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Chapter Twenty-Four

Jolie

My words don’t seem to relax them at all; instead, the room is filled with tension. The doctor has gone into the bathroom to test my urine, and when he walks back out, everyone turns to face him.

“I think you may have preeclampsia. Have you had any swelling recently, or anything new since we spoke last?”

“I have had some swelling over the last twenty-four hours. And today, I keep peeing myself.”

He walks closer to the bed. “Do you mind if I look at your feet?”

I nod as I pull the covers back to show him my feet.

“And that has happened only in the last day?”

I nod my head again.

“I will need to do an internal exam,” he concludes.

“Like fuck you will!” Chester roars. Creed instantly moves in and wraps his arm around Chester’s back, pulling him into his body.

“Let’s go for a walk,” Creed quietly tells Chester. “We need to let this happen.”

“I’ll kill him,” Chester growls, and Creed grabs his face and makes him focus solely on him.

“Just breathe, and let’s go for a walk. The doctor needs to check on the babies and make sure they’re alright.”

Chester nods curtly, and Creed leads him out of the room.

“If anyone else has an issue with this, leave now,” Brennan demands.

“Are you okay with everyone staying?” the doctor asks me, and I nod. He opens his briefcase and pulls out a pair of gloves. “First, I’m going to check your cervix, and then I will do a swab test to make sure your membranes haven’t ruptured.”

“What the fuck is a membrane, and why would it rupture?” Laughn asks.

“It’s the fluid around the baby. It sounds worse than it is, but we really don’t want that at this stage in pregnancy. We were hoping to keep these little guys in there until at least thirty-seven weeks. Jolie is only thirty-two plus three right now.”

The room grows quiet when the doctor explains what he is doing. He inserts two fingers, and it’s an extremely weird feeling to have a strange man feeling around inside, but in a non-sexual way. I lock eyes with Trace, who hasn’t said a word since he arrived. He doesn’t look away, and I use him for comfort and to ground me.

Once the doctor has finished all his tests and removes his gloves, we all look at him. “So, doc, what’s the verdict?”

“Jolie has preeclampsia. I’m not overly concerned about that, as we have been monitoring this for a couple of weeks. Right now, my test indicates her membranes are leaking. Jolie, I would like to transport you to the hospital so we can monitor the babies and check your membranes again in case this test isn’t accurate. If it is, we need to be careful with how we progress. If you were further along, I would induce you, but we need to make sure the babies’ lungs are ready for birth.”

“We don’t have a NICU,” Brennan says to the doctor.

“No, we don’t, so we will need to go to a private hospital that has a good team set up. In this case, I’m happy to recommend somewhere or you can pick yourselves.”

“We didn’t plan for this outcome, as we expected her to give birth at Olympia,” Brennan replies, and the doctor nods.

“I actually have a friend who lives with a guy who is a doctor,” Marlow interjects.

“Do you trust him?” Brennan asks.

“Is that your friend whose girlfriend owns that store, and her business partner Bella works at?” Boston asks Marlow.

“Her name is Ella, and yes.”

“Make the call,” Brennan says to Marlow.

Marlow pulls out his phone and types something and looks back at us. “Done.”

“Done what?” Boston asks. “All you did was send a text.”

“I actually sent a code, but we have a way to communicate.”

Marlow’s phone dings, and he looks down at it and smiles.

His phone then rings, and he hands it to the doctor. “It’s a doctor from New Hope Private Hospital.”

“That was quick,” the doctor says and answers the phone. He runs over the plan and that just sounds like a bunch of doctor lingo to me.

While they all decide where we are going, I swing my legs off the bed and stand. I want to pack if I’m going to the hospital, and I want to message Jimmie and Sinclair.

Water trickles down my leg, and I know it isn’t normal. “Um, guys... I don’t think I peed myself this time.”

Everyone in the room stops talking and turns to face me.

“We don’t have time to take Jolie to New Hope,” the doctor states. “My sister-in-law is a midwife at Evergreen Private. It’s about ten minutes away and a very respectable hospital.”

“Call them and tell them we are on our way. We will need a private room and will have security arriving with us. Just make it happen.”

The doctor nods, and before he leaves the room, asks me to go into the bathroom and put on a pad, then to pack anything else I would like to take.

Boston says he will go pack for me, Brennan exits to organise security, and Marlow calls Grandma Betty to get her to call everyone else.

Chester and Creed come back into the room, and seeing the hustle and bustle of everyone, beeline straight for me.

“What’s happening?” Creed asks.

“I think the babies are coming—my water broke.” I point to the small puddle on the brand-new carpet.

Both Creed and Chester look down. “I’m about to become a dad,” Chester says, his voice tinged with awe.

“You’re about to become a dad,” I repeat.

I have so many questions for the doctor, but figure they can wait until we are at the hospital. Within fifteen minutes, we are all ready to leave. The doctor left ten minutes ago so he could get there first and make sure everything is set up and ready for us.

We arrive at the hospital in a black SUV with a damn entourage, like we’re celebrities or some shit. We have to sit in the car while the security team goes up to the maternity ward with Brennan, which is overkill, if you ask me.

A lovely blonde nurse, who is not much older than us, comes out to the car and knocks on the window. Boston rolls it down.

“What?!” he snaps, and she scowls at him in return. I love her already.

“Your bodyguards cleared the floor, and I thought I would get a head start and bring the wheelchair down here. It’s a long walk and being heavily pregnant, leaking fluids, and swollen, I thought your girlfriend might want a lift. I work for Olympia, and we were all called in. The staff upstairs are all in a hissy fit about you providing your own doctor and midwives.”

“That’s because the idiots wouldn’t begin to know how to deal with babies like this—it would blow their fucking minds,” Boston adds, clearly warming up to the girl now that he knows she works for us.

“Brennan thought it would be a good idea for us to be here. We have been briefed about your births and what we can possibly expect. We know these babies are different, but that’s all we have to go off.”

“Thank you,” I tell her and lean across Boston to open the door.

“Brennan said to stay in the car until he is back,” Boston demands.

“Brennan said to stay in the car until he is back,” I mock. “Since when do you care?”

“Fine,” he snaps and opens the door, jumping out to help me get down. Trace exits the other side, and when the others notice me not so gracefully getting out of the car, they all exit the other vehicles.

“I’m Grace. I started last week because the doc expects a lot of births at the same time, if your history is anything to go by.”

As I take a seat in the wheelchair, Kai moves his way between Grace and the back of the chair. “Sorry, but trust issues. You lead the way.” Kai gestures for the nurse to show us where to go, then takes off running with me in the wheelchair, causing poor Grace to run alongside us. But if her smile is any indication, she isn’t mad. She doesn’t argue, just turns and leads us into the building to a lift, where she pushes the button for the third floor.

Boston yells out something incoherent, and Kai just ignores him like usual. We all stop dead in our tracks when the lift doors open and Brennan steps out.

“He did it,” I say, pointing to Kai.

“Thanks for throwing me under the bus so quickly,” he retorts. “You could have blamed Boston, and we all could have enjoyed that.”

I shrug. “Nope, I have to push some babies out of me soon, so you’re taking the hit now. I will try to remember to give you a free pass when I’m in pain again.”

“The maternity floor is all clear for us to go up. We can’t have the entire floor to ourselves since there are already women giving birth. But our security team is here and will be on the floor day and night until we can move back to Olympia.”

“You’re being paranoid. No one here gives a shit about us, but they might when they see you guys coming in with all your crazy,” I say with an eye roll.

The lift isn’t big enough for everyone to go up in one trip, so Kai, Grace, myself, two meathead security guards, Brennan, and Boston go up in the first lift.

Midwives that work here at the hospital stare at us as we pass, and I hear one whisper to another, “I wonder who they are? They won’t even tell us their names.”

“Maybe she is a celebrity. Wouldn’t that be amazing?”

I don’t catch the rest of their conversation since Kai walks at superspeed as he follows Grace. I’m led into a room that is nicer than your average hospital room. It’s also massive.

Kai helps me from the wheelchair and onto the bed, then Grace starts hooking me up so they can monitor the babies straight away while we wait on the doctor.

A handful of security guards walk in with foldable chairs and place them around the room. It looks like enough for all the guys to sit in while we wait for the babies to arrive. The room is massive, but as all my guys pile in, it doesn’t quite seem so big anymore.

Chester pushes his way to my side and holds my hand.

“Are you going to be okay?” I ask him. He has really struggled with knowing that a doctor will see my bits while I give birth, and we really don’t need him to attack anyone right now.

“Creed is going to watch me, and I promise to try my best. I don’t want to miss their birth, but I won’t do anything stupid either.”

“Good, now who is in charge of lunch?” I look around the room and everyone looks at someone else.

The doors to the room open and a group of people walk in with the doctor. “Jolie, this is our team. They are all hired by Brennan, so be assured they have clearance to be here. We have Doctor Hopper, the babies’ paediatrician, and Grace is the trainee midwife for Olympia. We also have Samantha, the hospital’s head midwife for today, and Racheal is their pathologist.” Shit, they really have thought of everything. I’m glad I have Brennan because if it were up to me, I would be at a public hospital with no idea what was happening.

“Scarlett is also on her way here with everything we’ll need in terms of drugs and medication. We know you will need that, but we also have a few extra supplies should the babies need anything,” Chester explains.

“Is it all safe for the babies?” I ask him.

“It is. It’s only things that have been used on us. Years and years of testing has been done.”

“While we wait on her,” the doctor says, “we will do a trace on the babies to make sure they are doing okay. We will also take some bloods and once we have what we need, we will start a drip to make sure you don’t get an infection. The hospital is fetching me some equipment, so I can perform an ultrasound to see if the babies have moved at all. Baby B was in the birthing position the last time we checked, but not Baby A.”

“Is that bad?” I ask.

“No, we have a few options, but let’s wait and see. I will be back shortly. I have to smooth things over with the hospital since we barged in on them.”

It’s not long before Scarlett shows up and goes all boss bitch, telling the security guard to bring up the mini fridge which is in her car—which she left at the front entrance, mind you. The doctor has the drip quickly set up, and Chester is even chill when the midwife gives me an internal to check my progress.

But a commotion outside has all the guys jumping to their feet. Chester blocks my view of the damn door, and I have to look around him when I see the door fly open. In walks Blayne, followed by Sinclair, Jimmie, and Summer.

“Cujo outside couldn’t stop me from getting in here,” Blayne says, flexing her muscles, and I laugh.

“More like the poor guy didn’t want to throw down with three heavily pregnant women. Colt and Khale are waiting outside, so there wasn’t a scene,” Jimmie adds.

“ He only got in with us because he hid behind us.” Summer points at Jimmie, who laughs.

“We just wanted to come and say good luck,” Sinclair says, coming over to the bed and throwing her arms around my neck.

A few of the guys don’t look impressed that the girls managed to get past security, but really, what would they have done? If they had laid a finger on them, Colt, Khale, and even Jimmie, would have thrown down, and it would have gotten ugly.

“Is there room in the bed for me? Maybe if Lynx gets wind that the twins are coming out, he might get some ideas,” Blayne jokes.

“You named him?” I ask.

“Not me. I left it up to Van and the guys. Ask Sinclair what she and Colt plan to call their kid.”

I look at Sinclair. “And?”

“Kyro,” she says. “I think it’s cute.”

It’s definitely unusual.

“I love it,” I say. “What about the rest of you?”

“Betty and I have decided on Cruze,” Jimmie adds.

“And we have narrowed it down to a few names, but at the top of our list is Hayes,” Summer says.

“I’m glad you are all organised. We have Zadom picked out, but not a name for our daughter. Nothing feels right.”

“It’s totally okay to wait until after the baby is born,” Grace says, and Blayne turns to look at her like she is offended the girl spoke to her.

“Do you have kids?” Blayne snaps.

“And on that note, we are going,” Jimmie says, moving Blayne away from me, and she cackles.

“Call us when those babies get here,” Sinclair says and points to the guys. “Because I will break back in here if you don’t. I have Colt, and I’m not afraid to sacrifice him.”

I laugh, imagining the crap Colt would do to distract everyone so she could get back in here. I’m surprised he has survived life this far with how his brain works.

They all leave, and I close my eyes to rest just a little, but the machine I’m hooked up to starts beeping incessantly. Both Grace and the other midwife are at my side straight away, checking over the machine. Grace runs out of the room and comes back in with the doctor.

“Jolie, Baby A doesn’t like being inside anymore. Since we don’t know much about these babies, they need out now.”

I nod, and in a blur, the medical team jumps into action. I’m wheeled into an operating room, alone. My anxiety spikes and Grace clutches my hand.

“It will all be okay. They will put you to sleep, but I will be right here. Your guys are watching from up there,” she says, pointing to a glass window above us to the left. I sigh in relief when the guys fill the window, and I give them a small wave.

“Please ask them to get photos.”

“They can hear you, it’s just you can’t hear them,” she says with a reassuring smile.

“Who’s ready to become parents?” the doctor says, entering the room, fully scrubbed up.

I’m counting back from ten before I know it. “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six...”