"Shayna, it's Drama," I handed him the phone.

I can't describe everything that I felt right then. All at the same time.

"Thank God. Thank you, God. Thank you..." I reached my arms past Rob and straight to my baby. Jasmine handed her to me, her eyes traveling all the way down my bloody pants and back up to my face. Drama's eyes did the same.

"Mommeee!" Sammie threw her arms up and screamed, like I was her favorite cartoon character.

"My baby." I squeezed her so tight. I never wanted to let her go. "Thank you Jesus. My baby..." Tears started to pour. I couldn't stop them. "Thank you God. Thank you Jesus. Thank God...thank God..." I squeezed her tighter. She hugged me back. She thought I was just happy to see her.

She had absolutely no idea. No idea. None...

Drama hung up with Shayna and put the phone in his pocket. "You alright, shorty?" I was still in the closet, and Drama was standing by the door, careful not to make me feel blocked in.

Shayna must have told him.

I couldn't do anything but hug my baby. I was so grateful. And that's all I felt.

Gratitude.

"Hey," Drama put his hand lightly on my arm. "Are you ok?"

The tears just kept coming. I couldn't do anything but close my eyes and hug her tight.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I heard the back door open and close. The footsteps creaking up the stairs slightly registered as Drama turned from me and took a more protective stance in front of us. I was vaguely aware of Jasmine taking my arm and pulling me away from the closet and away from the doors that had held me captive a few minutes before.

"It's ok," she whispered and put a calming hand on the baby's back. Sammie could feel me tense up and she had done the same. "Look at me. Natasha," she put a firmer grip on my arm. "It's ok. Stop crying. Look at me." I looked at her and tried to stop the tears. "Everything's ok. Give me the baby." I shook my head no and looked into her eyes. "Natasha," she let go of me and put her other hand on the baby, "give me the baby." I shook my head no again and held on tighter. She nodded yes and didn't break eye contact with me. "Collin's here, and we're not leaving without you. Both of you."

She slid the baby out of my arms as my whole body froze up. Then she went to stand further away from the door.

"It's ok," she whispered one more time to both me and the baby as the footsteps grew closer. She kissed the top of Sammie's head and patted her back. Sammie put her head down on Jasmine's chest and her eyes got sleepy.

My baby had literally no idea.

"What the fuck," Collin declared as he walked into the room, wearing a clean shirt, and found himself face to face with Drama. Drama didn't move or say anything until Collin looked past him and at me. "What the fuck are they doing here?" Then he saw Jasmine holding the baby. "Aw shit." He chuckled. "Hell is this?"

"Be easy, bro." Drama put a hand up. "Natasha called us. You scared her."

Collin looked skeptically at him, then he looked at me. "You did?"

Drama answered for me. "She did." He maintained a steady gaze with Collin. "She was crying and afraid when we got here." He stared into Collins eyes. For some reason, Drama had always been the one person that Collin never wanted to cross. It dawned on me then that maybe it wasn't that Collin was afraid of him, but recognized that Drama was...covered...when Jasmine's story of how her husband never went into her sister's house briefly crossed my mind. "Everything alright, bro?"

Collin broke the gaze and looked over Drama's shoulder at me. "Yeah, everything's good. Right?"

Again, Drama answered for me. "Sure about that, bro? She called my wife."

Drama didn't get any closer to Collin, and he didn't back down from him, either. I wasn't sure why he kept calling him "bro," but whatever he was doing seemed to be working because no guns had been drawn, and no one had gotten punched in the mouth yet.

"My wife asked me to come over here and make sure everything's ok. So...you sure everything's alright?"

Collin kind of tilted his head to the side and gave Drama a look that would have either intimidated or put, almost anyone else, on the defensive. But Drama didn't blink, and he didn't look away.

Collin looked past him and at Jasmine. "Fuck you doin' with my baby?"

Drama stepped slightly to his left and blocked her from Collin's line of sight. "Don't talk to the women, bro. Talk to me. From where I'm standing, it looks like everyone's on edge here."

"Damn straight." Collin focused back in on Drama. "Fuck y'all doin' in my house, mayne?"

"You tell me."

"Hell if I know." Collin kind of bared his teeth.

"You know." Drama squared his shoulders and Collin jolted a little.

I guess he didn't realize until then that they knew what had taken place right before they got there. He seemed to back down a little, but then noticed Drama eyeing the blood on my pants.

"That's my blood," he answered the unasked question, "and this is family business."

"Natasha is my wife's family, so that makes it my business."

Collin eyed him the same way that Drama had just eyed the blood on my pants. "Look bro," I was surprised that he chose Drama's word to use. "I didn't mean it."

"Didn't mean what?" Drama stood taller, and Collin seemed to shrink back more.

Again, Collin looked past Drama to me. "You know I wasn't going to hurt the baby. Y'all ma' fuckas was just gettin' on my damn nerves."

"There's a better way to handle that." Drama moved closer to Collin, but it was such a small step that I don't think he noticed.

"Oh, really?" He asked sarcastically.

"Yeah."

"So tell me, the fuck do you do when you want to kill your wife and make her body disappear?"

He was threatening me on the sly, and I felt that threat...all the way through to my baby.

Drama felt it, too, and shut him down immediately. "You don't want to do that."

Collin looked surprised, and then quickly fixed his face. "Fuck you know about it?"

"I know you love her."

Again, Collin looked taken aback. "You don't know shit."

"I know that much."

Collin looked back past him to me, then over at Jasmine and the baby, then back to Drama.

"If you love her, why do you hurt her?"

Collin sneered at him and kind of moved his hand behind his back. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jasmine turn the baby away from us.

"Fuck you gone do about it, 'bro?"

"Look bruh," Drama put up a be easy hand. "I didn't come here for anything other than to make sure my sister's safe. And right now, I'm feeling a whole lot like she might be in danger."

Collin moved his hand back to his side and nodded. "You might be right. What you come here to do then, bruh? Pray for me and all that bullshit?" He looked right at Jasmine when he said it, probably remembering exactly who she was, but she still had the baby turned away from us and didn't acknowledge him.

Drama took another inconspicuous step closer. Collin backed down a little more.

"I have been praying for you, bruh. The whole time. Natasha and the baby, too. You don't want to treat them like this, and you know it."

Collin nodded again and looked down at his feet.

"Then why do you?" Collin shook his head but didn't answer. "What happens when one day you don't want to just scare her, you really want to kill her?"

Collin looked directly into Drama's eyes and just stared at him for the longest time. I couldn't read his face.

"I don't know."

"I know you don't, bruh. You need help."

"I know."

"You do? Then why don't you get help?"

"I tried. It doesn't work."

"Try again. Go to somebody else. You need help finding somebody?"

"Nah," Collin's face hardened a little and he looked back at me. Then he looked over at Jasmine protecting his own child from him and his face softened again. He looked back at Drama. "Man to man, I love them. I can't let them go. I tried..."

Drama nodded. "I feel you. But if you love her...and if you love her," he nodded to the baby, "then you have to let them go. This," he gestured his hand toward me, "is not working out. It's not. Why would you keep hurting someone that you love this much? You just locked her in the closet, man. And you have her truly believing that you would murder your own child. That you would actually shoot a baby. Your baby. Take the life of your own flesh and blood. You have her believing that you would do that."

Collin's mouth kind of dropped open and he looked over at me quickly, like he didn't understand how I could think that he would really do such a thing. I looked down just as quickly because I didn't want him to see himself in my eyes right then. I didn't want him to see what a total nut job I thought he was.

Looking back, though, I probably should have made him look into my eyes. Made him see for himself the sadistic maniac staring back at him.

"Bruh..." Drama stepped in closer and put a hand on Collin's shoulder. Collin looked down at Drama's hand and then back into Drama's eyes, but he didn't move away. "Do you even know why you do the things you do?"

Collin looked at Drama like he used to look at my dad when they were outside talking and working on the car. He looked like no one had understood him in a really long time.

"No." He looked back down at his feet. "No, I don't."

"You need help, bruh."

"Yeah, I do."

"And you need to get yourself together...without them." Drama looked back at me.

My tears had started falling again, the minute I saw Collin looking at Drama like that. He did need help. He really, really did.

Drama looked back at Collin. "This is not working out, bruh. At all. And you need to let them go."

Collin nodded and looked over at me. He looked at me like he used to, and my heart melted. After all that, my heart melted for that fool.

"Come here."

Drama stepped quickly toward me and put his arm out to block my way.

Collin looked kind of thrown by how quickly Drama could move, and then squared his shoulders and looked him in the eye.

"Man to man, I'm not going to hurt her. I just want to talk to her."

"Talk from there." Drama meant it and Collin and I both stayed where we were.

"Listen, Tash..." Collin put a hand over his heart. "I love you. I love you so much. It hurts how much I love you. And the baby. But he's right. You have to go. You have to." He looked at Drama. "Please let me touch her." It was the weirdest thing to see him asking for permission to touch me. Like he was incarcerated and we were visiting him in jail, talking to him through the glass. Even now I don't know what to say about that.

Drama looked at me, and when I gave him the unspoken go-ahead, he kind of moved out of the way and, at the same time, positioned himself beside and a little behind Collin, where he could easily tackle him if Collin started to trip. Jasmine, as if she had heard her cue, turned back around toward us and held the baby closer.

Collin made a gesture for me to come to him, but I was frozen in place. I looked back at Jasmine, who was holding Sammie's head protectively against her chest, and giving Collin an icy stare over the top of our baby's head. She was clearly not in favor of him touching me. Collin ignored her and came over to me. He held out his hand and I took it. Then he pulled me close and wrapped both arms around me. I can't say that it didn't cross my mind, when I put my arms around him, to grab that gun and show him how it felt to have his own life flash before his eyes. But I didn't.

I was a sucker and I knew it.

I always had been for him.

Love...was the worst.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I love you so much," he whispered into my ear. "I don't want to hurt you the way that I do." He pulled away and looked at me with those eyes. "You shouldn't be afraid all the time in your own house. He's right, I need help. And you and Samantha have to go. You have to."

And just like I knew I would, I grabbed onto him as soon as I heard those words coming from his mouth, and held on tighter. What the hell was wrong with me? I hated for him to walk away from me. I hated it.

Collin kissed the top of my head as Drama kind of moved to put an invisible barrier back up between us. He didn't pull me away when I started sobbing and clinging tighter to Collin's shirt, though. He and Jasmine both just stood back and let us do us. I guess they both knew that we had to separate ourselves. We wouldn't stay separated any other way.

Collin kissed me again and pulled away first. He looked at Drama and gave him a nod like it was ok for him to step back in. "Go on." He looked at me, and then the baby. His eyes teared up when he looked at Sammie and he made a move toward her, but Jasmine quickly backed up and Drama stepped in his way.

"Bruh..."

Collin nodded. "I know." He looked over at me while talking to Drama. "Listen, come back tomorrow and get their stuff. I won't be here. Tash, you can take anything you want. Any of it. Take it all if you want. I won't trip. And I won't try to get it back."

Drama put his hand on Jasmine's back and kind of moved her toward the door. When he started to do the same with me, Collin caught my hand.

"Wait." I looked down at his hand and then up into the same candy coated eyes that had been pulling me back in for almost a decade. "Don't come back."

I gasped. That was nowhere close to what I was expecting him to say.

"I mean it Natasha. Do not let me back in this time. Later in life maybe, after I get my shit together, I might ask to see my baby. After I get my head straight. But you and me, we don't work. As long as I know I can keep getting you back, I'll keep doing this to you. I will."

He nodded sincerely and ran a gentle finger under my eye, across the scar that I still had from where his ring had cut me during our fight when I was pregnant. I thought he had killed our baby then, and I was a damn fool for standing there still talking to him now. He literally had to tell me to stay away from him.

Again.

For the second time.

"I'm saying this in front of my man," he pointed over his shoulder at Drama, who was standing closely by, "because it's true." He looked over at Drama, but continued to talk to me. "He's right. You're not safe here, and you're not safe with me. I don't know why I hurt you," he looked back at me, "but I can't stop doing it. If you come back, I'll just keep doing this."

He ran a hand smoothly over the wrist that he had broken five years ago in college, when I should have left him the first time. I literally felt my spirit back away from him when I realized and accepted that all this time...he had been doing those things to me on purpose. I looked over at Drama and hoped that he could see that I was finally ready to get the hell out of dodge.

The glint in Collin's eye as he recognized the fact that I finally saw him...scared me. It scared me in a way that I had never been scared before, and I realized finally that Shayna was right. We're not always fighting an enemy that we can see. Collin probably didn't even realize that he looked at me that way, but when he did, I knew then and there that he would have to fight his own fight from then on. I was stepping out of this ring. I could almost hear the bell ding as Drama guided me ahead of him out the door.

It was a TKO.

And Collin and I were both down for the count.