Despite never keeping it where she could get to it, with it either on his person or locked in the safe, Sean still felt uneasy.
He didn’t enjoy feeling like he was living under siege. It couldn’t be good for the kids, either, much less his own stress levels.
In fact, as he started to get the gun out of the safe, he considered closing the door and not wearing it at all. Just telling Emery he had it when his man was sure to ask.
With a sigh, he picked up its deceptive weight and loaded rounds in the chambers. Then he took the holster and tucked it under his shirt, into his waistband. He couldn’t—wouldn’t—lie to Emery if he called and asked about it.
If something did happen and he wasn’t wearing it, he would feel even worse.
He was almost all the way downstairs when his phone rang in his pocket, making him jump. It was Emery. “Hey,” Sean said when he answered. “When do you think you’ll be here today?”
Emery sounded exhausted, aged. “We just turned off 75 onto River Road.”
That was a happy surprise. That meant they were less than thirty minutes away. “I wasn’t expecting you until later this afternoon. Did you get any sleep?”
“Not much. We left at five this morning. We wanted to try to miss the worst of rush hour traffic.”
“It’ll be good to have you home, dude.”
“Wyatt still there?”
“No. He just left. He said to call him when you needed him and he’d get Gus and they’d help us unload.”
“Okay. You wearing the gun?”
“Yes. I don’t like it, but I’m wearing it.”
“I’m sorry, babe. I feel better with you having it.”
Isla ran down the stairs and threw her arms around his legs. “Is that Daddy, Da? Can I say hi?”
“Hold on. Someone wants to say hi.” He held the phone for her while she babbled at Emery for a minute. Then she finished and let him take the phone back.
“I’ll see you in a few minutes. I’ll send the elevator down and leave the gate open.”
“Okay. Love you.”
Sean smiled. “Love you, too.” He hit end and slipped the phone back into his pocket.
“I’ll do it, Da!” Isla declared as she zipped out of the kitchen and over to the elevator and gate control panel. Standing on tiptoes, she punched the buttons while he walked into the kitchen to get their breakfast started.
* * * *
Erik watched as the alligator shifter left. The gate swung closed behind his car as he drove away.
That wasn’t much of a problem, because he could go around from the beach side. The stairs up to the living level, however, were the bitch. It looked like the damn house had an elevator, but he suspected that would be kept locked, likely accessible by key or special code.
Trying to get up those stairs on crutches would put him at risk of being seen or heard before he could surprise them. Although maybe he could catch them on the ground.
Hobbling slowly through the sand and brush, he made his way around the edge of the property and down to the beach. From there, he could see the elevator. Yep, the damn thing had a control panel on it with a number pad. That meant a lock.
Hell, it won’t hurt to try it.
As he started to work his way through the sea grapes at the edge of the property, staying out of sight of the house, he saw something that damn near made him giggle.
The elevator door slid open, and there wasn’t a soul around. As he looked, he saw the front gate opening, too.
Maybe my luck is finally changing for the better.
* * * *
Sean got the electric skillet heating while Isla went to the fridge and pulled out the jug of milk and carried it over to the island.
Then he heard Sofia making noises on the baby monitor.
Crap.
“Hey, sweetheart? Run upstairs and go look in on your brother and sister, okay? See if they’re really awake or—”
“Let them sleep. I know, Da.” She hurried for the stairs as Sean struggled not to laugh at her toddler ’tude. He laid his cell phone on the counter to get it out of his pocket. Besides, Emery would be home shortly anyway.
A moment later, he heard Isla softly open the nursery door, but she didn’t speak. Sofia didn’t make any other noises, either. He had half his attention on the baby monitor and the other half on fixing breakfast when he heard Isla close the door again and then walk down the stairs.
Whew. Crisis averted. Hopefully the twins would sleep until he could finish feeding Isla. He was dipping bread in the egg and milk mix when he heard Isla speak about the same time he heard the elevator come to life.
“Daddy!”
Yay, Daddy! He smiled to himself. Life could begin to level out, hopefully.
Now if they could just find whoever murdered Olivia and Brad, life would be peachy.
That was a buzzkill thought.
He heard the elevator arrive and the door start to open. It took him a second to process what Isla said.
“You’re not my Daddy,” she said, her tone sounding confused. “Who are you?”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Maybe it was instinct. Sean didn’t know. His body processed Isla’s comment before his brain did. When he inhaled, he’d been dropping a piece of bread onto the hot skillet, where the egg and milk wash coating the bread immediately began to sizzle.
As he exhaled, he realized he already had the gun in his hand and was running around the corner. As he rounded the turn, his feet slipped out from under him on the tile.
Erik, knife in hand, a crutch under his other arm, and a wild look on his face, was lunging out of the elevator and toward Isla, who’d started screaming.
Sean inhaled as he gave her a hard shove toward the stairs and brought the gun up. The first shot caught Erik in the shoulder. The second went wild and put a hole in the wall beside the elevator.
He exhaled.
The third round hit the back wall of the elevator, and still, Erik was coming despite being one-legged and using a crutch.
Blood roared in Sean’s ears, the only sound he could process now that the shots had temporarily robbed him of his hearing.
He inhaled.
The fourth shot hit Erik square in the gut and dropped him, but his eyes remained open and he was still sneering at Sean. The fifth went wild and blew a hole in the glass of the front door.
He exhaled and scrambled to his feet, scooping a screaming Isla under his arm as he ran for the stairs. At least, he assumed she was screaming. All he could hear was the roar in his ears from the shots.
Scratch that, someone else was screaming, and he realized it was him.
Fortunately, Isla had left the baby gates open so he didn’t have to jump them. Sean didn’t glance behind him until he hit the top of the stairs. Erik, still moving, although now slowly crawling and leaving a trail of blood in his wake, was heading toward the stairs.
Sean shoved Isla toward his open bedroom door and burst into the nursery. Jamming the gun into his pocket, he grabbed the now crying babies and rushed back into the hall toward his room.
Erik was three stairs up.
Isla had landed at the foot of their bed and was still screaming. Sean kicked the door shut and went to lay Julian on the bed so he could turn and lock the bedroom door. Then he grabbed Isla by the hand and yanked her into his bathroom. He set her in the tub and handed her Sofia.
“Baby, stop screaming. Right now. You have to be a big girl and hold your sister. Hold her close. Okay?”
Isla nodded, sniffling, and carefully clutched the crying infant against her even as tears rolled down her face.
He ran back to the bedroom and grabbed Julian, then snatched the comforter off the bed, and a couple of pillows, and took them into the bathroom. He put them in the bathtub and tucked Julian in next to Isla. “Take care of him, too.” He turned to go.
“Da, please don’t leave us!” He could barely hear Isla through the roar in his ears.
“Shh.??
? He held up his left finger to his lips as his trembling hand fumbled the gun out of his pocket. “Do not speak. Okay? You have to be very, very quiet.”
“Is that the bad man?”
He nodded and turned to go, locking the bathroom door knob before he pulled it closed behind him.
It wouldn’t stop Erik for long.
Hopefully, it wouldn’t have to.
The first pounding on the bedroom door came as Sean was fumbling the combination to the gun safe. The bedroom doors were solid wood, not that cheap hollow-core, cardboard crap, but Sean knew it wouldn’t hold long.
He finally got the safe open and only dropped three rounds before he managed to get the chambers emptied and refilled. When he felt his pocket for his cell, he swore, remembering it was downstairs on the counter.
And they’d never put in a land line.
They’d never needed one.
Dammit.
Another round of pounding on the door. Through the roar in his ears, he could make out Erik’s enraged, inhuman screams.
Sean inhaled.
Grabbing another handful of rounds and jamming them in his pocket, he walked over to the door.
“Erik! Get the fuck out of my house!”
Sean exhaled.
“Screw you, I’m gonna kill you and those fucking brats and then I’m killing Emery! He should have been mine! He should have been—”
Sean fired through the door.
He inhaled, the roar back with a vengeance and his hands shaking so badly he almost couldn’t hold the gun steady.
Another thump hit the door.
He fired again, aiming lower.
The two holes in the door were large enough he could see Erik now lying on the floor.
Exhale.
Erik’s eyes opened and he tried to sit up.
Sean emptied the gun into Erik through the door.
Inhale.
He dumped the spent rounds and refilled the gun again, dropping two bullets in the process. He spun the cylinder to confirm all the chambers were loaded before snapping it closed. He unlocked the door, jumping back, the gun pointed at the floor.
Exhale.
Erik lay in a spreading puddle of blood on the carpet just outside the door, still breathing.
Inhale.
Exhale.
That’s what Sean continued to do for the forever it took for him to finally hear Emery and Christopher rattle and pound on the front door. He couldn’t make out what they said, but he didn’t dare pull his focus away from Erik. Didn’t dare take his eyes off the fucker.
Emery yelled something, and finally the door opened as he must have dug his key out and used it. Sean was aware of them walking into the foyer and freezing, catching their movement in his peripheral vision.
Sean didn’t blink, didn’t move, didn’t dare stop watching Erik.
Emery, Chris behind him, pounded up the stairs and stopped at the top.
“Sean?”
Sean shook his head. He didn’t want to speak, didn’t want to answer.
He knew he’d start screaming and not be able to stop if he did.
Erik took another breath.
Emery said something to Christopher, who ran for the nursery and returned seconds later, shaking his head.
Emery pulled out his phone and dialed it and handed it to Christopher. Then he stepped forward, slowly, around Erik.
Erik took another breath.
Sean adjusted his grip on the gun, keeping it trained on the man’s torso. That was what Wyatt had told him, aim for the gut.
It’s the biggest, easiest shot. Enough lead in the gut will stop anyone, shifter or not.
Emery moved forward, toward Sean, one hand palm forward facing him, the other hand palm up and motioning him to hand over the gun.
Sean shook his head. “Not until the fucker’s dead.”
He didn’t dare say it out loud.
Emery replied through their mate-bond. “Where’s the kids?”
“Our bathroom. Safe.”
Erik took another breath.
“Babe, give me the gun.”
“No.”
“He’s dying.”
“He’s not dead yet. You can have the fucking gun when he’s dead. He’s not coming back this time.”
His hearing was starting to return a little. Chris hung up with whoever he’d been talking with. “He’s on his way back. Where are the kids?”
“Call 911,” Emery said. “They’re safe in the bathroom.”
“Got it.” Chris punched the number into the phone and headed down the stairs.
Sean risked a blink and thought he saw Erik take another breath.
“Back off, Emery. I’m not moving.”
“Babe, you need to give me the gun. The cops are on their way. They’ll take care of him.”
“If he’s alive, they’ll try to save him.”
“He’s dying. You’ve put…several holes in him.”
“Not enough.”
Emery stepped closer, mostly blocking Sean’s view of the fallen man. He spoke out loud. “Babe, you have to give me the gun. We have to take care of our kids.”
“Fuck you. I am taking care of our kids,” he silently replied.
Emery slowly reached forward, facing Sean, and put one hand on top of Sean’s gun and tried to push it to the side, away from him.
Erik opened his eyes.
“Move!” Sean screamed as Erik sat up, the knife still clutched in his hand and descending in an arc toward Emery’s leg.
Sean pulled the trigger, wordlessly screaming as he emptied the gun into Erik once more. This time the man fell back to the floor, limp.
Not breathing, and half his face gone. Somewhere, it smelled like smoke, but not from the gunfire.
Christopher charged up the stairs. Sean started to collapse against the doorframe, but Emery caught him and dragged him back into the bedroom, easing him to the floor.
Sean sobbed, screamed, his hearing again nothing but the roar of his blood in his ears.
He let Emery take the gun from him, but still he stared at Erik’s lifeless body.
Chris kicked the knife away from Erik’s hand and hesitated before leaning down to feel for a pulse in his neck. He looked at Sean. “He’s dead.”
Sean clutched Emery’s arm, sobbing and crying and screaming until his throat hurt. Even when Chris let in the deputies, who raced up the stairs, guns drawn, Sean was still screaming, Emery rocking him.
Chris handled the initial talking and apparently warned them that Wyatt was on his way, because a moment later, he was there, too.
Paramedics arrived. When they knelt next to Erik’s body, Sean screamed and tried to break free of Emery, wordless sobs for them not to touch the bastard, to leave him alone until he was stiff and cold and beyond-a-doubt dead.
Maybe only a couple of minutes had passed, he wasn’t sure.
Then Emery grabbed his face in both hands and kissed him, hard.
“You did it. He’s dead. It’s okay. You have to calm down.”
Sean let him kiss him, his screams and sobs fading away as he focused on his alive and healthy and safe mate.
Then he shoved Emery away and ran for the still-locked bathroom door. He stretched and grabbed the skeleton key from where they kept it on the molding over the door and barely managed to get it unlocked with his trembling hands. He tumbled through it, Emery and the others behind him.
In the tub, Isla had her arms wrapped around the crying infants, tears coursing down her face. “Where’s Puppy?” she screamed. “I want Puppy!”
Emery and Chris scooped up the twins while Sean grabbed Isla and squeezed her tightly against him, his face buried in her hair as he kissed her over and over.
Wyatt handed her something. “I wondered why he was downstairs all by his lonesome, Little ’Un. He barked at the deputies. We need to take him to training class, he gonna do that.”
She pulled the stuffed dog into her arms. “Thank you, Uncle Wyatt.”
/>
One of the deputies leaned in through the doorway. “They all right?”
Emery nodded. “I don’t want to take her out through there yet.”
“We need to speak to him though and get his statement.”
Isla sat up and touched Sean’s cheek with her tiny palm. “Da, you took care of the bad guy?”
He nodded and kissed her forehead before wiping her tears away. “I did, baby. He’s gone. Gone for good. He’s never coming back.”
“Is he the one who sent Aunt Olivia and Uncle Brad to the Goddess?”
He nodded. “We think so, sweetie.”
“Okay.” She looked at Wyatt. “Can I shoot him, too?”
“No, sugar. Your poppa did a right fine job of that all on his own. But you and me and Uncle Chris, we need to take care of the babies while Daddy and Da talk to the police. All right?”
She nodded. “All right.”
Sean was growing increasingly aware of a pain in his right shoulder, from when he’d hit the tile floor at the beginning of all this. He handed Isla off to Wyatt. But then she reached out and grabbed his arm when he tried to walk past them and out the door.
“Here, Da. Take Puppy with you. He’ll protect you.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
Emery carefully laid Sofia back in the tub, into the makeshift nest. Both babies were awake and staring and had stopped crying.
Sean stared out the bedroom door as the deputies talked to him, asking him what happened.
Then the smoke alarm in the kitchen went off.
“What the hell?” the deputy asked.
“Shit! The electric skillet in the kitchen,” Sean told them.
A deputy outside in the hall shouted downstairs to someone. A moment later, someone yelled back, “Got it. We took it out onto the deck. We’ll get some windows opened.”
Sean slumped onto their bed. “I was making French toast,” he said. He stroked Puppy with his left hand. Emery sat next to him and kept his arm around Sean’s shoulder. “All I wanted to do was to make her French toast for breakfast before the babies woke up.”
* * * *