Chapter 24 – Chelcie
“That’s all it said?” Izzy asks from the floor, where she’s playing with Nate. She’s been in the same spot since she arrived at my apartment earlier.
“Yeah. Scary, right?” I look around, meeting each of their eyes.
Izzy looks confused, Dee’s worried, and Melissa looks pissed.
“What did Asher say?” Dee questions.
“He told me not to worry about it. That he would take care of it, but it’s been two weeks and he’s been so distant lately. He’s gone before I wake up and I’m already asleep when he comes home. The little that I have seen him was in passing when he came home to change his clothes.”
I’ve been so worried about the distance between us. I’ve tried to talk to him about it, but every time I try, he just gives me one of his sweet kisses and tells me to stop worrying. I’m terrified and I feel so alone.
“He’s been at CS. Axel says that he’s there every morning and stays long after they all have gone.”
“Goddammit. He’s researching that man again! I thought we had moved past it. I mean, I knew that he was still looking into him, but I didn’t think it was as bad as before.”
My heart hurts. I think I’ve known that there was a chance that even my love wouldn’t keep him from this crazy, quest for vengeance. There can’t be anything good that comes from his bloodthirst to avenge Coop’s death. I get it—I really do—but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel hopeless to stop this.
“What man?” Izzy asks.
“Dominic Murphy,” I shudder. “The man who put everything in motion. The man who is single-handedly responsible for everything that happened to you, Dee. And the man Asher is hunting so that he can make him pay for Coop’s murder.”
All of their eyes widen. I know Dee knew that he has been researching him, but I don’t think anyone besides Maddox and I knew just how deep he was swimming in this shit.
“Do you think it’s from him?” Melissa asks with worry clearly written all over her face.
She hands one of her twin daughters—Lyndsie, I think—over to Dee and shifts the other sweetheart onto her shoulder to give her a burp. I look over at Dee, who is doing the same. I have no idea how Melissa has learned to breastfeed both babies at the same time.
I meet her eyes and let her see my worry. Maybe if she talks to Greg, he can talk some sense into Asher. “I can’t imagine anyone else it could be. I don’t know anyone here beyond all of y’all, and unless Dee is pissed that I’m no longer working for her, then I can’t comprehend who else it could be. It makes sense. Who else would say that?”
The whole situation is both confusing and terrifying. I can’t even leave the apartment without becoming so fearful of my surroundings that I’m teetering on the verge of having a panic attack. And I know my rising anxiety isn’t good for the baby, so I haven’t left. I stay here day in and day out, praying that everything is going to be okay.
“You need to talk to Asher, babe. Don’t let this fester,” Dee whispers.
I know she means well, and Lord knows I love her, but I don’t keep things from Asher. She and Beck had a crappy start, and I know she’s speaking from experience, but my not talking to Asher has nothing to do with avoiding the topic. I haven’t been able to get him in the same room with me long enough to have a conversation. I think he believes that, by shutting me out completely, he’s doing me a favor, but the worry for him is worse than the fear of the unknown.
I don’t know what I would do if I lost him. If we lost him.
“I’m going to make sure he talks to me today. I’ve been trying so hard to stay up and wait for him to come home, but my body always wins the fight and I’m passed out long before he comes home. I set my alarm on my phone to go off every hour, and I don’t care if I have to do it all night—I will be awake when he gets home. If he’s asleep when it goes off, I’m going to wake him up and demand answers.”
“Hell yeah!” Melissa cheers.
“If you need anything, promise you’ll call?” Izzy asks.
“I’ll call, but I won’t need anything other than my man to talk to me.”
She smiles sweetly at me and goes to pull herself off the floor. Her stomach is just now starting to show signs of her pregnancy.
“I’m going to head home. Nate hasn’t been sleeping well at night, so I told Axel that we needed to have an early dinner and get him down before his normal bedtime. I hope that works. You let me know if you need anything, Chelcie.” She leans in and gives me a hug.
I give Nate a big hug, laughing when he kisses my stomach and warns me to “bez car full.”
“Such an alpha baby,” Dee mumbles.
“I’m going to head out too,” Melissa says. “Greg has Cohen down at the office, and the last time I let him stay all day, he was up all night fighting the bad guys. I swear, one day, that boy is going to turn into a carbon copy of Greg.” She gathers up the babies’ blankets off the floor, stuffs some of her diaper items back in the diaper bag, and snaps both girls into their car carriers.
“Do you need help down?” I ask.
“Nope. I’ve got this down to a science now. And like I would let your pregnant ass lift these heavy things. No freaking way. Later, Dee. Chelcie, I’m here if you need me, okay?”
I nod, standing to give her a hug before walking her to the door.
Once I come back to the living room, I don’t even waste any time. “Well, spit it out, Dee. I know you’re over there thinking all sorts of crazy shit.”
“What if this isn’t about the letter? What if he’s having second thoughts? I hate saying it, Chelc… Hell, I hate thinking it. This whole thing is crazy complicated between you, and I just don’t want to see you hurt. Maybe the letter is nothing? Maybe he’s just… God, I don’t know,” she sighs.
One thing that annoys me about Dee is when she lets her own insecurities about men in general pass on to others. I recognize where she’s coming from. You don’t just turn that stuff off—a pain that has been a part of you for your whole life—but that doesn’t give her a right to place that bullshit on Asher’s shoulders.
“Dee,” I warn.
“I know—I’m sorry. I just… Shit. I just worry about you.” She shrugs her shoulders and sinks back against the couch.
“Okay, Dee. I appreciate where you’re coming from, but let me tell you right now that if you ever insult the man I love like that again, I won’t be responsible for what I do.” Her eyes widen, but I keep going. “He has done nothing to deserve that shit you just spewed all over the place. He’s had a hard time, but you know that any one of us would have felt the same pain he did when Coop died. Yeah, I know how our situation is complicated, but that’s just it, Dee. It’s our situation. It’s brought us together. This baby, this very loved baby of ours, is our miracle. We don’t look at it as a complication. I can assure you that he loves this baby because it’s part of me. Yes, he loves this baby because he’s a part of his brother too—but that by no stretch of the imagination means that he is transferring his feelings for the baby into some confused love.”
I take a deep breath, never letting my eyes leave her shocked ones. I have never talked to her like this, but I’m not going to stand here in the middle of my own personal shit storm and let her throw Asher in the ‘bad guy’ category.
“We all have that person, Dee. Beck is yours. Axel is Izzy’s. Melissa’s is Greg. Hell, Emmy’s is Maddox. Every. Single. One. Of. Us. We have that person who makes us complete. He is my person.”
“You have been watching too much Grey’s Anatomy,” she says under her breath.
“Dee! Did you even fucking hear me? He’s my person! He would never doubt our relationship or me. What is complicated to you is our perfect. We took the lemons life threw at us and started a lemonade-making factory. This, this love that you’re questioning—this love is perfect.”
My chest is heaving. God, it felt good to get that all out. I won’t even lie—when I was on day five without seeing him, I let the same doubts filter through my mind until I realized how ridiculous I was being. Asher would never give up on me.
“I’m sorry. I just worry about you. I worry about you both, but I don’t like seeing you hurting.” She looks down, clearly ashamed that she let her own handicaps cloud what she knows is right.
“I’m only hurting because I don’t know how to help him. I’m not asking you to borrow trouble. My pain is because I feel powerless to ease his pain. Not because he’s hurting me.”
“I get it. Just promise me that, if you need something, you’ll call. Don’t sit here and let it fester a second longer. If you miss him again tonight, call me in the morning and I promise you I will make sure you can corner his ass.”
“That won’t be necessary, Dee,” I hear over my shoulder. The deep rumble of his voice sends shivers racing across my skin. “I can assure you that the only thing she needs right now is”—he pauses and looks over at me, his face unreadable—“her person.”
I melt… Right there, I melt. It all washes away—the last two weeks of worry, hurt that he’s shut me out, and pain that I don’t know how to help. All that matters is that he’s here now.
“Uh, got it. I’ll see myself out,” she meekly says.
I might have said goodbye, but the only thing my mind can comprehend at this moment is that my man is finally here. He isn’t avoiding me anymore and I can finally figure out where his head has been since that ill-fated night we opened that letter.