Page 23 of Breeding Justice

“You have the hands for it. What happened?”

“Someone shot me,” I said. “I had to have surgery and now I’m hoping my liver is going to just grow back. I just got lucky.”

Her gaze sharpened, catching on the word “lucky.” The tension in her posture said she didn’t buy it. “Sure doesn’t sound like it.”

Jade cocked her head, her eyes narrowing. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure,” I said. “Shit, sorry. I think I got blood on your mirror.”

“I can wash that,” Jade said, stepping into the bathroom. “You have more prescient things to worry about.”

That was true. “What was your question?”

“What’s the surgeon-to-gangster pipeline?” she asked. “Or are you a surgeon because you’re from a mafia family and they needed a doctor?”

I chuckled despite the dull throb in my side. “Not quite. I didn’t grow up in the life, if that’s what you’re asking. I became a surgeon because I was good at it. Got pulled into all this because…” I hesitated, searching for the right words. “Because people I care about needed me.”

Jade handed me a clean towel, her expression thoughtful. “So, you’re not the kind of guy who gets dragged into a gunfight willingly, then?”

I shrugged, dabbing at the fresh stitches with the towel. “Depends on who I’m dragging myself in for.”

“Are they the reason you’re in it? Hassan, the baby?”

I took a second to think. “No,” I said. “They’re family. And Justice and Skylar and Bash are family too.”

I didn’t think she needed to know that Justice was my girlfriend and that Skylar was my boyfriend. It was none of her business, but it was also a complicated thing to explain—something that I had a hard time even wrapping my own head around.

“Many years ago, I was going out with this man. Everett.” My voice was quieter now, the weight of the memory making it harder to continue. “It was serious. I loved him. But he had a life I knew nothing about, and one day, someone shot him. He came to my emergency room. My hospital. One of my coworkers told me he was dead as my shift ended. I left the ER and Bash was there. He offered me weed. We smoked together on the worst night of my life… I don’t know where I would be without him.”

Jade’s eyes widened, and for a moment, the sharp wit in her expression softened into something more human. “Well, shit,” she said, her voice carrying a note of genuine surprise.

I gave her a small, tired smile. “Yeah. That about sums it up.”

She leaned against the bathroom doorframe, her hand absently resting on her belly. “So, this guy, Bash…he pulled you into all of this?”

“Not exactly,” I said, adjusting the fresh bandage over my side. “He didn’t ask me to do anything. But when you lovesomeone, really love them, you find yourself doing things you never thought you would. At first, I just wanted to keep him alive. He needed a man of my skills. Then Skylar got involved, then Hassan. Then Justice…before I knew it, they weren’t just patients. They were my life.”

Jade nodded slowly, like she understood more than she let on. “It sounds…messy. And dangerous.”

“It is,” I admitted. “But I can’t imagine walking away from it now. Not when they need me.”

“And now there’s a toddler in the mix.” She tilted her head, her gaze steady. “That’s a lot of people depending on you, Zane.”

I sighed, running a hand through my hair. “Tell me about it.”

Her smirk returned, though it was gentler this time. “Sounds like you’re the glue holding everyone together.”

“More like duct tape,” I muttered. “Barely holding, but good enough for now. But you get it, don’t you? You’re ageneticist? And you’re pregnant with Dante Moretti’s baby?”

She didn’t answer right away, and the silence stretched just long enough to make me glance up at her. Her gaze was fixed somewhere past me, her expression unreadable.

Jade’s hand lingered on her belly, her gaze distant. “You’re giving me too much credit,” she said finally, her voice quiet but steady. “I didn’t know what I was getting into. Not even close.”

I raised an eyebrow, letting her continue.

“I knew Dante was… different,” she said, her words deliberate. “But I thought ‘different’ meant intense, maybe secretive. I didn’t think it meant… this.” She gestured vaguely, as though encompassing the entire surreal situation: the danger, the blood, the alliances.

“But you still…I mean, look, I’m prying. You’re an adult. Your family planning is none of my business.”

---