Page 82 of Baby I'm Yours

“Yeah,” I murmur. “I want you back. For keeps. I want—” I break off with a sharp inhalation as something hard shoves into my palm. “Was that…”

She grins. “Baby A? Yeah. She’s feisty as hell.”

I smile, awe blooming in my chest as the hard nub presses forward again, changing the shape of Elaina’s stomach. “Is she kicking?”

“Stretching, I think,” she says, her fingers tracing the nub through the tight cotton shirt she wears under her cardigan. “But I’m pretty sure that’s her foot. And Baby B’s head is down here.” She guides my hand to her lower right side, where I can actually feel the softly rounded shape of our daughter’s skull.

“Is she safe?” I ask, my heart beating faster. “Shouldn’t there be more fluid to protect her in there?”

“She’s fine.” Elaina exhales a soft laugh. “They’re just running out of room. The doctor wants me to try to make it to the end of next week before we induce, but I don’t know if the girls are going to go for that. They’re already squeezed in tight.” She winces as Baby A stretches again, then swings her legs over the side of the chaise. “Andthatwas a kick to my bladder. Sorry, I have to go. I pee every fifteen minutes these days. It’s my number one hobby.”

I stand and reach down to help her up. “Don’t apologize. Just tell me what I can do. Do you need help to the bathroom?”

She looks up at me as she takes my hand, clearly amused. “No, I’m good. I can still use the toilet by myself.” She rises witha grunt. “But if you wanted to order pizza, I wouldn’t complain. I started thinking about pizza when I was planning to hide from you in the pizza parlor, and it summoned a craving for pepperoni with extra black olives.”

“Done,” I say, releasing her hand. I watch her amble slowly across the room for a beat before calling after her, “And Elaina?”

She turns back to me.

“I’m glad you didn’t hide from me,” I say.

A hopeful smile curves her lips. “Me, too. I think—” She breaks off, frowning for a moment before her eyes fly wide. “Shit. Oh God, shit!” I have no idea what’s happening until she glances down. I follow her gaze, watching as a dark stain spreads quickly across the crotch of her brown leggings.

I’m about to assure her that it’s no big deal—she’ll have to do a lot worse than pee herself to scare me off—when she lifts saucer-round eyes to mine and bleats, “My water broke. That was my water breaking, Hunter. Shit!”

Blinking faster, I try to remain calm as I ask, “Okay, so that means we should?—”

“That means we’re having some babies,” she says, fear and excitement mixing in her expression. “And that we should head to the hospital. Now.”

twenty-four

ELAINA

I always imagined goinginto labor would be dramatic—contractions wrenching through my guts, maybe some screaming, definitely an abundance of panic and trying not to freak out as I navigated the “heading to the hospital” process.

Instead, I basically just…peed myself.

It’s both surreal and weirdly mundane, like my body didn’t get the memo that this is supposed to be the Big Moment. Life will never be the same after this.Never.There are now officiallyzerosleeps left before I become a mom.

But instead of chaos and upheaval, I’m weirdly calm as I emerge from the bathroom in fresh underpants and waddle toward where Hunter has the pair of sweats I requested waiting.

“Here, careful. Hold onto me,” he says, fussing like a designer-clad mother hen as I step into the clean bottoms. “I don’t want you to fall.”

“I won’t,” I say, smiling as I hold onto his shoulder and let him pull my pants up.

This isn’t even close to how I imagined this moment would go, either, butdamnit’s good to have him with me. I’m not alone anymore. He’s here, hovering and fussing and looking at me like I’m a precious treasure he’s vowed to protect at all costs.

Anirreplaceabletreasure…

It was the perfect word. Just perfect.

“Okay, what else?” he asks as he smooths my shirt down over the top of the sweats. “Should I pack fresh clothes for after the birth? Toiletries? Maybe some?—”

“I already have all that packed in the little gray suitcase by the door,” I assure him. “The yellow suitcase next to it is for the babies. So, we just need to get those both down to the car and grab the car seats from the storage area near my parking spot and?—”

I break off as the first real contraction hits, making me suck in a surprised breath as my stomach balls into a knot.

“Oh. Wow. Okay,” I say as pain enters the picture, steady and throbbing. I frown and my shoulders instinctively creep closer to my ears, but I try to stay as relaxed as I can, remembering my birth class training.

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