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“Mom! You shouldn’t carry that!” Adam yells while racing across the sand. I laugh, bringing Dylan with me to greet her. Hollie gently rolls her eyes at Adam and gives me a pointed look that says,this is your fault.
“I’m fine honey. These bags only have clothes for your sister in them,” she explains, while Adam takes them out of her hands. He’s very protective of his mother and it’s only gotten worse in the six months that she’s been pregnant. He might have gotten that from me. I have a feeling he’s going to be just as protective of his little sister when she arrives.
“Welcome back, angel,” I say before giving her a kiss and settling Dylan on my hip. “How’s Caroline?”
Caroline DuPont has become almost a surrogate mother to Hollie over the years. I’ll be forever grateful to her for that since we haven’t seen neither hide nor hair of Regina in three years. One day she showed up at our offices, drunk and high, demanding money. She didn’t even care about seeing her daughter, all she wanted was cash. With Hollie’s blessing, I sent her on her way and it’s been radio silence from her ever since.
“She’s great. She’s almost as bad as I am with all the girls’ clothes. I mean, I was bad with the boys, but there’s something about all the little dresses that makes me lose my mind. I swore I blacked out and woke up outside with all these bags.” She laughs as Adam carries her haul up the steps and inside the bungalow.
“How are you feeling?” I ask. I know she was kidding about blacking out, but she’s been out for a few hours. Fatigue sneaks up on her when she’s pregnant. “Do you still want to go out to dinner? We could always have something here.”
“Oh, no you don’t, mister. Dante and Violet are going to watch the kids in their bungalow, and I get you all to myself tonight.” Her eyes heat and wander the expanse of my exposed chest, and I know she can’t wait to get me alone. Pregnancy makes Hollie even hornier than usual, and I’m a man that’s happy to accommodate his wife.
I set Dylan down and send him inside after his brother, then take Hollie in my arms, holding her tightly against me. I push my nose into the hair at the top of her head, breathing her in. She still smells like honeysuckle and summer just the way she did when she walked into my office all those years ago. If I had known that day how things would have turned out, I wouldn’t have spent all that time resisting her, trying to keep things professional between us. I would have gotten down on one knee and given her a ring instead of a job.
I didn’t realize how empty and lonely those years were between my parents’ deaths and finding Hollie. I was a man solely going through the motions, trying to build an empire as a monument to the life that I once had but was gone. It took Hollie coming into my life to realize that my past was important, but what was more important was my future and my own family.
I kiss the top of Hollie’s head. “I love you, angel. Thank you.”
“Thank me for what?”
“For our family.” She pulls away from me and looks into my eyes. Hers are watering, and I know she’s about to burst into tears. Her emotions are always on a roller coaster ride when she’s pregnant.
“Thankyou, Archer. I don’t know where I would be without you. Without our boys and our baby girl.” She settles her hand on her protruding stomach, and I drop to my knees in the sand and snuggle into it.
“We’re waiting for you, baby girl. Only three months left,” I whisper before placing a gentle kiss against her stomach.
“Daddy’s talking to da baby!” Dylan yells from the open doorway before rushing over to his mother and me, his brother hot on his heels.
They stop short of crashing into Hollie, knowing how important it is to be gentle with her. They both place their hands on Hollie’s stomach, fascinated that their little sister could be inside.
“Hurry up, baby,” Adam says, “we want to meet you.”
“Mom, will the baby come tonight?” Dylan asks.
“Nope sweetheart, we’ve got a while longer than that. We’ll be back home before the baby comes.” He looks disappointed for a minute before tugging on my trunks, demanding to be picked up. I raise him up and tuck Hollie into my side before the four, soon to be five, of us make our way back to the bungalow. My entire world is right here in my arms, and I couldn’t be happier.
