Page 89 of Penn

The door to my room opens, but it’s not the confident push of the nurses or Penn. Of someone who belongs here.

My chest tightens instinctively, and a cold spike of adrenaline pierces through my exhausted haze. My hand rests on Jeremy’s back protectively, as if it’ll shield him from the man stepping into the room.

A man I didn’t expect to still be breathing, if I’m being honest.

“What are you doing here, Stephen?”

I’m taken aback by his presence. He normally wears expensive clothes and shoes, but he wears sweatpants and a baggy T-shirt. He slips slightly as he walks, and his face looks even worse than it did the night I saw him last, when Penn fought him. Twice.

What shocks me the most, though, is the cheap cologne. Stephen has a signature scent, and when I looked it up, it costs nearly a grand. Besides it being ridiculously pricey, it didn’t smell that great. But it does smell better than whatever restroom cologne he’s found.

“Are you alone?” Stephen whispers. “I’ve been trying to get to you for hours. I finally managed to get away from the bikers.”

His threat to take Jeremy away from me and never let me see him again comes to mind, and my pulse races, thumping hard in my ears. “Get out.”

“Dixie—”

“If any of those men come in here to check on me and find you here, you’ll have a first-class trip to the morgue. And I won’t try to stop them.”

“You don’t understand,” he says, stepping forward and looking at the baby. A flash of possessiveness crosses his face, and it makes my skin crawl. “Dixie, we have to go. Right now. I have money. A lot of money. I have a bag hidden with over a million dollars in cash. We can leave Gravelton. We can leave this miserable state. Let’s go to Mexico, or South America. Somewhere nobody knows us. We’ll start over. You, me, and our boy.”

My jaw drops. He can’t be serious. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“I can give you the life you always wanted. My wife served me with papers. I’m free and clear of her and the kids. It’s just you and me, baby.”

How hard did Penn hit him? “There is no you and me, Stephen. You ensured that when you threw money at me, ordered me to get an abortion, and then set my house on fire.”

“I’m that boy’s father,” Stephen says, walking toward us. “You think you can just keep him from me? Let some greasy biker in a leather vest raise him? If you don’t come with me, Dixie, I swear I’ll take him. I’ll take him with me to Mexico. You have a choice. You can come with us, or you can lose him.”

Standing up, I hate the way I wince. My body’s much more sore than I expected, but I keep the bed between us. “You’re not on his birth certificate, Stephen. If you take him, it’ll be considered kidnapping.”

“He has my blood!”

“And you’ll have to jump through hoops to prove it since I’ll deny it. I’ll make sure it costs you every penny you have left.”

His eyes widen. “I’m taking my boy, Dixie. Whether you like it or—”

“Dixie, you okay in there?” Zep calls.

“Zep!”

The door slams open, and he walks inside. A surprised look appears on his face as he stands between Stephen and me. “Can’t believe you’re still walking.”

“Is she fucking you, too?”

He cheated on his wife, but I’m the whore? “No.”

“Penn’s not gonna be happy to find you here,” Zep says. “He might just kill you right here.”

“Kill who?” Penn asks, walking into the room with the car seat. “Holy fuck, you’re still breathing?”

We’ll have to address the language around our kid once Jeremy’s old enough to talk. “You guys thought he was dead?”

“Yeah, kind of,” he admits. “The Black Venom want his head on a stick.”

“You think a piece of paper changes things? I have rights,” Stephen says.

“The fuck you do,” he says with a laugh.