Chapter 15
Kin
By the end of the shower, Lucy’s house was flooded with new baby essentials and furniture. Harris enlisted all the Tainted Knights guys to help him carry everything up to the nursery, while Kassa and I hung up all the new outfits and put away all the other items so Lucy could remain in the chair her father had refused to allow her out of.
Downstairs, Layla and Natalie were busy cleaning up, and Lucy was still sitting where I’d left her. She had a pained expression on her face, but when she noticed me watching her as I came down the stairs, she gave me a bright smile. “Thanks. I could have done it. Apparently I’m on lockdown.”
I kept my eyes fastened on her as I moved closer, not wanting Jesse, who was just a few feet away talking with Zander Brockman and Nik Armstrong, to hear what I was about to ask his daughter.
Reaching her, I bent so I could speak close to her ear. “Are you having contractions?”
She was quiet for a moment but finally nodded. “It’s okay. Nothing to worry about. It’s just Braxton Hicks. They come and go. I’m fine.?
??
I leaned back, watching her face. She looked uncomfortable as hell, but that just as easily could be because she was so close to her due date and her stomach was huge. I rubbed my hand over the baby bump, felt Hayat kick at me as if she didn’t want me to bother her mother, and grinned. “I’m not going home,” I told her. “I’ll crash in the guest room. I have this strange feeling things are about to get very, very interesting very, very soon.”
She shifted restlessly. “Just don’t tell my dad,” she whispered. “He will lose his mind.”
“He nearly lost your mom when she had the twins early. Of course, he’s worried.” I picked up her empty water glass. “Need anything? I’m going to help out in the kitchen.”
“My back is killing me.”
Since we were no longer whispering, Jesse heard what she said and was on red alert. “Lu? You okay?”
She rolled her eyes at me but smiled warmly up at her dad. “My back is hurting from sitting in the same spot for so long, Daddy. I think I just need to stretch.”
“Go lie down, Lu,” he urged. “Stay off your feet.”
“Yeah, okay. Love you, Daddy.”
“Love you, baby.”
I set down her glass and offered her my hands, helping her stand. As she did, she gasped, her face twisting in pain. I moved to block her from Jesse’s eyes, keeping a hand around her back as I walked with her to the stairs.
“Tell Harris,” she said with a groan as I helped her sit on the edge of the bed in her room. “Wait. Don’t tell Harris. Just ask him to come here. I don’t want him getting hysterical. It’s just a few contractions. Even if this is labor, it could take forever before I’m even able to go to the hospital. The contractions have to be so far apart before they will even consider me in active labor.”
I backed out of the room, worried about her. “I’ll be right back. Okay?”
“Yeah,” she said nervously.
The nursery was only across the hall, but I sprinted the short distance. Inside the baby’s room, Jace and Harris were setting up the dream glider and a few other things with Cash and Gray’s help, while Kale and Sin unboxed several other items.
I didn’t want to make a scene in front of all of them, so I tapped on Harris’s shoulder. “Your wife is asking for you,” I told him. “She’s in your bedroom, about to lie down.”
His head snapped around, worry and concern already shining in his aquamarine eyes. “Is she okay?”
I forced a smile. “She just wants to talk to you.”
“Oh, okay.” He straightened to his full six-and-a-half-feet height and dusted off his hands. “You got this?” he asked Jace.
“How hard can it be, right?” Jace said with a laugh.
“You would be surprised,” Harris said with a snort, his long legs eating up the distance to the door. “If you can’t figure it out, see if my dad is still around and get him to help.”
I went to follow him, but Jace caught my hand, stopping me in my tracks. “She okay?”
“I don’t know,” I told him, keeping my voice quiet. “It could be nothing. She’s just uncomfortable, I guess.”