Welcome to the World
LEXI
The crowd from the baby shower is finally thinning out, voices fading to a dull hum as laughter and goodbyes drift toward the driveway. I wave to Sharla—one of the older club member’s wife—watching the swish of her floral dress until she disappears around the corner of my brother’s house.
A peaceful quiet falls over the backyard after the last car door slams. It’s much appreciated, after hours of chatter, games, and clinking glasses.
I sink deeper into the lounger, my swollen ankles propped up like useless sandbags, and stifle a yawn behind the back of my hand. My belly shifts under my skin, a reminder that I’m not alone. I press a palm to the swell, and she presses back.
God, I still can’t believe so many people showed up. When Harlow and Josephine first told me they wanted to throw me a shower, I nearly laughed in their faces.
Who was even going to come?
I didn’t think I had enough people in my life to fill a table, let alone a backyard. But then the salon girls arrived, along with the wives and girlfriends of the club members, bearing more gifts, sweet smiles, and excited congratulations than I knew what to do with.
For once, I didn’t feel like an outsider amongst strangers—a piece of arm candy to be admired but not spoken to. For once, the day felt like it was mine.
“There you are.”
The rumble of his voice is so familiar that my chest tightens before I even open my eyes.
I jerk upright, blinking against the dusky light.
Somewhere between the last goodbye and now, I must’ve dozed off.
The tables are folded, the food packed away, and the mountain of gifts carted off to who knows where.
“Here I am,” I whisper back, rubbing at my eye and holding out my hand for him. His palms are rough as he pulls me to my feet.
“You ready to head home? The car’s all loaded.”
“Yeah,” I breathe, the word stretching into a yawn. “Just need to pee first.”
He grins, because if I’m not peeing, I’m bitching about my ankles, or whining about how I can’t roll over in bed anymore without help. He doesn’t tease, though. He just slides a supportive arm around my waist and steers me toward the back door.
But when Harlow yanks it open, my bare feet glue themselves to the deck boards.
A trickle of warmth spreads down my legs. My mind lurches, panic flaring so hot I drag up my dress to stare in horror. For a split second, I think I’ve actually lost control of my bladder and pissed myself in front of them. But the truth slams into me before I can breathe.
My water broke.
The wet spot grows beneath me, and my heart slams into my ribs hard enough to rival my daughter’s midnight somersaults.
“Oh, my God!” Harlow squeals, her voice shrill enough to rattle my eardrums.
“Oh, my God,” I echo, with a disbelieving, shaky whisper.
My hand squeezes Pierce’s like a lifeline, and his solid grip steadies me even as my knees threaten to give.
“Is that—?” His voice is cautious, like he’s not sure he should be asking the question.
“Well, I didn’t pee myself,” I manage to joke, though my voice wobbles.
He stiffens at my side with that confirmation.
“Silas!” Harlow shrieks, nearly blowing the glass out of the sliding door.
This late in the summer, the heat presses down on me, even though the sun’s tucked behind the trees around Silas’s property. My breathing picks up, shallow and too fast. My palms grow clammy, the edges of my vision tightening.
We didn’t bring the hospital bags. We aren’t ready. She wasn’t supposed to come this early.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy, baby.” Pierce’s lips brush my ear as his voice draws me back out of my head. He’s the calm in all my storms. Everything I’m not. “Deep breaths. There you go, stay with me.”
My brother barrels through the house, sliding to a stop beside his wife at the back door. His weapon gleams from the porch lights before he tucks it away, eyes darting between us like we’re under attack. “What’s going on?”
“Her water broke!” Harlow answers for me, bouncing in place like an excited toddler at the zoo.
“Oh, fuck.”
“Yeah, oh fuck!” My chest heaves. My wild gaze snaps to Pierce’s. “It’s too early. She can’t do this. It’s too early.” My words tumble faster, spilling out like an overflowing cup.
I don’t know if I’m ready. What if I can’t do this?
One minute I was yawning on a lounger, the next I’m about to be responsible for a whole human being. A fragile, breathing, screaming person who will depend on me for everything. How the hell is that legal?
“Okay, that’s enough,” Pierce cuts in.
Before I can blink, my feet leave the ground. He cradles me against his chest, one arm hooked under my knees, the other braced behind my back. My body jostles with each stride, his long legs eating up the distance from the backyard to the car.
“Put me down,” I huff, but his arms only tighten.
“Not happening, Princess.” His voice rumbles against my ear, and for the first time since I felt that trickle of fluid, my panic ebbs.
Sixteen hours of screaming, sobbing, and laughing later, our daughter finally made her entrance into the world. Sienna Branly Everett is a tiny, pink bundle of perfection.
Pierce hasn’t let go of her, not for a second.
But it didn’t matter. Harlow stayed glued to my side, supporting me through all the shit they don’t warn you about post pushing a bowling ball from your lady bits.
Silas—my big, bad, unshakable brother—turned ghostly white and spent half my labor hunched in the corner with his head between his knees.
I’ll never let him live it down.
Harlow and Silas waited until the chaos passed, spent an hour staring at their niece as she slept safely in her father’s arms, before heading for home.
Now, it’s just the three of us—my little family.
I lie here in my sweat-stained, milk-soaked muumuu, hair tied haphazardly at the top of my head, watching Pierce carefully fold and repack Sienna’s impossibly tiny clothes so we can go home.
And in the crook of my arm, she sleeps. Her little chest rises and falls, her lips puckering as if she’s dreaming of nursing. I trace the soft line of her cheek with my fingertip, memorizing her.
My throat tightens.
Life has a way of chewing you up, spitting you out, and dropping you exactly where you swore you’d never be. And yet, here I am. Here we are.
A family.
Sienna’s little nose scrunches before the first wail tears free, shrill and demanding in the quiet of our hospital room. My eyes snap wide, heart thudding like I’ve been caught doing something wrong. I shift to sit up, but before I can even get my fingers to the clasp of my bra, Pierce is there.
“Hey, hey, baby girl,” he murmurs, plucking her from my arms like she’s made of glass. The sound of his voice alone softens her cries, though her tiny fists still flail against his chest. “Daddy’s got you. No need for all that fuss.”
I sink back against the pillows, exhaustion and pain warring for my attention, but my lips curve into a sleepy smile.
Watching him sway with her, his arm supporting her back, his massive hand cradling her tiny head, twists my insides in the best way.
The same man who once bulldozed through life without a second thought now looks like he’d crumble if she so much as whimpered too long.
A bubble of laughter slips out of me. “Looks like she’s already stolen my title,” I say, my voice still scratchy from lack of sleep. “Your little princess has you wrapped around her finger, Daddy.”
He glances over, eyes dark and shining with mischief. One brow tips like he’s pretending not to enjoy the new nickname.
Lord, help me.
Then he looks back down at her squishy red face tucked against his bare chest. Her cries soften into pitiful hiccups, and he shakes his head like he’s powerless. “And if she has?” His voice is low, so he doesn’t startle her. “That’s fine by me. She can be my princess.”
He looks at me again, and I swear I stop breathing. “Because you, Lex,” he says, lips curving into the kind of smile that could raze me in an instant, “you should have always been my queen.”
My throat goes tight, and not just because of the hormones that have been running me ragged for months. Pressure floods behind my eyes, my chest aching with the sheer weight of it all. The way this man loves me. The life we’ve managed to right after so many terrible wrongs.
I bite my lip to keep from sobbing outright and whisper, “You can’t just say stuff like that when I’m this emotional.”
Pierce chuckles. It’s the kind of sound that wraps around me as securely as his arms always have. He bends just enough to press a kiss to our daughter’s downy head, then another to my forehead.
“Get used to it, my queen,” he murmurs, rocking Sienna until her breaths even out again. “Because I’m not stopping now.”
And with my entire world in this little sterile room and his promise stitched into my skin, I don’t want him to.