Page 144 of Insidious Heart
Right up until Stevie gasps and hops off the bed, anyway. “What is all over your face?”
“Chocolate.” Prince looks up with a shrug, his eyes almost the same shade as hers tracking her while she goes to the sink and starts wetting paper towels. “Papa Little John gave us Hershey bars.”
“Papa Little John?” I ask the man himself as he comes strolling in, my eyebrows practically disappearing into my hairline.
“Meh.” He shrugs. “Felt weird having them call meJohnorMr. Andrews.”
“So,papaseemed like the next best thing?”
“I told them to do it,” Tate says as she comes breezing into the room holding a couple of happy meals. “You’re basically John’s son, even have the papers to prove it.” She gives me a pointed smirk. “Prince and King have done nothing but refer to you as their brother since we’ve been here, and since you’re unofficially officially a King, that makes John the boys’ grandpa.”
I frown in confusion, looking at King, Spider, and Pope as they come lumbering in with coffee. “What the fuck is happening right now?”
“Don’t ask.” The Goliath Birdeater lifts his hands in defeat. “All the girls have been flapping their gums about all of us being one bighappy familyever since Snipe said he was gonna make you. And I’ll be damned if I understand it myself.”
“Hey, which one is supposed to be me?” John asks, pulling my stare toward the end of the bed where he’s crouching next to the boys.
“This one.” Prince hands him The Thing from the Fantastic 4 and I have to laugh.
And I keep laughing as what feels like forty more people come barreling into my room; Marbles and Harlow, who goes right for my chart, and Ember, Shithouse, and Tenderloin.
My hospital room is fucking packed and loud, it’s messy and chaotic, and while it’s all making my OCD itch, I just keep fucking laughing.
“You ok?” Stevie comes to stand next to the bed, her brow arched as she pushes her hair behind her ears. “Do you want me to get rid of them?”
I shake my head as I lift a finger and caress her scar before cupping her cheek.
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” I pull her toward me and smile against her lips. “It’s fine. Gonna have to get used to it, right?”
“We both will.” My little dove kisses me sweetly. “It’s been a lot, but it’s really helped.”
“Yeah?”
She nods. “We have a long road ahead of us, a lot of shit to deal with, but knowing we don’t have to do it alone really helps.”
“I love you.” I kiss her again and smile when my girl sways toward me. “I love you, baby dove.”
“I love you, too, Gizmo.”
“Good, because you didn’t really have a choice.”
“No?” Stevie arches a brow and crosses her arms against her chest.
And I shake my head. “No, you didn’t. Told you in the beginning I was taking your heart, and I meant that. So it’s a good thing you gave it willingly cause this shit”—I motion around the room—“is going to be a serious adjustment for me, and since I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, it won’t be an easy one. Which means, only a woman who loves me is going to be able to put up with how insufferable I’m about to get.”
Stevie dissolves into a fit of giggles, looking around at all the people invading my space while she nods emphatically, and it’s that exact moment, that second in time, when I can one hundred percent confirm what Toby said is true.
I did have a family waiting for me.
A family I didn’t intend to be a part of, but here we are. I’m in, so there’s no going back now, and I’ll just have to learn how to deal with it.
And for the record, Toby was right about the other thing, too.
There’s stillworkto be done, and just because I’ve caught a case of thewarm fuzziesdoesn’t mean I’m about to stop killing people. I’ll just add a few more reasons to my list, that’s all.
Toby. Stevie and her brothers. John and the Kings.
