Page 55 of Omega's Triplets

Chapter Fourteen

Several months passedwithout incident, unless you wanted to count the fact that Maddy had begun to feel like she could eat everything in the Hell’s Wolves’ refrigerator without batting an eye. Was it normal to feel this hungry all the time during pregnancy?

If she wasn’t eating, she was getting sick. She was more annoyed by this than anything. Her first months of pregnancy had been entirely free of morning sickness, and she’d begun to believe that she would be spared that unpleasantness. Why was it setting in now? It was so unfair.

In between eating and being sick, she had plenty to do. Mark was still insisting on daily jogs, although he’d become more flexible about the time of day and was allowing Maddy to set the pace. After a while, the jogs began to transition into yoga practice, which Maddy found much more enjoyable—she always felt energized afterward instead of exhausted. Maddy had also begun devoting a lot of time to taking naps, and Mark had issued a stern ruling that nobody was allowed to disturb her. It was like being a princess again, like when she was little—the house revolved around taking care of her, making sure she was healthy and happy. But it was even better now than it had been back then, because now everything they were doing was really for her babies.

Harley had devoted himself to cracking the mystery of her food cravings, despite the fact that Maddy had told him she wasn’t really having any. He spent hours in the kitchen cooking up the strangest foods, things Maddy had never even tried before, and asking her to taste them. She discovered dozens of new favorites—homemade strawberry ice cream, tacos with cilantro and jalapeno, even pickle juice, and Harley promptly stocked the fridge.

“But I don’t think any of that’s pregnancy related,” Maddy said. “I think I just like those foods.”

Harley chuckled. “If you say so.”

“You don’t think so?”

“Maddy, I found those foods on a list of common cravings among pregnant women. That’s why I offered them to you in the first place.” He grinned. “And let me guess, red meat sounds delicious?”

“Red meatisdelicious,” she argued. “I’ve always liked it.” But she couldn’t deny that she felt a twinge of longing now at the thought. “Did you make that too?”’

He laughed again. “It’s for dinner.”

“What else is on that list? Let me see it.”

Harley retreated to the library and came back with a well-thumbed book about pregnancy. Several of the pages had been dog eared. He handed it to her.

She stared at him. “How long have you had this?”

“A few weeks.”

“And you didn’t show me?” She smacked him in the forearm with the book. “You didn’t think I’d be interested in this? You suck, Harley. I’m keeping your book.”

“Hey, I need that!” he protested, but she was already leaving the room, book in hand, with thoughts of curling up in bed and reading a few chapters to find out what was coming her way in the remainder of the second trimester of her pregnancy.

But she never made it to her room. Jamie was coming down the stairs, twirling a ring of keys around his index finger, and he stopped her. “I’m going shopping,” he said. “Come with me.”

“I was going to take a nap,” she said, knowing she was invoking the magic words.

But Jamie just grinned. “You can nap when we get back,” he said. “You’re not going to be able to fit on the back of my bike for much longer, and you don’t want to miss this shopping trip.”

“Where are we going?”

“To buy supplies for the nursery.”

He was right. Maddy felt a surge of excitement. Shedidn’twant to miss this. “Let me just run to my room,” she said. “I’ll meet you in the garage in five minutes, okay?”

“Okay,” Jamie agreed.

Maddy ran up to her room, surprised the journey didn’t take more effort. She could feel her body starting to change, could feel the weight she was gaining, thanks to being pregnant. But she seemed to have boundless reserves of energy to go along with her new body. Maybe it was all the naps.

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