Man of Honor (Passion in Paradise Book 4) (9 page)

“I swear on my
love for you, baby, all three kids and your sister are all going to recover
just fine,” Zeke vowed solemnly, leaning forward to press a lingering kiss
against Honor’s forehead.   

A raw sob escaped
Honor’s lips at that promise as she lifted her hand to curl it around Zeke’s
neck while he held his lips pressed to her forehead.  “Thank God.” 

“You took the
brunt of the injuries, Kitten,” Zeke shared against her skin.

“Good,” Honor
declared with a watery laugh.  “If somebody had to get the brunt of it, I’m
glad it was just me.”

“What?” Zeke
growled, lifting his lips to glare at her. 

“My overachieving
sister is now a mother to three tiny little humans.  She needs all her
strength.  If somebody needs to suffer here, it should be me.  Nobody depends
on me for anything.”

“That’s bullshit. 
I depend on you for everything, Honor.  My happiness.  My sanity.  Pretty much
every single thing in my life.  I hate that either of you were hurt,” he
grumbled.  “But you need to get it through your head that you are every bit as
important as any of your sisters.  And you’re more than important to me. 
You’re vital.  Crucial in a way that might just cripple me if you try and leave
me again.”

Honor looked away
from him.  “I don’t have the energy to fight with you over this right now,” she
muttered.  “But for the record, I wasn’t leavin’ anybody.  I was run off the
blasted road.”

Zeke laughed. 
“Yeah, we’re gonna talk about that later.  For now, how about you stop fighting
the idea of there being an ‘us’ and just accept the way things are?  That
being, I need you as much as I need food, water, and air,” Zeke explained as he
saw Honor’s face tighten in agony again, the pain beginning to overwhelm her. 
“Just hang on for me, Kitten,” he urged, lifting her hand and holding it
between both of hers as he watched her try to take a few deep breaths.  “Your
body has been through it today.  You were in surgery for hours.”

“Surgery?  That
would explain why it feels like my insides have been rent in two,” Honor
surmised faintly.  Slowly rolling her head toward him, she whispered, “How bad
this time?”

He hated that
she’d tacked on the words ‘this time’, but he couldn’t blame her.  It wasn’t
the first time she’d woken up in a hospital both in pain and disoriented with
him by her bedside.  “Kitten, you’re going to be okay,” he felt the need to
reiterate.

She merely stared
back at him, waiting.

Fuck, he knew that
look.  She’d stare at him all night until he gave her the answer to her
question.  “It wasn’t good, Honor,” he affirmed quietly.  “But it could have
been so much fuckin’ worse, baby.”

“Details,
Ezekiel.  I want details,” she prodded.  “It is my body after all.  I deserve
to know what’s wrong with it.”

“You remember the
wreck, yeah?” he asked gently.

Breathing slowly,
Honor inclined her head slightly.  “We went off the road into the creek.  Abel
got Patience out, but I was…Oh, god,” she said, gasping as she shuddered.  “I
was pinned to the seat by that tree branch.  It was stabbing me,” she said
between barely-moving lips.  Suddenly jerking her gaze to Zeke, she narrowed
her eyes.  “The engine was on fire and you wouldn’t leave me, you stubborn
fool.”

“Leaving you never
has been and never will be an option I’m willing to consider, Kitten,” Zeke
reminded her with a gentle tolerance he’d built over time.  “You know that,
baby.”

“Idiot.  You could
have been killed,” she railed at him despite the pain running through her small
body.  “What kind of moron takes that kind of risk?”

“One that loves
you.  Sooner or later, you’ll understand that,” Zeke replied with a careless
shrug.

“I don’t want
that!” Honor yelled, her voice frail.

“There won’t be
many times in life that I’ll say this to you, Kitten, but right now, I could
care less what you want.  I wasn’t going to leave you there.  I’d rather have
died with you than lived without you.”

Sinking her top
teeth into her lower lip, Honor squeezed her eyes shut.  “You can’t make those
kind of irrational decisions, Ezekiel.  People depend on you to be the smart
one.”

Zeke laughed
softly.  “I am smart.  Smart enough to know that a life without you isn’t
something I want to contemplate.”

“God!  You’ve got
to stop doing that,” she insisted furiously, thumping a closed fist against the
bed even though it made her wince in pain.

“What?” Zeke asked
calmly.

“Stop being so…
so… sweet! I can’t handle it.”

Huffing out an
irritable breath, Zeke rolled his eyes.  “You’ll learn,” he said simply before
leveling the woman in the bed with an intense look.  “I’m done waitin’ for you
to be ready for me, Kitten.  Done wastin’ time tiptoeing around what I feel for
you because I’m afraid it’ll scare you.  You’re gonna be scared, regardless.  I
might as well be blunt about things.  I want you.  I need you.  I love you. 
Three simple truths that you’re just gonna have to get used to hearing and
knowing.”

Furious, Honor ground
her teeth together so tightly that her jaw clenched.  “What’s wrong with my
body, Ezekiel?  Why did I need surgery?” she asked, obviously done discussing
their relationship with him.

Zeke sighed. 
Fuck, but he hated to tell her this shit.  He knew she’d just eventually use it
as one more goddamned reason that they couldn’t be together.  He knew as soon
as he told her, she’d assume her perceived diminished ability to provide him
with a family would be one more nail in their relationship coffin.  It wouldn’t
matter that both Dr. Sanderson and Mack said she’d probably be able to have
kids without a single problem even with having only one set of reproductive
organs.  It wouldn’t matter to her that even if she COULDN’T eventually give
him a biological child, he could care less.  They could hire a surrogate.  They
could adopt.  Or, he could just spend his life being gratefully happy that he
had Honor in his bed.  None of that would matter at all.  Because Zeke KNEW
without a shadow of a doubt that Honor wouldn’t see it that way.

“Zeke, I’m
waiting.”

He also knew she
would dig at him until he answered her damn questions.  Lifting his eyes from
where they’d clung to their joined hands to Honor’s impassive face, he decided
to rip of the bandage and just hit her with the truth.  “You lost your left
ovary and fallopian tube.  Doctor Sanderson and Cain tried to save them, but
you started to bleed out and saving your life became the priority.”

Honor’s breath
caught as she absorbed that blow.  Finally, she slowly nodded.  “Okay,” she
assented softly.  “Now I know.”

He could tell the
news was killing her by degrees and Zeke automatically moved closer to her. 
“No, you don’t know.  It’s not as bad as I can tell your mind is working this
up to be.  You can still have babies, Kitten.  Your right ovary and tube are
fully functional.”

“There aren’t
going to be any babies for me, Ezekiel, because there’s not going to be any man
to give them to me.  I don’t WANT a man to give them to me,” Honor denied
softly, shaking her head quickly.  “So, this isn’t a big deal at all,” she
tried to say lightly even though her voice sounded unnaturally thick.

Catching sight of
the nurse in the orange scrubs heading back down the hallway toward their
cubicle, Zeke intentionally made himself relax.  “We’re about to have company,
baby, but I gotta say, if you think that one day you and I won’t be working on
a little Monroe, you’re not nearly as smart as I gave you credit for being.”

Honor gasped as
the sliding door opened again and the nurse stepped inside with a syringe in
her hand.

Zeke merely
shrugged and grinned at his girl.   “Told ya, Kitten.  Done with the tiptoeing
around,” he reminded her with a teasing wink while the nurse injected the dose
of morphine into Honor’s IV.

Hampered by the
other woman’s presence and the quick-acting medication, Honor wasn’t able to
respond to him before her eyes drooped shut.

But it wouldn’t
have mattered to Zeke.

Come hell or high
water, he was going to school Honor McKinnon on her brand new reality. 

A reality that
would include Ezekiel Monroe in a starring role.

December, 2015

November bled easily
into December as both Honor and Patience continued to heal inside the safe
confines of Paradise General Hospital under both Abel and Zeke’s watchful
eyes.  And while both their mama and auntie healed, triplets, Bronson, Harriet,
and Granger flourished under the attention of their family. 

Zeke had gone back to
work while Honor was healing, more determined than ever to find a lead into who
had attempted to run Honor and her sister off the road, but so far he’d come up
with a grand total of nothing.  In a town where everybody always seemed to know
a little something about everything, strangely, nobody claimed to have seen
anything.  Nobody copped to having heard anything.  And despite his very best
efforts, nobody was saying any-fucking-thing.  It was enough to nearly drive
the lawman insane.  He’d even broken his own moral code and asked Wrath and his
biker brethren to begin quietly asking around about that night, but as of yet,
none of them had been able to find a solid piece of verifiable intelligence
either.

It was a safe bet to
say that Zeke was quickly losing both patience and faith in his normally
closely-knit small town.

And while Zeke had
spent the last several long days searching for viable leads on who the hell was
trying to hurt his woman now, he’d left the McKinnon clan and extended family
in charge of Honor (much to her chagrin).  Despite her very loud and increasingly
shrill protests, he’d insisted that someone remain by her side at all times
until he returned to her room in the evenings to sleep in the chair beside her
hospital bed.

So, just a mere ten
days after she’d been admitted to the hospital, he shouldn’t have been
surprised by what he’d found as he’d walked into her room.  He really shouldn’t
have been shocked in the slightest.

And yet...Honor never
failed to amaze him.

~***~

“Move aside right
this second, you pair of overgrown bullies, and let me out of here or I swear
to God, I’m gonna give both of you an enema you’ll never forget with my IV pole
and a determined attitude!!  Believe me, I will make it my personal mission to
make your last prostate exam feel like a kiss on the neck before I’m done with
y’all.”

Sheriff Zeke
Monroe winced as he heard Honor’s voice threaten loudly as he stepped off the
elevator in front of the second floor nurses’ station of Paradise General
Hospital.  Nodding to the familiar wide eyed nurse behind the desk, Zeke felt
his shoulders slump.  It looked like his long day was about to become an even
longer night. 

“Miss Farrah,” he
greeted the dark-haired woman looking at him with something he greatly
suspected was pity.  “I guess I don’t need to ask what kind of afternoon it’s
been for Honor, huh?”

Sounds of a
scuffle came from the general direction of Honor’s room as the nurse shook her
head and tried to clear the amusement from her face.  “Our patient might be
gettin’ a little anxious to go home, Sheriff.   I guess I should warn you that
Dr. Sanderson accidently spilled the beans that Honor was technically ready to
leave two days ago when Patience and the babies got released but took your
concerns about her condition under serious advisement and kept her with us a
bit longer.  This… as you can imagine, hasn’t made little Honor exactly
cooperative,” Farrah explained as the sound of something that sounded
suspiciously like a body collided with the closed door of Honor’s room.

“Ah, hell,” Zeke
groaned, closing his eyes.  He could only imagine the state that their stubborn
patient had worked herself up to.  He’d only had the best of intentions when
he’d had that conversation with the doctor, and honestly, his girl was still
experiencing quite a bit of pain when she moved.  Add that to the fact that it
was a hell of a lot easier to protect her in a contained environment, and yes,
he’d talked her physicians into keeping her longer than entirely medically
necessary.  It was easy to do in a small town hospital where the docs were his
friends.

“If I were you,”
the black woman wearing purple scrubs seated beside Nurse Farrah drawled as she
flipped through a glossy magazine, “I’d wear a cup and a helmet if you’re goin’
into Miss McKinnon’s room tonight.  She’s lookin’ to draw blood.  Yours,
specifically, Sheriff.”

Zeke sighed. 
“That bad?”

“Worse,” both
women responded in unison.

Looking down the
thankfully empty hallway as another thump landed against Honor’s door, he shook
his head.  “I had the best intentions.”

The black lady
snorted and exchanged a look with Farrah.  “Road to hell is paved with those,
ain’t it?” she asked dryly.

Zeke couldn’t help
laughing at that.  If these ladies only knew how many times he’d walked up and
down that road to hell with Honor, they’d both get down on their knees and pray
for his rapidly blackening soul. 

“You listen to me,
Ice Monroe, I refuse to be held hostage by Ezekiel and his band of redneck
terrorists any longer!  A woman has a God-given right to shrug off the veil of
her oppressors and I am officially strippin’ down!” Zeke heard Honor proclaim
as devoutly as any war cry he’d ever heard from the other side of the door.

“I think that’s
your cue.  Better move fast before your poor brother sees a side of Honor that
he’s not prepared to deal with,” Farrah declared, nearly choking on her
giggles.

Oh, yeah.  This
was gonna be a hell of a night, Zeke thought as he quickly moved toward the
room to rescue both Ice and Honor’s brother-in-law, Jake.  Both men had taken
the afternoon shift to watch over Honor while the other sisters helped Patience
with her new babies.  Opening the door, Zeke ducked quickly as an empty water
pitcher came sailing at his head.  Slowly rising as he stared across the room
to the other side of the bed where Honor stood, gripping her silver IV pole with
whitened fingers, he held up a hand.  “Alright, Kitten.  How about you just
take a deep breath and…”

Zing.

Zeke’s eyes
widened as a box of tissues came flying toward his face.

“You breathe,
traitor!  I’m PISSED,” Honor roared.

Blinking as he
picked up the box of Kleenex from the tiled floor and tossed them on the sink
beside the door, Zeke nodded.  “I can see that.”

“Man, I have never
in my LIFE been happier to see somebody!  This chick is nuts!  Handle your
woman,” Ice growled, rubbing the goose egg that seemed to be forming on his
forehead as Honor turned her glare from Zeke to Ice.

“I. Am. Not. His.
WOMAN!” Honor screeched, punctuating each word with another projectile
missile.  A comb.  A hairbrush.  A remote.  The weapons just kept flying from
her hands.

“Holy mother of
God,” Jake breathed from the corner of the room, afraid to move.  “I thought
Harmony could be a handful when she was mad.  Zeke, dude, you’re seriously
fucked.”

Zeke watched
Jake’s gaze dart toward the door and there was no doubt the guy was eyeballing
the distance, measuring his chances of making it in one swift leap.  “Honor,
enough!” Zeke barked when she lifted her hand to hurl one of the paperbacks Aunt
Orla had dropped off this morning. “Put it down before I decide to put you in
cuffs and arrest you for assaulting a police officer.  Either that, or turn you
across my knee.”

“I’d go with the
spanking.  I think it would make a more lasting impression on Little Miss Hard
Head over there,” Ice grumbled, tenderly prodding the knot on his head. 
“Seriously, I’m thinking of charging her with assault myself.  She threw a
freaking vase at my head, Zeke!”

“And I’m not even
a little bit sorry for it, you big jerk!  You tied me to the bed while I was
sleeping!  Who does that?”

“People that are
trying to stop patients from escaping every time they turn around, you pain in
the ass!” Ice retorted angrily.

“Pain in the ass?”
Honor gasped in outrage, looking around for a heavier projectile.  “I’ll show
you a pain in the ass,” she shouted, finally locating a worthy missile in the
form of her half eaten dinner plate.

Grabbing Ice by
the arm, he physically shoved him from the room.  “He’s leaving, Honor,” Zeke
soothed as he pushed his protesting sibling out of harm’s way.  “So is Jake,”
he added, jerking his thumb toward the door to give Jake the all clear.  “It’s
just you and me now,” he said, promptly closing the door behind the two
traumatized babysitters.

Furious, Honor’s
reddened cheeks glowed as she shook her head.  “I canNOT believe you, Ezekiel! 
How could you?  How could you have made that doctor keep me in here when you
KNOW how much I despise hospitals?”

“Sweetheart…”

“No!  Don’t you
DARE try to coddle me with careless endearments and cheap words.  You
deliberately had me held here, you… you… ERGHHH!!!  I can’t even think of a
name bad enough to call you!”

“Give it time. 
I’m sure it’ll come to you eventually,” he offered with a guilty smile. 
Leaning back against the now firmly closed hospital room door, Zeke watched as
Honor closed her eyes and tried to catch her breath, her flushed face slightly
sweaty from exertion.  “You okay?” he asked quietly after a moment when it
seemed she was breathing a bit steadier.

“No,” she
snapped.  “I’m not.  Evidently, I’m your prisoner.  What I wanna know is why? 
And it better be a real good reason, Zeke.”

“Because I thought
being here was for the best,” he stated with simple honestly.

Honor’s eyes
flashed dangerously before narrowing.  “Wrong. Answer,” she hissed before
smoothly ripping the IV from her arm with one vicious jerk of her fingers.

Straightening
quickly, Zeke’s jaw dropped, unable to believe how impulsively foolish Honor
was being.  “Damn it!  What the hell do you think you’re doing, Kitten?” he
exploded, circling the bed in two steps to jerk her hand into his, snatching a
handful of the sheet from the bed to press to her bleeding hand.

Waiting until he
was distracted by the sight of her blood, Honor moved quickly to firmly grasp
Zeke’s groin, tightening her grip in a way that let him know she meant business. 
“I’d say that I’m makin’ my stand, Sheriff.  I’d suggest you stop getting in my
way!”

Sucking in a sharp
breath as her fingers twisted slightly around his manhood, Zeke was
flabbergasted.  Did the woman that couldn’t speak the word ‘penis’ out loud actually
have him by the literal balls?  A quick glance down into the general area of
his short and curly hairs confirmed that she did. “Baby, how ‘bout you turn me
loose before you do a kind of irreparable damage you might regret later?” Zeke
suggested tightly.

Chin lifting
defiantly as she rose on her tiptoes to go nose to nose with him, Honor smiled
sweetly.  “Oh, I assure you, sweetie, I’m not gonna regret a single, solitary
thing when I rip your stones off and send ‘em bouncing down the hallway.”

Astonished at her
behavior, Zeke dropped his gaze to study her face.  Yep, she looked like the
same mostly sane woman he’d left here this morning.  The long, silky hair was
the same.  The compact body was as smokin’ hot as ever.  And she still had the
prettiest face in the world as far as looks went.  No, it was her attitude that
had changed drastically during the hours he’d been apart from her.  Sure, when
he’d left this morning, she’d been irritated by the last few days of being kept
penned in her hospital bed, but nothing he couldn’t handle.  She was certainly
nothing like the unholy handful of femininity that stood twisting his testicles
into a knot now.  It seemed like the sweet, shy girl that was beloved by the
entire town of Paradise was long gone and in her place was a tiny tornado hell
bent on making him into a eunuch. 

Prying her hand
from his crotch, Zeke gently wrestled Honor’s arm behind her back as she
squirmed against him.  “Honor, honey, I know you’re mad…”

“Mad?  You think
I’m mad, do you?” Honor replied in a voice that while it might have seemed to
have been spun with sugar, actually held quite a bit of venom.  “Why ever would
you imagine that, Sheriff?” she asked caustically, arching one ash blonde
eyebrow as she reclined her head to look up into his face.  “Could it possibly
be because you now realize that your days of deceitful trickery are OVER?”

“I wasn’t tryin’
to either trick or deceive you, Honor,” Zeke declared impatiently.  “I was
doing my level best to keep you safe.”

“Oh, horse
hockey!” Honor spat angrily.  “You were trying to micro-manage my life and you
have no danged right to do it,” she accused.  “Listen here, Sheriff Ezekiel
Kinkaid Monroe, I am finished with this foolishness.    I’m goin’ HOME!” she
informed him on a roar as she smacked a closed fist against his solid chest. 
“It is the second week in December, and I have better things to do than sit in
this hospital room twiddling my thumbs.”

“You’re recovering
from surgery that very nearly killed you, you hard-headed ball of fury.  I
wouldn’t exactly say that the time has been wasted,” Zeke countered angrily.