JAX: MC Biker Romance (New Adult Contemporary Bad Boy Romance) (41 page)

“What do you mean? I wasn’t even expecting that it was you that I was delivering the package to,” he replied. “And, how else am I going to react, Hailee?” he asked.

“Well, certainly not as accepting as this,” she admitted. Carter scratched the back of his head, looking away from her as he pondered over her statement.

“I’ll be honest that if it were any other girl, I’d probably be running for the hills or laughing at their face for lying to me,” Carter started, his eyes sweeping down to her belly and a ghost of a smile appeared on his face. “But, you’re different, Hailee, and I’m not just saying that to get into your pants again,” he explained hastily, and she laughed.

“You’re the best kind of bad thing that’s ever happened to me,” Hailee said.

Carter smiled at her before taking her hands in his, holding them in his hands and caressing them softly before continuing.

“I am scared, Hailee. I’m scared as hell that I might not be the one you need or the person who deserves to be with you or be the father of our baby, but I’m not about to abandon you, or him either.” Hailee’s eyebrows rose up at her hairline.

“But, don’t you feel like I’m pinning you down? Holding you back from your dreams or whatever you want in life?” she asked. Carter shook his head and slowly inched his hand to her belly, looking at Hailee’s eyes for permission. She gave him the barest of nods before his warm hands touched the skin around her stomach, and Carter was in awe.

“You’re definitely not holding me back, Hailee. To be honest,” he looked at her again, this time his lips moving closer to hers slowly until they felt each other’s breaths on their cheek. “I think you’ve just set its course.”

Hailee closed her eyes and a solitary tear fell from the corner of her eye, as he closed the distance between them and kissed her.

Epilogue

They kissed each other for what seemed to be the longest time, their tongues dancing together languidly until Carter was distracted by the vibrations coming from his pocket. He cursed, as he saw that it was another client of theirs, asking for the whereabouts of her package. He turned his phone off before looking at Hailee again, groaning a bit at the slightly dazed look in her eyes that he was sure he created. His groan snapped her out of it and she blushed, making Carter’s hand itch in feeling the warmth of her cheeks from her embarrassment.

“I think you should go back to your work,” Hailee said softly. Carter looked like he was about to argue, so she added, “I’m not sending you away. I just don’t want you to get into trouble.”

Carter shook his head. “The thing she wants me to deliver is back in the office, and I can tell my other guys to do it instead. I want to be clear on everything first, Hailee.” He placed both of his hands on her face, making her look up at him straight in his eyes. “Even if you weren’t pregnant, I’d probably still have tried to find you again, Hailee. I swear to God, I couldn’t stop thinking about you, your face, your voice, and everything. She blushed even more and he brushed his thumbs to her cheeks, smiling softly at her. “It’s been haunting me until I finally gave in. I want to be with you so bad, Hailee, and having a baby with you isn’t about to make me lose interest. Honestly, it pretty much multiplied once the idea of my baby growing in your belly finally sunk in,” he smirked, and Hailee slapped him lightly on his face.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but if it really was inevitable that I was going to be knocked up that night, I’m glad it’s you and not someone else,” Hailee said, and Carter growled, as he imagined another guy dancing and taking her.

“If any other guy had tried to do that, kitten, they’d wish they’d never been born,” Carter said.

They talked more about the baby, what appointments Hailee had already attended, when her next ultrasound was, and about each other. Hailee joked that he never got to tell her his last name, and when he did, he teased her back that Hailee Maxwell had a nice ring to it, raising his eyebrows suggestively until she laughed at her. They also covered some other serious topics, and when Hailee asked him to meet with her parents to finally tell them the big news, he readily agreed, already feeling that despite Hailee’s efforts to give her parents the benefit of the doubt, he wasn’t about to let the mother of his child get hurt.

Telling Hailee’s parents that he knocked her up scared whatever bravado he stored within his entire body. He had let Hailee do most of the talking while he watched her parents’ reaction, as they slowly became on edge wanting her to move. Her father suddenly threw his glass of Scotch to the wall in the middle of their discussion, and Carter snapped out of his fright and yelled at Hailee’s father, defending her and taking all of the blame and derogatory terms they called her before pulling Hailee out of their home and going back to her dorm. He held her for the rest of the night, as she cried about what happened, and he vowed that they would treat their children with hope and encouragement, not pressuring them to excel the way Hailee had been pressured by her parents.

Her parents had kicked her out of their house and refused to have anything to do with her now. She was supposed to attend a job interview, but once they found out she was pregnant, they told her that it wasn’t possible to hire her this time. Carter assured her that he’ll take care of her as best as he could, and he made sure that Hailee was comfortable and well-taken care of, going full-on overprotective boyfriend and daddy, as Meaghan and the others teased him. He’d shrug it off and plant a kiss on Hailee’s cheeks, making the latter blush, as he continued with the rest of his chores or needing to fix up orders in their deliveries.

Carter was doing pretty well, all things considered, but he knew that once the baby was born, they’d need to prepare a lot of things, all of which would be expensive. Carter reassured Hailee that he’d figure something out, and she told him that he didn’t have to take the burden of everything, and they should start working more as partners now that they were going to have a baby. His friends from the gang gave him their utmost support, and even helped him move Hailee’s stuff into his apartment once he’d finally convinced her to move in with him.

When it was finally time for their son or daughter to come into the world, there had been a lot of screaming matches from all sides. Carter had freaked and lost it once Hailee announced her water broke, and proceeded to drive like a madman all the way to the hospital.

“You know, I’d like to be able to deliver this kid while I’m still breathing, honey,” Hailee said, moaning in pain, as another contraction hit her.

“How far apart are they?” Carter asked, ignoring his girlfriend’s quip about his driving.

“About 14 minutes from the last contraction,” Meaghan said, biting her lip to keep from laughing, as she noted down the time on the chart that Carter had prepared just for this moment. “Still a long way to go.”

“Oh my God, it hurts so much! If you come near me begging for sex, Carter, I swear to God I am keeping my legs shut right after this!” Hailee yelled. Carter’s face paled at her declaration, but kept on driving until they finally reached the hospital.

After about five hours of labor, a handsome boy who looked just like his father cried his lungs out, and the proud parents were overjoyed. The doctor gave the baby to Hailee after they cleaned him up and she cooed at him automatically, marveling at his beauty. She moved him a bit, so Carter could see him better, and he smiled at his son.

“I have to tell you kid, you have the worst possible timing,” Carter said, and Hailee frowned at him. “Do you know I was about to ask your mother to marry me when you decided to soak the carpet?”

Hailee gasped, as Carter dug into his pocket and produced a diamond ring, white gold and sparkling, and just the way she wanted. Carter took his son and gave it to the nurse before taking Hailee’s hand and putting the ring on the appropriate finger, and Hailee’s eyes filled with tears as she looked at it.

“I love you, Hailee. And, I am going to love you and our son for the rest of my life and then some,” he said, and Hailee nodded.

“I love you too, you big idiot. Now get me back my son so I can cuddle him,” Hailee demanded, and Carter raised an eyebrow at her, but did as she commanded.

“So…is that a ‘yes’?” Carter asked, moving their son closer to his mother. Hailee looked up and brushed her lips to Carter’s before bending her head down and nuzzling her son’s nose with hers.

“What do you think?”

The End

Bonus - Protected by a Navy SEAL - Clean Version

The glow from the street lamp glistened through the rain drops. Detective Cooper was fidgeting in the driver’s seat of the blacked out Toyota Sequoia with his eyes fixed on the alleyway ahead. His partner, Brooke, sat beside him with a steaming coffee in his hands and a cigarette drooping from between his lips.

“You need to quit those,” Cooper said, as he stared forward.

“Urgh… Like you don’t have any bad habits?”“I have plenty, but at least, they don’t kill me,” he shrugged.

“Yeah well, we’ve all gotta die of something,” Brooke took a long drag of the cigarette and rolled down the window to toss out the smoldering end. “Imagine how dumb you’d look if you were in a hospital bed dying of nothing.” “Huh. You’ve always got an answer for everything,” Cooper averted his gaze to his partner and gave him a sly look. “But anyway…. We’ve been here for nearly four hours and still haven’t seen a thing.”

“Chill. they’ll come.” Brooke took a sip of his coffee and winced at the bitterness. “They always do.”

The two narcotics officers had been on their first night of stakeout and Cooper was getting bored already. They’d been tailing the Russian mafia for almost six months and were starting to get a feel for them. A strategically placed undercover agent had informed them of a deal that was supposed to be taking place tonight, but so far, they’d not shown up.

Cooper hated waiting. He wanted to be in the middle of the action, at the heart of all the danger. But, here he was stuck in the car with his surly partner and an agonizing backache. He grimaced at the pain and shifted in his seat again.

“What’s up?” Brooke looked over.

“Just my back.”

“Sports injury?”

“Nah… Injured in combat,” Cooper explained with a hint of pride in his voice.

There was an awkward silence for a moment as Brooke contemplated what to say next. He was intimidated by his partner and often found himself grasping for the right words to say. Fiddling with the crinkly wrapper of his cigarette packet, he tried to distract himself for a moment before saying:

“How come you never talk about your old Navy SEAL days?”

It was an innocent enough question, but one Brooke regretted. He knew Cooper had seen things. He new his past was a grizzly one.

“I just don’t,” came Cooper’s cold reply. “I just don’t…..” and he chewed on his thumbnail, as he watched a black Range Rover in the distance.

It was travelling at a slow and ominously pacing toward the alley. But, just when the two detectives began to get excited, it sped away.

“False alarm,” Brooke tried to change the subject. “That was looking like a likely one.”

“Yeah…. But-“

The crackle of the radio interrupted Cooper.

“We’ve got a 187 on the corner of Bentley and Maybole Avenue…..” the female voice was urgent though relaxed, as she relayed the information.

“Sounds like another one,” Cooper twisted the key to fire up the ignition and he pulled the car out of the shadows, his eyes still fixed on the alley.

“I guess we’ll get them another time, eh?”

“Yeah….. Maybe,” Brooke sounded cynical, as they pulled out onto the highway toward the crime scene.

The rain fell heavier as they drove with nothing but the sound of the windshield wipers screeching across the glass. Brooke, although he wouldn’t’ admit it, idolized his partner and wanted to ask him so many questions and wanted to learn everything about him. But, he knew he wasn’t the most amiable guy, so he kept his head down and stayed silent.

Every now and again, he’d make furtive glances over to Cooper and gaze at the scar that ran down the length of his neck. He’s heard stories of course, tales about how the man earned his stripes in the Middle East, but he wasn’t sure how many of them were true or just idle gossip.

As they approached their destination, they could see the hubbub in the street already. Flashing lights were outside the house breaking up the crowd of neighbors who were trying to peek behind the police tape. An angry officer was trying to placate the chaos with little effect and looked relieved to see the detectives pull up to save him.

“You got here quick,” he half smiled, as he saw them approach.

“What have we got here? And more to the point, why were
we
called?” Cooper wasn’t interested in small talk.

“Well,” the officer shifted from one foot to another, as his face blanched nervously. “As far as I can tell, he’s one of yours. I mean, the victim, he’s on your watch list or something,” he stuttered in Cooper’s presence.

“On our watch list?”

“Yeah…. Anthony Richards.”

“No way!” Brooke leaned in, suddenly interested. “He’s been under surveillance for nearly a year now.”