Violet
ThreeYearsLater
The first time I felt both babies kick at once, I laughed and cried in the same breath.
Blade panicked.
“Is that bad?” he demanded, already halfway off the couch like he was about to call Havoc, Ghost, and possibly the National Guard.
“It’s normal,” I told him, still laughing. “They’re just… enthusiastic.”
He sat back down slowly, one hand already on my stomach. He doesn’t even realize he does that now. Protects without thinking. Guards without being asked.
Three years.
Sometimes it feels like a lifetime. Sometimes it feels like a blink that started in a neon-lit club and ended in a cabin that changed everything.
It took almost a year to shut down Salazar’s operation.
Clubs closed for “violations.”
Licenses pulled.
Shipments intercepted.
People flipped.
Some of his men died. Some went to prison.
Blade and his brothers pulled more girls out than I’ll ever know the full number of.
I watched Salazar Huntington disappear piece by piece.
By the time it was over, his name wasn’t powerful anymore.
It was a warning.
That year was hard.
There were nights Blade came home with bruised knuckles and silence in his eyes. Nights when Ghost called too late. Nights when I pretended not to hear the low, tense conversations on the porch.
But he never let it touch me.
He built walls between us and the storm.
And when it finally ended, it wasn’t dramatic.
It was just… finished.
Like a door closing.
We got married months after that first night in the cabin. I already knew I was his from the start. My brother protested, loudly and theatrically, but it was all for show. He saw what I saw. He knew Blade would love me and protect me with everything he had.
Now I sit on the porch swing, one hand cradling the curve of my stomach. I’m round enough that I can’t see my own feet anymore.
Blade stands in the yard splitting wood.
Shirtless.
