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The nurses shoo me out of the room soon after, telling me they’re going to get Calla cleaned up and comfortable.

I make my way to the waiting room where my mother, sister, and brother are anxious for news. When I enter the room,Mika stops pacing around and from my face alone, he must know something is wrong. He instantly stiffens.

“She’s okay now. Both are,” I say, extending my arm to support myself on my palm on the wall still weak on my feet. My sister and mother rush to me, embracing me tightly, and Mika claps my shoulder in silent support.

When the doctor appears, telling me about her being at risk for another pregnancy, I don’t have to think about my decision.

“I’ll schedule a vasectomy,” I tell him.

I am not risking losing my wife. If I knew there was even the slightest chance that this could happen, I would have never gotten her pregnant. But I could never regret my baby boy. He will simply be an only child.

This scare will never fucking happen again. I refuse to even think that thought.

He nods and tells me it’s okay for me to return to her private room. Calla is asleep and I watch between her heart monitor and pale face.

Dropping into the chair by her side, my head hangs forward and I hold my head between my palms, exhaustion pulling me under. I tell myself to calm down, that she’s all right, but processing what I experienced today will leave scars while strengthening my love for her, if it’s possible. Undisturbed, I let it all out, crying. Only thinking I wouldn’t be with her anymore breaks me, cutting at my strength and will to live until I am hollow inside. Just an empty vessel with no life in it. I’ve never sobbed, but the thought of losing her makes me a damn wreck.

I don’t know how much time passes, and I couldn’t care less. As long as her heart beats, she’s here with me. I won’t let her go. I will hold on to her. She can’t leave me. I forbid her that.

“I knew we’d only have one child. I had a dream of my mother handing me my boy while she smiled but cried at the same time, and it felt so real,” she says in a groggy voice, ringing with apology.

My chin jerks up, glancing into her silver eyes, which captured my attention and stole my heart the first moment she looked at me. She brushes my wet cheeks, eyeing me with so much softness. Her love stitches me back together. I grip her hand, placing kisses all over her palm.

“What is my life’s biggest gift?” I ask her in a serious tone. If my wife needs a reminder, so be it.

She chews on her bottom lip. “Me.”

“Exactly. You would have been enough for me. Will be enough for me. Our son is a very cherished and loved present. Without you, I wouldn’t be a husband or a father.”

She cries softly. I lean over her bed, my hands spanning her neck and cheeks, needing to feel her and her pulse to keep my sanity.

“I love you. Thank you for fighting, amore mio. I wouldn’t have managed without you.”

“You’re never getting rid of me. When I have to leave this world because of old age, I’m taking you with me.”

I chuckle. “You do that.”

A radiant smile paints her beautiful face. “I have a name for him.”

No name has been good enough for our boy in my woman’s eyes until now.

“Aris.”

“It’s a derivation of the Greek god of war. I like it. Aris Ferrara.”

“He’ll be cocky, won’t he?”

I arch a brow, not even hoping for something different. “With us as parents, that is a prerequisite.”

She giggles, and those sounds are enough to rev up everything that sputtered with uncertainty back to life.

Cupping her face, I caress with my thumbs along her cheeks. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine, not so fine, happy, terrified…”

Just then, the door opens and the nurse wheels in our little miracle.

Approaching the bassinet, I bend over and, with utter care, I pick up my baby boy.

“Hello, Aris. Welcome to our family.” I kiss his forehead before I bring him to his mommy.

Instinctively, he latches as my wife watches him with eyes filled with wonder, smiling down at him.

“I love him so much, Enzo. It’s different, a completely new love that is stronger than anything else.” Then she looks up at me and smiles softly. “My two men I love with everything in me. I love you, and I’ll never stop.”

Putting a protective hand on her shoulder and the other on my son, I say, “I vow to protect you with everything in me.I’ll love you even when I’ll be nothing but dust. If souls truly live longer than bodies, I’ll love you for the entirety of my existence.”

Love fills every crevice in my body, pumping my blood with renewed strength as I look at my little family.

There’s nothing stronger than family. It can raise you up or push you down. You live and die for it. There’s no middle ground. I became a man when I was entrusted with them—to safeguard the blessings of my life. They will never know hardship because I’ll walk freely through hell and back for them. This is my vow.