Guardian Angel (Angel's Halo MC #3) by Terri Anne Browning
Bash had just left me to go assure my brothers that I was going to be okay. For a few minutes today I hadn’t been so sure if I was going to make it or not, but I was seriously thankful that wasn’t the case. Grimacing, I tried to push the memories of the day out of my mind, but I couldn’t get the picture of Bubbles getting me on my back and trying to beat my child out of me from flashing through my head.
I had no idea where that bitch was right now, but as soon as I could get out of bed I was going to put a bullet through her head myself.
For now, however, I had to take care of myself and the baby boy in my belly.
Thinking of my baby that the ultrasound tech had discovered plain and clearly was a boy made me smile despite all the pain I was in. I really did have a little Bash growing inside of me. A son was what I’d been wanting, not only because I wanted a little double of the man I loved walking around, but because I’d feared that having a girl would make Lexa think that I loved her less. I didn’t know what I would have done if that had ever come to pass, but I was glad that it wouldn’t.
I loved Lexa as if she were my own and never wanted her to feel any differently because she hadn’t been born to me.
The suddenness of the hospital room’s door opening had me jerking with a moment of fear, still a little unsettled from the day’s events. Bash was across the room in the blink of an eye, his hands moving over the parts of my body that didn’t hurt. A tricky feat since most of my body was one big throb.
Big hands that held the strength of a Greek god skimmed over me so gently that I couldn’t help the tears that filled my eyes. Oh fuck. I’d been so close to never seeing this beautiful man ever again. “I love you,” I whispered for what was probably the five hundredth time he’d joined me at the hospital so many hours ago.
“I love you too, Raven.” He brushed his lips tenderly over my damp eyes, being careful to avoid my fractured cheek. An x-ray—something I’d been against for fear of hurting my son but that the doctors had been adamant about—had shown that it was just a fracture and wouldn’t need surgery. I’d been lucky with the broken wrist as well, since they had been able to set it without any problems.
I left my uninjured hand and pushed his dark hair back from his face. “Did you call Willa? Is Lexa okay?”
Some of the lightning storm that had been flashing behind my biker’s eyes all evening faded and he smiled slightly. “I called her, although she already knew what was going on thanks to Spider. Lexa is fine, just a little upset that she can’t come see you tonight.”
I swallowed hard. “She called me ‘momma’ today,” I whispered. “I should have stayed home with her when she begged me. If I had this wouldn’t have happened. Our son wouldn’t have been put in danger.”
“Stop it,” he gently scolded. “You couldn’t have known that any of this would have happened. You had no reason to think that Bubbles would want to hurt you.” He sat on the edge of my hospital bed and carefully placed one of his gigantic hands on my lower stomach. “You and our son are okay. That’s all I care about right now.”
I covered his hand and we sat there in silence for a long while. When he was beside me, touching me, making me feel loved and safe, my pain was almost bearable. A yawn escaped me and my eyes started to drift closed. Sleep would bring sweet oblivion from this fuck-tastic day.
“Is it okay that she calls you ‘momma’?”
My eyes snapped open at his quietly asked question. When I met his gaze I saw that he looked worried. “Of course it’s okay. I love that little girl just as much as I love you and the baby we’ve created together. Why would you think that I wouldn’t be okay with it? Do you…not want her to call me that?” He’d always given me the impression that he was glad Lexa and I were so close, but what if I’d been wrong? What if he didn’t want his daughter to think of me as her mother?
“No, no. Fuck no, Raven.” The hand on my stomach turned over and he clasped my fingers. “Baby, I’m so happy that the two most important females in my life are so close. I just want to make sure that you are okay with it.” He grimaced and shook his head before giving me a smile that was almost shy. “How would you feel about her calling you ‘momma’ all the time? What if you adopted her?”
“I…” Tears filled my eyes and I had to blink them back. “I would love that, Bash.”
I’d thought that being on board with his suggestion would have made him smile, or kiss me. Something. Instead he just looked incredibly nervous, which made me anxious. He shifted on the bed then blew out a long breath. I bit my lip. “Spit it out, Bash,” I practically shouted when he just continued to squirm around and started to sweat.
He gave me a sheepish grin. “Fine. This wasn’t supposed to be how I did this. I wanted to do it at the party in front of everyone, but at least I’m getting to ask you tonight.” He shoved one big hand into his front jeans pocket. When he pulled his hand out his hand was fisted. Bash licked his lips and swallowed hard, then opened his hand.
If a girl ever says she isn’t all that into diamonds, that bitch is a liar. Every woman on the face of the planet will stop in her tracks to look at those sparkly little gems. They call to her like a siren calling to sailors out to sea. I was no different. And the diamond on the ring that Bash unveiled right then was one of the most beautiful diamonds I’d ever laid eyes on.
Seeing the amazing diamond ring made my brain go blank for a moment, but when it started functioning again and I realized what the ring meant my throat tightened and tears spilled from my eyes unchecked. “Oh my god,” I whispered.
Bash laughed nervously. “That’s not really an answer, baby.”
I blinked in hopes of clearing my vision so I could see him clearly. “You haven’t exactly asked me anything,” I reminded him.
He shook his dark head, a smile teasing at his mouth. “Raven Anne Hannigan, it seems like I’ve loved you my entire life. I can’t live without you—I’ve already tried that and it sucks. I don’t ever want to be apart from you. Will you marry me and let me love you, protect you, and fucking adore you for the rest of my life?”
Well, when he put it like that…
“Yes.”
Epilogue
Jet
The house was quiet. After the events of the day I was thankful to have some downtime. My family knew how to throw one hell of a party and my baby sister’s wedding hadn’t been an exception.
Raven had made Bash wait until after the baby was born before she would marry him. I knew why she’d made him wait and it had nothing to do with her not wanting to be pregnant. She’d been hoping that Flick would have gotten back before she got married. Raven had wanted her best friend there with her as she took such a giant step in her life. But that hadn’t happened, and Bash had started to grow impatient, something I couldn’t blame him for.
Now, a little over six months since the birth of her baby, Raven had officially become Mrs. Sebastian Reid. I was happy for her, but damn, she’d put me through one hell of an emotional day. It had been hard as fuck to walk my baby sister down the aisle, especially when I knew that she wasn’t truly happy with her wedding.
I leaned back in my recliner and turned on the TV, hoping to find something that would help me settle down after the craziness of watching the girl I’d spent my whole life loving like my own child marry the only man that would ever deserve her. At least Willa and Spider had played it smart and ran off to Vegas to get married rather than making me suffer through a big-ass wedding, unlike my sister who’d had to have her white dress. She hadn’t had any bridesmaids, though. Which was yet another thing Hawk had been pissed at Flick for, since he thought she’d ruined our sister’s happy day.
Things have been crazy ever since I’d come home from prison. We’d rebuilt the bar, and I thought it looked better than ever but it was hard on all of us to know that the place that our father’s legacy was had been taken from us when that motherfucker Kevin Samson had torched the place.
With his death we hadn’t been left i
Since then things had calmed down a little, or as much as they could when your life revolved around a motorcycle club. I was just happy to be home with my family and that my sister was happy. It was made obvious to me just how happy she was on a daily basis.
Raven seemed to shine with that happiness. I’d never seen her like that and it gave me a little peace to see it. She was a wonderful mother to Lexa and when her son Max had been born, that motherly shit doubled. Now she was married to the man she loved and settled down.
Even as happy as my sister was I was unable to truly find peace. I haven’t given up the search for Flick. As soon as Raven had come home from the hospital I’d started looking for her. I’d called in favors that I’d been saving for desperate times, burned bridges with people who couldn’t help me because I always felt like they didn’t want me to find her.
It was like she’d become a fucking ghost and had disappeared into thin air. I couldn’t find the one thing I’d spent months dreaming of coming home to while I was behind bars and it was slowly killing me.
Where was she?
Where the fuck was my Flick?
A groan from beside my chair made me reach down and scratch behind Toby’s ears. That dog was the only connection I still had to the woman that fucking owned my heart. I’d given him to her before we’d started fucking around, back when I’d still been trying to hide how I felt for her.
Fuck, I’d been such a dumbass back then. I’d been too much of a pussy to tell that girl how much I really cared about her, and then I had lost her. By the grace of God I’d been given a second chance when she’d told me she was pregnant, but again I’d been a chicken shit and waited too long to make things right between us. I should have asked her to marry me the minute she told me she was going to have my baby. Instead, I’d waited too long—and then a man that I’d thought was my best friend had taken all of that away from me.
Westcliffe had taken more than just my child away the night he’d beaten Flick almost to death. He’d ripped away my last chance of being with the only female I’d ever felt something strong for. The woman I’d loved since she was too fucking young for me to love her, hated me after that. When I’d beaten Westcliffe to death, I’d done it for the loss of my kid, for the pain he’d caused my female, but for me too. With each punch that had caused one internal injury after another, with each kick of my boot to his head that had resulted in a fractured skull that had eventually lead to brain death, I’d done it because I knew that my life was over and I didn’t give a shit what happened to me when I was finished.
While I was in prison, I’d had time to think. I’d made plans and dreamed about getting home to Flick so that I could make things right for us.
And then she’d shown up out of the blue and told me goodbye. She had left me all over again and I’d been powerless to stop her. But now I was a free man and soon my parole was up so I could get out there and search for her myself instead of relying on idiots to do the job for me.
I just had to bide my time and pray that I could find her.
The sitcom I’d landed on was starting to bore me so I flipped it over to the national news channel. A commercial was on and I was about to officially call it a night when the picture showed up on the screen.
At first I didn’t see her. All I saw was a tour bus and cops and a few big men in suits that had to be custom made for them because no way did anyone make suits that big. I saw a small redhead with a phone to her ear, and a guy that I instantly recognized as one of the biggest rock stars in the world because I listened to his music every day. Demon’s Wings’ music was always blaring at the bar. It was one of the few bands that everyone in the MC all liked.
When I saw the rocker, I had to take a closer look because he was carrying one of his kids. A little girl that looked just like the redhead with the phone in her hand…
There.
I hit pause on the remote, thankful for the fucking technology to freeze live television for the first time in my life. I sat forward in my recliner so fast that it made Toby jerk up and bark thinking that something was wrong. I didn’t bother to shush him as my eyes zeroed in on the woman holding a little boy behind the rocker.
Fucking. Hell.
Her hair was different and it looked like she had lost a little weight, but I knew it was her. The angel of that stubborn jaw, the shape of her lips as she smiled down at the little boy in her arms. It was Flick.
I’d found her.
I hit playback and the voice of the anchorman finally registered and I stiffened. “Demon’s Wings bassist Shane Stevenson’s bus was broken into on the band’s latest stop in their summer tour. A source informs us that no one was hurt except for the rocker’s dog, who had to be rushed to the local emergency vet. No word on the dog’s condition, but we do know that he was badly injured. The band’s manager, Ember Jameson Armstrong, has not been able to give us a statement as of yet, but an inside source has told us that the normally emotionless manager was close to tears earlier tonight.”
I’ve found her.
Acknowledgements
It’s always hard to imagine writing the end of one book, let alone fifteen. Yet here I am, with my fifteenth self-published book. The last two years have been crazy and wonderful and did I mention crazy? I’ve had so much fun sharing the characters in my head with you and I can’t wait to give you more. But none of this would be possible without the people that help make my life a little less crazy on a daily basis so that I can stay sane long enough to create these books. Jennie, Mellie, Nikki, Melanie, and Felicity, you guys are not just my BETA readers, but you are quite possibly the only people standing between a bunch of gibberish and an actual story. Mike Browning, you are my heart, my voice of reason—and yes, sometimes you are definitely my inspiration. I love you to the moon and back.
Playlist
“All I Need to Know” by Thousand Foot Krutch
“Something More” by Secondhand Serenade
“Never Be the Same” by Red
“Wrecking Ball (Rock Version)” by Our Last Night
“Chemical Love” by Escape the Fate
“Never Have to Say Goodbye” by Papa Roach
“War over Me” by Papa Roach
“The Kids Aren’t Alright” by Fall Out Boys
“Make Me Believe Again” by Nickleback
“Get Through This” by Art of Dying
“Right Here In My Arms” by HIM
“Moth” by Hellyeah
“Move On” by Asking Alexandria
“Fall Into Me” by Brantley Gilbert
“I Am Machine” by Three Days Grace
“I Am a Stone” by Demon Hunter
Terri Anne Browning, Guardian Angel (Angel's Halo MC #3)