Billionaires Dollar Series

I mutter something about how I’m at least trying to be cultured and Ethan bends to kiss me, breaking off my protests.

But his kiss is soon broken off in turn by another contraction. And then another. And it’s not long until our doctor returns, a smile on her face.

“Looks like someone’s getting ready to meet their baby,” she tells me.

If I’ve ever doubted the theory of relativity before, I’ll never do it again. Because time warps and bends and speeds up and slows down in the coming hours. Or is it days? Weeks? An eternity?

Because there’s no telling how long my labor is. It’s a blur of pain and orders and breathing. Of faces. Dearest is Ethan’s, close to mine, telling me things in a deep, calm manner. I barely make out his words, but his voice is heavenly.

Or at least I thought his voice was heavenly, but then a wail cuts through the air that is infinitely preferable. I see two tiny, blood-covered feet before my screaming baby is pulled away.

“I can only see his feet,” I half-sob, half-cry. “I love his feet.”

Ethan isn’t next to me anymore, his face focused on the bundle. “Wait till you see the rest of him.”

“Him? It’s a boy?”

The nurse returns, placing the tiny, ruddy-faced baby on my chest. “A boy,” she confirms.

“Hi,” I whisper to him, to this beautiful, mushed, minuscule human being who is somehow part me and part Ethan. “I’ve waited for you for so long.”

He looks up at me and I look down at him and my tears don’t stop. I doubt they ever will.

“Ethan, look,” I breathe.

“I’m looking,” he murmurs, bending so his head rests next to mine. “I’m looking, Bella.”

“He’s asleep?”

“Yes.” Ethan stretches out beside me, and we both watch the crib at the foot of the bed with bated breath.

Not a peep.

“Thank God.” I stretch out fully for what feels like the first time in days. Not even at gunpoint could I come up with a single part of my body that isn’t sore.

Ethan slides his arm underneath my head. “I practically had to bar the door to keep the girls out.”

I smile at that. “They want to play with him?”

“Yes. Haven gets that he’s not big enough yet, but Evie doesn’t.”

“Yesterday she snuck a doll into his crib when I looked away.”

Ethan groans. “Was it her purple-haired one, at least?”

“Oh, you bet it was. She means the best.” Both the girls did. The other day they’d sat next to me and watched him as he slept, and I’d answered all their questions to the best of my ability. Certain questions, like how did you and Daddy make him? had been difficult to answer.

We picked him up at the baby store, I’d felt like saying, but I’d mangled a short reply about how it could happen when two people loved each other. Anything more elaborate than that and I’d need Ethan as backup.

“Your parents just called,” he tells me. “They arrive in town next weekend to meet him.”

“They’ll be taking a ton of pictures,” I warn. “Prepare yourself.”

“Oh, your mother told me she already has a scrapbook planned,” Ethan says, sounding pleased by the thought. His meeting with my parents a few months ago had gone far better than I’d hoped. My parents, apprehensive of the whole situation, were immediately at ease in his company. I understood the feeling perfectly.

“Both of our brothers need to meet him, too,” Ethan says.

“Wyatt is dying to,” I say. “Has Liam accepted your offer to work with you on the new company?”

“No, and I don’t even know what city he’s in.” There’s more in his voice than he’s letting on-I know the distance between him and his brother pains him. “He said he’d think about it. Cole is planning to speak with him, and I’m not sure Liam is prepared for that. He’ll be steamrolled.”

Laughing weakly, I turn onto my side and bury my head against his chest. Through all of this, the long nights and my panic and the difficulty with latching, Ethan has been here. Something about the sheer strength of him, his wide smile, his competence, makes for the best anti-stress medication on the globe.

“I’m so very, very happy I did all this with you,” I tell him.

His other arm comes around me, somehow avoiding all the bits of me that hurt. “That’s good,” he says, “because I can’t imagine doing it with anyone else either.”

“I love you,” I tell him. “I’m sorry for being so crazy the last few weeks.”

“That was your right.” He presses soft kisses to my forehead, my cheeks, my closed eyelids, my mouth. “You’d look so good in white.”

I burst into laughter. “Ethan Carter, you never stop trying, do you?”

“I never will. Marry me, Bella.”

I smile against his jaw, burying my face there. “You’re relentless.”

“Don’t you want to?”

It’s the first time he’s asked that particular question, though he’s been mentioning marriage for months. I lean back and meet his gaze with my own, and there’s no fear or concern there. No hint that he’s asking out of a misguided feeling of responsibility.

“I do,” I whisper, running my finger along his cheek. “I really, really do.”

His smile could light up a stadium, but it’s just me here, and I’m hit with the full force of it. My heart leaps into overdrive.

“I love you,” he murmurs.

“I love you too,” I whisper. “But perhaps a small ceremony? Just the five of us, and our parents.”

“The five of us,” Ethan repeats. “I think that might be the best phrase I’ve ever heard.”

“Sounds good, right?”

“Yes,” he says, and then groans. “But it might become the six of us.”

I put my hands flat against his chest. “Hold on there, stud. I’m not ready to be pregnant again.”

“Haven asked me for a dog yesterday.”

“You agreed?”

“She chose a very weak moment. I was sleep-deprived and holding Lucas and there was absolutely nothing I would have said no to. We should be lucky she didn’t ask me for a pony.”

Laughing, I pull him closer. “Some could say the same about your proposal here, choosing a weak moment.”

“They’re not remotely comparable.” He kisses me again, soft and sweet. “You should get some sleep.”

“We both should. The girls won’t be back for hours.”

“Remember when Cole called me a lucky bastard because my perfect woman moved in next door?” Ethan murmurs.

I fight against my impossibly heavy eyelids. “I remember thinking he was wrong, because that was the way it was for me,” I say.

“He was right.” Ethan’s arm tightens around me. “Because you’ve given me everything I’ve ever wanted, including the things I’d never thought to ask for. And I’ll never stop loving you for that.”

I swallow against the sudden tightness in my throat. “You’re taking the words right out of my mouth,” I murmur. “Because that’s the way it is for me.”

His lips find mine, and kissing him is home, safe and thrilling at the same time. “We’ll just have to agree to disagree,” he says, pulling the comforter up and over us. I snuggle closer to him and close my eyes, the feeling of his arms around me all I need. From the foot of the bed, there’s a small cooing sound from our sleeping son.

The one who was as unexpected as he will be loved, born into a home with two clever older sisters and two parents who love each other very much-because I hadn’t lied to the girls when I explained how Ethan and I’d made him. I’d just simplified a tiny bit.

Authors note

Thank you so much for reading!

Ethan and Bella will be back, because the Seattle Billionaires series isn’t over yet…