Page 41 of Sinful Blaze

I stand tall and glower down at her. “You act as if I’m not allowed to be in my child’s life. Our child’s life.”

“And you’re acting as if it’s totally fine to just raise my baby in your fucked-up world of Anything You Say Goes.” She tucks the blanket around her more. “Which it’s not.”

Ah. So that’s what this is about.

I lean down so my face fills her vision. “If you think for one second that you will get to do anything concerning this child without my explicit permission, I suggest you think again, moya plamya. That’s a piece of me inside of you. I will decide its fate.”

Daphne opens her mouth to say something else, but the nurse comes back in with a broad smile and a copy of the ultrasound for each of us. “So,” she chirps, “would you like to know what you’re having?”

Both of us still.

To my surprise, Daphne looks up at me. “What do you think? Should we?”

The nurse waits for our unified nod before she smiles. “From everything we can see, she’s a healthy baby girl.”

A girl.

We’re having a girl.

I’m going to have a daughter.

A daughter who looks just like her mother. Or just like Mama, or Sofiya. Maybe a little mix of both. Whatever she looks like, I know she will be beautiful.

Without thinking, I press my hand to Daphne’s swollen womb. It’s not so big—just enough to see and feel the fullness of life growing there. Our daughter. My daughter.

Something flutters beneath my palm.

“Did you feel that?” Daphne asks me. She sucks in a sharp breath and sits up a bit more, rubbing her hand next to mine.

Again, another flutter.

“Is that…?”

Daphne’s eyes well up with happy tears. “This is the first time I’ve been able to feel her.”

I don’t know what washes over me. All I know is that it’s intoxicating, and debilitating, and only my hand on her stomach and my arm around her keep me from falling to my knees in the most literal sense.

At some point, our fingers intertwine. We still wait for the flutters and kicks, but with joined hands that seem to somehow calm our baby girl. Soon, she’s still, which the nurse informs us can happen when she feels safe and falls asleep.

I let my hand linger there for a moment longer than I should. I don’t know this woman as well as I need to, or as well as I should.

But I know that I will move Heaven and Earth for her.

And for our daughter.

13

DAPHNE

A knock sounds on the door. Hazel pops in with a shit-eating grin. “You’re gonna wanna clear more space off your desk.”

“Stop. Really?” I glance at my tiny desk, which is already covered with several vases’ worth of champagne roses, notecards signed by Pasha, and a few empty smoothie cups. “Are you serious?”

“Not as serious as Lover Boy is!” She steps aside. Right on cue, several men and women in uniform march in carrying vases of blood red roses, a large box tied with velvet ribbon, and yet another prenatal-packed smoothie with an itemized label of every ingredient slapped on the side.

Okay. I might be enjoying the attention a little bit.

Just the teensiest, tiniest little bit.

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