Chapter 20 Levi
Levi
My heart was in my throat as I held the door of the dojo open for Tess and Luke. I wasn’t sure why I was nervous; this was toddler karate. How hard could it be?
But I knew deep down it had nothing to do with what I’d be doing and more about what I was here for—Dad’s Night. And I was here because I was a dad. First, on a technicality, but now that Tess and I were legitimate, I really was Luke’s stepfather.
The responsibility was a physical weight on my shoulders, and to know that Tess could be pregnant right now…
I felt sick with nerves and excitement. I didn’t even know that feeling was possible, but it was there, and it had been since our talk in the park yesterday.
I meant what I said when I told her whatever she wanted I’d do, but I was kind of freaking out about it now.
“Good evening, everyone,” the sensei said, pulling me out of my thoughts. “If I can have all the students and their fathers come down to the mats and we can get started with our Dad’s Night.”
Luke was skipping as we made our way to the mat, his tiny hand wrapped around one of my fingers to pull me along. I must’ve been having an overly emotional day because the sight of it broke my heart, knowing there’d be a day he wouldn’t want to hold my hand.
I looked at Tess over my shoulder, and she was sitting next to Anna in the bleachers with a few other moms. She gave me a warm smile, and it settled some of the chaos inside me.
All of us dads stood in front of our kids, Luke and I next to Henry and Joseph. Luke was so adorable in his too-big gi, peering up at me with his big brown eyes and chubby little cheeks. He was so excited that he was hopping around in place, as if his tiny body couldn’t contain it.
“That’s my dad,” Luke whispered to the girl next to him, pointing at me.
The way he’d said it with a smile, with unmistakable pride in his voice, obliterated me.
Love I didn’t even know was possible ran through me like a flood; the kind that had people lifting cars and taking bullets and moving heaven and earth.
I might’ve belonged to Tess, but I realized in this moment I belonged to Luke just as much.
Swearing under my breath, I turned around. Lifting my glasses, I pinched the corners of my eyes to force the prickling feeling away. I refused to cry here in a dojo filled with toddlers, of all places. That would just be embarrassing.
Joseph must’ve heard what Luke said because he clapped my shoulder, giving it a good squeeze with a knowing smile. “Kids say the damnedest things, don’t they?”
I cleared my throat. “Yeah.”
The sensei handed out boards for us after I pulled myself together, instructing us to kneel on the ground in front of the kids. They were supposedly going to break them. “Don’t hit me in the face, kid,” Joseph told Henry, laughing.
“No promises,” Henry snickered, making Luke laugh, too.
We held the boards out, and I honestly didn’t know how they were going to break them. They felt like real, sturdy wood to me, but Luke didn’t look the least bit concerned. “I’m gonna break it, Wevi,” he said as if he read my mind.
“I know you will, buddy.”
Luke got into his stance: one foot in front of the other, his tiny fists raised by his face. His eyes locked on the board with an intense focus I’d never seen from him before.
A chorus of cute yahs rang through the dojo, and Luke’s heel came swinging down on the board, and it split clean in two.
“Oh my God?” I stared at the pieces of wood in my lap, stunned laughter leaving me. “You broke it.”
“I towd you.” His grin was smug, and I loved it.
I looked over at Tess, my jaw hung open. She hadn’t told me he could do that when they’d come home from practice each week. She gave me an innocent little shrug, pointing her phone at us.
Luke spent the rest of the evening showing me everything he’d learned in class so far, and we finished with a little ceremony where they were awarded white belts.
“You guys are so cute, I can’t stand it,” Anna cooed while she took a picture of Tess, Luke, and me.
I had Luke in one arm, holding his certificate and his belt; my other arm wrapped around Tess’s waist, holding her close.
I felt on top of the world, and wasn’t sure how things could get better than this.
I’d always wanted this kind of life, the nuclear family life with ordinary things that felt extraordinary.
When Tess finished taking pictures for Anna, we all agreed to meet up for ice cream. At this point, I was convinced I was becoming part ice cream, but I didn’t care. Tess and Luke loved it, so I did too.
“I think I’m gonna try a new flavor tonight,” Tess said as we crossed the almost empty parking lot. She hadn’t gotten her usual vanilla since the first time we went, wanting to branch out and try new things. It was small, almost inconsequential, but I was proud of her for it.
“Oh yeah? What—” Tess gasped and yanked my hand so hard it turned me around, silencing me. Her grip became so tight, it hurt. “Tess?” She looked like she’d seen a ghost, staring past me.
“Call Colt,” she whispered, her voice shaking so badly I could hardly understand her. “Call him right now.”
My heart lurched, dread pooling in the pit of my stomach like lead. I turned, looking in the same direction as her, and that’s when I saw it. Him.
Jeremy.
It had to be him. There was no one else Tess would’ve had this kind of reaction to, no one who could pull such visceral fear out of her.
And he was staring right at us.
He was leaning against a souped-up truck, a lit cigarette in his mouth.
My insides surged with white-hot rage at the sight of him, at the sheer size of him.
He was built for intimidation, and worse, he knew it.
But that was part of the thrill for people like Jeremy; they targeted people who were too vulnerable to fight back.
I was not one of them. Even if he had four inches and probably fifty pounds on me. Over my dead body would he get past me to them.
“Take Luke inside,” I said, my voice hoarse. I put my body between hers and Jeremy. He straightened off the truck, stalking towards us. He flicked the cigarette across the asphalt, his face a picture of fury.
“Tess!” he bellowed across the parking lot, his voice booming like thunder. She shrieked and slammed her body against my back. Luke whimpered behind me, clinging to my leg. I looked down at him and—God fucking help Jeremy if I got my hands on him. Just the sight of him made Luke wet himself.
I took a deep breath, wrenching my jaw. “You’re violating a legal protection order, Jeremy,” I said, using every piece of restraint I had to keep my voice calm. I didn’t want to scare Tess and Luke even more. “You can’t come within a hundred yards of Tess. Leave now, and I won’t call the cops.”
It was chilling to see him so close, to see the similarities to Luke. They had the same brown eyes, but Jeremy’s held no warmth, just a feral possessiveness as he looked at my family. “And who the fuck are you?”
I reached behind me, my hand on Tess’s lower back. “Her husband,” I ground out lowly, protective rage flaring through me as he looked at her.
Jeremy scoffed, not believing me. “Tess, get over here,” he ordered, his voice calm but biting. She sobbed, her fists curling into the back of my shirt. He ran a hand over his buzzed scalp, his composure snapping. “Now!”
“Just go, Jeremy, please,” she wept.
He let out a humorless laugh. “You always were a dumb bitch. I’m not going anywhere without you two.”
“This is your last warning.” I took a step towards him. “Leave,” I said through clenched teeth. My hands curled into fists at my sides, trying to stop the shaking. Not from fear, but fury.
His eyes flickered with amusement, sizing me up. “You think you can stop me?”
My stomach twisted. I’d never been in a fight before, but I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I was about to have my first one, and it wasn’t going to be pretty. “To keep them from you? Yes.”
Jeremy’s nostrils flared, his eyes clouding over with something that made all the hairs on my body stand. “They’re mine,” he snapped.
It came faster than I could blink, the pain blinding as it radiated up through my nose and into the rest of my skull.
I’d never been hit like that in my life.
I didn’t even know where I was for a second.
I fell to the ground, spitting blood. Tess screamed.
My vision swirled, and I ripped my broken glasses off, tossing them to the side.
The thought of Tess enduring that kind of pain for years ignited something feral in me.
I hurled myself at him, my throat raw with a sound I didn’t recognize as my own, and somehow we hit the pavement.
I wasn’t delusional enough to think it was because I was stronger; it was because he wasn’t expecting it.
The smack of my fist against bone jolted all the way up my arm, pain sparking as sharp as a knife.
Jeremy’s head whipped sideways, blood spraying, but all I felt was the sting in my hand and the crazed need to swing again.
I wanted to lay into him. I wanted to punish him for the terror he’s reigned down on my family for years.
For the first time in my life, I wanted to kill someone.
I swung again. And again. Yelling with every blow I landed.
“You motherfucker,” he roared, neck veins straining. Past Tess’s screaming and Luke’s crying, I heard the faint whirl of sirens. Someone must’ve called the cops, thank God.
I just had to hold Jeremy off until they got here.
His fist slammed into my side with the force of a Mack truck, and the air just…
vanished. My body buckled, and I slid off him to the ground, useless.
I groaned, my lungs seizing with every failed breath I took.
My forehead rested against the pavement, the sound of Jeremy’s boots on the asphalt ringing in my ears.
“Grab the boy and let’s go, Tess,” Jeremy ordered.