Page 39 of B.D.E
I smiled. “We’re a fucking mess, friend.”
She laughed. “We really fucking are. You’re pregnant by a ghost and I’m sprung from a one-night stand.”
We sat there, reflecting how much our life had shifted in just these few weeks.
“What are we gonna’ do?” she whispered.
I sighed. “I don’t know, friend… At least we have each other.”
Tori and I continued small conversation before she eventually got sleepy and I showed her to the guest room to lie down. Sleep was nowhere in sight for me, so I curled up on the couch with my thoughts spinning out of control. I rested a hand on my stomach, still trying to process the truth that two pink lines couldn’t lie about. I was really pregnant. Telling Ghost was something I didn’t know how to do. He was already at war with something I couldn’t see so, the last thing I wanted was to give him another reason to run. I also knew I couldn’t keep this to myself much longer… he needed to know. I just didn’t know what it would cost me when he did.
CHAPTER 20
Ghost
I’d been tuckedin the tree line behind Gideon’s estate for over two hours… waiting. My legs were numb, and my patience was becoming razor thin, but I stayed put… watching them plan that I mapped out step by step being executed. Marcellus was a smart man, probably the reason Gideon kept him close, but he never paid attention to detail. Lately, he’d gotten to damn comfortable. It was almost too easy to slip out of the shadows two nights ago and rig his car with a heat-detonated bomb. I knew Gideon’s schedule like the back of my hand, and today was the day for his usual private meeting with Marcellus. I ain’t have shit against Marcellus but at the end of the day, he was a casualty of the war that Gideon had started. The friend of my enemy type shit.
I watched through my scope as he walked out of the house, completely unaware. He slid into the driver's seat of his Cadillac without a care in the world, then…
BOOM.
One press of the remote detonator and the car exploded like it was packed with TNT and soaked in gasoline. My dick twitched as I watched flames devour the vehicle, black smokespiraling into the evening sky. That boom wasn’t just a sound. It was a warning. Marcellus was Gideon’s right-hand man, the one he trust the most so, I knew it had to be him so that the message would be loud and fucking clear.
I’m coming.
I watched Gideon storm outside half-dressed, barking orders while his men scrambled in every direction like chickens with their heads cut off. Guns drawn, looking confused as fuck, but they never saw me. Gideon made the deadly mistake of coming for me and he would soon find out, how made shit was about to get. After the chaos unfolded and I’d seen enough, I slipped back down the slope and disappeared the way I came. Part one was complete. But now… now it was time for the grand fucking finale.
It was a short forty-minute drive back to Burnbridge, where I had Ivy tucked away. My adrenaline had me on a high, but underneath it all, I felt a sense of betrayal. The kind that I knew we would never come from. When it was all said and done, somebody had to die, and I knew like hell it wouldn’t be me. I pulled into the driveway a little past midnight and noticed Ivy had left the porch light on like she always did when I wasn’t there. It was a small gesture to let me know she was waiting. I parked and sat in the car for a few minutes to clear my head, then walked inside. She met me at the door wearing one of my t-shirts and some shorts that looked like they were eating her ass up and sleepy eyes. Her hair was tied back, and her glasses were slipping down her nose. I stared at her, admiring her beauty, and adjusting my dick in my pants. It was crazy how much I was turned on by everything about her.
“You almost missed me,” she said, stepping aside to let me in.
I grunted in response, as I walked to my office with her in tow behind me. I kicked off my boots and dropped the bag on the floor.
“You hungry?” she asked softly from the doorway.
I shook my head. “Nah. I’m good.”
She lingered like she had more to say but held it back. Right now, I was thankful for the silence. My head was already a war zone filled with thoughts of revenge and betrayal, and as much as I like Specs and wanted to pick up thick ass up and fuck the stress out against that wall… I wasn’t in the right headspace for her. I guess she felt it, cause’ she didn’t press me and further.
After showering and changing clothes, I stepped out onto the porch with a burner in one hand and a glass of cognac in the other. I was never the type of nigga to really drink because it was too risky in my line of work. A cloudy head could get a nigga killed in a heartbeat, but tonight… tonight I needed something to burn the edge off. Specs joined me a few minutes later, wrapped up in one of my blankets, her eyes soft but alert. We sat in silence, just listening tom the night talk.
“You seem… off,” she finally said. “Is everything ok, Ghost?”
I nodded, staring into the dark. “I’m straight, Specs. Ain’t nothing for you to worry your pretty little head about.”
She didn’t respond right away, just looked at me like she was trying to figure out how to peel the layers of up that I kept hidden. Crazy thing is, everything that I’d done with her leading up to know was some shit that I’d never done or ever saw myself doing in this lifetime.
“So, the explosion in the city… that was you, wasn’t it?”
I turned my head slowly, meeting her eyes. She wasn’t accusing me of it, she just… knew. Shit caught me completely off guard, but I was never the type of nigga to lie, and I wasn’t aboutto start now. I took a sip of the cognac, letting the burn sit on my tongue.
“What makes you ask that?”
She shrugged, her voice calm but steady. “I don’t know… I can just feel it. Your energy's different. Like you’re holding something in, and it’s damn near ripping you apart.” She pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders. “I don’t know exactly what happened tonight, but I feel like I know you… and I can tell you crossed a line you can’t come back from.”
I let out a low breath, more of a grunt than a sigh. “Yeah. That was me,” I admitted.
She nodded slowly, no judgment on her face. “Was it worth it?”
