Before I could respond, Stella poked her head out from the kitchen. “Christian? Can you come here? I need your help with something.”
“Be right there.” I rose and pinned a laughing Rhys with a cool stare. “While I help my wife, you think about when Camilla grows up and starts dating,” I said, wiping the smile off his face. “Have fun.”
Satisfaction filled me when I heard his low growl.
When I walked into the kitchen, I found Stella downing what must’ve been her fifth glass of water that night.
“Are you sure you don’t want any wine?” She wasn’t a big drinker, but she usually had a glass or two. “It’s a great vintage.”
“Yes, I’m sure.” She set her glass down and looked at me with an oddly nervous expression. “I can’t drink alcohol right now.”
She said it with meaning, like I was supposed to know what that meant.
Why would it matter that she wasn’t drinking alcohol? Granted, it was a bit odd that she…
I can’t drink alcohol right now.
I replayed her words.
Can’t. Not don’t want to.
She couldn’t drink alcohol, which likely meant…
My pulse slowed into one long, disbelieving beat.
“I didn’t want to tell you in front of the others, but I also couldn’t wait anymore.” Stella’s voice lowered. “Christian, I’m pregnant.”
“You’re pregnant,” I repeated.
The words echoed in my head, too gilded with shock to sink in fully.
Stella confirmed with a nod, her face glowing with equal parts excitement and nervousness.
Pregnant. Babies. Our baby.
The breath left my lungs in one fell swoop.
I closed the distance between us with two long strides and kissed her fiercely, my heart thudding hard enough to bruise.
Forget every uncharitable thought I’d had about children.
We were going to be parents.I was going to be a father, and I was going to see Stella swell with our child. A little boy, perhaps, with curls and brown skin. Or a little girl with her mother’s green eyes and sweet smile.
A fierce protectiveness gripped my chest.
The baby hadn’t even been born, and I already wanted to guard them with my life.
A boy or a girl, it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that they were ours.
“Does that mean you’re happy?” Stella asked hopefully when we broke apart.
My laugh was rough with emotion. “Of course I’m happy, sweetheart. How could I not be?”
I needed to find the best obstetrician in the country ASAP, plus redo the penthouse (which was currently as non-childproof as it could get), take Stella shopping for maternity clothes, book a babymoon…
“Well, you just called our friends’ children little terrors, so…” Her voice held a teasing note.
“Yes, but that won’t be our child.”
Our child would never do to my hair what Alex’s did to his.
Stella gave me a wry look. “As much as I’d like to believe our baby will be the first baby in the world that doesn’t scream or cry, there’s a chance that won’t happen. I want you to be prepared.”
“I don’t care. They could scream and cry all they want, and they’d still be like their mother.” I brushed her lips with mine. “Perfect.”
A small shudder of pleasure rippled through her body.
“I was right all those years ago,” she murmured. “You, Christian Harper, are a softie at heart.”
I laughed softly. “Only for you, Butterfly.”
I kissed my wife again, and I let her warmth wrap around me while our friends’ laughter drifted over from the living room.
The scene was so cheesy and cozy that the old, pre-Stella me would’ve despised it on principle. But that was the difference between then and now.
Once upon a time, I hadn’t believed in love.
Now, I realize that love was the last piece that’d been missing in the puzzle of my life.
With it, I was finally whole.
***