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Only one of the reasons I love him so much. He knows exactly what I need, and he makes it happen. A few hours later, we’re sitting in the medical room in the castle. Dr. Williams has my legs covered in warm quilts, my belly exposed for her inspection.
Dr. Williams does an external check, her doppler sliding over the warm jelly she’s spread on my belly. She can see I’m holding my breath, expecting the worst.
She gives me a smile. “I’m finding the heartbeat,” she says. “Give it a minute. Try to breathe.”
“Finding? Or searching for?” I ask. I’ve been through this before, the doctor searching while I held my breath, then him finding nothing. I feel uncomfortable, prickles of heat dancing over my lower back as I lie on the bed.
Dr. Williams’s brown eyes lock on mine. “I’m locating the active heartbeat of your healthy baby, sweetheart.”
A loudswish-swish-swishcomes over the doppler. The heartbeat is much faster than mine would sound. It belongs to my baby.
Doesn’t it?
A huge smile, bright as the sun, spreads over Dr. Williams’s face. “See? There it is. Strong as can be.”
We listen for a moment, Nikolaos’s hand squeezing mine. It’s literally the most amazing sound in the whole world. The strong heartbeat of my real live baby. I can’t believe I’m hearing my baby’s heartbeat.
“See?” He kisses my cheek. “Curse is broken.”
“Curse?” Dr. Williams’s nose wrinkles up. “What curse?”
“Nothing.” I shake my head. “Just a silly inside joke.”
“Okay,” Dr. Williams says, “It’s time to move on to the internal ultrasound. Let’s check out what’s going on with this little peanut.”
“Oh my gosh, I can’t believe we’re actually going to be able to see our baby.” Nikolaos holds onto my shoulder as Dr. Williams cleans the jelly from my belly, fixing my top back in place. She helps me spread my legs under the quilt, inserting the wand of the internal ultrasound.
She says, “Some would use an external ultrasound at this point, but I know how stressed you’ve been, and I want to give you the clearest picture possible to ease your mind.”
“I can handle whatever you throw at me.”
As long as I leave here with a picture of my precious, healthy baby.
She finds the baby, a little tiny being showing up on the screen. There’s a flickering heartbeat in its little rib cage. You can make out the early formations of little hands and feet, the baby curled in a curve, looking snug.
“Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.” I’m overwhelmed. There’s a baby in there. A real, live baby.
The doctor uses her tools to measure the baby. “8.5 centimeters. Perfect size for fourteen weeks. About the size of a precious little kiwi fruit. Baby is kicking around but you won’t be able to feel it yet.”
“Fourteen weeks!”
Shock and surprise settles over me. How on earth could I have been pregnant for fourteen weeks and not realized it?
Sure, my waistband has expanded a bit, but I’d put the blame on Remy’s good cooking and the fact that Nikolaos has chocolate from Lush on auto-ship. The fatigue I’ve been feeling? I glance over at Nikolaos who, in his newfound state of “daddy,” looks even more handsome than before.
Didn’t think that was possible…
But yes, his hot body and sexy demeanor have kept us very active in the bedroom, the riverboat, the greenhouse, the stairs of the castle. I’d blamed my fatigue on him.
Fourteen weeks…
“Oh no. I had a glass of wine last night. And one last week as well. Will the baby be okay?”
She nods. “One or two glasses of wine before you found out you were pregnant won’t hurt baby. But I’d recommend you abstain from now on.”
Nikolaos gives her a look so serious I almost laugh. “There won’t be any alcohol near this baby.”
“Will I be able to feel it move soon?” I ask.
