Page 14 of One Hellion of a Christmas

“Please stop saying that, Sparks. This wasn’t your fault. I’m the one who is sorry. If I’d said something sooner, told you about feeling like I was being watched or followed…” She gulped. “I thought…hoped… I hoped I was being paranoid.”

“No, baby. No. We should have kept a closer eye on things—Ishould have been more prepared. If I’d been paying attention, I would have realized that my brother’s silence recently was a flashing sign that something was up with him and Sancho.” He spat out his father’s name. “But I promise you, sweetheart, they won’t ever bother us again.”

She huffed out a small laugh. “I mean, I kind of killed your dad, babe. So, I wasn’t exactly worried about this happening again.”

His lips lifted in a halfhearted attempt at the smile she was aiming for from him. “That’s my amazing little badass.”

Jamie slapped his hand down on the bed beside her feet, forcing us back to the reason I was still holding my breath. “You can’t do shit like that, Hellion. I don’t care what happened. You do not lock us out like that again.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. A few tears spilled down her cheeks. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just… I needed to know.”

“What?” He exploded. “What the fuck did you need to know? Why couldn’t we be in here with you when you got your answers? Fuck! You are ours, Hayat. I don’t care if Abi andSammy were here too. But we should have been in here. Us. You’ve been putting up walls lately. I’ve given you time. We all have. But this shit stops now. Do you hear me?”

“Jamie—”

“We didn’t even have a say in whether we could be in here. The doctor didn’t even fucking blink. Because you’re Hayat Cutter. That is not going to happen again. You’re changing your last name to Carver.”

I snapped my head around in his direction at the same time Sparks barked, “Jamie! Shit. Not like this. We had a plan.”

“The plan changed when she started using her last name to lock us out.”

Hayat’s brows pinched together. “Your plan for what? I’m so confused right now.”

“Join the fucking club,” Jamie snarked. “Because we’re clueless on a few things too. But we wouldn’t have been if you were a Carver like us. Because then we could have waved a ring or some shit in the doctor’s face and put down roots beside this damn bed. Sorry, Doc. She’s our wife. Or life partner. Something. Whatever title you want, Hellion. You pick. I don’t care anymore. I don’t care, as long as you share our last name and we can legally tell everyone to fuck off because you are ours.”

“Of course I’m yours.”

“No, you’re not. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been thrown out of this room without a single say in the matter. So, pick a title—wife, partner, whatever—and a date to make it official. We can have an anniversary that at least one of us forgets, and you can hold it over our heads. But before the end of the year, your name is going to be Hayat Carver. End of discussion.”

Hayat stared up at him with her mouth hanging open in surprise. Sparks groaned, muttering a curse in Spanish, but it was me she turned to, her eyes full of questions since Jamie shut down as soon as he finished running his mouth.

“We had a ring made for you. Kind of…” I shrugged. After everything else that had happened that day, Jamie’s crazy had chosen to switch gears and choose the impulse route, and I was stumbling. “We’re complicated. Nothing new about that. But we were going to…propose? I don’t know. Every time someone asks you about marriage, whether it’s family or some reporter, you always say you wouldn’t choose who to legally marry. And we don’t want you to have to choose. But we do want to complete our family by changing your last name. Maybe…”

“Yes!”

We all blinked down at her in surprise. “What?”

Her eyes glittered with more tears, but she was smiling now. “Yes. Do you want to have a commitment ceremony? Something to celebrate the changing of my name? I’m okay with that. All of it. Something small, though. Maybe, since most of the family is already here for the holidays, we can plan a little celebration.”

“Yes,” Sparks repeated, sounding as dazed as I felt. Jamie just stood at the end of the bed, arms crossed over his chest, defensive but not unfazed by her obvious excitement. “She said yes?”

I nodded, trying to reassure him and myself of her answer. “Yeah.”

“Don’t care if you’re saying yes or not, Hellion. It’s happening.” Jamie sat on the edge of the bed at her feet, apparently no longer able to stand upright after the adrenaline had left following his explosive impulse to demand Hayat change her name. I was still reeling over her actually saying yes. “Now, fucking tell us what you needed the doctor to confirm. Did… Were you… What…”

He stopped and stumbled repeatedly over the question that none of us could voice.

“No! I wasn’t hurt like that. No one touched me.” Hayat rushed to soothe, and the three of us each released a relieved breath.

Jamie swallowed convulsively a few times. “Okay. Good. That’s…good.”

She nibbled on her bottom lip for a moment then seemed to gather her courage. I kept hold of her hands, suddenly feeling like I needed the contact with her more than ever. Instinctively, I knew whatever she was about to say was going to change everything.

I just didn’t know it was in a way none of us had allowed ourselves to think about but secretly craved.

“I’m pregnant.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

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