Page 46 of Buried

“How do you plan on telling her?” I asked, referring to Adelaide.

Tristan sighed. “I don’t fucking want to, River. She doesn’t need to worry about how much longer she has with me while she’s pregnant and trying to take care of Axel. Fuck, man, she can have Jaxon any damn day now.” Tristan looked over at me with tired eyes, and I realized right then how much he had been hiding from all of us. He looked fucking exhausted, like living was justtoo much for him to do anymore. “I know you tell her just about everything, River, but I don’t want her to know this. Don’t breathe a fucking word about this in her direction.”

I blew out a harsh breath, knowing that what he was requesting was going against everything I believed in. I never kept shit from Adelaide. I told her everything. She and I had one hundred percent honesty with each other.

“River, I mean it. It’s my one fucking death wish,” Tristan told me. “I just want her to relax as much as she can. Can I please just let her have that after all of the shit that I’ve done to her?”

Since Tristan finally saw what the fuck his selfishness did to her, he’d been different—gentler with her. He was careful about trying his best to stay calm, though they both always had a way of pressing the other’s buttons.

Honestly, Joey punched Tristan in the face one day when Tristan and Adelaide were arguing about her needing to eat. When Tristan had angrily told her that she was a selfish mother, Joey had snapped and knocked Tristan unconscious. I hadn’t been close enough to do it myself. But I did get my ass over there to hold her as she cried.

Adelaide ate when she was hungry, and Joey and I both knew that. Tristan had just been his normal, overbearing asshole self.

But despite him being an asshole, I would give him his one, dying wish, even if I didn’t fucking like it.

I ran my hands down my face and nodded. “Alright, Grim,” I grumbled. “I won’t tell her.”

He nodded in thanks and pushed himself up off of the bed with a groan, his arms shaking. He was getting weaker with each daythat passed. It wouldn’t be long before Joey and I stood next to Adelaide as she set up funeral arrangements for him.

“Let’s go before she gets suspicious,” Tristan grumbled as he walked toward the door, forcing his body to stand straight like he always had, no sign of how sick he actually was showing through his mask. And when he turned to look at me, his eyes gave nothing away except the confidence and dominating attitude he’d always had.

Finally, he was doing something for her, even if it was damn near too late.

Sighing, I followed him from the room, his request weighing heavily on my shoulders.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Adelaide

River wrapped an arm around my waist as soon as he stepped up behind the bar and pulled me against him, pressing his lips to mine. I gripped his cut in my fists, tugging him up harder against me—well, as far as I could manage with my large belly between us. He pulled back and pressed a gentle kiss to the tip of my nose, a smirk on his lips.

“Always so fucking needy,” he teased, his eyes gleaming with mischief.

I opened my mouth to tell him my high sex drive was all because of him, but then something crashed in the kitchen before the sound of something heavy falling to the floor reached my ears. “Fuck! River!” Reina screamed from inside of the kitchen.

We both rushed inside, and my heart stopped at the sight of Tristan passed out on the floor. “Tristan!” I screamed, shoving past River. I fell to my knees beside him, shaking his shoulders. Panic clawed at my throat, fear filling my veins. “Fucking wake up, Tristan!” I screamed.

This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t lose him. God, no, not today. Please let him live long enough to meet Jaxon.Please.

“Tristan, don’t you dare fucking leave me!” I screamed, tears pouring down my cheeks.

I vaguely registered Sam talking to a 9-1-1 operator, but I was too focused on Tristan. River pressed his fingers to Tristan’s pulse, nodding something to Sam. I gripped Tristan’s pale face in my hands, tears blurring my vision, making it so hard to see him. I sobbed. “Tristan, please!” I wailed, something in my gut telling me that this was bad. Really fucking bad.

My gut was telling me what my heart wanted to deny.

I was losing him. This was it.

I had no idea how long I screamed and cried and begged, pleaded with a God who never gave a damn about me, but suddenly, paramedics were rushing into the kitchen. River tried pulling me back from Tristan, but I screamed at him to let me go, to put me the fuck down.

“Darlin’, come on. Let them get to him. They have to help him, Adelaide,” River told me soothingly.

“River, let me go!” I screeched. “Tristan!” I yelled, sobs wracking my chest. “Tristan!”

“Patient is breathing. Pulse strong. Get me a stretcher,” one of the paramedics ordered.

I shook my head, crying so hard, I could barely breathe. “Darlin’, come on. Stay with me,” River begged me, but I was losing it.

“No!” I wailed when they lifted Tristan onto a stretcher. I tried getting up, but River held me with him on the floor. “Tristan, please, God,no!” I screamed.

---