Page 53 of Bad Boy Husband

JAMESON

Late Fall

F all had settled in with the kind of crisp bite in the air that made me think of fires in the hearth, pumpkin spice, and cuddling up with blankets on the couch. I glanced out the window, anxiously waiting for my delivery to arrive.

I’d been pacing at the front door for the better part of twenty minutes while Sadie laughed at me from the kitchen. She was learning a new recipe , which, in our house, was code for open every window and pray the smoke doesn’t set off the alarm.

The open windows hadn’t made much of a difference so far, though. At this point, the entire first floor was a haze, the wispy tendrils of smoke warm and rich with something that would’ve been paprika heavy but now seemed mostly just burnt.

When the delivery guy finally showed up, I signed for the order so fast that he probably thought I was trying to break a speed record, but I grabbed the boxes he handed over and headed back inside, kicking the door shut behind me.

Back in the hallway, I got caught in a little stampede with Wanda marching past with a mop, muttering something under her breath as she chased Hooch, who was doing his best impression of I’m too old for this shit .

The foster puppies didn’t seem to mind that he was trying to get away from them, yapping and pouncing like a squad of tiny, joyful maniacs.

I waited for Hooch to pass, shot Wanda an apologetic smile, and managed to dodge the puppies as I carried my boxes into the living room.

Kittens zapped across the back of my couch.

A particularly cute little white one sat on the armrest, flicking her tail as she watched me with her curious expression on her tiny face.

My life had officially crossed over into zoo territory, but I loved it. Every messy, noisy, ridiculous second of living with too many animals and a wife who genuinely, desperately could not cook to save her life but refused to quit trying.

As I lowered the boxed onto the coffee table, I grinned at the kitten. “You’re going to love what I’ve got in here. Come check it out.”

I grabbed the box cutter I’d gotten ready when I’d received the notification that the delivery was almost here, sliced into the tape, and cracked the packages open. Inside were new collars, chew toys, and a collapsible playpen for the fosters, as well as a cat tree for my office.

The kittens had been scaling things I hadn’t realized could be scaled, leaving claw marks in places I hadn’t known they could reach. In the end, I’d decided it was better to give them something tall enough to keep them occupied that had been designed especially for them.

“Jamie!” Sadie called from the kitchen, a strangely emotional wobble in her voice. “I think we might have to order in.”

Not surprised, I straightened up and abandoned my purchases. Crossing back to the kitchen, I found the dinner she’d attempted in the trash, charred so far beyond recognition that it might as well have been bits of a meteorite.

“That’s okay,” I said, firmly shutting the garbage bin and smiling at her over my shoulder. “I kind of feel like pizza anyway. What are you in the mood for?”

She stood in the middle of the kitchen with her red hair pulled up into a high, messy ponytail and her sweatshirt covered in something that looked like flour. Her eyes glistened with tears and her shoulders were slumped.

“Pizza is fine,” she muttered, shaking her head as she surveyed the damage to the kitchen. “I can’t believe that turned out so badly. I followed the recipe to the letter.”

In doing so, she’d also used every pot, pan, and spatula we had, leaving a trail of destruction in her wake. I would’ve teased her about it, but this particular gastronomic disaster seemed to have hit her really hard.

Frowning, I strode over to her, took her hips in my hands, and waited for those sad blue eyes to come up to my own before I kissed her forehead. “Don’t worry about it, baby. I’m sure you’ll knock it out of the park next time.”

She sighed, leaning into me. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket and placed our order. All the while, I kept an arm around her hips, holding her to me and wondering why she seemed so upset. This was far from her first recipe gone wrong. In fact, all of them kind of did in one way or another.

Still, this one seemed to have really gotten to her. She clung to me like she was trying not to crumble. I pressed another kiss to the top of her head once I’d confirmed our order. Then I slid my hand into her hers and started leading her to the living room.

“Come see what I got. It’s going to cheer you right up,” I promised. “You might have to help me assemble that tree, though. I’m not sure it’ll be safe if I do it by myself.”

I expected at least a smile from her, but all I got was a soft sigh and a barely there nod. “Yeah, okay. Can we do it later?”

“Sure.”

When we got to the living room, she rummaged through the boxes, occasionally picking up a toy and giving it a squeeze but not with nearly as much enthusiasm as usual.

The puppies clamored around our feet when they heard the squeaks and Hooch collapsed on his bed in the corner, giving me a look like he was thanking me for getting them off his back.

Sadie wore a thoughtful expression in her eyes as she helped me unpack everything. After the food arrived, I carried our takeout to the kitchen and finally gave up waiting to ask her what was going on.

“Is the food really bothering you that much?” I asked gently as I looked at her from across the island. “Why do you seem so bummed about it this time?”

“I wanted us to have a special night together,” she said softly. “Something we would both remember and that we could look back on.”

After sliding a slice of pizza onto a plate, I poured us each a glass of wine and slid one toward her with the pizza.

“Every night with you is a special night for me, Sades. God knows, we waited long enough just to be able to have dinner together without having to worry about someone walking in and catching us in the act.”

“Yeah, I know.” She glanced at the wine and pushed it back to me. “I can’t drink that. Thanks, though.”

At first, I thought she was still upset about dinner, but there was something in her eyes, like a shimmer just under the surface, that made me think again.

She’d been weirdly emotional about the food, and earlier, she’d run a mysterious errand.

Now she was saying no to wine—one of Sterling’s bottles, which I knew she loved—but also not really saying no.

What she said was I can’t drink that. Not I don’t want that . My brain caught up half a second before my mouth did. “Wait. Are you…”

She bit her lip and nodded, blue eyes boring into mine with anticipation, anxiety, excitement, and worry all seemingly contributing to that shimmer. “I was going to tell you tonight. That’s why I wanted to cook something special, but we’re, uh, we’re pregnant, Jamie.”

The words landed right in the center of my chest and it felt like the whole world tilted on its axis as I processed them. Pregnant .

Sadie was pregnant. With my baby.

I hadn’t even realized I was grinning until I felt my cheeks hurting. A rush of warmth smacked into me, flowing from my chest to my extremities, sharp and overwhelming. There were a hundred things I wanted to say, but when I opened my mouth, all that came out was laughter.

“Are you serious? I mean, are you sure?” I was moving before I’d given the conscious command to my feet to do so, racing around the island until I was standing right in front of her, so close that her chest brushed mine with every breath we took. “We’re pregnant?”

She looked up into my eyes, a slow but real smile spreading on her lips. She finally dipped her chin into a nod. “I’m sure. I went to the doctor today to double-check that it wasn’t a false positive, and it definitely wasn’t. We really are pregnant.”

I blinked hard against the pressure building at the backs of my eyes, then scooped her up in my arms. Laughing again, I spun her around. “Shit, I can’t believe this. Seriously? We’re really going to be parents?”

She squealed with laughter, gripping my shoulders tightly and hanging on. “That’s generally what it means when someone is pregnant. You’re really happy about this?”

“Of course, I am.” I set her back down on her feet and circled my arms around her waist, unable to quit grinning. “We said we were going to roll the dice, right? It seems to me that we won. How far along are you? Was it the wedding night? What did the doctor say? Is everything okay?”

Sadie chuckled, tears shining in her eyes.

She reached for her bag on the counter. Her hand disappeared into it, and a moment later, she pulled out a strip of black-and-white images.

“Everything seems fine so far, and yeah, I’m pretty sure it was the wedding night.

The dates line up. The doctor seems happy.

We’ve got another appointment in a few weeks. ”

When she handed over the images, I took them and only realized once I was holding them that my hands were trembling a little. Sadie leaned against my side, staring down at the grainy pictures with me as I tried to decipher them.

My grin faltered when I started comprehending what I was looking at. “Are these…”

“Ultrasound pictures,” she confirmed breathlessly, glancing up at me with tears welling on her eyelids.

“The doctor gave them to me this afternoon when I went for the appointment to confirm. I was going to do something cute with them. There are all these ideas on the internet, but then I got caught up in the cooking and I didn’t get around to nailing down which one I wanted to use, and then the food burnt, and… ”

She trailed off.

I traced the little shapes on the images with my eyes, wondering how it could suddenly feel like the future was right there in my hands. I’d only found out about this a minute ago, but already, it felt like something was different. Better. Brighter.

My life was already so full, but somehow, there was even more. “Why does it seem attached? Shouldn’t there only be one blob?”

Her eyes locked on me and a soft laugh escaped her as she shook her head. “Yeah, normally, there is only one blob, but it turns out that when we rolled the dice, we really rolled it.”

“Twins?” I stared at her, eyes widening to the point of pain.

Even our zoo faded into the background. The dogs were racing around, the puppies were nipping at Hooch’s heels, and the kittens zoomed around the boxes in the living room.

Bells on balls tinkled as they smacked them with their tiny paws. “Really?”

“Really.” She smiled, hesitant but hopeful. “Are you okay with that?”

“Are you kidding? Twins?” I repeated the word, and honestly, it was the best thing I’d ever said. “Hell yeah, I’m okay with it.”

Catching her face in my hands, I gently pinched the pictures between two fingers so they wouldn’t get creased, and then I kissed her. I kissed her with all the joy, shock, and excitement coursing through my system right now.

I kissed her through the chaos reigning supreme around us, puppies, kittens, Hooch, and Wanda all blissfully oblivious to how much things were about to change. Again. And I kissed her with all my hope for the future and with all the gratitude I felt right now.

I couldn’t believe that this was my life. Our life.

Messy. Wild. And about to get even better—as well as doubling in size.