DECEIT (B723) by Hazel Grace (ebook reader for surface pro .TXT) 📕

“Was it something I said to him?” Alexander asks as we watch him stride out.

I shake my head. “He is the hardest guy to get to like you. It took me six years.”

“Well, that’s….comforting.”

Lacing his fingers with mine, we walk out together as two people who are about to parents.

It’s the last time it’s ever like this for us—calm, content, and clear.

“Do you know what this fucking means?” Marty sneers in my face, twisting the fabric of my t-shirt harder. His body tremors ever so slightly that only I can feel it because I’m his human beating bag if he should so need it.

“I know,” I reply, watching Marty’s eyes overcast in pure panic.

“Marty.” Mills shows up next to both of us, his tone mild. “You’re gonna need to go in with—“

“Shut the fuck up,” he snaps, his head whirling in his direction. “She deserves better than me. I’m not going to do anything but fuck this kid up.”

I roll my eyes—yeah, I know—but I can’t help it.

Marty has been on this kick about how he’s going to be a shit dad because he killed his sister’s father and all this other happy horseshit. He’ll do fine, I don’t know how many more times we need to tell him that but he hasn’t listened. I’m about to pummel his ass to sink the message in.

“You want your wife to have this baby alone so you can have a mini panic attack out here?” I’m pushing him to where this could go one of two ways; he can grow a pair of balls and go back into that hospital room where they are prepping Stormi to have their first child, or he’s gonna beat my ass.

Marty’s expression turns deadly. “Motherfucker, I will—“

“Marty.” The man in question stops everything he was about to say, and his face lightens when he registers the voice.

Mine tenses.

It’s Emmy.

I step to the side, allowing Marty the initial view of her because he needs it more than anyone else.

Immediately, he advances, needing the one woman who makes everything better. One we’ve all relied on in some way or another.

I slowly pivot to find Emmy hugging Marty and gently rubbing his back in comfort. She’s speaking lowly, laser-focused on him and him only because she knows as well as anyone else that he needs all her words of encouragement and bravery.

Emmy tucks her arm under Marty’s and guides him down the busy hallway full of nurses and doctors. Kyson and Mills follow a bit behind, leaving me to level out my racing pulse and jittery heartbeat.

It’s been another month that’s gone by that I’ve purposely stayed away and focused on my own family that I’m reconnecting with.

Four weeks where Emmy’s stomach has gotten bigger on Instagram, and I’ve been fumbling in my own head.

I’m broken and numb.

There’s no other way to sugarcoat how my heart convulses and my body feels like it’s not really here, living and operating.

Every time I check her shit, I tell myself it’s the last. But the next time is to make sure she’s happy. To watch her from afar to make sure that I don’t have to put Alexander on life support just so I can bring him back to life and practically kill him again.

The clicking of heels draws my chin upward, locating Emmy in a baby blue dress and nude stilettos. The sway of her hips, her long curls of whitish-blonde hair that bounces off her shoulders, and the confidence that radiates of Emmy Lou Rhodes still make her the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.

“First panic attack at the hospital down,” she jeers with a small smile developing along her face as my heart slows to a critical pace. “How many did he have in the car?”

“Two, according to Reagan.”

Her honey-browns light up. She seems fine.

I want her to be fine. I just also want her to be with me.

“Where is she?”

I nod towards the hallway she just came from. “In the room with Stormi.”

“Do you know what they’re having?” She stops within a foot of me and I wish she wouldn’t.

It’s too close.

Just like she was too close at that stupid ass dinner Kyson guilt tripped me into going to.

It took everything in me not to drag her out of that restaurant and break Alexander’s hand for touching her.

“A girl.”

“No shit.” She lets out a little scoff. “He purposely kept it from me like an asshole. And I wasn’t going to put Stormi in the middle of that debacle. Lord knows I would’ve won.”

Yeah, I know.

Marty felt like Emmy would lecture him to death about future boyfriends and how he couldn’t go offing them all, so he kept it to himself to buy him a few months of peace.

“It’ll be perfect,” Emmy proceeds with a widening smile, her hand falling mindlessly onto the top of her belly. It makes my own writhe in discomfort.

I need to go now.

I don’t do this sort of thing. The boys don’t need me anyway, and I can’t stand around hanging out with Emmy alone like nothing has happened when everything did.

I can’t breathe while looking at her. It’s too painful. I’ve always thought I was a decently strong man who could handle shit, but this is downright torture.

“He needs to learn to be able to be soft when the time allows,” Emmy carries on. “Then he can be his normal asshole self the rest of the time. I was daddy’s little girl growing up. There is nothing like a father-daughter relationship.”

My body lingers back, demanding some personal space. “It was good to see you, Ems. I’m going to go—“

“Bish.” Her arm reaches out for me, and without even touching me, I flinch.

She notices.

I can’t handle any contact from her right now. I’m not looking to go backward when I’ve already served this much time.

“I’m sorry,” she mutters, her once excited features vanished and replaced with remorseful ones. “Please don’t ignore me. I know it’s been—”

“I’m not, I—“

“You are,” she quickly counters.