I walked over to Leia and kissed her softly on the lips. “You did it! Way to go, honey!”
She smiled and pressed her head against mine. I could tell she was exhausted. Apparently, she’d been in labor for about four hours, which I was told is not terribly long to be in labor, but sounded like a long time to be in agony when you thought about it.
“I’m so glad you are here,” Leia said. Her voice sounded strained and quiet. “Where were you?”
“I was out on the course still and there was a dead spot out there. I called you and told you I was on my way the minute I heard. You are a week early. I thought these things typically were overdue rather than under.”
Leia smirked and shook her head slightly. She was too exhausted and too happy about being a brand new mother to care about me. And I was perfectly ok with that.
The past few months had been better between Leia and I, mostly because she’d been preoccupied with becoming a mother and with running her business. I had been preoccupied with not being around, so there was much less chance for us to fight. I’d worked on controlling my temper though, mostly because I didn’t want to waste time with fighting and because things just went smoother if Leia thought I was the perfect guy.
And it turned out that she looked rather hot when she was pregnant. It also made her even hornier than normal, so we’d done a lot of making love the past few months. I was always happy for that, but lately she’d been getting too big and it was a bit of a turnoff. I was glad to see that most of the weight she’d gained had fallen out with the baby.
The rest of the day was spent just being supportive for Leia and helping her start the road of recovery. It blew my mind when they said she would probably be going home either that night or first thing in the morning.
After all the health tests were run on our twin boys I was glad to hear that everything about them seemed normal and healthy. Having a kid with some weird health issues was the last thing I wanted. That was just another problem we’d have to deal with and with all we had going on I sure didn’t want that kind of stress.
After a while Penny and Cheryl, who’d both been with Leia shopping when she went into labor, came into the room to see Leia and then the babies. Neither one of them could stop crying. I had to stop myself from laughing at their emotions. I’ve never for the life of me ever understood how or why people cry when they are happy. Crying was a sad thing. There was so much about people I have just never understood.
That night I drove home at Leia’s insistence. She was going to be released first thing in the morning and I volunteered to pick her up. I could have just sent a car but I felt it looked better for me to suggest this. As always appearances were everything.
That night as I played some pool and had a few drinks of whiskey I found myself wondering what was going to come next. I was hanging out, relaxing in my quiet mansion, knowing that tomorrow my life was going to change dramatically when the twins were brought home. Did this mean the end to my quiet, relaxing lifestyle?
I laughed at the thought. “Not hardly,” I said as I broke a new rack and scattered the balls across the table.
It was true. I didn’t plan on letting this get in the way of me or my plans. If anything, the kids would just give me another thing I could leverage over Leia, because now if she double crossed me in some way it would not just be her who would pay, but the kids as well.
Something told me that she would do anything to keep the kids safe, always.
Chapter Fifteen
Leia
Six Months Later
I heard the cries over the baby monitor and my eyes instantly flew awake. It had become an automatic response and I was out of bed before I even realized that I wasn’t asleep anymore. This sort of immediate response to the cries of my children had been there since the day they were born. It was innate, ingrained in me. My first thought was always them, about anything. And I wouldn’t have wished for it to be any other way.
I glanced back briefly as I reached the door and looked at Ted still fast asleep in bed. At least he’d made it to the bed today. On most nights the past few months I’d find him passed out drunk in front of the television or the couch in the billiard room. Although, on rare occasions he’d be gone before I got up, off on another one of his ‘business meetings’ on the golf course. I was tempted to ask him if any of these meetings actually involved any business.