“You’re pregnant!” Corey’s gaze darted to me, desperate now. “Like, legitimately? You don’t think you’ll lose it this?—”
Pain flared through me at the thought of losing this pregnancy, too. But that pain was quickly overcome with rage that Corey would dare to ask me that.
Actually, it might not have been allmyrage.
“Don’t talk to her, you waste of a dick!” Hawk commanded on a growl, tightening his grip so Corey didn’t have enough air to possibly disobey that command. “Don’t look at her. Look at me!”
He squeezed even tighter. “The ex-con who’ll proudly cut your tongue out and feed it to a dog if you ever talk to her again. If you ever breathe the same air as her again.”
Corey released a whimper, his face turning a dangerous shade of blue. Then something else released. Corey’s cream-colored slacks darkened with the stream of piss that ran down his leg and dribbled onto the floor.
“Fucking piss pants.” Hawk wrinkled his nose in disgust and dropped him like a sack of garbage.
Hawk watched the smaller man gasp for air, wanting to do more than just drop him in his own puddle of piss. He wanted to kill my ex for what he’d done to me. But I could feel him tamp down that instinct. Not out of any moral code. But because he knew I wouldn’t allow it.
“Unless you would…”Hawk’s voice pushed into my head, and he peeped at me over his shoulder with a look that was half-coax, half-plea to end my ex-husband’s life.
But I answered out loud, “I think you made your point.”
Hawk turned back to Corey to growl, “Guess it’s your lucky day. Holly decided to let you live. But that alimony shit stops today. No more checks. Ever.”
Corey opened his mouth to protest.
“Please, say something shitastic like you deserve it or that she owes you anything.” Hawk crouched down to get eye level with him. “I am looking for even the tiniest excuse to break off the leash she’s got me on and snap your neck like a twig.”
Apparently, Corey wasn’t as stupid as I was beginning to believe when he showed up at my door to demand more money for his male fertility issues.
He scrambled to his feet and bolted for the stairs, leaving the smell of only his piss behind.
Silence hung heavy in the air as his footsteps receded down the metal stairs.
Then all three bears turned to me.
“Hi, Holly,” Koda said gently. Seemingly for all three of them. “May we come in?”
23/
okay, the dream might not be over
holly
Okay, the dream might not be over.
They were here. All three of the bears who’d left me behind… were at my door. Asking me to invite them in.
I stared at them, my heart pounding so hard it felt like it might break free from my chest.
Hawk, with his grizzled smirk. Leif, with his soft, hopeful expression. And Koda, with his stoic, unreadable gaze.
They all wore dark blue jeans and flannels over Henleys as if they’d prompted a chatbot:How can all three of us look like small-town romance novel heroes when we show up at Holly’s door?
Relief flared like a firework… then plunged like a misfired rocket into the cold, dark ocean of hurt. The same frigid place I’d woken up alone.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, my voice sharp and trembling.
Hawk stepped forward first, reaching out to me, his amber eyes warm and tender. “Aw, baby?—”
“No!” I shoved him away.
