Chapter 20
TWENTY
By the time Red roared into the grocery store parking lot, Val’s blinking dot had moved on. She was home, but that didn’t mean she was safe from whatever the hell Shannon had planned.
Not even taking a moment to breathe, he spun from the lot and pointed his bike toward Val’s place.
Fuck, he really hoped he got there before Shannon showed her crazy. The woman hadn’t taken being kicked from the clubhouse well. She’d taken to parking across the street and watching the place, and calling and texting him. He’d blocked her on all his social media accounts, but he knew how easy it was to just create another profile. Fuck, it was a good thing he’d already decided to pull back from his social media shit; this craziness with Shannon was a sign that he’d been coasting along, living the life of a thirst trap star, without any of the consequences. Until now. No, he hadn’t fucked Shannon because he was making a Reel, but she, no doubt, had known who he was in that gym, and she’d set her sights on him, thinking she’d get her piece of him. Thank fuck that baby wasn't his.
But if she tells Val that baby is mine…. He couldn’t even begin to comprehend how fucked up everything would be. Val would be hurt, she’d feel betrayed, and he’d lose her for good.
No! I won’t let her walk away from me, from us. I’ll just make her listen to the truth. She’ll believe me!
She had to.
A few blocks from Val’s place, he noticed red and blue lights ahead, turning down the street toward Val’s house.
Suddenly, his heart was in his guts, and both were bleeding out.
Oh, God, what the hell happened?
He cranked up the speed, desperate to get to his woman, to see that she was safe.
As he peeled to a stop behind the police cars, he’d barely put the kickstand down before he heard it. The screeching.
“He’s mine, you fucking bitch! I’m carrying his baby—it’s me he wants! You can’t have him!”
Holy fuck! Shannon!
Driven by the urge to see his woman, to know she was safe, he ignored the people gathering in the street and hurried around the cop cars to Val’s yard.
Immediately, he saw her…and Shannon.
Shannon was flailing against the hold of two police officers, her face red, her crazy eyes wide, as she screamed at Val, who was standing there beside her car, pale, her arms crossed.
He was beside her in a blink, wrapping his arms around her.
She melted into him, shuddering.
“Fuck, Val!” he murmured against her temple. “What the fuck happened?”
“Redtube!” Shannon shrieked. “You’re here! I knew you’d come! That woman, she’s a homewrecker! She tried to hurt me and the baby! You have to kill her! Then you and I can be a family. I’ll be your old lady!”
He didn’t even bother turning to see the woman, he was too focused on watching those words land in the expressions on Val’s face. Anger. Hurt. Annoyance.
“Ma’am,” a male voice said, and Red turned, Val still tucked into him, to face the police officer. “Can you tell us what happened?”
Val nodded, her autumn eyes filled with alarm and frustration.
“That woman came up behind me while I was getting my groceries out of my car. She started talking nonsense, then she got in my face,” Valentina recounted.
As he listened, Red got angrier. What the fuck was Shannon thinking? She obviously followed Val from somewhere because there was no way Shannon just knew where Val lived, not when it had taken him hacking the world’s largest retailer to get the information.
“She alleges you hit her,” the officer, his name tag reading “Harris,” said, his narrowed eyes shifting over Redtube. Yeah, the fucker probably got the wrong idea about what the fuck was happening. Big, tattooed biker must have been stepping out on his pregnant woman, and Val was the supposed “homewrecker” as Shannon claimed. “Can you prove that you didn’t?”
Val shifted, pushing away from him, and his heart clenched. Was she trying to get away from him? What the hell had Shannon said?
Thankfully, she was only pulling away to grab her cell from her pocket.
“I have doorbell camera footage,” Val said, tapping her screen. She held the phone out to the police officer who took it. “It captured everything. It even has sound.”
Harris watched the footage, his expression tight, and then he sighed, shaking his head.
He turned to the men holding Shannon, and declared, “Let’s detain her.”
Shannon, probably realizing things weren’t going her way, began to struggle harder.
“Miss Ivanova, would you like to press charges?” Officer Harris asked, and Val immediately shook her head.
“No. I just want her gone. Though, you might want to talk to her family about getting her some help. It isn’t good that she’s acting so fucking crazy when she’s as pregnant as she is.”
Officer Harris nodded, then turned and followed the other two officers toward the squad cars. It took some doing to get the struggling heavily pregnant Shannon in the back of the SUV safely, but once they shut the door on the screeching woman, the telling silence followed.
When he turned back to Val, she was watching the cops, silent, her face still pale, her eyes hard.
Shit.
This wasn’t going to be good, but there wasn’t anything he could do but tell her the truth about Shannon. His woman was still hurt from the bullshit he’d done before, so this could be the final straw on the camel’s back of their relationship.
“Val—”
She snapped her head around to look at him and raised her hand to stop him.
“Wait until she’s gone. Then we’ll go inside and talk.” She stepped out from under his arm completely, but she didn’t go far. She bent by her car and picked up two shopping bags. “If we’re going to talk about this, I need my fucking peppermint mocha,” she grumbled.
He understood his woman’s need for caffeine and chocolate…and time to let things mentally settle, so he remained silent.
It took another twenty minutes for the police to haul off a still shrieking Shannon, but once the red and blue lights were gone, and the looky-loos had retreated back to their homes, he knew it was time for him to sack up and let his woman have her say.
She shot him a look and turned toward her house. Without a word, he grabbed her grocery bags from her grip and followed her. Inside, he took the food to the kitchen, turned on the Keurig, and located the mugs. The whole time, Val watched him move around her kitchen. In silence.
Coffee brewed, creamer applied, and the steaming mug in Val’s hands, he finally said, “The baby isn’t mine.”
She didn’t flinch, look at him, or reply, she simply took a slow sip of her coffee, closing her eyes as she did. She moaned, which made his dick perk up, but then she sighed. The sigh killed his chub.
“I had sex with her a few months ago…in the gym bathroom. She’s further along than that, and I know that because when she tried to claim the baby was mine, I hacked the hospital medical records and found the information on her pregnancy.” Still she said nothing, just continued sipping her coffee.
Despair and fear flooded him. What did her silence mean? What else had Shannon told her?
Suddenly anxious as fuck, he ate up the space between them, gently grabbing her shoulders. She didn’t stiffen, tense, or try to pull away, she just kept sipping.
“You believe me, right?” he asked, his voice thick with an unspoken plea. She had to believe him; he couldn’t lose her!
Finally putting him out of his mounting misery, she met his gaze. Her eyes were clear, the color returning to her face.
“I do believe you,” she offered, and he nearly collapsed with relief. “She was certifiable.”
Grinning, remembering the doorbell footage, Red remarked, “She slapped herself, of course she’s fucking crazy. And when she came to the clubhouse to try and get my patch with that baby daddy bullshit, I knew she’d be trouble.”
She cocked her head. “So why didn’t you deal with her before she hunted me down and ambushed me in my driveway?”
He heaved a sigh, pressing his forehead against hers. “Because I was an idiot. I thought that once we kicked her from the compound, she’d get the message that I wasn’t going to play into her delusions. She thought that she’d come to me, claim the baby was mine, and I would take her word for it. I remembered fucking her once, not more than two months ago, so I knew there was no way that baby was mine. I didn’t stop there, though. Like I said, I hacked the medical records and discovered she was more than twenty-five weeks along. When I confronted her about that, she refused to admit she was lying, and kept going on about how the baby was mine, and that she’d be my old lady.”
Val nodded, humming. “Yeah, she said something like that.”
Kissing her, he didn’t allow himself to really melt into it because there were still things that needed discussing.
“What else did she say?” he inquired, and she sighed, rolling her eyes. Lord, his woman was feisty.
“She said that I was fat and ugly, and that you were only with me because you were just sowing your oats—or whatever—until you were ready to settle down with her and your son.”
“You didn’t believe her about the baby.” She snorted. “Why not?”
Placing her nearly empty mug on the counter, she took his face in her hands. He closed his eyes, soaking up the feeling of her hands on him. He found comfort and hope in her touch.
“Because I know you, Damian. I know that you’re a man of integrity and duty and loyalty. I knew that if she was really pregnant with your baby, that you would have taken responsibility, and that you would have told me about it. You wouldn’t have wanted it to be something that would be sprung on me later.”
“Never in a million years would I have kept something like that from you,” he asserted, and she rubbed her thumbs over the stubble on his cheeks.
“I know.”
He slid his hands from her shoulders to her neck, squeezing gently. She hummed, leaning into him and dropping her hands from his face to wrap them around his waist. Her lush breasts were squished against his belly, and his cock was more than ready to go at such an invitation.
“And know that shit she said about you being fat and ugly is also just that, bullshit,” he exclaimed. He could feel her pulse beneath his hands, and it was picking up.
She nodded. “I do know…and it wasn’t because I kept hearing your voice in my head, telling me I was beautiful and sexy and you get hard around me, though that did happen.”
He smirked.
“At first, it hurt, what she said, but then…I remembered this weekend.”
He brushed his lips over hers. “Oh yeah? What about it?”
“I remembered…you kissing my scars. I remembered you touching me like I was something precious. I remembered you wrapping your arms around me and holding me so close I could barely breathe. I remembered how good and whole I felt lying next to you.”
“It was the best weekend of my life, baby,” he supplied, and she smiled up at him, her eyes filling with tears.
Gut punch.
“My Daisy, what?—”
“I heard what Shannon said, but…I didn’t believe it, not because of that voice or anything you’ve ever said. It wasn’t because you said I was beautiful…it was because I felt beautiful when I was with you. Never in my life had I felt something like that, not since my mother was alive. But you made me feel truly beautiful, truly wanted, for the first time in twelve years. So, I knew that Shannon was full of shit, I just needed to get her to leave so I could call you and tell you that I love you, and that I’m sorry for ever doubting how you feel about me.”
Redtube didn’t hesitate to crush his mouth to hers, owning her breaths. She gave and he took, deepening the kiss until he could feel her pulse through her tongue. She threaded her fingers through his hair, holding his head in place, taking over the kiss. And, goddamn, did she rule him. The dominance flipped, and she was taking, and he was giving—willing as fuck to let his woman take control. It was fucking hot; his cock thickening as she ate at him.
Pulling away, panting, Val smiled up at him, her face glowing, her body humming.
“Sweet fuck, baby, that was incredible,” Red rasped.
She shrugged. “It was the coffee and creamer—they always make me a little passionate.”
He chuckled, dropping another quick kiss to her swollen lips.
“Thank you for trusting me, my Daisy.”
“Thank you for loving me, my sexy ass thirst trap,” she remarked, making him laugh.
“Retired thirst trap,” he teased. “From now on, you’re the only woman who gets fucked off camera.”
She gasped. “Hell no. No cameras; this body is strictly for your eyes only.”
He wrapped his arms around her, peering down into her face, his heart full, his soul light, his body thrumming.
“I love you, my Daisy,” he whispered, leaning down to press his cheek against hers, the need to feel her skin against his nearly crippling.
“And I love you, Redtube.”
They kissed again, pouring their adoration, affection, and undying devotion into it.
“Now, I want to see that tattoo again,” she demanded, her face flushed, and his already hard dick jumped.
“Your wish is my command,” he growled. “Forever.”
She hummed, and he felt it all the way down to his soul. “I like the sound of that.”
When the morning light reflected off the ceiling, Valentina Ivanova rolled over and stared into the face of the man who’d rocked her world five times throughout the night, and she smiled.
For someone who’d only ever dreamed of a happily ever after, she knew this was just the beginning of a real-life fairytale, one that began online with just two words: “You’re Unchained.”