Inked Babies (Inked Brotherhood 6)

Or do they have families somewhere looking for them? Did they go missing, like Tyrese Weir?

Rafe comes to stand beside me, silent. He catches my hand, laces our fingers together. “Hey.”

“How’s Zane?”

He shakes his head. “Not sure where he is in his mind right now. Not really here.”

I swallow hard. “He’ll come back. The police will catch the guy, a

nd we can put this behind us.”

Except for the kids.

How can we leave them behind?

Rafe seems to read my mind. “Feels like they’re our responsibility. We found them. They suffered like Zane has. Feels like they’re ours to protect.”

“Yeah.” I nod, because I feel it, too. “They’re ours.”

***

The lights on all the police cars are on, bathing the house and the yard in light. A few neighbors have come out to the street to gawk at the commotion.

The EMTs are waiting outside the ambulance parked across the street, while the police are trying to talk to the kids. They’ve also offered them bottled water, which seems to have broken the ice a little.

I look at the five of them, wrapped in thermal blankets, how they’re sticking close together, a tight group of fear and distrust.

Rafe hauls me into his arms, and I rest my head on his shoulder. “Our work here is done. We should go pick up our son.”

“But we can’t leave them alone!” I pull back, turn to look at the kids again. My chest is so tight it hurts to breathe.

“They don’t know us yet.” Rafe takes my hands, then frowns down at them. “We need to get these scratches cleaned up.”

I tug them away. “Later. The kids, Rafe.”

He smiles, his dimples deepening, his eyes turning to flaming gold. “Suddenly we have more kids than one.”

“Yeah.” I laugh softly. “I mean, I just want to help them.”

“I know, babe.” He’s still smiling, a full, bright smile that lights up his gaze.

“You look so… happy. After all this, after finding the kids, with Zane in such bad shape… Why?”

“Sorry.” He shoves his hands into his jeans pockets. “It seems to me… we found the end of the thread. Of the maze. Haven’t reached our happy ending yet, but we’re close, I can feel it.”

“You have the feeling everything will be all right from now on?”

He nods. “We’ll have to see how to help these kids, and make sure Kenneth Shaw lands in a prison so deep in the ground he never sees the light ever again. But meanwhile… we’ll start to mend. To heal.”

I rub my arms, suddenly feeling the cold, the pain in my scratched hands and elbows, the painful hammering of my heart against my ribs. “You’ve been so stressed because of this.”

“I had a lot of things on my mind. The Damage Control expansion, our collaboration with Soul Stain, the gym and training the guys, which I’ve neglected lately. The wedding coming up… and of course Zane, and Kenneth Shaw. And you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, you.” He gives me a rueful smile. “Having a baby before you were ready for it. This fear you had that something would happen. I’ve been damn worried and you know it.”

Christ. I hadn’t known, in fact. Didn’t realize he’d been so concerned about me. I thought I’d shown him how happy I was to have his baby.