Page 6 of American Hellhound
“Here.” He handed the gun to her. “Watch my six.” And wheeled his bike inside.
Maggie followed, walking backward, eyes scanning the dark street and yard behind them, the heft of the gun a comfort in her palm. She’d been a teenager the last time she asked him if this level of caution was really necessary in Knoxville, Tennessee, of all places. They didn’t exactly live a typical suburban life.
When the door was shut, she passed him the gun back and they trooped into the house via the laundry room. The .45 didn’t go back in its holster until Ghost had walked through every room, looked in every closet and behind all the shower curtains.
Maggie closed the pantry door and pressed her hand against it as she heard him come into the kitchen behind her.
“All clear,” he said, and then let out a deep exhausted sigh. “Jesus Christ,” he muttered.
She turned around to face him and let the door hold her weight, unsteady on her feet all over again.
Ghost stood with his hands braced on the back of a chair, wedding band catching the light, the gray standing out along his temples. It struck her hard, the contradiction: the way he seemed every one of his hard-lived fifty-two years, and the scared-to-death twenty-seven-year-old she’d fallen in love with at the same time. It was a genetic trait he’d passed along to his son. The way he grew and grew, and didn’t grow at all. In so many ways, the club was harmful to him. But it was something that lived deep in his blood, that he’d never be able to cut out of his veins.
He lifted his head to look at her, and it hit her all over again, like it so often did, how very much she loved him. If the club was his disease, then he was hers. Neither of them seemed in want of a cure.
“That dog,” he said, voice heavy. “The one in the picture? I’ve seen it before.”
Her heart stuttered with alarm.
“It’s been hanging around Stella’s. I’ve seen it a few times, when I was with the guys. And last week, I…” His voice faltered. “I saved it a bit of muffin and fed it on my way out.”
“The poor thing.”
“I think someone saw me do that. I think…” He trailed off. They both knew what that meant. Someone was stalking him. Or them. Someone was paying attention.
Maggie took a deep breath. “Kenny.”
His gaze tightened, zeroed in on her face.
“I was gonna break this to you slowly, but, well.” She sighed. “Fuck. I’m pregnant.”
~*~
Maggie was reaching for the aspirin when Ghost finally blinked. “I’m not having a heart attack,” he said, voice tight.
“Well, you’re having something. Because you’ve been standing there for…” She checked the time on the microwave. “Ten minutes.”
“I’m thinking.”
“Right.”
He sighed and moved around the chair to sit in it, elbows braced on the table and face in his hands. “Jesus,” he muttered through his fingers.
“A little presumptuous, but alright, I’ll put it on the list of names,” Maggie deadpanned.
He let his hands fall down to the table and sent her a look that was part-apology, part-panic. “I’m sorry, baby.”
“You should be.” She was proud of the way her voice didn’t shake, because inside, she was terrified. She’d suspected for a few days now, and she’d learned for sure tonight, but it wasn’t until now, saying it to her husband, that it hit her in full: she was pregnant. It wasn’t the fear of motherhood – no, that had no part in it – but a fear of the unknown future. A fear that this pregnancy, at forty-one, might not go as smoothly as the first. That the club was about to start another war. That Ghost would find no love in his heart for another child, not at this age, with these kinds of distractions around him.
One corner of his mouth tucked back, a careful expression as his eyes moved over her. “Are you okay?”
“I threw up in the middle of my interview,” she said, sagging back against the counter. “But I managed to hit the trash can. So. Yeah. Guess so.”
His brows lifted. “You know what I meant.”
“I’m fine. I just…” She didn’t want to explain it to him, suddenly exhausted. “Yeah. I’ll make a doctor’s appointment for this week and go get checked out.”
Ghost nodded and stared at her a moment, gaze hard to read – even for her, who prided herself on reading him so well. He stared, and stared…and then got to his feet suddenly, quickly, and walked toward her in a handful of long strides.
