Page 3 of Falling for Lucifer
“Look at you,” Ellodie’s mother fussed, criticizing her daughter, who now had tears streaming down her face as she looked at the ceiling in defeat. “Pathetic, honestly. I raised you to be better than this. Now you’re going to be a single mother and?—”
“Man, if you don’t get out of my way.” The words left Lucifer’s mouth before he could process them. The sight of Ellodie crying while her mother berated her at a time that should have been special did something to him. Just minutes ago, she had a hint of playfulness and fire. Now, she looked broken, and that shattered something within him. He bumped her mother out of the way before looking down at her. “We’re getting ready to bring our child into the world, and I don’t want you in here. You gotta go.”
Her mother’s mouth dropped open as she looked between Lucifer and Ellodie. Lucifer grabbed Ellodie’s hand and squeezed it. She squeezed it back, and they looked into each other’s eyes. A moment of understanding passed between them. He could see the relief in her eyes, and a bit of that fire came back. He smirked before subtly winking at her just as she cried out in pain again.
“You? Oh, no.” The older woman looked around Lucifer and at Ellodie. “He cannot be the father of your child. I forbid it.”
Lucifer barked out a laugh. “Too late for that.”
“Is it Ms. Glover?” Harley asked, positioning herself at the end of the bed so she could deliver the baby.
“Yes,” the woman said, looking to be in a daze.
“I need you to step outside, please. We can only have one person in the room during the birth. I can come get you from the waiting room when we’re done, if you’d like,” Harley said withher eyes focused between Ellodie’s legs, where Lucifer was very mindful not to look.
“What? No, he needs to leave. I’m her mother!”
The nurse left her station at the monitor and grabbed Ms. Glover by the elbow. Lucifer appreciated that she didn’t allow Ms. Glover to intimidate her as she escorted her out.
“Thank you,” Ellodie whispered as fresh tears fell from her eyes.
“No need to thank us, honey. I just need you to focus on pushing, okay?” Harley coaxed.
“I’ll just step over here,” Lucifer said, letting go of Ellodie’s hand. He planned to stand watch at the door and make sure her evil mama stayed her ass out, but Ellodie snatched his hand back up and looked up at him with pleading eyes.
“Wait, . . . can you . . . can you stay right here, please?”
He looked down at her, wondering why the hell she would want some strange man by her side while she gave birth, but he didn’t need to open his mouth to ask. He saw it in her eyes. Baby girl was afraid. Her mother’s words had gotten to her, and he immediately understood that she didn’t want to do it alone.
Luckily for her, she wouldn’t have to. He gave her hand another squeeze and offered her another smile. “I got you.”
The look of relief that swept across her face made Lucifer’s heart stutter, but it quickly vanished when Harley said, “Okay, Ello. One big push for me.”
“Okay, Ello. One big push for me.”
Those words had been spoken hours ago, and Ellodie was close to giving up. Everyone knew giving birth was hard, but nobody could really understand the depth of the pain until they went through it. At least she didn’t, anyway.
“I promise, Ello, just one more push,” Harley encouraged.
Ellodie bit back her words because she really wanted to curse Harley out. She had been saying one more push for the last hour. Ellodie genuinely liked Harley, though, so she grunted instead and pushed with the last bit of energy she had.
“Good job, Ellodie. You’re doing great.”
Her eyes fluttered open at the sound of the deep voice as she gritted her teeth. She kept her eyes on the stranger who held her hand through the most painful moments of her life. Lu, Harley had called him. Her eyes bore into his as she felt all the pressure in her stomach drop down to her pussy before relief flooded her.Tears streamed down her face from the effort, pain, and emotion of the last few hours, and the handsome man she had just met looked down at her in awe.
“You did it,” he muttered.
A cry sounded through the room, which prompted Ellodie to tear her eyes away from his and look toward the end of the bed where Harley held a baby.
“Do you want to cut the cord, Ellodie?” Harley asked.
The thought of cutting flesh that was attached to her made Ellodie squeamish, so she quickly shook her head while keeping her eyes on her daughter.
“No, you can go ahead.”
Harley carefully handed her crying daughter to Ellodie, who instantly fell in love. At the same time, fear clawed at her. She didn’t know the first thing about being a good mother. She didn’t have one to lead by example. The last thing she wanted to do was mess up this little girl’s life. As Ellodie stared down at her daughter, she memorized everything about her. The head full of jet-black curly hair, her little scrunched face, and her mocha skin were perfect. Even her little cries sounded perfect to Ellodie, who instantly knew she would never be able to get enough of her daughter.
“Okay, Ello, Nurse Allie needs to take her for some testing. She’ll get her right back to you, alright?”
