Ivy watched me for a beat before looking back at King. I kept my eyes fucking cemented to her, watching for any sign that she was about to turn on us.
“There’s an attack coming,” she finally said. “I don’t know when and I don’t know how, but I’ve heard him talk about it for weeks. And it won’t be just on your club, it’ll be on your families, too. He wants them all dead.” She paused. “He wants to wipe everyone and everything you care about off the face of the earth. And I believe he could do it.”
Jesus fucking Christ.
King forced out a harsh breath. “Who?” he demanded through clenched teeth. “Who the fuck are you talking about? And why?”
Her eyes bored into his. “My husband. You took what was his, so now he wants to take what is yours.”
“Fuck! Tony is the one behind all this?”
Ivy was married to Tony Romano, one of Australia’s biggest crime bosses. He lived in Melbourne, which was why he hadn’t been on our list of Italians to check into. I only knew this because King had made me track her movements for a few years after he’d left her. Her marriage had tipped him over the edge, and I’d convinced him to stop tracking her.
I stepped forward, anger spiking through me. “What the fuck did King take?”
She turned her face to look at me. “He took me.”
“How the fuck did I take you?” King growled.
Her eyes met his again, still blazing with a fierce intensity. “You didn’t, but he thinks you did. He thinks I’m leaving him because I never stopped loving you.”
Epilogue
Hyde
3 months later
Monroe hit me with the sexy look she pulled out when she wanted something. I’d just walked in the door after a long day out on club business. I hadn’t even had a chance to put my feet up yet, and I knew she was gonna blast me with requests to do shit around the house. I knew this because it had been going on for almost two weeks while she renovated parts of our house.
I rested my shoulder against the doorjamb and crossed my arms over my chest. “What?”
Her lips twitched as she fought a smile. She fucking knew what she was doing. She also fucking knew I’d cave to her demands. I always did.
She came to me and rubbed her body against mine while looping her arms around my neck, making real sure to get that sweet pussy of hers against my dick. “It’s not so much a what as it is a my-parents-are-coming-for-dinner.”
“Fuck, sugar, I was looking forward to a little couch time and then a whole lot of time between your legs.” Charlie was away on school camp until tomorrow, so I wanted to make the most of the night. Fuck knew, with all the club shit that had gone down recently, we could do with a night together, just the two of us.
She pulled a face. “Ah, well that was never gonna happen. Charlie came home a day early. She’s in her bedroom.”
My brows pulled together as I pushed off the doorjamb and straightened, ready to go find her. “She okay?”
Monroe gripped my shirt. “Steady, tiger, she’s fine. Two of the teachers fell sick, so the trip ended a day early.”
Thank fuck she was okay.
I ran my hand over her hair. “She called you when she got back?”
Monroe’s face lit up with a smile. “Yeah,” she said softly.
I fucking loved the shit out of the way Monroe and Charlie had bonded. The day we received the paternity test results that confirmed I was her father, Monroe celebrated by throwing a party. She made a big fucking deal about Charlie in an effort to make her feel special. Hell, the kid deserved it after everything she’d been through. Once we’d moved all of Charlie’s stuff in, they’d decorated our house together and spent hours with each other doing the kind of shit females loved to do.
Bending to kiss her, I murmured, “Our kids are gonna be the luckiest kids on the planet, red. Having you for a mother.” I knew she thought of Charlie like a daughter, but I also understood that she wanted her own babies. And I was gonna give them to her when she was ready.
“Oh,” she said, remembering something, “Tenille called just before. She’ll be here just after lunch tomorrow.”
We were navigating shared parenting with Tenille while she and Charlie smoothed out their relationship. Craig had moved to Perth and hadn’t kept in touch with either of them. Charlie was disappointed, but I did everything I could to be the father she needed.
“She better not be hours later again. I can’t sit and watch Charlie get upset all over again.”
She smiled up at me. “I can’t wait to see you with a baby. I think it might just melt my heart once and for all.”
I smacked her ass. I fucking loved that ass. “You let me know when you’re ready to get started on that. But for now, I’m gonna take a shower and get ready to face your dad.”
She bit her lip. “Ah, yeah, no.”
“No?”
She glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. The large-as-fuck teal clock that took up half the fucking wall. I’d asked her if she was blind when she asked me to put it up, because surely we didn’t need a clock that size in the kitchen. She’d just laughed at me and carried on. I’d put the fucking clock up for her, figuring that at least we’d still be able to read the time when we hit ninety.
Pointing at it, she said, “They’ll be here in like two minutes, maybe one. There’s no time for you to do anything except get the barbeque ready.”
I scrubbed my face. “So let me get this straight. I’ve been working all day, I’m exhausted, with no pussy in sight, I’ve no time for a shower or a minute to myself, I have to be nice to your father all night, and I’m the sucker who has to fucking cook dinner, too?”
She smiled like the world was running exactly how it should be. “Yes.” And then she added, “Because you love me.”
She was fucking right about that.
I backed her up against the wall and dropped my lips to hers. After I had kissed her, I said, “I love you like nothing fucking else, woman. But there’s gonna be some serious time dedicated to my dick later tonight. Just so you’re aware.”
“You say that like it’s you getting the better end of the deal. I would have thought you’d know by now that if I could dedicate every second of the day to your dick, I would. Especially since you got that piercing.”
Another thing I’d caved on for her. My prince albert was never far from her mind. Or her pussy.
“Okay,” I said, moving away from her. “You got the meat ready for the barbie?” Fuck knew I needed a moment alone to get my dick under control. Throwing the fucking front door open to her father, sporting a raging hard-on was not on my list of priorities.
She reached for my shirt. “Just one other thing, baby.”
I hung my head. She only pulled the baby word out when she really wanted something. Looking back up at her, I said, “What?”
“I need another room built in the shop. A little bigger than the waxing room you built. I wanna bring a beautician in, too.”
I would give Monroe the fucking world if I could. She’d sure as shit given it to me. “How many more rooms you reckon you could use in the shop?”
She frowned. “Why?”