Page 276 of Triplet Babies for my Ex's Best Friend

“Perfect.”

“Me?”

“Also perfect.”

“Liar.”

“Occasionally.”

She smiles faintly. “Oliver?”

“On his way with Luci. She got here as quickly as she could. Diane is apparently bringing balloons despite being told not to.”

“Captain?”

“Has been banned from the maternity ward.”

“Tragic.”

“Deeply.”

Her fingers shift weakly against mine. “You okay?”

No one has ever asked me that at the right moments the way Addy does.

I look at her. At the woman who fell apart in an airport and rebuilt my life in the wreckage. The woman who loved my son before she had to, who stayed when running would havebeen easier, who gave me back a future I thought grief had permanently taken.

I reach into my pocket.

Addy’s eyes narrow immediately. “What are you doing?”

“Something I should’ve done before there were three witnesses in incubators.”

“Ethan.”

I stand.

Then I lower myself beside her bed, not quite on one knee because hospital furniture is designed by sadists, but close enough.

Her mouth falls open. “Oh wow.”

“I had a plan,” I say.

She starts crying instantly.

“I had several plans, actually. Millennium Park. The balcony. The lakefront. Oliver was going to hold a sign, but his spelling is unpredictable under pressure.”

She laughs and sobs at once.

“But then you went into labor during breakfast.”

“Sorry for ruining your billionaire choreography.”

“You improved it.”

Her face crumples.

I open the small velvet box.