Chapter 34
Thirty-Four
LEWIS
Sunlight crept in through the cracks in the hotel curtains as Callie lay naked in my arms. Her head rested on my chest, her arm over my stomach as I rested mine on her hip over the duvet.
We were both awake after another enthusiastic night.
Callie was a bit sore from all the attention, so we’d mostly taken care of each other with our hands and mouths.
It had been one of the best nights of my life.
Now, lying together, enjoying the quiet and the feel of her in my arms, I wished we could stay like this forever.
“We should enjoy this while we can,” Callie said, breaking the silence, and as if reading my thoughts, she continued, “I doubt we’ll have many peaceful moments like this together once the baby comes.”
Of course, I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t feel a touch of trepidation at the thought, but I’d always wanted a family. And I felt lucky that this had happened with Callie and not with a woman I didn’t love. For our child’s sake as well as my own.
“Then we’ll appreciate every moment.” I caressed her upper arm. “And remind ourselves that we have a shit ton of family who are more than happy to babysit when we need alone time.”
I felt her smile against my chest. “That’s true.”
“You know …” I tangled my fingers through her hair, playing with it. “Yesterday was the first time you’ve told me you loved me since we started dating.” Shit. Did that make me sound like a needy bastard?
Callie pushed up to look at me. “No, it isn’t.”
“Aye, it is. You told me you loved me in the museum.”
A deep frown marred her brow. “Is it really?”
I nodded, watching her carefully.
“I’m sorry if that’s true.” Callie cupped my face, her fingers scratching through my beard. “But you must know how much I love you. You do, don’t you?”
“It’s nice to hear it sometimes.”
“I’ll do better,” she whispered. “I love you, Lewis. I love you so much.”
“I love you too. Always have. Always will.”
“Always only ever you,” she repeated words she’d said to me weeks ago. “Once I have the baby, I’m going to get a tattoo. For you. For us.”
The thought of me inked on Callie in some way made my cock twitch. “Aye? Where?”
“I don’t know.” She pulled the duvet away, revealing her beautiful naked body. “Where do you think?”
I joked, “I think you should get Property of Lewis Adair tattooed on your face.”
Callie shook her head, laughing. “Arsehole.”
“Do you want a boy or a girl?” I asked randomly as I reached out to slide my hand over her belly.
Callie covered my hand with hers. “I’ll take either.
I just want to have a relationship with them like the one I have with Mum.
For them to know that I’m here for them, through everything, that I’m a place they can run to when the world seems too big and scary.
That I’ll never judge them, will always accept them, and will be the fiercest friend they’ve ever known.
That’s what I want.” Her eyes gleamed with emotion.
“When they grow up, I want them to consider me one of their best friends.”
Gratitude crashed through me. How lucky was I that someone with Callie’s good heart would be the mother of my child? Emotion thickened my voice as I replied, “Then that’s the way it’ll be.”
She caressed my hand. “Do you want a boy or a girl? I won’t judge you if it’s one or the other.”
“It’s not,” I answered honestly. “I’ll love them no matter what.”
Callie considered me. “This isn’t the way I wanted to have a child. Accidentally. Do you know Sarah and Theo Cavendish?”
“Of course.”
“She and Mum have gotten friendly through Aunt Ally. Anyway, she invited us to her baby shower and it was before Paris so I attended too. There was just us and Sarah’s close friends so Aunt Ally didn’t mean anything by it when she made a joke about how she thought Sarah and Theo never wanted to have kids.
I didn’t know anything about that. But Sarah got very emotional, and started telling us all how she hadn’t planned for kids.
That she and Theo had decided they just wanted each other.
How terrified she was. How when she realized they’d gotten accidentally pregnant, she couldn’t explain it, but she wanted their baby more than anything. She was so afraid to tell Theo.”
“He wasn’t shitty to her, was he?” I heard the scowl in Lewis’s voice.
“No. Not at all. Sarah said he was shocked but determined to reassure her that she had his support. Except, she could see he was struggling really badly with it. And she was scared that having a baby would change what they had together. Mum and Aunt Ally were so kind to her that day. I felt so awful for her and promised myself I’d never get pregnant accidentally. ” I snorted at my own naivete.
“Are they okay now?”
“Oh, Theo has turned out to be the biggest daddy’s girl ever. He loves Rose more than he loves anything in this world.”
“But you didn’t want to have a baby this way?”
I looked up at him. “Like Sarah, I got lucky and fell accidentally pregnant to the man I love. But there’s a part of me that’s scared, concerned.
I mean, I always thought you and I would have kids before we were thirty, but that we’d have the chance to live a little with each other.
To travel. To soak in art and culture and food and music all over the world, to have sex in exotic places … But we did this all backward.”
“I know. But it doesn’t mean we won’t get to do all those things, Callie.
I will make it my mission in life to give you all those things.
And like I said, that’s what family is for.
Do you know how ecstatic my mum would be to have her grandkid for a week while we gallivant around Europe, soaking in the culture and having enough sex to give her another grandkid? ”
“I doubt very much she’d be ecstatic to know you’re sexually insatiable,” she teased.
“Uh!” I made a very unmanly, high-pitched sound. “I’m insatiable?”
She quirked an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”
“It means that you’ve almost broken my fucking cock.”
Callie laughed in delight and then rested a hand on my stomach, sliding it downward. “Fucking cock, eh? That sounds like a very useful piece of equipment.”
My huff of laughter turned into a groan as she wrapped her hand around me.
The sound of my phone blaring beside us made me bite out a curse. Callie, however, didn’t stop her ministrations as I reached for it. “Let me go, mo chridhe. It’s my dad and he wouldn’t call for nothing.”
With an adorably petulant twist of her lips, she released me and settled back against my chest as I answered the phone.
“Ah, Lew, I’m sorry, bud.” Dad’s voice was gruff. “Fyfe just called. He checked your CCTV … the house has been ransacked. I think you and Callie should come home. Now.”
It was even worse than what had happened at the cottage.
Rage shuddered through me as I walked through our home. “Well, now we really need to get new furniture,” I offered with a dry amusement I did not feel. But guilt flashed on Callie’s face like a neon sign, and I didn’t want her taking that on. Therefore, I hid my fury as best I could.
The arseholes Fyfe had caught on camera were two men in black, wearing ball caps so we couldn’t see their faces.
They’d cut through the sofa cushions with a blade and ripped out all the stuffing.
Drawers were torn from the kitchen, out of sideboards, parts smashed, broken.
The mattress was sliced open on our bed and in the guest room.
Clothing everywhere. Every shoebox upended.
“What the fuck are they looking for?” I turned to Walker, Dad, and Fyfe.
Fyfe winced and apologized for the fifteenth time. “Lewis, I’m so sorry about the delay.”
The break-in happened in the wee hours of the morning and because the system wasn’t fully set up yet, there wasn’t an alarm trigger to my phone or to his company’s system. He was checking in manually for me while I was gone. Fyfe had been asleep.
“Fyfe, mate, it’s not your fault,” I insisted.
“No, it’s not.” Callie patted him on the shoulder, expression wan with anxiety. “But I think we all recognize the common denominator.”
We could, and it scared the shit out of me to think someone was after Callie.
“Do we think it’s Nathan Andros?” Fyfe asked. “You definitely don’t recognize the guys on the footage?”
We’d both looked at the footage before we walked inside so we were prepared for the mess we were about to encounter.
Callie shook her head. “Definitely not. But Lewis is right—what are they looking for? This isn’t mere intimidation or stealing … I mean, this time they left with nothing. They’re looking for something.”
“I don’t like this.” Walker glowered grimly at the wrecked living space. “And for that reason, I’m still leaning toward Andros. He likes to fuck with people. Maybe this is a mind game.”
My dad let out a heavy sigh. “Is there anything you can do about that?”
Walker nodded, a coldness in his eyes that reminded me Ironside was not a man you crossed. And you definitely didn’t mess with the people he loved. “I have a contact who can get a message to him on the inside.”
Callie’s eyes changed from bleak to angry. “I wish Mum had killed him. All those years ago when she shot him in self-defense. I wish he’d died. That’s what he does to you. That’s the kind of hate he instills in you.”
Bridging the distance between us, I pulled her into my arms, and I felt her shake as she quietly cried. I met Walker’s furious gaze and hoped he could read the words in my eyes, giving him instruction to put the fear of hell into Nathan Andros. Whatever that might take.