“I think you were right. I think the people here are all waiting for me to lead them on some sort of fight against Sandler and Evander. I don’t think I’m the person to do that.”
She’d said that before. “Your mom might be.”
Diana shook her head. “She says she’s passing the job on. She wants to help, advise.”
Well this wasn’t working out so well. “How about one of the guys?”
“Which one? Haven’t you noticed the men take orders much better from us than each other? I’m just not sure. I have a different idea in mind and…”
An alarm sounded, and we both jolted to our feet. She sighed. “That’s a proximity alarm. Someone is circling the planet that we don’t know. It might pass.”
The alarm turned off, and Diana let out a breath. “We don’t own the whole planet. Yet. We might soon if Damian gets his way. He’s on a mission. We’ll own the whole place and, therefore, be able to control who comes into the space around it. What little population was here is either joining us or leaving. Damian can be persuasive.”
“He might be able to get Quinn to help him with that.” I touched her arm. “This can’t be good for you, all of the worry all of the time.”
She met my gaze. “This is going to be the life I give to my baby. This is the life I had, always. I spent my first years traipsing through the snow, sometimes not having food. I…” She shook her head. “This is the life that came the day the bombs went off on Earth and everyone had to flee. This is the result of the virus that stopped most people from being able to make girl babies.” Her hand went to her stomach, and she rubbed. I wondered if she knew she’d reached out to connect with her daughter or if it was totally subconscious. “This is what happens with zombies coming through black holes. With Evander poisoning planets. With Sandler Cartel trying to take over everything. With the Dark Planets being targeted by people who would be as bad as Sandler and Evander if they got their chance. This is the result of everything being so screwed up that the best I can give this baby is a quasi-militarized farming community waiting to go to war.”
By the time she was finished, she was shouting.
“Diana…” I wanted to hug her, but she took a step back, gasping.
“My water just broke.”
Panic settled in my spine. Wow. I really knew next to nothing about childbirth. “What do we do?”
“We get my husbands. And Ari.”
I nodded. “Okay.” I gave her my best fake smile. “Let’s do that.”
I stood outside of the medical enclosure, enjoying the sun and trying not to think about what was going on inside with Diana. Ari had arrived, looking pretty cleaned up in the hours we’d been back—he’d even trimmed his hair—and told me not to worry. He had this under control.
Since then, I’d been hearing shouting. Mostly Cash and Lewis. If Damian, Sterling, or Judge were yelling, I hadn’t heard them yet. Tommy came over, leaning on his cane. He sat down next to me on my bench.
“Giving birth? That’s what Dane said was going on after his tablet pinged. He and the rest of her family are all sort of pretending not to pace around.”
I liked the image. “Yes. She’s in there. For all the advancements in medical stuff now, they can’t make this easier for her. She has to do it.”
“Women are so brave.” He looked up at the sky.
I didn’t know that I was any braver than Tommy. “What did Dane say about your leg?”
He shrugged. “They don’t think they can fix it. He’s fascinated with the idea. He’d like to think about it, but right now, it is what it is.” Tommy paused, kicking his good leg forward like he was going to play with the dirt. “Are you okay with being with me like this?”
That was the most ridiculous question he’d ever asked me. But I knew it came from deep inside of him and my telling him his insecurity was foolish would not eliminate the problem. Cash yelled again from inside the medical area. “Do you think you’ll yell when I’m giving birth?”
I hoped that answered his question.
He raised his gaze to meet mine, his blue eyes so filled with warmth I wished I could swim around in them. “The only person who gets to yell when you are giving birth is you.”
I smiled. “Fair enough.”
“Quinn will be working really hard not to pass out. He’ll be anxious, so he’ll ask a lot of questions. Clay will cry when the baby comes, but he won’t want you to see that. Keith and I will pretend to be brave and stoic. Panicked on the inside.”
I leaned my head on his shoulder. “Sounds about right.”
“Paloma, love, when they thought Quinn and I were dead, were Clay and Keith okay? I worried about all of you. I knew they’d get you to safety and if you could be saved, you would be. After that, I wasn’t sure what would happen. I kept trying to picture it. I could never come up with a scene in my mind.”
I hated even remembering those hours. But Tommy needed closure, and this was how he’d get it. “I was only awake thinking you were dead for twenty-four hours. They were miserable minutes. Long seconds. Desperately…” My voice choked. I wouldn’t cry. He was alive. I had my head on his shoulder.
“Paloma…”
I held up my hand. “No, Tommy. We weren’t okay. We were here. Then we came for you. Clay kept saying he’d figure out how to make it right, somewhere to go, but I think it was really Keith who was managing things. I was a zombie.”
He nodded. “I’m sorry I asked. I just wanted to know what had happened.”
I kissed his cheek, breathing in his scent. “Don’t die.”
“I thought you were dead, too.” His voice was quiet. “I hung on for Quinn but…” He shook his head. “I don’t want to go back into Sandler space ever again. Would it be okay with you if I basically went back to doing what I was doing when we were in hiding? If I designed and made really incredible ships.”
I took a long breath. “I think that sounds phenomenal.”
My tablet dinged, and I looked down at it. “C.J. wants to see us. Specifically has you on here. You don’t have a tablet yet. We need to get that fixed.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to keep the spymaster waiting.” He rose, picking up the cane and leaning on it when he did. “Maybe we could make me a better cane. Like something with a little more style.”
I loved this man so much.
14
Stronger Together
C.J. stood in the control room, staring at the screen. There were a lot of dots moving around. That was all I could tell.
Tommy, however, seemed to know better what it was he was seeing. “Why are there so many ships up there?”
C.J. side eyed him. “I was asking myself the same question. One of the ships got too close. The alarm went off. Then they backed off. Eventually, the ship sent a message. They were looking for you.”
Tommy shook his head. “For me?”
“Yes, apparently that is what is left of the armada you left Earth with. They regrouped. When they heard you escaped Sandler One, they trailed a ship, that you then blew up, and they’ve been searching the area ever since.”
Wow. That was loyalty. “Do they need you to tell them to go home?”
Tommy scrunched up his face in the way he did when he just wasn’t sure what was going on. “I’ll answer them.”
C.J. indicated a button on the panel, and Tommy pushed it. “Hey, this is Tommy Sandler. Who am I speaking to?”
“Tommy, this is Trenton Montgomery. I knew your wife briefly on Mars Station, and I’m friends with Ari. We joined the brigade toward the end, after I arrived on Earth. You guys had almost left.”
I remembered him. “He took care of things when I left you guys unconscious to go help with Diana. He’s Ari’s good friend.”
“You trust him?” Tommy’s question was to me.
“Ari did.” So I supposed I did, too. I’d threatened his well-being if my guys weren’t okay, and he’d told me how he lost his wife. “I think he’s as he appears.”
<
br /> Tommy hit the button. “Trenton, yes. Paloma remembers you. I see you all up there, and while I appreciate you guys continuing to follow, you are free to go. The assault is obviously over. Big giant failure.”
I rubbed Tommy’s back. Up until recently, he’d never failed at anything. It had changed him and not necessarily in a bad way. I liked seeing the side of Tommy that had learned to roll with the punches. I liked how he wasn’t so angry all the time. I didn’t like that he was defeated, not after he had accomplished so much, after he’d saved his brothers, turned their lives around, held the family together, and was, when it came down to it, a genius.
But that wasn’t all going to be fixed right now.
“We don’t see it that way, Tommy. We lost a battle and our leader was taken. That’s on the rest of us. You weren’t alone. Our flag ship should not have gone down like that.”
Tommy shook his head, even though the only ones who could see it were C.J. and myself. “That’s kind of you to say, but the blame lies with me and no one else.”
“Permission to land, Captain Sandler?”
He looked at C.J. and then back at the control panel. “You want to land, Trenton?”
“The whole fleet does, sir. We all want to land.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “C.J., is that possible? Can you handle that big of an influx?”
He actually grinned. “As a matter of fact, yes. Thanks to Damian. My niece married smart men.” He inputted something into the controls. “Tommy, tell them to follow those coordinates.”
I leaned on Tommy’s shoulder. He needed to know I was there. “Trenton, don’t call me sir, okay? Land on the coordinates you were just sent. I guess I’ll see you all soon.”
He disconnected the communication. Before I could say anything, C.J. spoke. “Tommy, you don’t know me all that well, but I imagine that is about to change. I think a lot of things are going to change. I’ve lost. A lot. I lost Melissa, twice. The first time she was taken from me and had her mind erased. That was of her own doing, sort of. The second time, she sent me unconscious through a black hole to save my life. That left her on the other side of the galaxy with a newborn who I wouldn’t meet until she was five. That newborn is giving birth to her own daughter today. Things have a way of working out in ways we can’t anticipate. Take it from an old hand at this, your story didn’t end in a dungeon getting sick from pneumonia. That means there’s still a future. Chin up.”
I had never heard C.J. make anything close to a speech before. Having delivered it, he left the room. I hoped it was to go deal with the huge number of ships about to land, but with C.J., I never knew what was coming next. He used to sneak up and scare Diana and me just for fun. We’d yelp. He’d laugh.
My heart turned over at his story. The newborn was now having a baby. That was a funny image. As if life really had gone that fast.
Tommy leaned on his cane. “I really want to make ships again. Really good ones. That maybe some other people can fight with. If this whole group of people want me back, how am I going to tell them no? If they’re counting on me?”
“I’ll tell them no.” He could count on that.
Landing fifty some-odd ships wasn’t an easy thing to do. It took some planning. Jackson wasn’t letting any of the people off until he security scanned them. Without Sterling helping, he tasked Rohan and Canyon with the job. I watched from the sidelines for a while, impressed with how coordinated they were. I also couldn’t help but notice just how many hidden buildings had literally popped up from the ground as they readied for the influx of people.
This place had secrets, and some of them were hidden in plain sight.
I was impressed.
My tablet pinged, and I nudged Tommy, who had stood watching with me. If his leg bothered him, he wasn’t letting on. He just leaned on the cane as though he’d always done so, his face expressionless. The words I read made me let out a breath. “The baby is here.”
He grinned. “Go. I’m good here. I won’t make anyone any promises or agree to anything until you come back.”
To make myself feel better, I pinged my other three husbands on their tablets. Maybe one of them could wait with Tommy until I returned. They weren’t going to let him make any hasty decisions either. Tommy Sandler didn’t owe the universe anything, and his soft, guilt-ridden center that should have been hidden was too close to the surface right now.
I kissed him. “Love you.”
“The day Clay came home from the Sisterhood of the Universe and told us a young Sister had saved his life and had been beaten for it, I hadn’t known she was going to be the most important person in my life. If I’d known, I would have run, not walked, to you and insisted you leave there right that second. When I think of all the times I almost lost you…” He stopped talking to kiss me hard.
Emotion stilled my feet. I didn’t want to run away to meet Diana’s baby without saying one more thing. I held up my arm, pointing to the chip that said I couldn’t get pregnant. It was green, that meant the chip was working. Coded to my finger, no one could turn it off but me or a doctor in an emergency. There were all sorts of stories of women being forced to turn it off, but that hadn’t happened to me. With everything that did go wrong, that hadn’t.
“I want to turn it off.”
His eyes widened. “I’ve always wanted whatever you want, beautiful. If that’s what you want, that’s what we’ll do. Turn it off. Maybe one of us will be able to get you pregnant. Let’s make our own world. Let’s do that.”
I had to check with each of them before I hit the button. I took a deep breath. “See you later, honey.”
With that behind me and hearing the answer I wanted, I ran to Diana. There was so much going on for one day. Did anyone ever have a quiet existence anymore?
Helene Hurst was six pounds, six ounces and as healthy as she could be. I stared at her while I held her in my arms. I hadn’t been expecting to hold her, just kiss Diana, coo over the baby, and leave them alone. But I’d been put in a chair and handed the baby by a very in love Uncle Sterling as soon as I’d arrived.
She seemed like the most perfect combination of Lewis and Diana that I could have imagined. She had her dad’s beautiful, dark, angular eyes and her mother’s cheekbones. Her hair was shiny, dark—not surprising, considering both her parents were brown haired—and a pouty mouth that I thought looked more like Lewis’s, but it was hard to tell right then. She had Diana’s olive skin tone for sure.
There had never been a baby with so many people in and out of the room. Melissa fussed, left, came back and fussed some more over Diana. Ari stayed back, watching monitors and not saying much. Diana was doing great. She had to be watched, but it seemed from a distance was close enough. Lewis sat on the edge of Diana’s bed. He was quiet and observant, his gaze going back and forth from the baby, Diana, and the monitors.
“She’s fine,” Cash would tell him every so often. I tried not to notice.
Her grandfather, her uncles, everyone came through and then did so again. Still, no one tried to take Miss Helene from me, and I was glad to hold her. I kind of thought she looked like the type of person who should have a Miss in front of her name to indicate sophistication. Not that I could have particularly explained to anyone why I felt that way if I was questioned.
Diana pulled herself back into a sitting position. “Hey guys, I need to speak to Paloma. Can you give us a few minutes?”
She was a mom now. How had that happened? I meant, I knew how. But why did it seem like Helene had always been with us? Like she wasn’t new, somehow. As though I’d known her forever. Diana hadn’t always been a mother?
Lewis came over and took the baby from me. I missed her in my arms immediately. “Can we take the monitor with us? I want her hooked up. Just leave her on it.”
“Her respiration, heart rate—it’s all perfect. She fed. She kept it down. I have no reason to think she needs any kind of additional care like a constant monitor,” Ari finally spoke.
“I mean, you can. But there’s no medical reason to do so.”
“Lewis.” Cash shook his head. “Helene is not spending her life hooked up to a machine. Use the evidence of your eyes. She’s a perfectly healthy newborn. We’ll check her every few hours. Let’s not start life by psychologically damaging her into thinking there is something wrong with her.”
The new daddy swayed slightly, almost rhythmically with the baby in his arms. “Ari, are we going to psychologically damage the baby by hooking her up to a monitor?”
Ari moved away from the wall. “Never was a baby so well loved so immediately. Good work, Diana. You were very brave. There’s no way to take all the pain away from what you just did. You were a champ. I’ll be back to check on you in an hour or so. Your daughter is perfect. She’ll be hungry again soon.”
Cash and Lewis were still arguing when they left the room with Helene. Damian bent over to kiss Diana. “Please, get some rest.”
“I never can resist the please.” She kissed him again. “Go. I’ll be good.”
Judge bounced from one foot to the other. “I don’t like the crib we made. I’m going to make another one. It’ll be the safest place on the planet. You wait and see.”
“I can’t wait. Don’t stay up all night doing it.”
Judge snorted. “Oh, I’ll be back here in an hour. I’m going to need to see you again then, and I bet Helene will want to feed so she’ll be with you. So I’ll get both my girls.”
This was unbelievable. They’d been a family before, but now the baby was just… included. They’d all simply expanded their love for her. Why hadn’t that been my parents? Shouldn’t it be against nature for Garrison to lock his kids in the dungeon? What was wrong with the world? I supposed that was what Diana had been going on about right before her water broke.
Sterling stood at the end of her bed, watching Judge leave. “If you’re going to talk about what I think you’re going to talk about, I want you to remember that there is no privacy here. I can hear everything, and so can two of my friends if they happen to be listening. So that being said, I’d be shocked if at least one of them doesn’t already know what you are going to tell Paloma. If there’s anything you don’t want them to hear, or me to hear for that matter—although I promise to try not to listen to it—don’t say it.”