Page 175 of Secondhand Smoke

He grabbed her knee and squeezed, holding her in place. The blankness fell away from his face and he looked distinctly worried this time.

Emmie had to smile as she covered his hand with her own. “I’m not pitching some kind of girl fit, I promise. Horse chick, remember?I’mthe one botheringyou, so I’m gonna go home and help with feeding. You have important bad guys to take down.”

“Em,” he said, tone serious. “I didn’t…ah, shit. Look, I’m forty. And this is my first time being married.”

She bit down hard on the inside of her cheek. “I know that.”

“So I’m not any good at being married,” he said, tone apologetic. “I don’t – I dunno. Sometimes I don’t act like a husband. It’s not that I mean it–”

She cut him off with a smile. “It’s alright. You do a pretty good job.”

Baldly, without malice or agenda, he said, “I haven’t ever thought about kids. I don’t hate them, but I didn’t figure I’d have them. And the things that have been going on with the club, bringing babies into that scares me shitless.”

Emmie nodded, a heavy stroke of tenderness and understanding passing across her heart. “I know, baby. It scares me too. Probably not as bad as you. But still.”

“I’m not a tyrant, lovey,” he said, quietly. “If you really want them, I’ll make it happen.”

“Gonna knock me up with one wave of your magic wand?” she asked with a quick laugh. She sobered, though. Sighed, overwhelmed with love for him, touched with reality and sadness. “It’s okay,” she assured him. “Who knows if I’d even be a decent mom anyway.”

“Emmaline.”

“Ihatewhen you call me that. Kingston.”

“I hate when you talk bad about yourself,” he countered. “Put all those stupid ideas out of your head. It’s just one question, pet. Do you want them, yes or no?”

She stared at his face, his strange pale eyes and the deep lines the sun and wind had pressed around them. She didn’t really have to ask herself; it was all just anxiety talking. “Yes. I want them.”

“Then we’ll have them.”

~*~

He was back at The Nest. The slinky black and white interior, the low lights filtered with blue, and red, and pink. He could smell the cigar smoke and hear the deep rumbles of male laughter. He was at the edge of the stage. A hand curled around his ankle.

He screamed.

His eyes opened.

Daylight. Ceiling. Food smells. Flat on his back.

Not The Nest.

But he was in fact screaming. He closed his mouth and when his teeth clenched together, pain shot through his skull, bright flashes of agony.

“Oh God,” a female voice said, and suddenly there was a face hovering above him.

He recognized that face. Through the increasing fog of pain that closed over him more tightly by the second, he registered the big blue eyes, the dark hair, the petite features.

“Whitney?” His voice was an awful croak.

An uncertain smile brightened her expression. “Yeah. Hi. Are you okay? What can I get you?”

He licked his lips – they were dry, split; he tasted blood. “Where are we?”

Quick breath of sound: a door opening. Not the angry clang of the cell door sliding back, but a regular house door, gliding over carpet. And then: “I heard him scream. Kev, you alright, baby?”

“Mags,” he said, and the panic began to ebb.

She joined Whitney, looking down at him, pretty face lined with maternal concern. “You’re at my house,” she said, as if anticipating what he needed to know. “You’re safe.”

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