Page 39 of Declan (Gold Team #5)

Jaxon opened the door, and without a word, he stepped to the side to let me enter.

“She’s in the living room,” he told me. “You want me in there or you want privacy?”

I stopped to look at my brother-in-law. Good man, good husband, good father—everything I wasn’t. I hadn’t called to tell him I was coming, so I could add observant and sharp to the long list of things I liked about him.

He’d take care of my sister.

“You should stay.”

“Right,” he mumbled, and I followed him into the living room.

Violet was sitting on the couch rocking my nephew Mason. I looked in his fuzzy brown hair and my heart felt like it was going to explode.

“Declan? Everything all right?” Violet’s sweet voice was full of concern.

Fucking, fucking , shit .

I couldn’t do this.

“Vi, baby, let me go lay Mason down.” Jaxon stepped in front of Violet and her eyes rounded in fear .

“Actually,” I started, then had to clear my throat. “I’d like to hold him before you do that.”

The sob that tore from my sister’s chest hit me like a nuclear bomb.

I’d done that to her.

My selfishness, my need to close down and shut everyone out, had caused my twin sister untold pain.

I was an asshole.

Before I could change my mind and flee like a pansy-assed-coward, Jaxon set my sleeping nephew in my arms. The weight of him—so slight, yet so heavy.

Fuck. I’d forgotten that.

Jaxon’s hand shot out and gripped my bicep as I swayed.

I made my way to a chair and sat not knowing how to start a conversation I never wanted to have.

Mason stirred in my arms and I looked down at his chubby face. Violet had been chubby, too. Full cheeks and pouty lips, with Juliana’s coloring and my eyes.

She was perfect.

Tiny fingers that used to wrap around mine. A smile that lit my world. The sweetest giggle that made everything slip away—my parents dying, shitty foster homes, losing my sister, the death and destruction, everything. With Violet in my arms, all was right in my world.

Then she was gone, Juliana was gone, and I felt like nothing would ever be right again.

Until Autumn.

“My daughter, Violet, had the same chubby cheeks,” I croaked, and I heard another painful sob rip from my sister but I didn’t dare look away from Mason.

“I always thought she looked just like her mom, but seeing Mason, I realize she had more of me in her than I thought. She had our eyes, and, boy, did she have a temper. When she was smiling and happy, the brown in her eyes danced, but when she got frustrated, they turned red like ours. She was the most perfect thing I’d ever done in my life.

“From the moment she was placed in my arms, I knew what I’d been missing my whole life.

” I took in a deep breath and tried to control my emotions.

“I loved Violet’s mom, I got the sense our parents loved us before they died, but I had never known soul-deep love until I looked at my daughter.

Until I felt her weight in my arms. Until I smelled her.

It was then I understood why men fight wars. I knew I’d do anything to protect her.”

With my heart in my throat and a losing battle against the emotions that had taken over, I looked at my sister. Her husband beside her wrapped up in his arms. Yeah, he’d take care of her.

Tears swam in my eyes and I didn’t bother trying to hide them.

My girl deserved my pain, my sorrow, my sadness, and I wasn’t going to deny her any longer.

“Where’s Violet now, Declan?” my sister asked and visibly braced.

“Here.” I placed my free hand over my heart.

“No,” Violet cried. “No, no, no.”

Jaxon pulled her closer and she shoved her face into his chest. Her body shuddered, wracked with pain—for me, for the niece she lost, and for herself.

“How?”

“How they died isn’t important,” I told her.

“What’s important is you know they existed.

I was married. I met Juliana while I was on an assignment in Brazil, we fell in love, she got pregnant, and we got married.

Then we had a beautiful daughter. And for exactly one year of my life, everything was perfect.

I had everything a man could want, a pretty wife who was sweet and loving and I had my Violet.

You deserve to know you had a niece, but more, my girl’s not a secret, she never should’ve been. I loved her, I loved them .

“Juliana was a good woman. She wasn’t a mistake or something I’m ashamed of. But I couldn’t think about them without feeling like my insides were being torn apart. I have one thing left of her and I want you to have it.”

I stood and kissed my nephew’s head, Jaxon let go of Violet and got to his feet, then reached a hand out to pull Vi up. Once I handed off Mason to his dad, I reached into my back pocket and took out my wallet.

The picture was old and faded, worn from being handled over the years.

My sister closed the distance and stood in front of me and took my offering. Her eyes drifted down and I heard her suck in a lungful of oxygen.

I knew what she saw—my beautiful Violet.

“I can’t—”

“I have her in my heart. I have her in my memory. And I have her in my dreams. You keep that. My girl, your niece, your namesake.”

My sister’s gaze lifted and hit mine. Unchecked tears streamed down her cheeks, and with each one, more pieces of my heart knitted back together.

No more hiding.

No more freezing out the people I cared about.

“She looks like us. Like Mason. She’s beautiful, Dec.”

I closed my eyes thinking she was right. My daughter was beautiful and I never should’ve kept her away from her aunt.

“Something else I need to tell you. I’m sorry—”

“You don’t.”

“Sister, I do.”

Violet rocked back and I wondered if I’d ever called her that to her face.

Damn, I was a dick.

“I love you. I should’ve told you a long time ago.

I should’ve walked across that street and pulled you into my arms and told you who I was.

I’ve made a million mistakes and I’m sorry.

What you have to know is, from now on, no matter where I am, I’m not hiding.

I’m not freezing anyone out. I’m not running. ”

“But you’re leaving,” she whispered.

“I need you to trust me, Vi. I’m doing what I need to do to heal, to move on, to let go of the grief and find happiness.”

“Autumn,” she said gently.

“Autumn,” I confirmed.

I looked to Jaxon and gave him a lift of my chin and he stepped closer to his wife.

“Would it be alright if I gave you—”

I didn’t let her finish, I tagged her hand and pulled her tight against me, and for the first time since as long as I could remember, I hugged my sister.

Fuck, Jaxon had been right, years he’d been telling me my sister had magical powers.

He was not wrong, but they weren’t magical, they were full of love. And the fuck of it was, I could have had this all along but I’d been too chickenshit to walk across the street.

“I love you, Dec.”

“I love you, too, sis.”

“Promise you’ll keep in touch.”

Violet, like her husband, was smart.

“Yeah, sweetheart, I promise I’ll be in touch soon.”

“I don’t want to let you go,” she said, and wrapped her arms around me tighter.

Fucking, fucking , hell, that felt great.

“When?” That was Zane’s greeting when I walked into his office.

He’d just gotten back to headquarters after dealing with the Maloof situation and hadn’t even settled into his chair when I’d barged in.

“Now.”

“Fuck,” he hissed. “You need anything?”

“Nope. Got everything I need.”

Zane held my gaze a beat, his blue eyes flared, he dipped his chin, turned his back to me, and faced his floor-to-ceiling windows.

I didn’t need to move closer to the window to know he was looking at the Naval Academy’s Chapel Dome. I’d been in his office enough to have memorized the view, but more, I knew Zane. When he had something on his mind he often stared out his window, gathering his thoughts.

After my conversation with my sister, this felt easy, the knot of apprehension had faded, the pain had receded to a dull throb rather than a sharp bite. My shoulders felt lighter, my heart freer, and my soul was on the mend.

Therefore, I didn’t brace, and when Zane turned back, I realized my mistake.

“I’m gonna say this to you once. Don’t ever look back, brother. You keep you and your woman facing forward. You find a time you’re struggling to stay that course, you call me. You need something—anything, you call me. Don’t ever for one second feel guilt over what you’re doing.”

“Thanks, Z. Means a lot.”

“Good. Then promise me you’ll pick up the phone, you find yourself in a place where you need a swift kick in your ass.”

“Promise.” I smiled.

“Good, now get the fuck out of my office.”

“The guys—”

“I’ll handle it.”

“’Preciate that.” Then I stood frozen, staring at a man who had taken me in when I had nothing.

Offered me a job, friendship, a team, had given me purpose, and he did all of that while silently supporting me.

“You can’t know what your friendship means to me.

That offer goes both ways— you need me, you call.

You wanna shoot the shit, you call. You have my loyalty until my dying breath, brother, I hope you know that. ”

“You gonna kiss me, too?” Zane snapped but he couldn’t hide the need to clear his throat.

“See ya around, boss.”

“Yeah, you will. Now, go, be happy and shit.”

“Right.”

I offered him my hand but he yanked me forward and gave me a one-armed embrace. Then he pounded my back. But before he broke away, in a very un-Zane-like tone, he mumbled, “Pleased as fuck for you, Declan.”

Zane abruptly let me go and turned back to his window.

I wasted no time leaving.

I had a future to see to.