Bucking Bear (Pounding Hearts 3)

Dale has my gear in his hands as he hands me my phone. “You need to call Grace, Max. She called me and asked for you to call her as soon as you can.”

What the fuck?

Grabbing my phone, I see two messages for me to call her as soon as possible and two missed calls. What the fuck happened?

Dialing her number, it barely rings once before she picks up. The guys are all surrounding me, and out of the corner of my eye I see Brett making a phone call. He peels away from us as well.

“Max?”

“What’s going on, baby?”

“Can you come home?” she asks and I can hear a crying Hope in the background. What the fuck? Hope is supposed to be with Carson right now.

“What’s wrong? Why is Hope with you?”

“Please come home, Max. Hope has been crying for you and won’t stop.”

“Let me talk to her?” I ask softly.

I don’t know what happened bu

t shits not good. I nod to the guys as I walk towards the door. Brett is striding right beside me though. He has a really pissed off look on his face and I bet he is talking to Mandy. Hope first then I will get the story.

“Be…Bear…I got hurts… He pushed me and…and Mommy down. I got lots of cuts.” Her words aren’t nearly as clear as they should be, that’s because of all the tears and sniffling I hear.

Hope is normally extremely well spoken, I rarely if ever have to have her repeat words.

“I’ll be home soon, little bear. Can you be really strong like me and give your mommy a hug?”

“Yeah. I don’t want to leave again? Okay?”

“Leave? What do you mean?”

“I don’t want to go to Carson, he hurt us bad.”

“I’ll be right there, baby. Put Mommy on the phone.” I don’t want to promise something I can’t deliver to her. No matter how much I want to make it so, I can’t endanger Hope. She needs Grace as her mother and home.

Looking behind me, I see all the guys surrounding me as I am about to get in my SUV. Brett is disconnecting right as Grace says, “Thank you, she has been so upset.”

“I’ll be home as soon as possible.”

“I love you, Max. Please drive carefully.”

Disconnecting the phone, I look to Brett. “What’s the story?”

“Carson got pushy with Grace. Apparently he was pushing way too hard to get Grace to get back with him. He saw a hickey or something and went ballistic. Pushed Grace down, and Hope was hanging onto her leg and fell with her.”

At this he looks at me. “They are okay, but Hope is freaking out. Grace is in full mommy mode and Mandy is trying to get the sharpest knife she can to castrate the fuck.”

“Got it.” I swing into the SUV and tell them. “I’ll call you guys in a bit. I need to get home and take care of Hope and Grace.”

“No doing anything stupid, Max.” Dale says quietly. “After the fight we will go hunting for the fuck, but not now.”

Shrugging my shoulders, I say, “He hurt my girls, Dale. I’ll be smart but I can’t promise anything.”

Chase waits until I have the door shut before he knocks on the window. Rolling it down, he waits until I nod. “I got some spots back behind my house.”

That’s it, nothing else. He just turns away from me and walks over to his black Impala.