Chapter Thirty
Declan
How did I end up here? I’ve never been in a more uncomfortable situation in my entire life, and the little asshole knows it by the way he beams at me from across the table.
Note to self: Never agree to anything when you’re still riding that post-orgasm high.
If you do, you could end up like me. At a bar and sitting at a table full of your partner’s friends that you know don’t like you.
I’d say at least I have Dieter on my team, but even he seems icy tonight.
We’ve only been here about twenty minutes, and still I’m ready to run out of here like my ass is on fire.
Jakob’s smile stops me every time I decide to make a lame excuse to get away.
He looks so happy and carefree, so if I have to deal with this shit for a few hours, I’ll do it.
Jake’s telling everyone about how his shitty bartenders bailed out on Ally the other night, causing her to have to call us around two in the morning because she was scared to walk to her car alone.
There’s been no word from Natasha since the assassination.
The violence on the streets has ramped up even more over the last week.
Mac and Lee’s wedding is just weeks away.
And Nix is in the hospital as of thirty minutes ago because of her blood pressure and complications with the pregnancy.
Everyone’s stressed and worried, and the world is falling around us.
Where I’d normally be behind the scenes holding it all up for everyone, tonight I’m in this fucking bar trying to make an ‘effort’ for Jake’s sake. I’m so anxious that my stomach is in knots and I haven’t taken more than a sip of my whiskey.
“Declan?” Jake’s voice pulls me out of my head, and as I look around at everyone, I realize that they’re all staring at me.
“I’m sorry. What was that?” I subtly shake the cobwebs out of my head so I don’t blow this for us.
“Jasper asked how contracts are coming along for that new building on Main?”
“Oh, yeah, I’m sorry.” I make eye contact with Jasper as I try my best to make small talk with him about the new offices that our company is building.
According to our general contractor, it’ll be nine stories, and each floor will have a separate business on it.
We have the property but are working on semantics.
Jasper’s an electrician, and we’ve been looking at his company to wire it up for us.
I really have been dreading this entire evening, but as time goes on, Jakob’s friends and I fall into easy conversation. I still don’t fucking like how closely Miles is sitting to him, but I guess that’s something I’ll have to get over.
“So, Declan. What are your intentions?” Elias’ lips tip up subtly as his whiskey eyes sparkle with a hint of trouble.
“My intentions?” I raise an eyebrow and look at him like he’s lost his mind.
Jake groans loudly and drops his face into his hands in embarrassment.
“Yeah, what Eli asked.” Tucker chimes in. “What are your intentions with my boy here?”
Everyone watches on with amusement as I have to fight hard not to laugh. They’re ribbing me, and I know that. I shouldn’t entertain this with Jakob clearly embarrassed, but I do anyway.
“Your boy?” I give him a questioning look. “I don’t think he’s much of anyone’s, except for mine.” I challenge.
“Yeah? What makes you so sure of that?” Elias jumps back in, fighting a laugh.
“Shut up, Declan.” Jakob’s head shoots up out of his hands as his serious ice blue eyes pierce into mine.
It’s so hard to fight back any expression as I keep my eyes locked on him, but I manage as I say without a hint of wavering, “Because my name is the one he moans as he comes multiple times a day. Every. Single. Day.”
Everyone at the table is slack jawed, but Jake’s eyes heat with anger.
It’s Roman who breaks the silence as he lets out a low whistle, “Damn, Jake. You’re living the fucking life over there.”
All the laughs that the guys have been holding back burst out of them at the same moment.
“I mean, I bat for a different team, but I’d kill to get play like that.” Ethan shakes his head in amusement.
Jake’s eyes whip around the table but settle on Dieter’s just as Dieter gives him an impressed look and taps the neck of his beer to Jakob’s in approval. His demeanor eases, and a small smile curves his lips as he slowly relaxes back and the conversation flows freely around us.
It’s been hours of easy conversations and broken tension when my phone vibrates in my pants pocket. I’m surprised I don’t rip it trying to quickly fish my phone out and see what update I just got.
Byrne Bros
Rowan: How’s Nix?
Flynn: I called but no answer.
Mac: They’re probably figuring out what they’re going to do.
Sully: She and the baby have to be okay.
Kieran: They have her BP under control for now. They said they want us to wait two more weeks to be in the clear for delivery. I don’t think she’ll make it another two days, and Ryan just started hurling.
Declan: I’ll be at the hospital in ten.
I’m pushing up to my feet before Kie can even respond.
He’s going to say it’s fine, but they don’t need to be alone and unprotected right now.
They need their family. Without a word I walk around to Jake, wrap my hand around his throat, and tilt his head back until he’s looking up at me.
He’s smiling until he registers the look on my face.
I press my lips to his and slowly pull back.
“I have to go, it’s my brother. I love you. I can come back and get you later to drive you home.”
A look of confusion followed by what looks to be hurt passes his expression, but no, that can’t be right, can it? He’s with his friends and his brother, there’s no way he wants to go with me.
“Oh, okay. Let me know if you need me, I guess. Don’t worry about coming back. Miles can give me a lift home.”
He knows what the fuck he’s doing. I hate Miles.
I mean, I have no real reason besides I thought they were fucking once, but still.
He’s pressing his luck just to get a rise out of me, but I’m too worried to even play into his game.
This shit can easily kill Nix and the baby, and I don’t have time for games.
“Do whatever you want to, Chaos. I’ll be at Corey Heights Memorial if you need me.” Shaking my head, I turn and leave without another word. I have to get to Kieran now.
* * *
I walk down the hall of the labor and delivery ward straight to my little brother, who’s pacing like a madman.
He’s panicking in front of the door that I know leads to his wife.
As soon as I know he can hear me at a normal volume, I call out for him.
His eyes lock on mine as his face crumbles.
Kie’s a few inches taller than me, but he’s still younger than me by a few years, and he still struggles with letting us in the most. As soon as I’m close enough, I wrap him up in my arms. My body prickles with awareness and the urge to jerk away is strong, but when he falls apart as I grasp the back of his shirt and hold him up, I make myself fight it back.
He needs this more than I need him to stop touching me.
“Ryan just came down with the, fucking stomach flu, Nix looks terrible, I’m fucking terrified, and now we’re unprotected.”
“Is that why you’re out here?” I question him.
“I’m not leaving her and the baby unprotected. Over my dead body.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll stay out here. You go be with your wife.” He looks at me like he isn’t sure. “Kieran I swear on my life and Jakob’s that I will not move from this spot no matter what.”
“What about if you have to pee?” He questions with complete seriousness.
I nod over to the fake potted plant about ten feet from me, “They got plants that need watering. I’ll stay right here, little brother. I swear.”
He finally concedes and goes back to his wife, making sure to shut the door behind him.
I make myself as comfortable as possible as I stand guard outside of their room.
About an hour later, Rowan posts up on the other side.
We don’t say a word, and we don’t need to.
We aren’t here to chat. We’re here to be his parents while he takes care of his wife and unborn child.
Nurses have been in and out of the hospital room all night.
We’ve been here for hours, but even though my eyes feel like sandpaper while my head is slightly swimming, I stand here strong and unyielding.
Rowan confirmed hours ago that his family is guarded at the estate and sleeping peacefully.
Cormac called me about twenty minutes ago to tell me that Jake and Dieter left Knipe.
I know he’s pissed. I left him high and dry without telling him much at all.
My phone has remained in my pocket unless a call comes through, so he could have been texting me, but I’m not sure.
He definitely hasn’t called, though. The sound of an alarm blares through the speakers in the ceiling.
A code is called. Red? Blue? Fuck, it could have been rainbow and I wouldn’t have caught it.
All I know is that in the next moment what looks like every single nurse and doctor on this floor rushes past us and into Phoenix’s room.
A sickening feeling brews deep in my chest, and it solidifies when, just a minute later, the nurses and doctors are rushing Nix out of the room with Kieran hot on their heels.
Kie doesn’t even look at us as he passes by.
His eyes solely fixated on his wife. Without a word Rowan and I follow them past multiple sets of ‘Stop here’ signs and doors that need a badge to get in.
When we reach the OR that they’re wheeling Nix into, we take up our spots on either side of the door.
No one questions us, not that I expected them to.
They aren’t dumb enough to ask why the two most powerful men on the East Coast are standing outside of a random operating room.
I silently watch Rowan pull his phone out and send a text.
In the next fifteen seconds my phone is blowing up, which tells me that he put something in the group chat.
I don’t touch it. Instead, I scan my surroundings.
I’m reading badges and taking note of every single person who sets foot on this hall.
We have no idea what’s going on in the room at our back, but when the unmistakable and soul shattering sound of Kieran breaking in two comes from behind us, it’s completely apparent. Our lives are about to change forever.
Before we can burst into the room, a team of people wheeling a tiny incubator comes rushing out with Kie robotically standing in the door, half inside and half out, just like his heart right now.
Rowan and I look at each other before a silent understanding passes between us.
I immediately grab my little brother by the back of his neck and guide him to follow the nurses and doctors with me.
He doesn’t even resist as we follow two steps behind the entire way to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
We stand in the back corner until they have the baby stable and settled into the room. One of the nurses turns around and directs us to the opposite corner of the room, where we’re told to put on thin hospital gowns, gloves, and face masks after thoroughly washing our hands.
“She told me if I didn’t follow him that she’d never forgive me.” Kieran whispers beside me as I slip the gown on.
“You did the right thing, deartháir beag.” Little brother.
“Dec, she flat lined seconds later. I wasn’t going to leave her.
They made me leave her.” A choked sob works up his throat as his hands tremble.
“How do I raise this baby without her?” He looks so broken that I’m concerned for his safety.
When his words work through my brain until they stick, it makes my chest hollow and tears sting the backs of my eyes.
There’s no fucking way that she’s gone. She can’t be.
“Kieran Patrick, you listen to me.” I turn him to face me and place my hands on his shoulders.
“You will not jump to conclusions. She has the best doctors on the East Coast working on her. You know this because we hired and relocated them here. Rowan’s with her while they get her all fixed up, and until you get back to her, your one job is to protect this baby. ”
I can see the moment it clicks for him and his back straightens. He swipes his teary eyes and nods. “He needs me.”
“He needs his Da. You are his Da, Kieran. Go be with your son.”
With a new look of determination crossing his features, he suits up and turns his back to me as he walks over to his baby, sits in the rocking chair beside his incubator, and intently listens to the nurse explaining to him what every tube and wire means.
He can’t hold him yet, but he can reach his hand into a hole at the side of the box and touch him.
I watch as his finger gently strokes the side of my new nephew’s arm.
He’s incredibly tiny, which tells me he may be here for a while. His little face is covered by a mask forcing oxygen into his lungs. His eyes are covered as well, keeping me from getting much of a look at him. But it’s clear that he’s extremely small.
Once I’m positive they’re settled and don’t need me, I step into the hall to give him some time with his son.
My phone’s eerily quiet, which sets me on edge.
I can’t allow anything to happen to any of them.
With renewed determination, I plant my feet.
I’ll be here until I fall flat on my face, but they will know they’re protected.