Page 32 of Other Woman Drama (Content Advisory #4)

Marrying a mature guy is stressful. I mean, he just apologizes straight away when he’s wrong. And now what am I supposed to do with my anger?

— Silver to Aella

SILVER

“You want to ride the bull?” my husband, the man of my dreams, the best person that I knew, asked.

“Yeah!” our two-year-old son, Rocky, screamed.

There was only one pitch of sound that came out of that boy’s mouth, and it was ear-piercing.

“Okay, hold on tight,” Piers ordered.

I watched as my son wrapped his entire little boy body around my husband’s hand and arm, his chest resting against the palm of Piers’s hand, and his legs and arms wrapped around his forearm and wrist.

“You ready?” Piers asked.

“Yeah!” again, my son screeched.

“Okay, you have to hold on for eight seconds to get a solid ride,” Piers urged.

“Okay!” Rocky said. “Ready!”

Then my husband started to rock his hand back and forth, and my heart soared.

A year ago, when my son was one, Piers would do this with Rocky, though at a much slower and less intense pace. Now, Piers actually intended for Rocky to fall off to the bed we were currently lounging on.

Rocky held on for the full eight seconds that Eedie called off, but barely.

He landed on the bed with a laughing cry and raised his fists up into the air in victory.

Piers grinned.

Then he full-body laughed when Eedie screeched, “My turn!”

Rocky squealed in excitement, because he loved his big sister with the power of a thousand suns, and clapped his hands.

Piers held out his hand, but he couldn’t hold her for long.

They all fell into a pile of laughter and giggles.

Piers dropped a kiss onto Eedie’s head before turning just in time to catch Rocky as he launched himself onto Piers.

Piers easily caught him—he was Superman with these kids—and tucked him in close. He hooked Eedie around the neck and pulled her in just as close.

Eedie was nineteen now, almost twenty, and in her first year as a journeyman to become a plumber, working under her Uncle Audric.

Audric was thrilled to have her, excited to pass on his knowledge to the next generation.

The soft whimper had me focusing on the other Webb child.

Our newest daughter, Mable.

Mable was three and a half days old, and the final piece of the Webb puzzle.

I had my tubes tied after Mable’s birth, and I was at peace.

I would’ve loved to have more kids, but Piers Webb wasn’t getting any younger, and according to him, he wanted to live life with me and our kids while he was still young enough to enjoy them.

Plus, I wasn’t getting any younger myself, and I didn’t want to have what the doctors considered a “geriatric pregnancy.”

The whimper caught everyone’s attention, but it was Piers who got up and came to me.

“Time to change her?” he asked, reaching for our girl.

“Seems to be,” I murmured as I watched him pick her up.

She fit in the palm of his hand.

At four pounds, eleven ounces, she was by far a tiny little thing.

At full term, we’d all expected her to come out the size that Rocky had been—a full nine and a half pounds.

Color us all surprised when she came into the world, kicking and screaming, and the size of a small doll.

When Webber had her in his hands, it flabbergasted me how small she appeared.

Webber’s hands were huge, and our baby looked so, so small.

She was in preemie clothes and looked like a little doll.

My little lovebug.

Webber expertly brought her up to his big, barrel chest.

He pressed her against his bare skin, and his lips skimmed over her head for a long moment before he headed toward the nursery.

I heard him on the monitor, talking to her in his soft, deep voice, and knew that my dreams had come true.

So many had come true, that I sometimes felt like I was going to burst at the seams from happiness.

I didn’t work anymore.

Didn’t have to.

When I was feeling frisky, I went to work with Webber and hung out with the kids—though that was before Miss Mable made her appearance.

Now, I would have to wait until she was old enough to withstand the heat.

“Come on, baby girl,” Webber’s deep voice said. “Come to Papa.”

Come to Papa.

Fuck, but I loved this man.

Mabel didn’t cry.

Not when she was with her daddy.

“Ready to start the show?” I asked when he arrived back in the huge Alaskan king bed.

“Ready.”

And when he lay down, our daughter on his chest, Eedie sandwiched between us cuddling Rocky, I closed my eyes and thanked my lucky stars that fate had given this man to me. Given me his daughter. Given me these two babies we shared.

Given me the life that I’d always wanted.

The beginning part of my life might’ve been awful—thank God I hadn’t heard from my dad since Webber had kicked him out of my life—but the middle part? It was the absolute best.

We didn’t have any more crazy people turning our lives upside down, but Webber hadn’t dated in years because I was his permanent date. So no more nut jobs to run him off the road and shoot at him.

Oh, and there were no more crazy police officers shooting at us, either.

Webber was much more careful about who he let prospect for the club and let into our lives.

He had to be, because we had too many precious babies added to our crew to be introducing just anyone into our lives.

“Baby, you’re thinking too hard over there. Watch the movie.”

I leaned over everyone and pressed a kiss to his lips. “Yes, Piers.”

Six years later

“I’m too young to be a grandmother!” Elizabeth’s screeched voice called through the phone.

I hated her.

I hated her so fucking much.

Yet, Eedie still had wanted to let her know that she was officially a grandmother.

Whore.

I hoped that she choked on her boba today and couldn’t find anyone to give her the Heimlich.

Eedie’s eyes went to mine, and I gave her a soft smile.

I looked down at the little boy in my hands, named after his grandfather, and said, “Piers, take the phone from your girl and handle that. She’s under enough stress.”

And she was.

Her husband wasn’t home from Iraq yet, and she’d just had her first child without him.

She missed her husband, who’d been gone for eight solid months now, had a baby a month early, and a C-section at that when her blood pressure had skyrocketed at her latest prenatal checkup—that I attended with her because her mother was too busy.

Thank God I’d been there.

I’d been in the operating room holding her hand an hour later when they performed an emergency C-section, too.

“I’ll handle her.”

I looked up and my heart fucking melted and leaped all at the same time.

Eedie’s husband, Hai, was there with his clothes still dusty and a smile on his face the size of Texas.

Eedie burst out crying, and I stood up, walking to the new dad.

“You let Piers handle it,” I said as I handed him his son. “You handle this.”

Hai took his baby boy, and the tears started to form.

I grabbed Eedie’s phone, Piers’s hand, and we headed out the door.

The moment that I was outside I started bitching, the phone going to my face as I let ’er rip.

“You do realize that your daughter, your flesh and blood, just had to have an emergency surgery because she almost died, right?” I seethed.

“Your daughter, the little girl that you were supposed to support in all things, literally had a stroke. Thank God they caught it in time, and they were able to handle it in such a way that she will have no lasting side effects. Meanwhile, you’re giving her shit about being too young to be a grandmother?

You should be here, bitch. You should be holding her hand.

You should’ve been at that doctor’s appointment.

You should’ve been here for her, but instead, I was.

I got to experience holding my grandchild for the first time.

I got to hold that baby while his mother struggled to wake up from anesthesia.

I got to be there when she met her child for the first time.

I have your man. I have your kid. And now I have your grandchild. I hope you rot in fucking hell.”

I hung up and for good measure, blocked her.

When I locked the phone, I looked up and found Piers staring at me with such love in his eyes that my heart hitched. “You know I love you, right?”

I nodded.

He pulled me into his arms and pressed his lips against my hair. “Thank you for saving my daughter today.”

“I didn’t do any saving, the doctors did.”

“You were the one to encourage her to go to the doctor. You were there to hold her hand and love on her while I was racing back from a poker run. So yes, you saved her today,” he breathed. “You’ve saved me .”

I buried my face in his chest—the one place that I always felt at home—and burst into tears.

He held me so tight that I forgot how to breathe.

I’d just gotten it under control when Hai came out and wrapped me in his arms, and I burst into tears for the second time.

God, I was an emotional mess.

But I was so thankful.

So, so thankful.

Everything had worked out.

I was a grandmother now.

“I think I’ll go by Sisi,” I declared. “Or Gigi. Or Grandma. Whatever the hell that kid wants to call me, I’ll be ecstatic.”

Hai touched the top of my head. “Knew we could count on you.”

I pinched him in the side. “I brought you some clothes from home. Go get in the shower with your woman. I’ll watch that sweet little baby.”

Hai looked relieved. “We’ll hurry.”

They didn’t have to hurry, because holding a little bundle of joy that belonged to my husband’s baby was no hardship at all.

“I love you, baby,” Webber whispered into my hair.

I looked up at him with all the hearts in my eyes and said, “I never hoped to dream this kind of life, Piers Webb. But now that I’m livin’ it, I never want to leave it.”

He brought me in tight, then ran the tip of his finger down his grandchild’s nose. “Next generation’s here. Watch out, world.”