Inked Babies: Epilogue to Inked Brotherhood Read online

  Inked Babies

  The Inked Brotherhood Epilogue

  By Jo Raven

  Inked Babies (The Inked Brotherhood Epilogue)

  Jo Raven

  Copyright © Jo Raven 2016

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, events, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Photographer: Eric Battershell

  Models: Burton Hughes and Coco Liliana Hughes

  Cover by Jo Raven

  Blurb

  Five brothers in all but blood, five girls who love them, emerging from a past fraught with darkness and danger. There are wedding bells, and baby cries and laughter all around. They have found their happy ending.

  Only one cloud is marring these blue skies, and it has to do with Zane, the rock of the Brotherhood. Nobody knows exactly what is wrong, but here’s the thing, folks:

  There are five of us, and we stand all for one and one for all. If you mess with one of us, you mess with all of us. We protect our own.

  And Zane is more than one of our own. He’s our leader. He’s our steady center. If our center shatters, we all shatter.

  This Brotherhood is strong. We’re gonna find out what troubles him and put it to rest, once and for all, bury it, stomp on it, crush it until it’s fixed or gone.

  Time we celebrated our happy ending.

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  Table of Contents

  Front Page

  PART I

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Part II

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  PART III

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  PART IV

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Chapter Twenty Six

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  Part V

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty One

  Chapter Thirty Two

  Chapter Thirty Three

  Chapter Thirty Four

  Chapter Thirty Five

  EPILOGUE

  The FUCKER Cocktail

  Acknowledgments

  JO SAYS…

  AUTHOR BIO

  PART I

  Tyler and Erin

  This Bastard Loves You

  Chapter One

  Tyler

  “Jax, where are you, buddy?” A small, blue jacket in one hand and a dino-themed hood in the other, I wander through the apartment, checking first inside the bathroom, then his bedroom. “Time to go.”

  If you’d told me two years ago that I’d be getting ready on a Sunday morning to take my six-year-old son out, I’d have laughed in your face and given you the finger. I wasn’t in a good place back then, and that’s a fucking understatement.

  Look at me now.

  Grinning, I stop to shake my head at myself, tell myself to take a breath and allow my chest to expand with happiness, before I open the door to the only room left.

  “There you are,” I tell Jax who’s standing by the crib, pulling faces at the baby. “Didn’t you hear me calling?”

  “She’s so funny,” he says in way of reply, and I have to agree with him that baby Isabella is more interesting than I am.

  “Yep.” I lean over the crib and gaze at my daughter who’s wiggling and staring back at us with huge, dark eyes and rosy cheeks just like Erin’s. “And although right now she looks just like a squirrel, cheeks stuffed with nuts, one day she’ll be pretty like her mom.”

  Jax giggles.

  Said mom, who’s currently brushing her hair, sitting on the bed, laughs, a sound I’ll never get tired of hearing. “Flattery will get you kissed,” she warns.

  “Ew.” Jax makes a face at the prospect, but I’m beside her in two strides to claim my prize.

  “Prettiest mom ever,” I tell her, leaning over her to cover her mouth with mine, taste her, and it’s only because of Jax that I don’t push her down on the bed and claim her on the spot.

  Working around the kids for some alone-time isn’t easy, but hell, I have plans for later tonight, and I’ll sink inside her so deep, fuck her so hard we might be in danger of making another baby.

  She does that to me. When I’m with her, I can’t stop touching her, kissing her, possessing her. Wanting her every minute of every hour. This hasn’t changed since I was sixteen and she was fourteen. Won’t change, ever.

  “I don’t feel so pretty right now,” she whispers and smooths a hand over her slightly rounded belly where our daughter lived for most of last year. “It feels like I’ll never go back to how my body was before.”

  “You’re perfect,” I tell her and hold her gaze, hoping she can feel me. I grab her hand and haul her to her feet, make a show of leering at her, and it’s not all show. Her lush curves are making me hard, so fucking hard. I turn slightly to hide this little—and getting bigger—fact from the room, although Jax is still too young to understand what’s happening. “You’re beautiful, our kids rock, and I love you.”

  She wraps a slender arm around my hips and smiles against my shoulder. “Right back at you, Tyler Grayson.”

  “Marry me, Erin Wilson?”

  She laughs again, pulling back just enough to slap my arm, her brown eyes sparkling. “How many times do I have to say yes?”

  “Every day,” I whisper and haul her back to me for another, quick kiss. I stare into her sparkling eyes. “And every night.”

  A small hand pats my leg, jerking me out of my trance. “Daddy, are we going out?”

  My heart always misses a beat when he calls me that. The fact that I’m a dad to these two kids, a husband-to-be to this amazing girl… it’s beyond me. Some days I question reality, wonder if this is a fucking dream.

  “Yeah, little buddy.” Without conscious thought, I bend my knees, wrap my other arm around his small form and lift him to my hip. “Let’s grab your sis, and we are all set to go.”

  ***

  We’re heading to an indoor playground Jax has fallen in love with—unless it’s that blond girl he likes to play with and who also frequents the place. Maybe he’s having his first crush.

  Hell.

  Dylan was the one who told me about the place, as he takes his young brothers there often. They’re eight and twelve now, not as young as Jax, but the three kids get along well, plus it gives us the chance to catch up, together with Ash and Audrey, whose kid is now old enough to play there, too.

  So… domestic. And peaceful. And normal. All the things I thought I’d never have, that I never thought I’d deserve to have. It’s fucking scary sometimes, because I’m getting used to this quiet and happiness and shit.

  Scary because I’m afraid i
t won’t last.

  But it will. This girl, these kids, this family and friends make sure I believe it every day with their laughter and hugs and affection, helping me bury the past.

  Bury the damage my father has done—or shall I say, Asher’s father—with his knife and his beatings and his words and actions. I’ll always be a bastard my mom had with an unknown man back in the day, but I’ve stopped caring about that. How can I fester in anger about the past when the present and the future look like Erin and my kids?

  My brightest stars.

  And then of course there’s Ash, my brother, who’s waving at us from the parking lot, holding in his arms Scott, his baby son, while Audrey is hauling a huge baby bag from the car, her red hair glinting in the morning light.

  Life’s fucking perfect right now, and again that nasty prong of fear jabs into my chest.

  To get rid of it for good, I lean over and kiss Erin, swallowing her gasp of surprise and getting a good taste of her sweetness before I unbuckle and climb out of the car. Then I open the door and scoop Jax up, letting his slight weight and kicking legs ground me in the here and now. I walk around the car to where Erin is unbuckling little Isa and manage to hug all of them the moment she straightens with the baby in her arms.

  Everything’s fine with the world. Here’s proof.

  “Dylan’s already inside with the kids,” Ash informs me, one brow raised at how I’m clinging to my family and not moving to join him. “Everything okay, Ty?”

  “Yeah,” I tell him gruffly and finally let go of Erin and the baby so that they can make their way toward the building, my hold on Jax relaxing a little as he squirms in my arms. “Everything’s fine.”

  “Good. Because Dylan said there’s something he wants to discuss. Let’s get inside.”

  “Don’t tell me he decided to get hitched, too. Did he finally knock Tessa up?”

  “Ya think?” Ash laughs and jiggles little Scott up and down. His laugh is low and deep and real, and his pale wolf-eyes sparkle. It makes my chest warm with joy to see my baby bro so relaxed, so easy in his skin, so playful with his son.

  So happy.

  “What are you guys laughing about?” Audrey slips her arm around Asher’s hips, her face flushed, her red curls bouncing on her shoulders. “What did I miss?”

  “Nothing. Dylan wants to talk.” He puts his free arm around her shoulders. “You feeling okay?”

  I narrow my eyes at them. Speaking of knocking up… Does Audrey have another bun in the oven? It’s only been a year and a half since the birth of Scott, and they wanted to wait until they both finished college and found steady jobs before going for another kid, but sometimes you can’t control these things…

  And she flushes even darker under my brother’s scrutiny. Huh.

  Then again, maybe I’m seeing things. Everyone around me seems to be burning with baby fever these days. Hell, I didn’t think Erin and I would be having another child so soon after getting back together.

  Not that I’d change anything. Anything at all.

  ***

  We find Dylan watching over his brothers who are busy jumping on one of the trampolines and making a racket.

  He’s the only one in the Inked Brotherhood who’s not yet a father—and yet he’s been acting like one before the thought of having children had even been a blip in our minds. When his mother left and then his dad went off the deep end, leaving him in charge of his little brothers, he had to grow up quickly and step into his parents’ shoes. That had been a hard time with his little brother and then himself getting sick with Lyme disease, then their dad burning their house and dying in the fire.

  It could have ended really badly, but all three brothers are fine now, thankfully. Tessa helped them through those dark times, stood by them. She made Dylan understand she wasn’t leaving his side, their side, for as long as they needed her.

  Dylan decided he needed her forever.

  Though, speaking of whom… “Hey, man, you here alone? Where’s Tess?” I clap him on the back, and he nods at me and we bump fists.

  “She’s in Guatemala, organizing an archaeological dig. She’s coming back on Tuesday.”

  I eye him carefully. He’s lounging there, all relaxed-like, but I can read these guys like an open book by now, and the tension in his shoulders betrays him. “She’s been traveling a lot, hasn’t she?”

  “What?” He blinks at me. “Well, yeah, but no more than normal.”

  “Then what’s the gloomy face for?”

  “Fuck off, Tyler.”

  “She won’t marry your sorry ass? I bet that’s what’s gotten your thong in a twist.”

  This gets him laughing, which is a fucking relief. I don’t want to be right, not about this shit.

  “I’m wearing her down slowly,” he says after a moment.

  I scratch at my arm, at my newest tattoo—black tribal patterns with the names of my kids inked on the underside, courtesy of Zane. “Whatever. That chick would give up everything for you.”

  “And that’s what I don’t want,” he says fiercely. “She’s only just gotten back her freedom from her parents and found a job she likes. She’s discovering herself for the first time. I don’t want her to fucking give up everything, anything, to marry me and have my kids.”

  “Trust me, Dylan,” Audrey says, leaning in to give him a quick hug, “having the babies of the man you love is no hardship.” She turns to watch Asher crawl onto the trampoline with Scott and smiles warmly. “Not at all.”

  “Daddy…” Jax starts jumping up and down on my arm and ow, he’s getting heavy. “Trampoline. Put me down, putmedown, putmedown!”

  Fuck. “Okay, buddy, calm down.”

  I slide him down before he dislocates my shoulder, and he runs like a bullet to his uncle who helps him climb up. Ash nods at me that he’s got Jax covered, and I turn back to Dylan, shaking out my arm.

  “He’s getting big.” Dylan smiles.

  “Yeah. And you’d make a great dad.”

  “Shut up.”

  I shrug. “It’s the truth.”

  “Tessa knows it,” my beautiful girlfriend says, coming to stand beside me, baby Isabella gurgling in her arms. “Trust me. Women know when a guy will make a good daddy.”

  “Really? That’s creepy,” Dylan says, making a face at her.

  “It’s sexy,” she replies and smiles up at me.

  She’s sexy. The things I wanna do to her…Two kids with her and I want her like the first day. No, scratch that: I want her more.

  She’s been insecure about her body since the birth of Isa three months ago, and I have to prove to her she has nothing to worry about. Not only because there’s no other girl for me, but also because I love how she carried our babies in her belly and fed them from her breasts.

  “Ooh shit,” she says suddenly, grabbing one of her boobs. “I’m leaking.”

  Am I a mind-reader or what? “Need help with that?” I offer magnanimously and lick my lips.

  “Help?”

  “I could hold your boob while she drinks. Or I could hold the other one.” I wink, and she blushes. It lights up all the golds and greens in her brown eyes.

  “Ty,” she hisses, glancing meaningfully at Dylan.

  As if it’s the first time I’ve said such things in front of the guys. “Fine. But the offer stands.”

  She shakes her head, cheeks colored crimson. “I’m going to find a bench and feed our daughter. We’ll talk later about this.”

  But as she walks away, cooing to the baby, she turns to smile at me over her shoulder, and I grin. Man, I can’t wait to sink inside her and fuck her into the mattress. Make her come again and again, calling out my name.

  My dick twitches in agreement.

  “Get a room, you guys,” Dylan mutters good-humoredly, and it serves as a reminder that walking around thinking about what I wanna do to Erin tonight and sporting a tent in the front of my jeans is generally frowned upon in children’s playgrounds.

  Hell.
>
  “Ash said you wanted to talk.” I follow his gaze to two boys bouncing on the trampoline, one blond, the other dark-haired, both wearing his face in miniature. I swear, all three Hayes brothers were cut from the same mold. “If it’s not about Tessa or your brothers, then what?”

  He grunts, rolls his shoulders. Since he went back to college and sports, he’s bulked up a lot more. “Later. Let’s go watch over the kids. They’re a handful, and Ash looks tired.”

  He does? I frown in the direction of my brother who’s pulling Jax back with one hand, hugging little Scott close to his body with the other, while saying something to Dylan’s brothers who are jumping too close to some other kids.

  He does. “Let’s go.”

  Tired doesn’t mean unhappy, I remind myself, and I should know. With the new baby in the house, sleep has become a precious commodity. A luxury. And still we’re happy. Happier than ever.

  Still.

  Maybe we should move to Rockin’ Jump trampolines where there’s much more space and we can all watch over the boys. Talking can wait.

  Chapter Two

  Erin

  I watch as Tyler and Dylan head toward the trampoline, and my heart settles in its place. No matter how much I trust Asher—and I trust him a lot—I only feel relaxed when Tyler is with Jax, looking over him.

  Call me overprotective if you like. I’ve just had a baby, and all my mother instincts are burning in my blood like fire. Letting Jax out of my sight is harder than ever. Hopefully the feeling will fade a little before I go stir-crazy.

  Hormones rule…

  I cover up my boob and lift the baby up to pat her back. Milk drools down the side of her mouth, but not too much. My blouse is already stained from the last breastfeeding session, and I don’t have the energy to reach for a tissue to clean it up.

  I can’t remember being so tired with Jax. Then again, I was sixteen when I had him. And Mom and Dad were with me all the time.

  Or I just forgot how I felt. That’s it, probably. My mind erased the pain of childbirth and the exhaustion of taking care of a baby so that I’d have another.