Chapter 24 Dante
Dante
I'm terrified I won't last long for our first time back together.
Every cell in my body is screaming for release, but I can't disappoint her.
She's the most beautiful woman in the world, and I'm her humble servant.
Her good boy. A shiver rolls down my spine at the thought, and I nearly lose myself—but I clench my thigh muscles and manage to hold it back.
Every whimpering moan, every pleasured sigh, every gentle scratch of her nails down my back has me inching closer to the edge. I can't believe she's pregnant. I can't believe we're free. And I have her under my grip, taking my cock.
"Dante?" Melody gasps, biting her lower lip.
"My love?" I manage to grunt out.
"You're my very good boy—ah!—Do you know what good boys get?" Her full lips turn up at the corners, complimenting the gorgeous flush of her cheeks. I can't answer. If I think about her question for too long, I'm sure I won't be able to hold back. "I asked you a question, Dante."
Fuck. "What do good boys get?"
"Good boys get to fuck their wives like animals."
Fuck.
My hips have a mind of their own and their only goal?
Fuck Melody as hard and deep as she wants.
I know she said that for my benefit, but I also know that it drives her wild when I thrust in with savagery.
Her claw-like nails rake down my back, and her eyes roll into her head.
The most beautiful primal sounds fall from her lips.
I nearly explode when I feel her walls tighten and clamp down around my cock.
"Fuck, love, fuck," I wheeze. "I need you. I fucking need you."
"I'm yours, Dante," she pants. "I'm yours. I'm your wife. I'll never let go, I promise—"
She shatters. Her beautiful, sopping-wet cunt clenches around my cock like a vice.
She throws her head back, exposing her gorgeous throat, and I need to bite it.
I manage to hold on long enough to lean down and sink my teeth into the soft skin of her neck, tasting her sweat, growling around her flesh.
"You're fucking mine," I snarl. "You're mine. You're mine. I'll keep you under lock and key if I have to, but you're fucking mine."
"Yes, yes, yes," Melody moans breathlessly. Her eyes are hazy and unfocused, but she gives me the most satisfied grin I've ever seen.
Apparently, the nursing staff tried to get into our rooms when our heart monitors stopped measuring anything. I slick my hair back, damp with sweat, and give Rebecca a shit-eating grin.
"I'm not sorry. I went through hell, you tell me my wife's pregnant, and you expect me not to fuck her?" I chuckle, and Melody stifles a gasp.
Rebecca's cheeks turn a bright pink. "If you could keep that activity to a minimum… at least, until we're entirely sure you're sound and healthy."
"Fucking try to stop me." The smile drops from my face, and I glare at the woman in scrubs.
"Stop it," Melody hisses.
"Moving swiftly along," Rebecca says nervously. "Dr. Martinez has ordered an ultrasound for Melody."
My heart leaps into my throat. "Why? Does he suspect something's wrong? I demand to go with her—"
"No! No, nothing at all. You've… well, like you said." She sucks in an inhale. "You've obviously been through a terrible ordeal, and the doctor just wants to check on the fetus. We would never bar a father from seeing his child for the first time."
"I'm sorry for my husband's asshole behavior," Melody snipes. "He gets cranky."
I prickle. I do not get cranky. I'm protective of my wife—doubly so, considering our situation—and I am acting in the most reasonable manner possible. To be quite honest, they're lucky I didn't burn this fucking place to the ground when their security guard tried to separate us.
"Yes, well—uh. Be that as it may, we'll need to take you down to the ultrasound room. And!" She turns to smile at me. "Your friend is awake and ready for visitors. Helena's stayed by his side—we couldn't tear her away. Every time we suggested she get some rest, she told us to go fuck ourselves."
"That sounds like her." Melody laughs. "Sorry on her behalf, too, I guess."
"No worries. Are we ready to see a little peanut?" Rebecca gestures to a rickety wheelchair and moves to help Melody up.
"I can move on my own," my wife says with a frown.
Rebecca looks between my wife and myself. She rolls her eyes and throws her hands up. "Fine. Follow me."
The ultrasound room, as it turns out, is very close.
It's a small, dark room with another old bed and the machinery set up next to it.
There's even a folding chair for me, but I don't dare sit down.
It's too far away from Melody. I stand at her side, offering her my hand for balance as she situates herself on the raised bed.
Another nurse swoops in with a tight smile, lifting Melody's gown and squirting some jelly on her stomach. My wife sucks in a gasp. My muscles tense, but she squeezes my hand. "It's just cold."
"Si, fría." The other nurse nods. Rebecca stands behind her, watching the screen intently.
The other nurse sweeps the device back and forth, pressing into Melody's flesh, and gray blobs whorl on the screen.
A whooshing sound fills the air. Melody stares at the screen with an unreadable expression.
I know I should be looking at the screen, but all I can see is her.
My wife. My love. My dangerous, murderous woman. She's everything I've ever wanted.
The whooshing sound changes—it becomes more rhythmic, more constant. A tear slips from Melody's eye as she watches the screen with rapt attention.
"That's the heartbeat," Rebecca whispers. She points to a tiny fluttering in the gray blobs. "See that? That's the heart. And right here we have the teeny, tiny little body—hang on."
Rebecca and the other nurse whisper in hushed, lightning-fast Spanish.
"What?" Melody demands. "What, hang on? What's going on? What aren't you telling me?"
"Answer her!" I snarl.
Rebecca turns to us with wide eyes. "Um, okay. It's fine. Everything is fine. Look here—you see that? That's the heartbeat, right?" She points to another fluttering blob to the left. "And that… is the other heartbeat."
All of the air rushes out of the room. I don't have any oxygen in my lungs. I don't think I have bones in my legs anymore. Collapsing onto the provided chair, I feel my heartbeat race in my neck.
"What do you mean, 'other heartbeat'?" Melody squeaks. "Why does the baby have two hearts? Two? Why? Is it gonna have to have surgery? Rebecca, why the fuck does the baby have two hearts?"
Rebecca gives us a pitying smile. "No, no surgery required. There are two hearts because, well, there are two babies."
Twins. I'm suddenly sweaty all over, and I can't quite catch my breath. I can hear my own heart, and that can't be good. The air hasn't returned yet. And the room is so hot—sweltering, really—and I can't think. I can't breathe. I can't talk. Twins. Twins. Twins?
Fuck.
Right as I turn to Melody with wide eyes, trying desperately to comfort her, it all goes black.
"Well, don't you look like shit?" Helena's voice floats into my mind. I'm sure I do, but that's no way to speak to her employer.
"Shut up," Melody snaps. "He just got… news."
"News?" I hear the shuffling of fabric against plastic. "What kind of news? Seraph news? GoCon news?"
I manage to wrench my eyes open. "No."
Helena sits in a plastic visitor chair, dressed in a baggy orange T-shirt and loose white shorts.
Her strawberry blonde hair is piled in a bun on top of her head, and she watches me with cautious regard.
Beside her lies Melnyk in his hospital bed, wrapped almost entirely in white bandages.
A heart monitor faithfully beeps away next to him.
And at my side, thankfully, is my wife. She reaches out with a shaking, gentle hand, placing it on mine. She takes a deep breath and tips her head toward our comrades.
"Do you want me to tell them, or are you going to faint again?" Her tone is teasing but loving. Thank god.
"I didn't faint," I grumble. "Men of my stature do not faint."
"Sure thing, babe." She turns to Helena and Melnyk. "I'm pregnant."
"Holy shit," Helena gasps. Melnyk doesn't say a word but smiles weakly.
"It gets better." Melody takes a shuddering breath. "There are two of them."
"What?" Helena squawks, and Melnyk's jaw drops. His eyes are bruised and swollen, but I can still see him staring at me in disbelief.
"Twins," I confirm. "There are two very strong heartbeats. I was… overcome with emotion. Melody may describe that as fainting, but I wouldn't."
Helena makes a strangled noise. I refuse to look at her.
My eyes are only for my wife—my beautiful, amazing, knocked-up wife.
She gazes back at me with a hazy smile, like she can't quite believe it herself.
Gone is the fierceness she used to interrogate Rebecca.
The panicked expression melted away to a serene glow.
My god, she's beautiful.
"Congratulations," Melnyk wheezes. His hoarse voice draws me back into the present. He winces and sucks in a breath.
Scurrying from my wheelchair—when did they put me in a wheelchair?—I approach the man, and lay my hand on the plastic side rail of his bed. "No need to speak if it hurts. Thank you. For… well, for everything, Melnyk."
A tear forces its way through the purple, bruised flesh around his eye. He silently nods, and his lips twitch into a pained smile.
"That's quite enough excitement for all of you," Rebecca announces, sweeping into the room. She narrows her eyes at me. "I thought I told you to stay put."
"I don't remember that."
"Right, because you fainted."
"I did not faint!" I roar, huffing out an exasperated breath.
"Sure you didn't, buddy." Rebecca cocks her hip. "By the way, the phone in your room is ringing off the hook. I don't know how you gave out a phone number—I haven't seen you touch the thing."
Fear grips my stomach. "Did anyone answer it?"
"Yeah, I did. Once. There was a woman on the other end. She didn't give me her name. She sounded very… brusque."
"Brusque? Not jokey? Not menacing?" Melody demands. I stare at Rebecca, waiting for her to answer. If Ella's awake, and she knows where we are… no one in this hospital is safe.
"I… wouldn't say menacing? She sounds like every businesswoman in a late '90s drama. Like, remember West Wing? She sounds like that." Rebecca throws her thumb over her shoulder. "She said it was urgent."
The Eligos. Relief floods through my veins, and I rush back to our room. Helena and Melnyk will understand. It's not leaving without a goodbye; it's me conducting business. As I always do. As I was born to do. And now, there's so much more on the line.
True to Rebecca's word, the phone rings incessantly as I swing open the door. I nearly trip over myself scurrying to the yellowed plastic landline phone.
"Hello? Eligos?"
"Took you long enough." The Eligos's clipped tone is tinny in my ear. "You've been in that hospital for over 24 hours, and you haven't made contact?"
"How did you—never mind. What is our status?"
The Eligos's sigh crackles over the phone. "It's not good. The Belphegor has been shot—we don't know his condition. The Marbas is verifiably dead. The Beacons—all of them, all over the world—have gone on the offensive. And, as you know, Ella is the Nephilim."
"That she fucking is," I snarl. "But has anyone seen her? Heard from her? When we left, she was bleeding on the concrete. Melody went a bit overboard, I think."
"She's alive. But Melody knocked her down a peg, we think. She's injured, furious, and more powerful than she's ever been. Every Beacon on the planet reports to her."
"So, what do we do now? We're in this hospital, as you've discovered—Helena is mostly fine, but Melnyk is recovering from surgery.
We still don't know what she did to him.
He…." I trail off, sucking in a breath. "They hurt him, Eligos.
They beat him within an inch of his life—that much is clear. But we don't know much more than that."
"The sister did that," The Eligos replies, almost flippantly. Like his condition is a footnote. "Hannah, I believe. She took her rage out on him over losing her brother."
"He didn't kill him! I did—Melody did!" I shout into the phone.
"I know that. Do not yell, I can hear you just fine," The Eligos snaps. "As to your question, I have a convoy en route. I've already seen the surgery report. My people will be there within the hour with two medical doctors on board. You'll be delivered to my safe house near Cancun."
"How many safehouses do you have?" I ask, running a hand down my face. My beard has grown long enough to be soft, instead of scratchy.
"Enough. Oh, I understand congratulations are in order. Congratulations."
"Did Rebecca—"
"You insult me, Dantalion. I can get into anything, can I not?"
"Right, of course. Well. Thank you."
"Unnecessary. My people will see you soon." Click.
A frazzled breath whooshes out of my lungs.
I plop down on the hospital bed and rake my fingers through my hair.
The Eligos found us—she knew where we were the whole time?
Had she tried to stage a rescue? She didn't really allow for questions, but if we'll be picked up by her people soon… I hope some of them have answers.
I need to warn my wife and crew.