Page 1 of Slow Burn
1
LEVI
I mean, shewaskind of cute. Dark reddish hair. Pretty eyes. Brightest green I had ever seen. Maybe she was more than cute. Looking up at me like that. My chest ached a little when I smiled down at that pretty face and she kind of smiled back.
Then she started crying. Never heard anything like that. Wailing, sobbing. Little face turnedpinkand her tiny hands shook in the air. Gasps shook her body and I panicked. I bent and scooped her up and just like that, she stopped. Beside me, I heard a sound of surprise.
“What was that dirty whore thinking?” I felt the need to protect the tiny ears of the baby I was holding.
“Jesus, Finn. Baby present, youdickwad.” Icooedat the baby like I knew what I was doing.
“Becausethat’sbetter than calling her whore mother what she is. Isabel did what now?”
“Left. Dropped heroffhere andbailed. Told me it was my turn. Didn’t want to be a mother.”
Apparently, I was a father.
Eightmonths ago, my wife Isabel walked out on me. Well actually, I walked in on her fucking a cop I thought was a buddy. Mistakenassumptionon my part. I mean, he was at our wedding reception. Then again so was half of the Chicago Fire, Rescue and Police force. Even the ones she had fucked her way through.
Clearly, she had not been finished. Finn, Cage and Hunter, all my closest friends at Ladder 71 had warned me about her. All three, except Cage, had a run at her. In fact, pretty sure Finn and Hunter shared her once or twice. I was an idiot but I thought I saved her from being that kind of girl. A fucking badge bunny.
Stupidest shit I ever heard, badge bunny. We didn’t even call them that, not really. They embraced the name though. Called each other bunnies and some of them, the invested bitches, got tattoos on their thighs of a bunny prints. That stupid tattoo was as bad as aScarlet A if you asked me.
I took a girl home a few weeks after Isabel left. Dropped to my knees, shoved her thighs open, ready to eat myself some retribution. Instead, I saw that tattoo on her thigh. Hard-on gone.I mean, I still let her suck my dick but it took some work on her part. She was a bunny, she knew what to do.
I was into Isabel for all the wrong reasons. Two being her filthy mouth and hergorgeoustits. I’m a tit man and hers were fucking amazing.Realones too, which made them even better. Besides the obviousthough, I thought I could save her. I don’t even know if I ever loved her, or loved the idea of her. Of making a whore into a housewife.
I think there’s a song about how well that works.
“What’s the nugget’s name?” Finn reached a hand out, his huge palm covering her whole head as he brushed her hair softly.
“Isabel didn’t tell me. Finn,” I looked up at him and sighed, “how do I even know the kid’s mine?” I held her to me even as I asked.
“You don’t. Does it matter right now?” We exchanged a look and I shook my head.
Finn Cooperwas kind of a dick, most of the time. But he was also one of the best guys I knew, deep down. Married life had tamed him. Really, his woman had tamed him long before they took the plunge. I knew whathisquestion meant; this tiny thing needed somebody.
I didn’t know if I could be that somebody. If I even wanted to be. I was afirefighter; my job put my life in danger every day. I’d spent a few months wallowing in heartbreak. Which meant lots of whisky and women. I didn’t know if I could be a father.I glanced over my shoulder as Cage Cooper, his brother-in-law and best friend, stepped into the room.
“What. The. Fuck?”Before I could object, he took the baby out of my arms, pressing her to his chest.
“Levi planted his seed. Isabel thinks growing a baby was the end of her part as a mother.” Finn smirked and moved with Cage, taking the baby a few steps away.
I can’t explain it, even though after that moment, I tried more than once to figure it out. I had no brothers or sisters. I was close to my parents but had been on my own since they had passed when I was a teen. We hadn’t made the time to talk about a family. But it seemed like now maybe, I was being given one anyway.
WatchingCage walkaway with that baby in his hands, I panicked. That was my daughter.My family. Mine. Besides, Cage was a one man basting machine trying to get his wifeCharlipregnant. Surprised his baby batter didn’t produce a football team of Coopers.The fuck didn’t need to bond with my spawn.
“Yeah...fuck Isabel.You can take it from here. What’s the midget’s name?” Cage asked me, but neither henor Finn ever looked away from that baby.
Can’t blame them. Little stinker was pretty darn cute.Chunky legs and cheeks aside, she was a pretty baby. Smiling up at those idiots, her bright eyes glistening, I thought she might be the prettiest baby I’d ever seen. My baby should be lovely, of course. God knows her whore mother was a stunner.
Too bad she used her powers for evil. Isabel had vanished for months and that cute little bundle gave me some answers to a few questions I’d had. Long before walking out on me, with child it would seem, things had been heading downhill, head first, and picking up speed.
“I don’t even know why I married you.”Iz said during one of the final, nastier, blow outs we’d had.
Just a few months into our marriage, I’d wondered the same thing, to be honest. Isabel was bright and bubbly, full of life. Funny and sweet, but also jaded and sometimes cynical. We were polar opposites; I thought it was a good thing.
“Just tell me why, bro. Give me a valid reason you did something so damn stupid.”Hunter, my boss and closest friend here in Chicago, asked when he found out I’d married her.
