Page 22 of Going Dark

"Give me my god damn money or I will kill her! Or maybe I'll end you and find out if I can make some of that money back by putting your bitch to work for it. Is that what I should do, Ace? I mean she said she didn't want you so maybe she wants to try out other men and see how she likes being the camp whore."

Son of a bitch has a death wish if he thinks he is touching what’s mine and walking away. My fucking ghost will come back and kill him before I let him hurt one hair on her head like that. My eyes catch hers and I see her lips move. She mouths the words I'm sorry. Tears are coming down her cheeks and I could kill this fucker with my bare hands - rip his fucking heart from his chest and not think twice about it.

"I love you." The words break my heart and cause my hand to shake.

"Aww...," Merrick is about to make fun of her vow to me when a cry beside him takes his attention away from me for a split second. Beside him, Jack has one man dead at his feet and the second wrestled to the ground. Steve uses the diversion to attack the man holding Ana by all but flinging himself on him taking all three of them to the ground. Merrick senses the time for monologuing like a supervillain is over and takes the gun away from Evie's head and points it at me. She elbows him in the stomach while at the same time pushing his hand away so I am not the target when his gun goes off. She drops to the ground and I take my shot putting a hole in the guy before he can take his next breath.

Given that there were so many guns it's amazing how quiet the end is. Only two shots were fired the entire time, mine and Merrick's. I run to Evie and take her in my arms before I check on the others. My first need is to make sure she is alright. When I get to her I slide to a stop. She's still sitting in the dirt with tear stains on her cheeks with a bruise forming on her temple - the bastard. I look over and see Jim grabbing his arm and blood coming out from between his fingers. I'm about to go help him when he waves me off.

"Flesh wound. Nothing to worry about. Is he alive?"

I check on Merrick, taking Evie with me. I can't let her go now that I have her safe with me. Merrick's chest is moving rapidly and he's giving off a wheezing rattle. "Yeah, but he won't be that way for long."

I look over to make sure Steve has Ana and he's doing the same thing I am with Evie. Checking over her to make sure she's not hurt. She's crying and falls into him to hide her face and he looks over at me with round eyes that look a little scared. The guy can take down a three hundred pound man barehanded but seeing my sister cry is scaring the fuck out of him. The guy who had her is lying beside them with his neck at an odd angle and I am one hundred percent sure Steve broke it for touching Ana. Jack is standing over the two he took out, his gun back in his hands. He's looking up and down the street to make sure no one else comes to try to finish what Merrick couldn't.

Jim is right next to Merrick. "Who hired you?"

"You know." His voice is thin and thready and sometimes no sound comes out. "You...took...the money."

"Actually, I didn't. That was a bluff. I lied my ass off." I feel more than hear Evie's gasp. Hell, even I am impressed with this one. I could have sworn Archer was telling the truth about having this guy's money. "Anyone who’s worked with me understands I'll do anything to get the job done - especially when it comes to protecting my men. Now, who hired you?"

Merrick grins and his teeth are covered in bright red blood. Fucker is drowning on his own blood and it couldn't happen to a better person. Blood gurgles up out of his mouth and he loses his grin right before the light goes out in his eyes. Jim lets loose a string of curse words that would make a sailor blush.

"Sorry, boss."

"Never be sorry for protecting what's yours, Ace. More will come and when they do we'll find what we need."

His words about more coming make me pull Evie closer to me. She buries her face in my chest and clutches me so tight my shirt will never be the same and I wouldn't change a fucking thing. I pull her head up so I can check to make sure she is alright.

Big wet eyes meet my own. "I lied. I want all of that with you," I know exactly what she is talking about without her having to go into detail, "but I’m so afraid of losing someone else again. I love you. I'm so sorry I was so mean and I lied to you."

"No baby, it's me that should be sorry. I left you alone when you needed me the most and I'll spend my life trying to make up for that." I'm not just talking about this time but every other time I wasn't there for her. "I'm so fucking sorry I brought this to you. I'd like to say I'll leave and let you go back to your safe, normal life," her fingers curl into my shirt harder and she shakes her head hard, "but I'm not going any-fucking-where, baby."

"Will you give me another chance? Will you give wanting a family with me another chance?" her eyes plead with me.

"What did I tell you baby, we waited long enough for us. I'm not about to let you being scared keep us from having what's ours for another second."

She wraps herself around me and kisses me, telling me with her body that she loves me. Whispering the words into my ear just in case I might not understand what her body is saying. I let her keep kissing me out on her front lawn as Jim goes into Commander mode and starts making phone calls to have the bodies removed and the evidence that anything happens to break up the suburban monotony that I am looking forward to getting back to.

It's not over. Like Jim said more will come but that's someone else's fight. I'm done fighting. All I'm doing is making sure my Evie and any growing family we have is safe and taken care of. I look around at the men standing around us. I don't have a moment of doubt that they will find who is behind wanting our team put down or that they will handle the situation when they find out. All I want to do is start planning a nursery and maybe adding on to the house so we can fit more kids in it one day.

Epilogue I

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Ace

One month later:

I stroke into Evie as she sits in front of me in the cockpit of the airplane I am working on. She's out of school for the summer and spends a lot of her days here with me, watching me work on this thing to make it flyable again. The threats to the men have been more targeted now. Word is out that whoever they send to try to kill us better be good or desperate. Jim had a lot to do with that. I'm not sure what he did with the bodies, nor do I really want to find out, but the word is definitely out there now.

Her little moans and cries make my dick throb harder inside of her. Having her on my lap like this is more than I could have ever hoped for a couple of months ago. Mom's fucking tickled pink. She is already planning the wedding. I would like to wait until things calm down a little before I say I do but things may not be able to keep that long. I wrap my hand around Evie's stomach. I still haven't wrapped it up and she hasn't asked me to. In fact, she has been telling me to cum inside of her more and more like she can't get enough. It's bound to happen one day and when it does me and my Evie will handle it just like we do everything else. We'll fight over who knows better and then we'll love each other until both of us want whatever makes the other one happy.

"Oh Sasha," when she says my name like that she is close. It makes my balls draw up tight to my body ready to give her my load when her body asks for it.

Feeling how warm and wet she is makes me fuck her harder. Lately, she's been soaked as soon as I have her panties off of her, ready for my fat cock to plow through her tight, tender little pussy.

"I'm close, baby. I'm so close, Sasha."

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