Page 144

“Let me clean you up.”

“I look terrible, don’t I?” I whimper.

Smiling, he shakes his head at me. “You’re laboring my babies. You couldn’t be any more perfect in this moment. But I told you I’d give you whatever you need, and right now, I know you, and I know this is what you want. It’s something you have control over.”

My dry lips quiver with emotion as he turns my head to him and sets a kiss against them. Then, slowly, he wipes away my makeup. With each pass of the cleanser, I feel a sense of relief.

Another contraction hits, and as it builds in my spine, I know the intensity has cranked up a notch. “I think you need to call the doctor. The pressure to push is starting, JJ.”

Bracketing my face with his large hands, he looks me dead in the eyes as he reaches over to press the call button. “You are so fucking powerful. You’re going to deliver these babies like a boss,and I’m going to be here for every single push, every whimper, every smile, and every tear. I wish I could take all the pain away, but instead, I’ll just make sure you get all the aftercare you need. I worship you, Princess.”

He reaches into my wash bag again and pulls out my lip balm. Popping the cap, he smooths it over my lips before setting his against mine. His tongue sweeps out to caress me, and even though I’m in the height of labor, this brief moment feels like the sweetest few seconds of my life.

JENSEN

“Okay.” The doctor and a couple of nurses push through the door. “Let’s see where we are.”

Pulling on her gloves, she pushes up Kate’s hospital gown, and a flash of black shows beneath.

I look at her as she relaxes her knees for the doctor. “Is that?”

She smirks through the clear discomfort she’s in, which breaks my fucking heart to see. “Your jersey. It survived the amniotic fluid, and it’s what I arrived in. They wanted me to remove it, but I insisted, so they let me keep it on. Feels kind of fitting, right?”

My dick twitches as I lean in to whisper, “How many weeks do we need to abstain?”

Another wave hits her again as she grabs hold of my hand, lurching forward and almost knocking me out in the process. “Never fucking again, Jensen.”

Goddamn my need to wind her up. “JJ,” I reply.

Her head whips to me. “Oh, you better not be correcting me right now.”

The doctor finishes her inspection. “We’re at ten centimeters and one hundred percent effaced. It’s time to start pushing, Kate.”

I see the panic as it overwhelms her. “I can’t do this.”

“You mean to tell me my boss woman can’t do something as simple as this? Come on, Princess. You scare the shit out of people for a living. You can do anything.” I kiss her knuckles. “Plus, once we have our babies, you get to find out what you’ve been dying to know.”

She narrows her eyes in determination and then cries out when, without a doubt, the biggest contraction ricochets through her body. The way she squeezes my hand makes every puck I’ve taken to the body feel like a light tickle. I’m not sure I have any fingers left since I can’t feel them, only the cracking of my knuckles under the pressure.

“Okay, Kate. We’re about to enter the crowning stage. I need you to take some deep breaths for me, and on the next contraction, I want you to push with everything you have.”

The wail that leaves my wife’s throat is nothing short of terrifying as I leap to my feet and stroke her back, all the while helping her follow the rhythmic breathing she’s so desperately trying to use from what she learned in the birthing classes we attended.

The best advice I received was to let her take the lead. I’m not about to do anything other than what she wants.

“Water,” she cries after the latest contraction.

“Just enough to wet her lips,” the doctor instructs. So that’s what I do, dampening her soft lips as carefully as I can.

Inside, I’m a panicked mess, hoping and praying everything goes right and knowing once she’s birthed our first child, she has to go through it all over again. But somehow, I keep it together and don’t let it show. I need to be strong for us both.

“Here comes another,” Kate moans.

“One big push, Princess.”

The huge cry from my wife is quickly replaced with a much smaller one as the girl of my dreams delivers the first of our babies into this snowy, wintery world.

My efforts to hold it together almost fail me as Kate falls apart right next to me. Exhaustion, elation, relief, and the knowledge that she has to do it all over again hit her.