We ran down the stairs. Sasha was standing in the middle of the room, pointing at a metal door. “They’re in there. That’s where X was keeping me.” Her eyes traveled down to a pool of blood on the floor. There was no body, but whoever had been there had lost quite a bit of blood. I prayed it wasn’t Vegas.
We all jumped back and aimed our weapons when we heard the sound of a bolt sliding on the other side of the metal door.
I felt all the tension leave my body when a battered Vegas sauntered out of the room carrying a gun. “What?” He laughed. “Y’all were expecting Brother X to be walking out of here, weren’t you?”
Both girls screamed with joy, running to him, while I went inside the room Vegas had come out of. I was expecting to find X’s dead body. Surprisingly, he was out cold, but he was very much alive, with two big-ass rats running in circles around him.
Chippy
52
“Lavernius, the war is over, and your boys won. They did you proud.” I took my husband’s hand between mine, desperate for it to be strong and solid, the way it had been all these years. But that didn’t happen. It felt limp and absent of him, although I refused to give up hope that he was still in there somewhere.
“Sorry to interrupt, Mrs. Duncan. I need to change his IV,” Sonya mumbled. She stood in the doorway, looking too afraid to enter.
“Go on then.” I waved her in and waited as she tiptoed into the room and got to work, swapping out the empty bag of saline for a fresh one. As I watched her taking care of LC for the hundredth time since he’d been home, something deep inside me shifted.
“Sorry about that,” she muttered as she finished, ready to dart out of the room and leave the two of us alone.
“Sonya?” That had to be the first time I’d spoken to her directly since LC had been shot, so the look of fear she gave me was well deserved.
“Yes, Mrs. Duncan?”
“I need to thank you for all that you are doing for my husband. You have gone above and beyond to help him, and I want you to know that I notice, and I’m grateful that you’re here.”
A look of embarrassment crossed her face before she responded.
“Please don’t thank me. We all know that it’s my fault he’s in that bed in the first place. If I had just walked away when I gave you my word, then Mr. Duncan wouldn’t be laying here.” She lowered her head, refusing to meet my eyes.
I had been so busy blaming her and being angry that I hadn’t accepted a hard truth, but now it was time to share it with her. “You know the business that my family is in?” I asked her.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“So you realize that danger and retribution is a very real part of this job. You don’t get all the rewards we have been given without a large degree of danger. There is a reason my son chose you. Most women couldn’t deal with this life, but you and I, we’re different. But that also means that we come with a history, one that makes this lifestyle an option. Yours just happens to include an angry husband. So yes, I needed to blame someone, but if I’m being honest, then I’m as responsible as you are for putting my husband in that bed.”
“You?” She seemed confused by my statement, but I wasn’t willing to explain the part I played in my husband entering this business in the first place. That was ancient history at this point, and it was between me and my husband. All she needed to know was that I understood why my son had chosen her.
“My son is very lucky to have you . . . and Sonya?” She glanced up at me, tears falling from her eyes. “So am I.”
“Thank you.” She closed her eyes and released a breath from deep within. When she opened her eyes again, I could see the relief, like a weight had been lifted off of her. “Can I bring you anything?” I shook my head, and she left the room, allowing me to be alone with LC again. There was so much I needed to say to him.