“I can’t fuckin’ put her down! We’re waiting on a goddamn ambulance for Christ’s sake!” I told him sharply, but it didn’t seem to matter.

“Sir, I’m not going to ask you again to put her down. We’re trying to be peaceful here, but you need to walk down here with your hands above your head,” he told me again as I thought of all the ways to kill him with my bare hands.

I didn’t know if they just couldn’t see Brenna’s face or if they just didn’t care, but they weren’t going to fuckin’ stop until I put her down. Poet started across the porch toward me, and all of the officers drew their weapons.

“You! Stop right where you are!” the one who seemed to be in charge yelled at Poet.

“Boy, none of us are gonna cause you any problems. No need for you to be pointin’ guns,” Poet told him calmly, his face as innocent as a baby. “That girl ain’t gonna be standing up no time soon. You want him with you, gonna have to let me go get her.”

“What’s wrong with her? What the fuck is going on?” the cop finally asked belligerently.

“Well, now, we just called you boys. Someone came in, shot that boy lying on the porch, and beat the hell outta that girl. We’re waiting on…” He pointed to the ambulance and another cop car pulling up the road. “That ambulance and the police.”

The cop’s face turned bright red as he looked between Poet and me. Finally, he told Poet to come get Brenna, and I felt her arms tighten around the back of my neck.

I whispered to her, “It’s okay, baby. We’ll get this straightened out. You go with your pop; he’ll take care of you.”

She squeezed even tighter, her breath wheezing out of her mouth fast and hard.

“Remember what I told you, Brenna? We talked about this. I said if I was gone, you needed to lean on your pop and Vera. Remember?” I felt her chest stop for a second as she finally understood our conversation. “You do that now Brenna. I love you.” Then, I handed her to Poet gently, prying her fingers off my neck.

Poet’s eyes met mine in understanding. “I’ll call the suit. Don’t say shit,” he told me as I walked off the porch, hands above my head, passing the EMTs as they spread out to help Casper and Brenna.

When I reached the driveway, two of the cops started searching me, but I was completely focused on the sounds happening behind me.

The cop who’d called me off the porch stepped in front of me, his eyes remorseful. “You have the right to remain silent…”

Then, the sound of my Miranda rights were overwhelmed by Brenna screaming my name.

I had been right. Tony had broken my jaw. He’d also bruised my ribs and sprained my wrist. There was a warrant out for his arrest, but no one had seen him since he left my house in Kendra’s car. Nobody had seen her either. I wasn’t sure what had spooked him, but he’d set me on the couch and was ranting and raving, and then all of a sudden, he’d taken off like a bat out of hell. I didn’t care why he’d left. I was just grateful that he had. Only minutes after he’d left, Dragon and the boys had pulled up to the house.

I didn’t remember a lot of that day, but I did remember the sound of Dragon calling my name. It was the best sound I’d ever heard. I knew I was safe when he’d gotten there. I’d known Trix made it to him. The rest of the day, I remembered in flashes, like the moment I watched from my gurney when they pushed a handcuffed Dragon into the back of the cop car. I hadn’t known what was going on, but I was in agony that they were taking him away from me. I thought I’d screamed.

I spent three days in the hospital while the doctors ran tests and wired my jaw shut. I had to wear the wires for about six weeks, and the first day I had them, I knew they were going to be a huge pain in the ass. Drinking all of my food through a straw sounded like a special form of hell.

I was really sore, but the doctors were hesitant to give me any heavy-duty drugs.

I hadn’t lost the baby.

The doctors said to be cautious but optimistic. The little bean was still so small that he or she was pretty well-padded in there. They said that trauma could cause miscarriages though, so they told me to prepare for the worst. I was trying. Every day that I didn’t bleed, I said a prayer of thanks and then tried not to think about it more than that. Worrying about what would or wouldn’t happen was too much to handle on top of everything else. I was grateful. My injuries could have been so much worse; I was lucky he didn’t kill me. The baby was like the cherry on top—an extra thing to be thankful for.

Casper had been shot in the shoulder, but they didn’t think there would be any permanent damage. When he was hit, the impact pushed him into one of the posts on the porch, and he’d knocked himself out. The boys gave him shit constantly for that, but he was digging the attention. Behind the jokes and jibes was an underlying respect. If I had to guess, I’d say he’d be patching in really soon. The fact that they’d found the trail of blood from where he landed to the doorway of the house was a pretty clear indication he was trying to get to me. He’d passed out before he could reach me though, and I was thankful for that. Tony would have killed him.

I missed Dragon more than I thought was possible. The days dragged on without him, and I wondered what he was doing as I lay in bed and counted the ceiling tiles. I ached to hear his voice or feel his fingers in my hair. I was at my lowest point, and I needed him with me.

My second day in the hospital, Pop brought Trix into see me. She’d been scared. I could tell she wasn’t sure where she could touch me, so I’d lifted her hands in mine and set them on my belly. She chattered nonstop about running through the grass and asked if she did okay. It was hard for me to talk through the wires, but I assured her that she did exactly what she was supposed to. She giggled uncontrollably at the way I spoke, and Pop had to pull her off the bed to keep her from jostling me.