He’d been attentive, helpful, and even went out of his way to go above and beyond to prove that he was there to stay.
But after that first day we’d arrived, when he’d told Mimi that he was raising a baby with me out of state and couldn’t help her with whatever was wrong… that had sealed the deal.
Whatever precipice I’d been teetering on when it came to deciding whether I’d give Bram a true chance or not completely disintegrated with that one phone call.
I held his hand as he guided me out of the office, both Marsha and Dutch watching with a smile on their faces.
Right outside the door, he collected his own food and offered me a wink.
They may not have met Bram, but I’d talked a lot about him over the last week as we’d gotten to know each other. Today might’ve been my first official day at the office, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t have a lot to say yesterday as I’d moved my stuff in, or two days before at the job interview with Dutch.
“Why were they both looking at me like that?” He grinned as he looked down at me.
I gestured to the park bench with our joined hands, then waited to explain until after I’d taken my seat.
“Dutch was talking about how she’d never dated a ‘blue collar’ guy before yesterday as I was getting my stuff inside the office after you dropped me off. She was impressed by your attire or something. The jeans you were wearing were really dirty, I guess because you were working on the grill before we left. She was also super impressed with your motorcycle, and she thought that you were an example of what her next ‘go to’ type of man should be. Apparently, she’s only dated business types,” I explained.
He grunted as he took a seat.
“She’s pretty,” he said. “But I could tell as soon as I saw her that she was high maintenance.”
“She’s probably the most down-to-Earth person I’ve ever met, high maintenance or not.” I smiled.
He snorted and gestured toward me to eat. “Eat, honey. You have a thirty-minute gap until your next patient.”
I wasn’t surprised he knew my schedule.
He’d been quite open and honest about snooping all day.
“I’m okay,” I told him.
The bruises that I’d gotten from that night were all gone. The lacerations from the gravel were also disappearing. The only thing that was left was a little ache in my right knee.
Hell, even the boot was gone. Had been since a few days after I’d put it on.
I was as good as new, mostly.
“I know.” He paused. “It just makes me jumpy, being here without having a clue what’s going on. Not having backup is weird, too.”
“There’s always Wake,” I teased.
Wake was an ex-con that’d just recently gotten out of prison.
As in, the week before I’d met him, recent.
He was a good guy, and from what I could tell, was just a victim of unfortunate circumstances.
At least, that’s what he came off as to me.
There were others in the town, like the sheriff, who didn’t think about him like I did.
Then again, I was a killer. I’d killed my own brother. Maybe Wake and I were kindred spirits.
Because that’s what he’d done. He’d gone on a killing spree and had killed every pedophile in a certain radius after his daughter had been harmed. Including the guy that’d harmed her.
Honestly, killing fourteen child predators seemed like a perfectly rational and explainable thing to do.
“Yeah, Wake’s been really good,” Bram agreed. “I like him.”
“You like him because he’s exactly like you,” I teased. “All badass, doesn’t give a fuck about anything, and would literally rip the balls off of anyone that hurt me.”
Bram smiled.
“That I’d do,” he admitted.
I bumped him with my shoulder, then started to eat.
Only a hint of nausea rolled through me.
I groaned as I got the first taste of fries for the first time in months.
“Holy shit.” I shoved more into my mouth. “These are amazing.”
He chuckled as he ate, watching me with amusement as I all but downed everything that I had. Then eyed his that he was still working on.
Without a word, he handed his fries over to me with a smile. “I can stop for more.”
He wouldn’t stop for more.
He didn’t have time.
But I was just so hungry.
I ate them all with a flourish and sat back against the bench’s back and groaned.
“Damn.” I rubbed my belly. “I think we found our new meal for a while.”
He chuckled as he started packing his trash away, and a tiny little flutter from my belly had me pressing my hand against my stomach.
“Can I feel?”
I blinked and looked over at Bram, who was looking so vulnerable in that moment that a little bit of my brick wall crumbled.
“Yes,” I agreed quickly. “I feel him inside… but outside…”
I pressed his hand to where I could feel the baby moving.
It felt like little gas bubbles at this point, but they were fluttery, fast, and I felt them all over. So I knew that they were the real thing.
I pressed two of his fingers in a little deeper and smiled when I felt the soft flutters.
“Feel it?” I wondered.
“No,” he sighed. “Soon, though.”
I moved my shirt up, then pressed his fingers against my bare flesh.
I all but groaned inwardly upon feeling it.
God, I wanted his hands on more than just my bare belly.
I wanted them on everything bare…
The last week with him in bed beside me had been torture.
“How about now?” I asked, looking over at him.
His eyes were closed tightly shut, and I wondered if he was feeling the same thing that I was.
“Nothing,” he croaked.
I looked down at where his hand was on my belly, splayed so wide that he almost encompassed my entire abdomen.
I smiled.
Then reached for my phone to take a picture.
“My hand’s dirty,” I heard him say as I got my phone out.
When he started to pull away with a grimace, I snapped my free hand forward and squeezed. When he got his hand back down to my belly with his fingers spread again, I pulled away.
His curious gaze was on my face.
I shrugged and took the picture. “I don’t care. Not even a little bit.”
CHAPTER 18
Physically thick and mentally sick.
-T-shirt
DORY
Later that night, as I lay in bed with Bram behind me, holding me close, I realized that I was going to have to make the first move.
He was respecting my boundaries. He was being courteous and polite.
He was slowly killing me inside.
I shuffled my legs again, causing his soft snoring to stop momentarily before picking back up again just as softly.
I’d always loved hearing him snore.
The comfort of knowing he was there, even to protect me in my sleep? That meant the entire world to me.
And he didn’t even know it.
He didn’t know that, just by being around, he was slaying one of the many demons that Amon instilled in me.
Truthfully, in the months that I’d been away from Bram, there’d been a whole lot of not sleeping going on. Sure, some of it was likely due to the fact that I’d been pregnant and didn’t know it. But there was also the fact that every little sound startled me. A creak? Wake up. A strong surge of wind causing the house to settle? Wake up.