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No.

No.

No.

Izzy finally just agreed to be mine. We’ve spent the last three weeks so fucking happy and in love so I can’t lose her now. Her honey eyes and bright smile pop into my mind and pain explodes through my chest.

“Please be okay, baby,” I whisper as I whip around the last curve before our house. “Please.”

My truck skids into the driveway, sending more gravel flying, but my focus is on the deck where Storm is standing, talking on his phone. He glances back at me, one hand in his hair as he tugs on it. His face is white, all the color leached from his skin and my stomach drops.

Oh, God.

Where is she?

Throwing the truck in park, I shove my door open and jump out, not bothering to close the damn thing as I run up to the deck. As soon as I get closer, I see her. She’s hidden behind Storm but when he steps to the side, my entire world comes crashing down around me.

I jerk my head back like I can physically flee from the memory currently tormenting me as I let out a sigh. For the rest of my goddamn life, I will remember the cold fist of fear that punched through my ribs and latched onto my heart when I saw her, unconscious on the front porch in the same chair I left her in earlier. It was the single worst moment of my thirty-four years and let me tell you, there have been some fucking doozies. Storm already had nine-one-one on the phone. I rushed to her side, wishing I could hold her but I didn’t have any idea what was wrong so I didn’t want to risk it.

“Hey,” Chance says as he walks into the waiting room with Carly at his side. “Any news yet?”

I shake my head as they sit across from me. After she was brought into Baton Rouge General by ambulance, the doctors quickly assessed her and made the decision that our boy would need to be delivered immediately by C-section. Izzy’s blood pressure was through the fucking roof and there was a risk of heart attack or stroke if they didn’t act fast. As they rushed her to the operating room, a nurse informed me I wouldn’t be permitted in the surgery since it’s so high risk and she directed me to this waiting room where I’ve been sitting for the past hour.

“They say what happened?” Carly asks and I nod, filling her in on all the details I know. She frowns, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest. “Izzy is healthy. Why would her blood pressure be so high?”

“Gee, I don’t know, Princess,” Chance replies. “It could be the fact that someone wants to kill her is causing her some stress.”

Her scowl deepens. “Right.”

“How is she?” a frantic Ali asks as she rushes into the room with Storm behind her and I give them the same update I gave Carly and Chance. Ali paces back and forth, chewing on her bottom lip.

“They’re delivering the baby now? It’s so early.”

I shrug, dragging a hand down my face. “She’s thirty-five weeks so she’s not that early and they said it was the best way to help her. I didn’t question it.”

“No,” she answers back. “Of course not. I’m just worried about her.”

Yeah, I know the feeling.

Along with this pit in my stomach that I’m about to lose everything again except this time would be worse because I truly believe I’d never find anyone else like Izzy.

“Can you guys give us a second?” Storm asks, looking at his wife and her friend. They share a look and nod before moving to the other side of the room. Storm slides into the chair next to Chance.

“She seemed okay last time I saw her,” Chance mutters, staring at the floor. We all got together for dinner a few nights ago and he’s right. Izzy was almost back to her usual self, cracking jokes and busting our balls. “Did something happen?”

I shake my head. “Man, your guess is as good as mine.”

“Listen, we’re going to have the guys keeping watch outside her room so you don’t have to worry about Dominic.”

Chance nods. “Besides, he’s not dumb enough to come after her in a hospital.”

“Any word back from him yet in response to the messages from Maverick and Tate?” I ask and they both shake their heads. It’s odd that he hasn’t reached out yet. Then again, Dominic King is very much a man who likes to be in control so maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. He’s dragging this out, making all of us miserable and he won’t give us an answer until he’s good and ready to. Meanwhile, my life with Izzy is just in limbo.

“Maybe we need to have them reach out again,” Storm offers and I wince. Getting Kodiak to agree to this plan was hard enough the first time so I doubt it’ll be any easier a second and I can’t say that I blame him. If I were him, I wouldn’t want my wife having any kind of communication with that bastard.

“What do we do if he never answers? Or he refuses?”

Storm releases a heavy breath. “I don’t fucking know. Right now, how about you just focus on your girl?”