Seven Sleepless Nights
: Chapter 1

KYLE CARTER

David Henderson was really gone.

Out of everything that had happened in the last seventy-two hours, and there had been a helluva lot – my daughter had given birth, her…whatever the hell Lucky was to her, had returned from the dead – and still, the only thing that seemed to stick in my mind was the fact that my father, if you could even call him that, was finally dead.

With my eyes trained on the ceiling, I remained rigid on the mattress, listening carefully to the sound of Lee breathing beside me. I knew I had a full house downstairs that I needed to entertain. Both of my brothers and their families had all stayed the night, along with my kids – adult and preteen – Cam’s girl, Tillie, and their son, Liam.

We had another baby to celebrate, a hero to welcome home, and a funeral to plan, but I couldn’t move. I was still reeling and needed the feel of her arm touching mine to ground me.

Forcing down the surge of panic that filled my chest every time I thought of David Henderson alone in that kitchen with my wife and my daughter, I tried to reason with myself.

David was dead.

Lucky made it in time.

He could never hurt my kids again.

He could never get to my wife again.

Breathe, Kyle.

Just…let it go.

A deep shudder of both terror and disbelief rolled through me and I craned my neck to the side, studying her sleeping face.

I could hear my family banging around downstairs, making enough noise to wake the dead, but Lee didn’t stir.

Anxiety gnawed at my gut. Lee was always the first up every morning, fixing breakfast and fussing over her babies. I wondered what demons she was fighting in her sleep that kept her from mothering her babies – both fully grown and still growing.

God knows she had enough of those.

As always, my gaze honed in on the jagged scar running from her temple to her jawline. A scar that was now mirrored on my daughter’s face. Fury, more potent than I’d ever experienced, flooded my body, making it hard to breathe.

Lee was paler than normal, with dark circles keeping company under her long lashes. We’d been through one hell of a year, and I knew she hadn’t slept well since the fiasco that was our daughter and the whole Lucky/Jordan debate.

Hope had an affair with my brother’s former cellmate, and Lee, both stunned and fearful of his intentions, had lashed out at our daughter’s new beau, banishing him from our home.

Being the headstrong woman that she is, Hope took it as a personal insult, removed herself from her mother’s life, and no amount of groveling on Lee’s part had helped to thaw the ice around our daughter’s heart.

I knew why Lee had reacted the way she had, of course. It was because of me. Because I was the dickhead that traumatized my wife beyond repair many years ago with Rachel and, well, for the want of a better phrase, my sheer lack of manning the hell up.

Lee had taken one look at our daughter’s bruised and scarred face, put two and two together, came up with five, and reacted on motherly instinct, desperately trying to protect her child from the only threat she could see.

My daughter’s rejection of any affection or communication from her mother had almost catapulted my wife into a nervous breakdown. I’d lost count of the nights the woman had cried herself to sleep, or the number of groveling voicemails she had left on Hope’s cell. She’d lost weight – a lot of it – and there was a sadness in her eyes that I hadn’t seen since Cam Frey’s passing.

Hope’s cold attitude towards Lee these past several months fucking infuriated me, but I kept my thoughts and opinions to myself, somehow managing to walk a thin line between the two women in my life and keep the peace.

My daughter was hurting and needed someone to blame, but my wife had suffered enough. I understood that my daughter was grieving, but I also understood that her anger was being unfairly directed towards her mother.

The woman who had given up her entire life to birth, raise, love, and protect my children did not deserve to be treated like a cast-off because she made one bad decision.

I was the screw-up in our marriage.

I was the bad cop in our parenting double act.

It was fucking cruel to watch my wife be punished and pushed out of our daughter’s pregnancy because she made one damn mistake in almost three decades of ultimate sacrifice and unconditional love.

To be honest, it was a good thing that Lucky had decided to resurface from the grave because I was fresh out of patience with my headstrong first-born.

I could only pray that Hope had a more relaxed and kinder approach to her mother once she was discharged from the hospital because I didn’t think I could keep my opinions to myself a minute longer.

‘You’re staring,’ Lee whispered, drawing my attention back to the present. She cracked a lid and one gray eye peeked up at me. ‘Bad dreams again?’

The sound of her soft southern drawl floated through me and I stifled a groan. ‘No.’ Exhaling a heavy sigh, I rolled on top of her and buried my face in her neck. ‘I just needed to look at you,’ I mumbled into her curls as I pinned her tiny frame to the mattress. ‘Love you.’

‘Love you, too.’ I felt her small hands settle on my bare back and I shivered, wishing more than anything that I could just burrow deep inside this woman and never come back out. ‘What time is it?’

‘A little after ten.’

‘For real?’ Her eyes widened. ‘I should’ve been up hours ago.’

‘Relax. The kids can fend for themselves for one morning.’

‘But your brothers –’

‘Fuck my brothers.’

‘Kyle.’ She frowned. ‘Mike traveled all the way from London to be here. You can’t ignore him.’

‘And I’m not ignoring him,’ I countered. ‘I’m spending time with my wife.’ Nuzzling her neck with my nose, I pressed a lazy kiss to her collarbone. ‘We don’t get enough time together.’

A small chuckle escaped her. ‘We’ve had a lifetime together.’

‘Still not enough,’ I mumbled against her skin.

‘So greedy,’ she sighed, patting my back.

‘You feeling okay, princess?’ Pulling back, I watched her carefully, ignoring my very noticeable morning wood nudging her stomach. ‘Are you…’ I cleared my throat, brows furrowed, knowing that I had to be very careful with how I phrased my next sentence. ‘Is everything working okay?’ Fucking great. Real tactful, asshole. ‘In your body?’ Jesus, like that was any better. I couldn’t help it, though. More than twenty-five years had passed since her transplant, but the fear never left me. A health scare when the twins were born kept the panic very much alive in my heart. This woman was my everything. Without her, I didn’t want any of this.

My gaze flicked to the small prescription bottles on her nightstand containing the immunosuppressant meds needed to keep her body in check. ‘You been taking your meds?’ I asked, risking her wrath. The stress she’d been under this past year had me fucking paranoid. ‘Are you peeing okay?’ I continued, anxious. ‘Is it clear? Have you been checking every morning?’

‘I’m fine, Kyle. Just tired.’ There was a long stretch of silence before a small sigh tore from her lips. ‘Do you think Hope will be okay with me?’ I felt her body stiffen beneath me, gray eyes full of unrestrained pain. ‘I know she was fine at the hospital when we visited yesterday and the day before, but I’m just…’ Lee shivered and peeked up at me, looking all uncertain and vulnerable. ‘When they bring Abi home today, do you think she’ll still be –’

‘She’ll be fine,’ I cut her off by saying, desperate to reassure her. ‘I’ll make sure of it.’ Resting my weight on one elbow, I brushed her hair off her face, tucking endless thick curls behind her ears. ‘Stop worrying, Grandma.’

‘Lord, can you believe it?’ A smile spread across her full lips, revealing that smile that always socked me in the gut. ‘We have two grandchildren.’ Reaching up, she trailed her fingers over the scar on my neck and bit down on her plump lip, eyes shining with emotion. ‘It’s still so surreal.’

‘Pretty fucking weird, huh?’ I chuckled, playfully nudging her nose with mine. ‘How’d we get here?’ Holding still above her, I inclined my head towards our bedroom door and grinned when the sound of our kids fighting filled the silence. ‘From roommates to a full house?’

‘I took a shot with you,’ she teased, reaching down to palm my ass. ‘The rest is history.’

‘Best fucking shot ever,’ I purred, capturing her lips with mine and feeling the familiar tingling sensation shoot down my spine. Probing her lips with mine and her thighs with my knees, I growled in victory when she submitted to me, letting her legs fall open and my tongue invade her sweet mouth.

Nestling between her thighs, I ground myself against her, pleased to replace her pussy already wet and waiting for me. It wasn’t often I got between my wife’s legs when the kids were up, she was always too busy racing around after them. Foregoing foreplay, I settled against her, my thick crown probing her slick lips, and thrust inside in one swift movement.

Her breath caught in her throat and I quickly swallowed up her moans with my mouth, kissing her deeply as I pushed inside her over and over, needing the grounding of having this woman’s body tangled up with mine.

Being inside her was more than just about sex for me. It was a need. I had to be joined with her. If I could, I’d keep my cock inside her all damn day. The hunger never seemed to be satiated no matter how many years passed us by. I was always starving for her. Her mind. Her thoughts. Her body. Her pussy. It didn’t matter. I just couldn’t get enough.

Breathing hard, Lee hooked her legs around my waist and dragged my body down on hers, loving having me pin her to the mattress almost as much as I loved feeling her beneath me. In the same room I’d taken her virginity in, I fucked my wife hard and fast, moving deeper, pushing further, grinding my hips the exact way she needed me to.

‘God,’ she breathed against my lips, wrapping both arms around my neck. ‘Kyle.’

Her back arched upwards, her tits pressing hard to my chest, and I growled in approval. Jesus, she was in amazing shape. For a woman who’d birthed six of my children, she had a phenomenal figure. All womanly curves, dainty features, and skin like silk. Her belly was a little softer and looser now, and her skin was layered with a few more silvery lines from multiple pregnancies, but she was still my Lee. She was still every inch the girl I’d fallen for all those years ago. I still adored the ground she walked on, and she still made my dick hard as goddamn rock.

A lot of men didn’t understand that when a woman gave you children, she wasn’t just giving you a family. She was giving you her body. It would never be the same again.

Yeah, a man’s life was rocked and altered forever with fatherhood, but nothing happened to our bodies. For a woman, pregnancy and childbirth was fucking hard. Raising kids was harder for them. And a real man? He treasured the sacrifice. He worshipped that body every damn day, grateful for the blessing he had been given.

I was barely a man when I became a father, but I was a fast learner. I knew the sacrifices she made to give me a family, and I made it my life’s mission to teach my sons just that. If I never accomplished another thing in life, I would be proud just knowing that my boys respected their mother and would, in turn, respect the women who gave them children of their own.

Because of her sacrifices, I worked my ass off to keep in shape for Lee. I considered all those countless laps in the pool every morning a small price to pay to keep up with my wife.

‘You like that?’ I purred, deepening my thrusts. ‘You like my cock in there, princess? Inside that hot little pussy?’

‘Oh god, Kyle,’ she cried out, bucking her hips upwards. ‘Yes!’

‘Yeah?’ Growling, I fucked her harder, causing the headboard to crack against the wall. ‘More?’

‘More, Kyle,’ Lee mewled, breathing hard, as she tightened around me. ‘God, Kyle, I’m gonna –’

‘Come?’ I coaxed, slipping a hand between us to thumb her clit. ‘I’m gonna fill you up with my cum, Lee. That’s what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna break you in half, baby.’

‘Jesus,’ she breathed, digging her nails into my back. ‘Kyle, I can’t–’

‘Yeah, you can, princess,’ I growled in approval, pounding into her. ‘Give it to me, sweetheart. Scream for me –’

‘Dad!’ A familiar voice called out from behind the door. ‘Mom?’

Lee froze beneath me and I resisted the urge to maim and kill my own offspring.

‘What is it?’ I bit out, still thrusting inside her.

‘Are you guys fighting?’

‘Obviously not, Cash,’ I shot back, nuzzling Lee’s neck, as I slowed my thrusts. ‘Now, go downstairs.’

The door handle turned and we both froze, holding our breath. ‘Your door’s locked.’

We both sagged in relief.

‘I know,’ I bit out. Now, fuck off.

‘Why’d you lock me out, Dad?’

‘Because Mom and Dad are having quiet time.’

‘Why?’

‘Just go downstairs, Cash.’

‘Why?’

‘Are you all breathing?’ I barked.

‘Uh, yeah?’

‘Is anyone bleeding?’ I demanded.

‘Uh, not at the moment?’

‘And what’s Dad’s rule?’

‘Dad…’

‘What’s my rule, Cash?’

He huffed loudly. ‘Unless we’re bleeding or not breathing, don’t bang on the door when Mom and Dad are having quiet time.’

‘Very good,’ I shot back. ‘Now, go downstairs.’

‘But you weren’t being quiet,’ he argued from the other side of the door. ‘You sounded like you were fighting. I could hear lots of banging and Mom was crying out.’

‘We’re not fighting,’ I groaned. ‘We’re fine. Now, go on down and have Colton make your breakfast.’

‘But why can’t Mom get my breakfast?’

‘Because Mom’s busy, she’s not your slave, and you’re big enough to pour yourself a bowl of cereal.’

‘I like it when Mom does it for me.’

‘So do I,’ I bit out. ‘Now please go downstairs.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I said so.’

‘But why?’

‘Because Dad’s busy.’

‘Doing what?’

‘Mommy,’ I grumbled.

Lee’s eyes widened and she slapped my chest. ‘Kyle!’

‘Cash. Go!’ I roared, knowing it was a lost cause when Lee pushed at my chest. With a huff, I pulled out and rolled onto my back. ‘Goddamn!’

‘But what are you doing in there?’ he pressed. ‘Why’s Mom yelling your name?’ There was a pause and then, ‘Are you hurting my mom?’

I turned to Lee. ‘I’m gonna kill him.’ Exhaling a heavy sigh, I sat up and threw the covers off my body. Leaning over her, I pecked her lips. ‘You can live with five, right?’

Chuckling softly, Lee covered my mouth with her hand. ‘Cash, honey, we’re both fine. Dad will be down in just a sec. I’m just going for a shower first.’

I narrowed my eyes in betrayal and licked at her palm, causing her to yank her hand away. ‘Are you sure we can’t cull out the mouthy ones?’

‘They’re all mouthy,’ she pointed out, laughing softly. ‘Now, go tend to your spawn. I need a shower.’

‘Bad idea, bro,’ Colton’s voice came from the other side of the door. ‘I wouldn’t stand there unless you want to be scarred for life with the sound of our father ramming his –’

‘Don’t you dare finish that sentence,’ I warned, jerking off the bed and moving for my sweatpants. ‘Now, take your brother downstairs and make some bacon.’

The sound of my son’s laughter filled my ears moments before footsteps retreated from the door. ‘Come on, kid. Let’s go downstairs and I can tell you about this stripper named Hayden I met the other night.’

‘What’s a stripper?’

‘Colt!’

‘A special kind of dancer.’

‘I like dancers.’

‘Colton!’

‘Me too, brother. Me too.’

‘That one.’ I turned to Lee and pointed an accusing thumb towards the door. ‘That one right there is gonna break my damn heart.’

Read about Kyle & Lee’s journey in the Broken Series