In honor of 60.3k reads, and Taylor Swift's new album dropping at Midnight, here's the first BONUS CHAPTER!!!
P.S. Keep a heads up for the Author's Note at the end.
For the third time now, I'd felt completely helpless. The only difference was, I knew I'd be able to help eventually.
After we had to do an emergency C-section with Aspen, Evelyn knew better than to even want a natural birth this time around. Plus, I don't think she was too keen on pushing out two babies instead of just one.
"I'm done after these two. I can't keep taking these stressful births." Evelyn says, looking over at me on the bed.
"I know baby." I say, leaning forward in the chair. I reach for her hand, "You're doing great." Just like I'd said the last two times.
"Is your mom getting Asher from school?" She asks, tying her hair up in a bun.
"Yeah. I think she even got there an hour early." I say and we both chuckle. "Gracie's on her way."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
Gracie and Aiden now had a total of 6 kids. 2 boys, 4 girls. To say Liam was excited about having a boy was an understatement, even if there is a 10 year age gap.
"I'm glad. We haven't seen them since Christmas."
"I know. It sucks." With us living in Colorado, it wasn't as easy to see Gracie and her crew since they weren't only an hour away anymore. Since, we'd only moved back in April, we hadn't had to time to even meet up with them yet.
Weekly cousin FaceTime calls were a necessity in both households, for both the kids and the parents. Aspen and Asher were going to lose their shit when they found out that they were going to get to see all six cousins in person after almost a year. We decided to wait and surprise all 8 kids and not tell them till they got here.
Evelyn turned on her side to face me, "Will you lay with me?" She asks quietly.
"Of course, baby." I say and she scoots over a little. I sink into the uncomfortable hospital bed. We'd only been here for three hours, unlike the other two kids, she was progressing quickly, which was a good sign.
"Time for the vasectomy to happen babe." She says as she snuggles into me.
"Fine with me."
Of course we'd talked about that, we were just gonna wait and see how we felt after the twins before making a final decision. But, then again, there's reversible vasectomies.
"Are you excited for Europe?" I ask and she nods her head.
After 5 years, we were finally getting to go. We had planned the trip before we found out we were pregnant with Aspen. Ev wasn't too set on spending most of the trip puking so we decided to push it back, and then, life just got in the way.
Now, we were finally getting to go. Walking around Paris and London with a 4 year old, 5 year old, and two twins in Baby Bjorn carriers was going to be quite an experience, but I was beyond ready for it.
"Extremely." Evelyn answered.
I run my fingers up and down her side as she sighs.
There's a knock on the door before Doctor York stepped in, gently shutting the door behind her. "Hey guys." She says quietly. "How are we feeling?"
"Pretty good. Compared to the last two, at least." Evelyn answers, lifting her head from my chest.
"Good, good. We're getting everything set up for you in there. A couple of nurses will be in here shortly to start prepping you. I'm sure both of you know the drill by now." She says and we nod.
"Alright, I'll see you guys in a bit. Let's get these babies out!" She says, sending us a smile on her way out.
"Are you nervous?" I ask looking down at Evelyn.
"Not yet." She says.
"I'm so proud of you baby." I say, leaning down, connecting my lips with hers. My tongue absentmindedly runs across the seam of her lips. She wastes no time letting me in as our tongues swirl around each other's. She moans against my lips and I pull away. "We can't have sex in the hospital room. Remember what happened last time?"
She looks down at the bulge in my pants, biting her lip. "It was so fun though."
"That it was." I say before her lips meet mine again.
*
"Mommy!" Aspen yelled as she ran through the door and we quickly "shushed" her.
"Hi babies." Evelyn smiled over at them as they walked towards us.
Aspen's eyes widened when she saw Evelyn and I each holding a baby. She climbed onto the bed, Asher following after her.
"How was school Bubby?" I ask and he grins.
"Good! They wouldn't let me on the monkey bars though." He pouts, scooting up by Ev.
"You don't want to go on those anyways, they're scary Bub." Evelyn says.
"Asher, be quiet. I want to meet sissy." Aspen snaps at him. She crawls onto Evelyn's lap and Ev winces.
"Hey Sis, what did we say about climbing on Mama right now?" I ask.
"Sorry Mommy." She says, carefully moving forward on her lap.
"You're okay baby. Do you want to hold her?" She asks and Aspen's eyes light up.
"Yes!"
"Aspen." I gently snap. "You have to be quiet baby."
"I sorry Daddy." She says before putting her arms out.
Evelyn gently puts her in Aspen's arms, keeping her hand on the baby's head and a hand behind Aspen's back.
"Come here, Bub." I say and Asher climbs off the bed and into the chair next to it.
I squat down in front of him, gently giving our other baby to him, supporting his head. Asher leaned down and placed a kissed on his head.
He looked up at me, "What's his name, Daddy?"
I look at Evelyn and she nods, "This is Augustus, and Aspen is holding Adelaide."
We decided to stick with 'A' names, since we did with Asher and Aspen. We had a few picked out but these two flowed the best together. Plus, Axel sounded too similar to Asher and Aspen.
"I love her, Mommy." Aspen says, her sweet little voice was finally quiet.
"She loves you two baby." Evelyn says, smiling down at them.
"Mommy?" Aspen says in a questioning tone.
"What baby?"
"Why don't you have a shirt on?"
*
"Look at them. They're so cute." Gracie looked down at Adelaide in awe.
"As expected to be." I quipped.
"Guess it's a good thing Evelyn obviously has strong genes and they don't get their looks from you." She snaps back.
"Ha ha. Then why do the other two look exactly like me. Also, keep in mind, you're me, with long hair, and other non-masculine parts." I say and she practically snorts.
"What are their middle names?" Aiden asked.
"Adelaide's is Harper, and Augustus's is Jameson." Gracie's head snapped up.
"You gave him Papaw's name for a middle name?" She asks, a small smile on her lips.
"Yeah." I say, smiling over at her.
"I can't get over how great Ev looks. You literally just had twins and you look better than I did after Hudson." She says, referring the the youngest Jones kid.
"Oh stop it. You literally have had six kids and you still look like that." Evelyn says.
"Let's not get into a 'who's prettier' argument shall we." Aiden says and I agree. Although, no offense to Gracie, especially because she looks like me but, Ev wins.
A soft knock on the door draws our attention, "I'll get it." I say, standing up from the edge of Evelyn's bed.
I open the door to be greeted by a smiling Evan and Ellie. Ellie's shrinking bump shows through the t-shirt and yoga pants she was wearing.
"Hey!" Ellie whisper yelled, shoving right past me.
"Congrats man." Evan says, hugging me.
"Thanks, Henderson." I say, patting his back before we pull away.
We walk in to see Ellie already holding Augustus, tears already running down her cheeks. "Babe, you just got ahold of the baby. You couldn't even wait 5 minutes."
She wipes her nose, chuckling through her tears. "I can't help it."
"Gracie, give me the baby." He says and Gracie reluctantly passes Adelaide over to him. This only makes Ellie cry even harder.
"Els." Evelyn frowns at her.
"I'm fine." She says through her hormonal sobs.
"Daddy, I'm tired." Aspen says, walking over to me. "I want to go home."
"Remember when we told you to go with Nana, and you cried?" I say, picking her up.
"I didn't want to go home without you." She says.
"I know baby, but Mama and I can't go home yet."
"Can't I just stay here with you?" She looks up at me, giving me her best puppy dog eyes. It nearly killed me to say no.
"No Sis, you can't." She immediately starts crying against my chest. Wrapping her arms around my neck.
"Sis, don't you want to go home, and play with PJ and Claire, remember how much you've missed all of them?" I say as she continues to cry.
"You can go night swimming." I whisper and she immediately stops crying, picking her head up.
"But, it'll be close to bedtime." She says in a sad tone.
"It'll be our little secret." I say, knowing damn well everybody else heard.
"Pinky Promise?" She puts her tiny pinky out.
I wrap my pinky around hers, "Pinky promise."
Word Count: 1,785
All new book!!
Most Valuable Parent?
Pro hockey star, Christian Brooks, has everything he ever needed as a starting forward Right Winger, and a three year old daughter. Or, so he thought. When Brinley Cameron's newest patient happens to be, a star hockey player, for her favorite team's biggest rival's, daughter. She never thought she'd find herself quickly getting over her ex fiancé, and falling into the world that is: Christian Brooks.
*
Christian
I never thought I'd need someone more than Charlie, that is, until I met her. Meet: Brinley Cameron, one of my daughter's surgeon, southern sass at its finest, slight pain in my ass, and the girl I can't get off my mind, no matter how hard I try.
Brinley
I always assumed Christian Brooks was a jerk. He was an antagonizer on the ice, that meant he was one off the ice too, right? Wrong. He was the total opposite. In fact, I couldn't help myself from melting into a puddle every time I saw him interact with his daughter. And I definitely could help the fact that I found myself wanting to be around him, 24/7.