip from my own Bud Light. It would be my only beer because if I had two, I’d be so tired I’d pass out. “How were things at the garage this week?”
“Normal. Pres is convinced Dash is going to screw everything up while she’s on maternity leave.”
I grinned. “Because he will.”
“What the hell is he thinking? He hates office work.”
“At least he hired someone to answer the phones.”
Presley’s baby was due any day now and while she was on leave, there’d be another woman working at the garage to help with the daily tasks. But Dash would cover the bulk of Pres’s job duties as manager.
We’d see how long it lasted.
Not only did Dash hate that sort of work, especially when the rest of us were working on cars in the shop, but Presley wouldn’t be able to help herself. I was giving her one month, then she’d probably be bringing her baby into the office while she made sure everything was in order.
Shaw was a damn movie star, worth millions, and when I’d asked if she was going to quit, she’d rolled her eyes and told me hell, no. Because to her, like it was to me, working at the garage wasn’t just a job. Most of us would show up even if Dash didn’t pay us. That garage was our family.
Until now.
Family meant more now than it had before.
Seraphina shifted, turning to face the other direction, and her eyes fluttered open. I put my hand on her belly, patting gently until she dozed off again.
“Good news on Tucker,” Emmett said.
“I hope that son of a bitch gets shivved.” The more I’d thought about Luke’s update, the angrier I’d gotten. I wished that I had gotten my hands on Tucker before the FBI, because prison seemed too good a life for that miserable bastard.
He’d killed Emmett’s father. He’d killed Draven. And he’d taken Cass. Tucker would have killed her or sold her into a trafficking ring, and the thought of her in the Arrowhead Warrior clubhouse made my blood boil.
“Think he’ll come after us?” I asked.
Emmett nodded. “Eventually, yes. He might be in prison but he’s got connections to other clubs.
Some of his own guys won’t be put away for long.
Part of me thinks that this sentencing will bring it all to a head, sooner rather than later.
The other part thinks he’ll wait until we’ve forgotten about him. ”
“We’ll never forget.” We’d never dismiss their threat. It meant a life of looking over our shoulders, but that was what we’d signed up for with the club.
My only regret was that Cass hadn’t signed up for that. Neither had Seraphina. They’d be dragged into this because of me.
Emmett took another drink of his beer. “Luke thinks Tucker might go after Scarlett first, but he doesn’t know about our history with the Warriors.”
Luke didn’t know how many Warriors the Kings had killed in the decades that our clubs had battled. Luke didn’t see the blood on our hands.
“Yeah. He’ll come after Dash, you and me. No question.”
“What?” Cass gasped.
My eyes whipped to the hallway where she was listening, her eyes wide and her face pale. “Don’t worry, babe. He might try but nothing will happen.”
Emmett glanced over, his eyebrows coming together. He knew there was a risk here. Tucker had killed our loved ones and he wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
But Cass didn’t need to know any of that shit.
Maybe it was a mistake downplaying this to her, but she’d suffered enough at the hands of the Warriors.
We had other things to worry about right now, namely keeping our daughter alive and our sanities intact.
And before we ever talked about my past with the club, I needed to know how Cass felt about the kidnapping, something she avoided at all costs.
I wouldn’t tell her tales from lost days if they were going to hurt her in any way.
“I’m going to get out of your hair.” Emmett pushed up from the couch, collecting his bottle and taking it to the trash can in the kitchen. Then he walked to Cass and wrapped her in a hug. “We’re here if you need anything. Just a phone call away.”
“Thank you.” She gave him a weary smile.
Against his tall, broad frame, she looked so small and fragile. She looked twenty-four, something I forgot at times because though she was eight years younger, she had wisdom in her young face. More than I’d given her credit for over all these months.
Cass might be young, but she wasn’t like other women her age, immature and prone to drama. She sure as hell wasn’t like I’d been at that age, wild and reckless. It was a damn good thing too. Any other woman and she wouldn’t have stuck with me. She wouldn’t have forced me to stick it out too.
And I would have missed this. I would have missed my Seraphina.
Fuck, but I was a goddamn fool.
Emmett let Cass go, then smacked me on the shoulder as he passed the back of the couch. “I’m heading to The Betsy tonight in case you want to grab a quick drink. Get out of the house for a minute.”
“’Kay. Thanks for coming over.”
He smiled at Seraphina. “Not a hardship to hang with her for a few.”
Emmett let himself out of the house as Cass came and looked down at our daughter.
“You didn’t take a very long nap,” I said.
“I can’t shut my mind off. It’s like I know it’s daytime and even though I’m tired, I think I should be awake. I might take a long bath and read before she wakes up. Is that okay?”
“Of course. I’ve got her.”
She reached out and ran a hand through my hair. “I know you do.”
One touch was all I got before she disappeared.
Since she’d moved back in, we’d set up camp in my bedroom.
There was no point in sleeping—attempting to sleep—in separate rooms when we were together whenever Seraphina woke up.
So we’d put the bassinet beside my bed and that was where Seraphina would stay until we were comfortable letting her sleep in a different room.
Cass had slept by my side every night, each of us face-planted into our own pillows.
And other than the occasional kiss on her temple or forehead, I’d tried to give her space.
Not force anything. Sex wasn’t even on my radar right now—it wasn’t about that.
I simply needed to be close to her. To always be close.
The same was true with Seraphina.
The night she was born, those long hours I’d stayed up holding her, had changed everything. I’d stared at her precious face, lost in such a tiny person. My person. I’d imagined what Draven would say, wishing he had been around to meet her.
He would have kicked my ass for how I’d acted lately. He would have punched me in the face and told me to man the fuck up, Leo. As I sat in that hospital bed, his voice had rung so loud and clear in my head that I would have sworn it had drifted in from the hallway.
All this time, I’d been afraid I’d be my own father, a selfish motherfucker who’d failed his kid. But he hadn’t been a father.
Draven had filled those shoes.
I wouldn’t be my own father. I’d be Draven.
It had taken this baby girl to open my eyes. If Draven was watching, I wasn’t going to disappoint him.
Or Cass.
Carefully, I slid my hands beneath Seraphina, doing my best not to wake her as I walked down the hallway to the bedroom. Then I placed her in the bassinet, holding my breath as she squirmed for a moment before settling and staying asleep.
Not that I had anything to worry about. The sun was up, therefore, she’d sleep.
The faucet in the bathroom turned off and I walked to the doorway just as Cass sank into the white bathtub.
She stretched an arm over the rim, reaching for the book on the small stool beside the bath, but she couldn’t quite touch it. “Ugh.”
“I’ll get it.”
Her face shot to me as I came in and picked up the book, opening it to the page she’d saved with a bookmark.
“I didn’t think this through.” She held up her hands, both wet.
“That’s okay. Just relax.” I sat down on the stool and started at the top of the page, reading to Cass while she rested her head against the side of the tub.