Mystery Man (Dream Man #1)(135)

He silently climbed the staircase, turned right and moved through the large open space at the top, one of the many family zones. He didn’t see the pictures but he knew they were there. Gwen decorated in photos. She wasn’t a knick knack sort of woman, thank f**k.

Hawk liked the way his wife decorated. There were pictures everywhere, on every surface, on all the walls, hell, you could barely see the fridge for the photos tacked to it. There were pictures of her, of him, of their two boys, their families, their friends – alone, in pairs, in huddles, all candid, nothing posed, nearly every photo everyone was smiling.

Or laughing.

And there were pictures of Simone and Sophie. Gwen had conspired with his mother and made certain Simone and Sophie had their places amongst her décor and his woman decorated in family.

It took awhile to get used to this, it took awhile for the pain of seeing them every day to dull. Then it dulled. Then he saw what was in the photos instead of felt the loss of it. And what was in the photos were memories. Those memories were bittersweet but, with time, and with Gwen’s guidance, the sweet outweighed the bitter.

Hawk turned right again at the first door.

He walked in and saw Asher asleep in his bed on his belly wearing loose shorts and a t-shirt, his black hair a mess, his limbs splayed, taking up more space than any four year old kid should in a double bed. The covers had been kicked off. Even as a baby, he’d kicked off his covers. Ash liked to be free. No restraints. Even in sleep. Hawk’s Mom said he’d done the same thing and Hawk learned not to be surprised at this.

Asher was his boy in more ways than one. Ash was intense, always had been from nearly the instant he left Gwen’s womb. And if Hawk was home, Asher was with him. From the second he could crawl, when Hawk opened the door to the house, Asher would be sitting on his ass, staring at the door, waiting for his Dad to walk in. It wasn’t clingy. Even as an infant, Asher had been able to entertain himself.

He just liked to do it close to his Dad.

Hawk walked to him and bent, doing what he did frequently, in fact every night he got home when his boys were asleep. He rested his hand light on the heat of his son’s back and felt him breathe. Once his son’s life communicated itself through Hawk’s hand, he lifted that hand and slid it over Asher’s thick hair. Then he left the room, crossed the hall and entered another door.

Bruno was on his back, one arm thrown wide, one knee up and dropped, the other leg straight, hand on his belly. Covers half-on, half-off. The stuffed bear with an ill-fitting Broncos t-shirt had fallen from his outstretched hand.

Bruno sat quietly on his Granddad’s lap during every Broncos home game. It was f**king uncanny but Hawk could swear his two year old son’s study of the game was more intense than Bax’s. Even if a game was on TV, Bruno would stop, sit his ass down and stare at it. If he was awake, he was wearing a football helmet and if Hawk or Gwen tried to take it off him, the kid pitched one helluva fit. So they let him wear it everywhere but to the dinner table and to bed. This was a good call considering when Bruno wasn’t eating, watching football on television or wrestling with his brother, he was tackling shit.

Hawk bent, his hand going to Bruno’s chest, resting lightly and his eyes roamed his son’s face as his hand felt his son’s heartbeat.

Both his boys looked like him, black hair, black eyes. Bruno got his dimples and Gwen praised the Lord loudly, and hilariously, that he did and she did this often. Nearly every time she saw them which was a lot. Bruno, like his Mom, liked to laugh and, like his Mom, he did it often.

At that memory, Hawk smiled at his son.

His wife liked her husband’s dimples. Hawk just liked his son’s.

He walked out of the room and his cell went. He headed to the master suite pulling it out of a pocket of his cargoes. He turned the display to face him and his brows knit.

It said “Gwen Calling”.

He didn’t answer as his eyes went to their door, seeing weak light coming from under it.

She was awake. This was surprising. It was late.

Fuck.

She was nearly nine months pregnant with their, what Gwen decreed, final child. She’d decreed this because the ultrasound showed it was a boy. She was done. Giving up the ghost. She had a lifetime ahead of her of fights, blood, drunkenness, puke and pregnancy scares. She wasn’t going to make it worse.

This was why he let her name their kids. Deacon was gestating in her belly. Hawk didn’t like the name Asher until Asher made it into the world. He really didn’t like the name Bruno until he met Bruno. And he seriously didn’t like the name Deacon but he reckoned he’d grow to like it.

His mother had a hand in these names but Hawk didn’t complain. He saw the signs with Asher’s intensity and Bruno tackling everything. Gwen was f**ked.

He shoved the still ringing phone in his pocket as he twisted the knob and opened one of the double doors to the master suite.

Hawk walked through and stopped dead.

The bedside light on Gwen’s side was on. The covers thrown back. The bed empty. A pool of blood was in the bed, a trail of it leading to the bathroom.

“Cabe, honey, you get this, go to the hospital.” He heard his wife’s voice, jerked out of his freeze and ran to the bathroom. “Something’s wrong. I’m calling…”

She stopped talking when he hit the bathroom and her head came up to look at him. She was sitting in her nightshirt on the floor, one arm around her swollen belly, one shapely leg straight, the other bent under her, her long, thick, blonde hair down and tousled, her blue eyes pained, her gorgeous face ashen, blood pooling around her on the black and white tiles.