August Heat

Prologue

May

The contractions
began late that night, and they began hard. Marly awoke from a restless sleep,
a pained gasp on her lips as her rounded stomach tightened painfully.
Imperatively.

She reached for
Cade, to awaken him, to warn him, but he was already there, his blue eyes
filling with panic as he flipped on the bedside lamp and stared back at her.

“Oh shit.” She had
never heard that particular tone of voice from him before.

Marly blinked at
him in surprise, torn between laughter and concern as his wide eyes went to the
rippling motions of the contraction that seized her heavily pregnant abdomen.

“Now, Cade,” she
tried to soothe him as she scooted to the end of the bed, “don’t panic.”

“Fuck. Sam! Brock!”
Marly was certain his demented scream rocked the upper level of the house.

Damn. They were
all going to panic on her now. She did not need this.

“Dammit, Marly,
where are you going?” Before she could throw her legs over the side of the
mattress Cade was moving to her, his hands trembling as he gripped her arm to
keep her in the bed.

“Cade August, I
refuse to have this child at home,” she snapped, staring at him like the
lunatic he was. “I need to get dressed. For that matter, so do you. I need the
hospital.”

Marly hadn’t
thought he could have gotten paler. But he did. In an instant his swarthy
complexion went snow white as he swallowed tightly.

“Oh shit,” he
seemed to wheeze.

The door burst
open and Sam, Brock, and their wives rushed into the room. Sam had a gun and a
hard-on. Brock was just sporting the hard-on. Thankfully, Sarah and Heather had
thought to drag on robes.

Marly closed her
eyes helplessly. They still hadn’t completely managed to still the terror that
had gripped them during the months she, Sarah and Heather had been stalked.
Annie still haunted them all.

“Heather was so
right last year,” she sighed. “Only you guys would still have a hard-on, no
matter the situation,” she moaned as she shook her head in resignation.

Another
contraction seized her body, tightening her abdomen and rippling the flesh
convulsively.

“Oh hell. She’s in
labor,” Sam seemed to choke then as both he and Brock paled alarmingly.

“I don’t want to
have this baby here,” she moaned, more than worried at the suddenly horrified
faces of the men staring at her, as though she were some sort of aberration. “Sarah.
Heather. Do something, please.”

Thankfully, they
did. Marly wasn’t certain how they managed to get everyone dressed, including
herself, and into the vehicles heading for the hospital. She was just thankful
they had. The contractions were coming faster than Doc had told her they would
starting off, and though she fought to hide her fear from Cade, she couldn’t
hide it from herself.

She sat in the
back seat of the Mercedes, Cade’s arms wrapped around her, doing the Lamaze
breathing and feeling like a panting dog as she tried to relax through the
rapidly building pain. God, she was so thankful she opted for drugs for the
delivery. This was not comfortable. Not comfortable at all.

“Babe, you doing
okay?” Sam glanced back as he sped through the night, his worried face
reflected in the dim interior lights.

“Watch the damned
road, Sam,” Cade snapped as he held Marly close to his chest, his gentle hands
stroking her distended abdomen as it contracted harshly.

“I’m watching the
road.” He turned back quickly as Heather’s softly whispered reminder of the
upcoming curves of the road added to Cade’s order.

“I love you,
Marly,” Cade whispered at her ear as another contraction gripped her stomach.

“Fifteen minutes
apart, Marly.” Heather timed her. “Sam, honey, you’d better pick up some speed.”

He picked up
speed. Marly closed her eyes instead of watching the night pass by at a rate
that came close to terrifying.

* * * * *

The contractions
were less than five minutes apart by the time they reached the hospital. Thanks
to Heather’s call, nurses, orderlies, and Marly’s no-nonsense obstetrician were
waiting at the ambulance entrance when they pulled in.

For Marly, life
had turned into a minute-by-minute count between contractions as she tried to
relax against the overwhelming pain of the labor. It had also turned into a kaleidoscope
of memories.

As though her life
were flashing before her eyes, Marly saw the impacting moments of her years
with Cade, from the day she had arrived on his doorstep until now.

How he had taken
her, a gawky, awkward child, and dressed her in the finest clothes, given her
everything a child could have wished for. He had showered her with all the
love, security and praise that he himself had lacked in his life. Brock and Sam
had followed suit. Throughout her teenage years they had raised and protected
her, sheltered her, and by turns had overseen each adventure in her life. Had
overseen them, and had eventually become the adventure. And now here they were
yet again. The three of them, faces pale, voices hoarse, as the nurses worked
around her.

Between contractions,
preparation and the smooth transition from pain to woozy comfort, she watched
the three men. They stood silently across the room, their gazes shadowed and
worried, flickering with fear. But Cade looked tortured.

“I’m okay,” she
whispered, smiling for him as the pain receded. “We’re both going to be fine.”

He moved to her,
careful to stay out of the way of the nurses until he could stand beside the
hospital bed. Then he laid his head beside hers, his hands tangling in her long
hair as he held her to him, his body convulsing with a hard shudder.

“I know,” he
whispered bleakly, his voice so haunted with pain it broke her heart. “Everything’s
fine. I know that.”

But she could hear
his fears. Fears that had only grown as the pregnancy progressed.

“He’ll be as
gorgeous as his daddy. And just as strong,” she whispered, well aware of the
fact that the child could be no one’s but Cade’s. She had made certain of it.

She had given each
of them the illusion that they would be as much a part of the baby as Cade was,
to keep that bond alive for them. But privately, she had ensured no other
fathered the baby but Cade. He was her soul. Everything that mattered in this
world to her.

As his hands
tightened in her hair, his body trembling with emotion, Marly feared the
changes that would soon come crashing into his life. She wanted her husband
happy. Whole. The nightmares were gone, but she knew his fears still lingered.
The fear of losing her. Of being alone, deep inside, once again. And she swore
to herself in that moment, for Cade, for their baby, she had to make him face
the final demon that haunted him. Him, Brock, and Sam.

* * * * *

Brock sat
nervously on the uncomfortable couch in the waiting room. He held his wife
close to him and watched the clock on the wall across from them. It amazed him.
She amazed him. In little more than a year, Sarah had managed to fill his life
so completely that he knew he could never ask for more. Yet he had so much
more.

Beside him, Sam held Heather as they talked softly. As they both
worried about the woman and child Cade was with now. Alone. His brothers weren’t
with him. But that was how it should be, Brock thought.

Until this moment,
they had shared damned near every minute of that pregnancy with Cade. Had
worried with him. Listened to his fears, saw his concerns. And as much as Brock
was nervous now himself, he knew this final step was being taken as it should.

His fingers twined
in Sarah’s hair, his eyes narrowing at the emotion that had been forming inside
him for almost a year now. He could feel the change in the air. From the moment
they rushed into Cade’s bedroom after his scream had disturbed Brock’s careful
sensual torture of Sarah’s body, Brock had felt it. It moved like a wraith,
weaving careful streamers of knowledge through his soul. He sighed deeply. No
regret. No sense of nightmare. No overwhelming need to be certain he was still
a part of the family, the bond that had saved his life for so many years. He
had Sarah. With her, he could survive damned near anything.

“You okay?” She
looked up at him, those whisky-colored eyes of hers soothing him as few other
things could.

As always, Sarah
sensed his feelings, his desires and needs, even before he knew himself.

“Do you know I
love you?” he asked her softly.

A smile spread
across her lips, through her gaze. “As I love you.”

His arms tightened
around her. Change could come, as he knew it would anyway. But as long as Sarah
held him, he knew he would survive.

* * * * *

Why didn’t he feel
isolated? Sam sat beside Heather, his arm around her shoulders as her head
rested against his chest, and frowned at that thought. Why wasn’t he going
crazy, the need to be in there with Marly and Cade overwhelming him? He was
concerned. Anxious. Sam thought of all the things that could go wrong, but he
wasn’t frothing at the mouth to be certain. To share in it, to be assured Cade
wasn’t alone. That he himself wasn’t alone.

He smoothed his
hands down Heather’s arms, distantly aware of the softness of her skin, the
warmth of her body. She was talking about her sister, Tara. He knew what she
was doing. Trying to ease his mind. To give him something else to focus on. He
frowned. She did that often. When the memories haunted him, it was as though
she knew. She knew and she went out of her way to still his demons, to fill his
heart.

Strange. He hadn’t
seen that before. He had been married to her for well over a year, and was only
now just realizing that.

“I told Tara this
new assignment was a bad idea.” Heather sighed against his chest. “But she
thinks she knows it all. Ryder’s not as easy to handle as she thinks he is. And
Rick is just acting damned funny.”

There was a thread
of suspicion in her voice. Sam could feel it, but couldn’t put his finger on
what it was.

“Rick will keep
her safe.” He wondered if that was really what she was worried about.

“Yeah. He will.”
He heard the amusement in her voice. “Just like Cade will keep Marly safe.”

Sam frowned. “Of
course he will. Cade wouldn’t let anything hurt her.”

“Then stop
worrying so much,” she chided him gently. “I know you want to be in the
delivery room yourself to be certain, but everything will be okay.”

Sam frowned. “No.
No, I don’t.” He hated the streak of selfishness that often filled him. “If it
were you, I’d want it to be just us, Heather. Together.”

He hadn’t been
jealous when Brock or Cade touched her, loved her. It filled him with a sense
of security to know she would always be loved, always cared for if something
happened to him. But sometimes…sometimes he wished he didn’t have that need.

“It will be just
us, Sam.” She rose from his chest, turning to him, her green eyes dark with
love, with dreams and life. “I promise you that. Just us.”

His heart
clenched. Something in his soul seemed to shift, though he wasn’t certain what
it was.

“I love you,” he
whispered.

She smiled that
smile. The one that never failed to heat his blood, to mend his heart.

“As I love you,
cowboy,” she said gently, leaning forward, her lips touching his. “Always, Sam.
As I love you.”