by Julia Kent
Dad is my insurance policy when it comes to my mom. He understands basic social niceties and will force her to actually leave and not try to piggyback off our homecoming.
In other words, he’s human.
“We’ll get going now,” Mom says in a high, nervous voice, eyes cutting to Dad in a way that makes me understand he had to hammer drop. “But before we go, we have something we want to say to you and Declan.”
Uh oh.
Dec has been sitting in the pull-out chair/bed monstrosity that he’s slept in for two nights. After fruitlessly trying to spend money to upgrade us to a level of room service it turns out doesn’t exist in this hospital, he gave up the ghost and settled for two nights of atrocious sleep. As he stands, he watches Mom for signs of what’s about to come.
Ellie is sound asleep in the little plastic rolling crib thing they have for her. As Declan adjusts her hat, I watch Dad.
“We didn’t know how to bring this up,” Mom starts.
“No, you can’t stay in our spare bedroom for the next three weeks, Marie,” Dec says tightly. “We’ve told you before.”
Dad holds his palm out. “Give her a chance to speak. It’s not what you’re expecting.”
“Fine.” Dec crosses his arms over his chest, the weather warm enough outside for short sleeves. At least, I guess so. I wouldn’t know. I haven’t left this room for more than forty-eight hours.
“We know you two decided to wait and see about the night nurse, and the same with hiring a nanny,” Mom explains. “And we didn’t want to interfere with that decision. It’s something that only the mother and father can decide, and we would never want to butt our noses in.”
My eyebrows go up. So do Dec’s. Pretty sure Ellie’s do, too.
“But Jason and I want to offer to be your part-time nanny.”
The words hang in the air like a meteor shower. A triple rainbow.
A–dare I say it? A unicorn.
“Part-time nanny?” Declan says, coughing hard after.
“Two or three days a week. So Shannon can go back to work and not worry. We’re pretty good with babies,” Dad says, grinning like a fool at Ellie.
“You’re wonderful with babies,” I interject, looking at Declan for cues.
He gives none.
“This one is Shannon’s call,” he says, turning to me, arms still tightly crossed.
“It’s our call. We’re parents now. Remember? Partners.” As I say it, Declan looks at Dad, the two sharing a funny guy look I doubt I’ll ever understand.
“Right. Partners,” Declan says, hand moving up to his chin as he considers. “I think it’s a good idea.”
Mom’s eyes bug out of her head. “You do?”
“I do.”
Just then, James appears, holding a giant bouquet of balloons and a thick folder full of paperwork. “Where’s my little granddaughter?” This is the second time he’s visited, the first during a quiet interlude when Declan was away, showering at home and bringing Chuckles a little hat Ellie had worn, so our cat can get used to the sentient being that will upstage him.
Like it or not, he’s going to have to share Declan with a new litter mate.
“Dad!” Dec says, the mutual hug-pounding looking more and more like a beating and less like father-son bonding. “Sorry I missed you yesterday.”
“No problem. I got my chance to hold your sweet girl.” James sets the balloons on a table and gives me a look that is sadder than it should be. “How are you, Shannon? Holding up?”
Ah. That’s not sadness. That’s what passes for compassion when it comes to my father-in-law.
“I’ve never felt better,” I lie, pretending I don’t have a numbing-cream-covered ice pack resting on my labia. No one can see under the hospital blankets that cover my legs, and that is as God intended, right?
My father pats my knee, then says, “We’ll talk later, but you two think about it.”
“Think about what?” James ask Declan, who watches Mom and Dad the way Chuckles looks at cardinals in the bird feeder.
Mom hugs me, her smell strangely exotic, comforting and unfamiliar at the same time. It occurs to me that I have a scent unique to me that Ellie will associate with love. Tears fill my eyes. I hug Mom a little harder.
“We offered to help babysit little Ellie,” Mom tells James as she pulls back and smiles at me. “You know. Whenever they’re ready.”
“Ah.” He doesn’t even try to offer to do the same.
Awkward silence fills the room, and then Mom and Dad shuffle out.
“We’re about to go home,” Declan explains to James, uncertainty in his voice. “I was just getting the car seat ready,” he says, pointing to the little bucket baby-holder we’ll click into its already-installed base in Declan’s Audi SUV. “I need to go check on Dave. He’s bringing the car around.”
“You’re sure?” I ask, suddenly nervous.
“I took it to the police station yesterday myself, to make certain. A car seat specialist double checked.”
Relief floods me. “Thank you.”
“Let me head downstairs and make sure Dave’s here,” he says, kissing my cheek, then doing the same to Ellie.
She lets out an adorable little sigh.
“Taking her home already? Why don’t you walk me out to the curb? Gerald’s waiting. By the way, I gave the man a bonus for driving you to the hospital the other night, after delivering my grandchild,” James says to Declan, waving goodbye to me, blowing the baby a kiss.
Their voices fade.
I exhale.
Alone.
For the first time in more than two days, I am actually alone.
At that exact moment, Ellie starts making sucking noises, and I laugh.
I’m never really going to be alone for a very long time, am I?
* * *
Declan
* * *
“I read the news reports about what really happened in that elevator, Declan,” Dad says in a low, hushed voice, head bent close to mine. “You broke in through a ceiling panel? Decked that pompous ex-boyfriend of Shannon’s who was trapped in there with her?”
“I did.”
“Good for you. He’s all over the news claiming he’ll have you charged with assault, but I’ve already taken care of it.”
“You–what?”
Dad winks. “Any son of mine who can take command like you did and save your wife and child... that deserves pulling out all the stops.”
I go cold at the words save your wife and child.
In that same moment, Dad stops, too. He can feel it. Our eyes meet, and as his hand settles on my shoulder, my blood starts racing, as if it’s competing with my bones to store emotion.
“You did everything right, son. You did it. You saved them both,” he says, voice trembling just enough to make my eyes sting. “You broke your way in, took out the asshole who wasn’t helping Shannon, and by God, you did it.” As he lets out a choked, half-embarrassed laugh, I fall to pieces, one by one, as if they slough off onto the industrial tile at our feet, nurses in white Crocs flying past, IV poles and pharmacy deliveries a blur.
And that is the moment I cry in my father’s arms for the first time in my life. He never let me after my mother died. His forearms hesitate at my shoulders, then slide around as I lean into him, the feeling as bizarrely intimate as it is wholly unnatural.
This is no hearty masculine back-clapping ritual. I don’t sob or fall entirely apart. Just a few pieces need to be dropped, the burden of carrying them all these years finally greater than the fear that I’ll be judged for ever having to lug them around in the first place.
“Son,” he says, his voice thick. “I’m proud of you.”
“Damn it, Dad.”
“And also,” he says, pulling away, ending physical contact with a finality I can’t transcend, “Hamish was right.”
“Hamish?”
“The sex of the baby. The ultrasound was wrong.”
I wipe my eyes and laugh, l
ooking up. “He was right. We had a girl. I owe him a pint somewhere.”
“I’m sure he’ll be back in town soon enough.”
It’s awkward between us.
“Oh! And Pamela was right, too,” Dad says with a headshake that says, I’ll be damned.
“Right about what?”
“Shannon’s due date. Remember at the baby shower? She said Shannon would be exactly one week late.”
I start. “You’re right! Or, rather, she’s right.”
“Hamish is right. Pam is right.” He hands me the thick folder he walked in with. “And here is the paperwork to add your child to the family trusts.”
With that, I get a clap on the shoulder, and then Dad walks off toward the entrance doors, leaving me vibrating in place, too many emotions inside the sack of skin that I am.
Bzzz. A text from Dave.
I’m here.
It really is time to go home. All the hospital discharge paperwork is done. I return to the room to find Shannon out of bed, fully dressed, sitting in my chair with Ellie snapped into her car seat.
“Shannon,” I say, taken by surprise, stuffing Dad’s folder in the diaper bag. “You did all of that? I would have helped.”
“I just want to go home,” she says simply.
As she stands, I hold her. “Me, too. You were a rockstar.”
“You’ve said that nine thousand times.”
“I need to say it more. I still can’t believe you did that. Gave birth like that. No doctors, no medications, no painkillers.”
“I could have done without Steve’s slack body pressing up against me.”
“Good point.”
“Let’s go home, Declan.”
“Your wish is my command.”
An uneventful elevator ride down to the ground floor makes us both sigh with relief as we walk out into the spring sunshine, my eyes pattern-matching for my SUV until Shannon starts laughing, hard.
“I think that’s our car,” she says, pointing.
To the Turdmobile.
We walk up to the car. Dave is in the driver’s seat.
“Your SUV had a flat tire, so I took the baby seat out and put it in... this. I didn’t know Grind It Fresh! had a company car,” he says to us.
I am struck dumb. This only happens with Marie.
“You brought the Turdmobile?”
“The what?” Dave asks.
“We can’t have my daughter’s homecoming happen in the Turdmobile. We need an Uber. We need to call Andrew and force him to let Gerald take us home in a limo. Anything but this.”
“Don’t make me laugh,” Shannon hisses. “If I laugh, I’ll pee myself. Never overestimate the strength of a newly postpartum bladder. Let’s just drive it home, Dec, and deal with it all later.”
Little Ellie squawks in her seat, her hands in fists that poke out from under the blanket.
“It’s fine,” I tell Dave. “We will manage.”
“What’s wrong?” Dave rests one flannel-covered arm on the open window’s edge. “I took the car seat to your local police station, like you did with the Audi, so no worries.”
“You drove this voluntarily?” I am agog.
“This car is great! I would have negotiated for a company car if I’d known you had this beauty. The artist did such intricate work on the coffee bean on the roof.” Dave steps out of the driver’s seat and hands me the keys.
“Here.”
“Where are you going? Need a ride?” Shannon asks.
“I’ve got a friend coming. No problem. This is a special moment for you three.”
You three.
“I don’t want to wreck that.” Dave smiles and offers his hand, the grip strong and steady. “Congratulations. Go home. Learn how to be a family.”
A family.
I pull him in for an embrace. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“And after the SUV is fixed, come get this car. It’s yours. HR can make all the arrangements.”
“Seriously? Parking space at work included?”
“Don’t push it, Dave.”
“I always push it.”
“Fine.”
“You’re a softy, Declan.”
In the backseat, Shannon is bent over, delicately settling little Ellie into her carseat. I look at Dave and grin.
“I must be.”
With that, we take baby Ellie home.
And learn how to be a family.
Epilogue(ish)
Declan
There are toes in my kidneys.
Tiny and burrowing, they push with a surprising strength against my spine, gaining purchase on my skin until I open one eye and roll over, finding myself face to face with a baby who is rooting, mouth open, eyes closed.
The room smells like sweet milk and baby powder.
All the pillows on the bed are gone, my head flat, the visual effect jarring. Ellie is in a yellow baby sleep-sack, our covers pulled down, following co-sleeping protocol. Shannon must have brought her into the bed in the middle of the night while I was out cold.
“Shannon,” I whisper, shaking her shoulder slightly. She’s facing me, mouth slack with sleep, one breast hanging out of her nursing bra, the unclasped part resting silently on her biceps, like it’s waiting to be called to duty. I hate to wake her up, but I don’t have the necessary equipment to give Ellie what she needs.
“Honey?”
She’s out.
Ellie’s eyes open, little steel-grey irises out of focus, her sleep still possible–and therefore, mine, too–if I can get her a nice, warm breast to drink from. Ah, to have a life that is so simple. A warm breast in your face, a comforting body to curl up to, someone to meet every single need you have before it’s fully realized.
“Mmmm?” Shannon mutters as I nudge Ellie a bit, aligning her mouth with Shannon’s nipple. With a precision that makes me think we’ve created a cyborg, Ellie clamps down and latches, her tiny muscles going soft and relaxed, breathing and sucking a pattern like a well-calibrated machine, eyelids fluttering, lashes like bare tree branches in winter against a pale sky.
Shannon doesn’t wake up. Doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t move.
Carefully, I roll over, inch by inch, like I’m in a field of velociraptors, trying to escape. My eyes shut, my breathing normalizes, but–
No.
Sleep is for other people.
Ninja skills are for parents, I realize, as I move with a stealth that puts special ops guys to shame. Waking an almost-sleeping baby and mom is a crime. Shannon would be judge, jury, and arresting officer if I ruined this.
My bare feet on the hallway floor are a form of asylum. Whew. Achievement unlocked. I close the bedroom door, holding the doorknob just so, carefully rotating my wrist so the door closes properly, then slink down to the kitchen.
Where I brew some alertness.
Ellie is three weeks old, and as I grab my hot mug of coffee and start to sit down on the leather couch next to Chuckles, I hear a cry. A snurgle. The murmured tones of my wife working to calm our baby. The yawning stretch and groan of a woman giving in to reality.
Righting myself, I go back to the coffee machine and pour Shannon a cup, doctoring it with some milk, then head back into the bedroom to offer it to her.
It’s the start of another great day.
As a family.
❤️
* * *
I hope you enjoyed Shannon and Declan’s journey! The series is not over, so there are more books coming. Keep reading!
Shopping for a CEO’s Honeymoon
Andrew says we never had a proper honeymoon.
So, instead, he’s giving me…
A prepper honeymoon?
Who knew billionaire preppers were a thing?
I guess I’m about to find out.
* * *
Read a sneak peek of Shopping for a CEO’s Honeymoon, the next book in the Shopping series, and pre-order your copy now!
* * *
Aman
da
I am eating a piece of grilled white asparagus wrapped in prosciutto, drizzled with melted manchego cheese and coated in crushed pistachio when my friend and co-worker, Josh, ruins my culinary orgasm by bringing up my honeymoon.
More specifically, my lack of a honeymoon.
And all I can do is grunt.
“I’m just saying,” he says with a sigh as he waves his bacon-wrapped goat-cheese-stuffed date around on its silver toothpick like he’s the conductor of the Boston Pops doing a tapas bar gig, “you married a freaking billionaire. You deserve a honeymoon.”
“It’s not about Amanda does or doesn’t deserve,” Carol insists on my behalf. As I chew, I give her a look that either says Thank you or that is so indecent I need a cigarette and a fan, because damn, that asparagus is good.
“What’s it about?”
“It’s about what they want. I mean, my god, Josh! Andrew bought her an estate as a wedding gift. I think he’s got all the good husband bases covered.”
“Pfft. That? He’s a billionaire! That’s to be expected.”
“You’re poo-pooing my husband’s wedding gift to me? An estate in Weston, Massachusetts? It’s one of the most expensive zip codes for real estate in the country.”
“Hello? Billionaire? For him, that’s like buying a cheap condo behind the railroad tracks in Clinton,” Josh sighs. “Declan bought Shannon an entire coffee chain.”
“This isn’t a competition,” I say, alarm making my Pinot Noir taste like vinegar.
“And he managed to give her a nice honeymoon in Hawaii.”
I lean in. “Define ‘nice.’ Because those two sill refuse to talk about their honeymoon.”
“Isn’t that weird?” Carol says, affirming my gut instinct. “Shannon’s normally easy to pry information out of, but she’s so closed-lipped on this.”
“Maybe they had an orgy,” Josh ponders.
“On their honeymoon?”