Chapter 30 #2
I nodded, stepping out of her way. My heart was still thumping like crazy. She groaned, her hand rubbing her belly again as she sat in the rocking chair. Her eyes drifted close, and I looked at my watch.
Still irregular. But I didn’t like how much pain she seemed to be in.
By the time I looked up from my watch, her eyes were open, locked on the changing table.
“Is that…”
I smiled, walking over to grab the blanket she’d finally seen.
“I asked for it to be released from the evidence since it had already been swabbed and photographed. I washed it in some baby detergent Jessie recommended. It’s not perfect because I could only remember how to do a running stitch, but I hope that’s okay.”
I placed the baby blanket in her arms.
“It’s perfect, Colt. Thank you. For all of this, for—” Her gasp filled the nursery. My knees hit the floor in front of her.
“What’s going on?” Could I hear the fear in my own voice? Yes. Did I give a single fuck about it? Absolutely not.
“I think…” We waited as she breathed in and out slowly until the pain seemed to pass. “I think this is probably just prodromal labor.”
“Labor? I think you need to let me call an ambulance.” My poor heart was going to give out.
I was forty-fucking-years-old, and it was the second time in only a handful of weeks that I thought I was about to have a heart attack.
Violet just sat there, holding onto the arms of the rocking chair, panting through a contraction like the baby was about to exit her body in the next five minutes.
And then she laughed. “I will never understand how you can be so calm in a million different situations, but fall to pieces when it comes to me.”
“You can’t figure out why?” The rumble that tore through my chest was a perfect reflection of the tornado ripping through my soul at the sight of her in pain.
In a blink, I was holding her face in my hands.
Her cheeks were flushed, painted with the prettiest shade of pink I realized had been missing from my life since she walked out the door all those years ago.
A shade of pink I never want to go another day without seeing.
“Why?” she whispers, her eyes as wide as saucers.
“Because I love you, Vi. I love you more than anything else in this world. I have since the day we met in seventh grade, and I haven’t stopped fucking loving you for one goddamn minute since.”
I expected to see the corner of her mouth twitch, a smile she’d work to conceal, to keep away from me even though I’d just spilled my heart out at her feet. She’d always been the more reserved one. The one who said “I love you” only when she’d thought I was asleep, or too far away to hear it.
Instead, her face crumpled and one hand went to her belly as she sucked in a harsh breath, the other grabbing onto my arm like I was her only lifeline.
“I’m calling that fucking ambulance.” There. No room for argument from her. Except there was—of course she was sitting there, shaking her head at me.
“Stop it. This could just be nothing. It’s normal to have weird contractions in the last few weeks, and it’s probably not going to progress into full blown labor. It happened the other night too, I just didn’t wake you. And they never get closer together. They never get stronger.”
Stronger?! Christ, she looked like she was about to pass out every time a contraction rolled through her. How the hell was she going to be okay if they got stronger?
“Never again, Vi. You wake me up. You let me help you, okay?”
“Hey, are the contractions back?” I asked, my voice thick with a bone-deep tiredness I hadn’t felt in a long time.
My head was aching, but I couldn’t stop looking through her books for a clue I’d missed.
Even after Vi went to bed, I just needed to find something that would point us in a direction for what was coming next. Anything to give us the upper hand.
I’d heard her feet pad down the hall, past my office, but when she didn’t come back upstairs after a few minutes, I decided to see if she needed me. But the second I rounded the corner into the kitchen, I knew it wasn’t me she was searching for.
Her hand was wrapped around a fork, and it took me a minute to realize the jar in front of her used to be filled with pickled beets.
“Oh God,” she groaned as a smile formed on her lips. “Well, this is embarrassing.”
“Embarrassing?”
“I’m fine. The contractions haven’t come back. But I woke up and I couldn’t get comfortable because you weren’t there, and then I remembered I saw the jar of pickled beets in here earlier, and I had to have them.”
I laughed, taking a few steps to close the distance between us. “I remember how much you liked them.”
“They’re better than I remember. And our son really seems to be enjoying them, too.”
My eyes dropped to her belly. “May I?”
“You don’t need to ask.” Her hands slipped to her back and she turned so she was facing me. “He’s yours, too.”
“But it’s your body, Vi.” I reached my hand out, settling it on the top of her belly. “I’d never want to touch you if you didn’t want it.”
“I want it,” she whispered, the double meaning flashing in her eyes. I pressed my lips to her forehead.
“Good to know. But for now,” my hand slid over her bump, palming her belly, “I think we need to get you both back to bed.”
She nodded in agreement. “Did you find anything?” She yawned as we reached the stairs. “In the books?”
“No. Not yet.” But I knew I was close.