Page 23 of Curvy Girl and the Bad Boy Cowboy

I smile through my fear, remembering the night I formally asked her to be my girlfriend. We were painting the nursery—the sage green wall now joined by a mural of mountains and trees I'd insisted on trying to create myself. I was speckled with paint, she was laughing at my artistic attempts, and I just blurted it out.

"Be my girlfriend?" I'd asked, paintbrush dripping onto the drop cloth.

She'd tilted her head, that smile I love spreading across her face. "Aren't we a bit beyond that, considering I'm carrying your child and you're living in my house?"

"Maybe," I'd admitted. "But I never did this right. Never asked properly."

"Yes," she'd said simply, stepping carefully over paint cans to kiss me. "Yes, I'll be your girlfriend, Ethan Covington."

Now, Naomi lets out another scream, gripping my hand so hard I feel bones about to crack. I don't care. I'd let her break every bone in my body if it would help.

"That's it!" Dr. Mason exclaims. "Keep pushing, Naomi. She's coming!"

Everything seems to blur, time compressing and expanding all at once. One moment, Naomi is crying out; the next, there's a different cry—higher, indignant, perfect.

"Here she is," Dr. Mason announces, holding up a squirming, red-faced miracle. "Your daughter."

I can't speak. Can't breathe. Can only stare as the doctor places this tiny, wailing human on Naomi's chest.

"Oh my god," Naomi whispers, her voice breaking. "Ethan, look at her. Look at Grace."

Grace Elizabeth Harper Covington. Seven pounds, three ounces of absolute perfection. Dark hair matted to her tiny head, eyes squeezed shut, fists balled as if ready to fight the whole world.

I'm crying. I don't realize it until a tear splashes onto Naomi's arm. I make no move to wipe the others that follow.

"She's beautiful," I manage, gasping. "She's so beautiful."

Naomi looks up at me, her eyes shining despite her exhaustion. "She looks like you," she says. "Same chin."

I laugh through my tears. "Poor kid."

A nurse approaches, showing me how to cut the umbilical cord. My hands shake, but I manage the task, severing the physical connection between mother and child while forging a thousand invisible new ones between all three of us.

They take Grace briefly to clean her up and check her vitals, and I press kisses to Naomi's forehead, her cheeks, her lips.

"You did it," I tell her, awestruck. "You're incredible."

"We did it," she corrects me, squeezing my hand—gentler now.

When they place Grace back in Naomi's arms, swaddled in a hospital blanket with a tiny pink cap covering her dark hair, I perch carefully on the edge of the bed beside them.

"Want to hold her?" Naomi asks.

My heart hammers. "What if I do it wrong?"

"You won't," she assures me, already shifting our daughter toward me.

And then she's in my arms—this tiny person who is part me, part Naomi, and entirely her own self already. Her eyes flutter open briefly, unfocused but seeming to look right into me. I'm changed instantly, rearranged at a molecular level.

"Hi, Grace," I whisper. "I'm your dad."

Dad. The word feels foreign and completely right all at once.

"I'm going to do everything I can to be worthy of you," I promise her. "To be the kind of father you deserve."

Naomi's hand finds mine where it supports Grace's small body.

"You already are," she says softly.

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