Page 85 of Pregnant By A Rich Demon 4

My jaw tightened.

I hung up the phone without saying goodbye to the nurse and tossed it onto the island.

“Since when you wearing linen on a Wednesday?” I asked Priest, my voice dropping an octave.

Priest didn’t even blink. He shut the fridge door, grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl, and leaned back against the counter with his arms crossed. “Since it’s eighty-five degrees outside, and I don’t feel like sweating through a tactical vest just to pick up your groceries.”

“You went to the grocery store together,” I said, looking between him and Raven. “In the middle of the day. Like a couple on HGTV.”

Raven rolled her eyes, walking straight past me to peer into the lounger. “Shut up, Amai. Nobody asked for your commentary. Hey, sweet girl,” she cooed, her entire voice shifting from street-sharp to honey-sweet in half a second as she leaned over Trumai. “Look at you sleeping like your daddy ain’t in here losing the rest of his damn mind.”

“I’m not losing my mind,” I said. “I’m being thorough.”

“You called the clinic over green poop. Truth already texted me,” Raven said, looking up with a smirk that looked way too much like Truth’s. “Priest told me you had him searching medical forums at six in the morning.”

I snapped my neck toward Priest. “You running your mouth to her about my business?”

Priest took a slow bite of his apple. “When your business involves asking me if baby gas can cause internal hemorrhaging, yeah. I’m seeking outside counsel. Raven got nieces and nephews. She knows more than WebMD.”

“He was about to order an ultrasound machine off medical surplus,” Raven added, laughing. “Truth texted me from the bed this morning begging me to come over here and distract his ass before she committed a homicide.”

“I didn’t order the ultrasound,” I said defensively. “I looked at the pricing.”

“Nigga!” Raven cackled. She turned around, leaning her hip against the island right next to Priest. Priest looked down at her, the corners of his mouth twitching with that tiny, rare smile he only ever pulled out when nobody was shooting at us.

I looked at them standing side by side. Priest was my right hand. He’d buried bodies with me, taken bullets for me, stood by my side while we cleared out Rahsaan’s entire network block by block. And Raven was Truth’s sister—loud, unapologetic, protective as a pit bull, and completely unimpressed by anything that had the Landry name attached to it. Seeing them together made the hair on the back of my neck stand up, not because Priest wasn’t solid, but because if they went sideways, I was the one who was gonna have to live in the blast zone between my enforcer and my woman’s family.

“You standing awful close to him,” I told Raven.

“And you standing awful close to an aneurysm,” she shot back without missing a beat. “Back up off me and go check your monitors. Ain’t one of your little smart watches vibrating?”

Truth walked into the kitchen right then, wearing oversized sweatpants and one of my black t-shirts that hung down to her mid-thigh. She looked at Raven, looked at Priest, and then looked at me standing by the table like an armed guard.

“Did they roast you yet?” Truth asked, walking over to the island to pour a glass of orange juice.

“They tried,” I said.

“Good,” Truth said, taking a sip and smiling over the rim of the glass. “You deserved every bit of it. Now sit your big ass down and leave that baby alone before I put you on time-out. Did you have the staff fix up that other room for my mama?”

“Yeah, everything is ready.”

“She only staying one night, but I want her comfortable.”

“She can stay as long as she wants. You know I’ll make sure Mama D has everything she needs.”

“I told y’all not to make a fuss,” Delphine startled us walking in. “It’s only one night, and then I’m gone. Where Granny baby?”

I watched her B line to Tru and gently pick her up. She fussed a bit but not much. It was like she knew she was in good hands. Delphine mumbled something in her ear and laid Tru on her chest.

Me and Truth just stood there in awe. We had a life neither of us thought was possible, and it all felt like a dream. For me to possess something so pure is a miracle. I’d never thought I’d be worthy of a joy like this.

By the end of the second week, Delphine had basically moved into the guest suite downstairs.

She didn’t announce it. She just showed up one afternoon with two giant plastic totes filled with frozen gumbo, three packs of white cotton onesies she’d washed in Dreft beforehand, and an overnight bag the size of an engine block.

“I’m staying until you two stop looking like walking corpses,” she’d said, dropping her keys on the front table and marching straight toward the kitchen. “And don’t nobody ask me when I’m leaving, ’cause the answer is when I feel like it.”

I didn’t argue. In my entire life, there were maybe three people who could walk into my house and give orders without me putting a hand on my piece, and Delphine Renois had shot straight to the top of that list without firing a single round.