Page 100 of Savage Bratva King

“Mika thinks they’re both girls,” I say.

“Three of you?” He kisses the top of my head. “My luck just keeps growing and growing.”

POST EPILOGUE

LEONID

Another pain racks Gianna’s body. She grips my hand tightly, clenches her jaw, and breathes deeply, in through her nose and out through her mouth. Beads of sweat cling to her forehead and upper lip, and her hair, swept up onto her head to keep her cool, is damp with the steam from the birthing pool.

But between contractions, her wide smile is all for me.

I mop her face with a cool wet towel and raise a cup of water to her lips. Her cheeks are flushed, and I can see the pain etched around her pinched lips, but her eyes are the brightest I’ve ever seen them, filled with anticipation.

“Shall I call the obstetrician?” I recognize the panic in my own voice, something I’ve never experienced before, and warn myself to keep it together. For Gianna’s sake.

“No.” Gianna slumps back against the side of the pool, and I cradle her in my arms. “I’m fine. They’re just … getting stronger.”

“Stronger? Is this normal? We’ve been here for ten hours already.”

“Gianna, you’re doing brilliantly.” Valerie, our doula, flashes me a warning look from the other side of the pool. “Breathe, that’s it, you can do this.”

Gianna insisted that she wanted the birth to be as natural as possible, and Valerie spent months during the pregnancy practicing hypnobirthing with her and helping her to write a birth-plan that we both felt comfortable with. I was skeptical to begin with, but I’ve seen how Gianna’s entire body relaxes whenever the doula speaks to her.

This time though, before Gianna can gather her strength in preparation for the next wave of pain, she moves forward on to all fours, and the noise that emits from her is so animalistic, so feral, that it raises goosebumps on my arms.

“Printzessa?” I rub her lower back, fear spiking through my chest. “Is this normal?” I ask Valerie because Gianna’s eyes are squeezed tightly shut, and she doesn’t even acknowledge me.

“Yes.” Valerie’s voice is low and so fucking calm that I want to throttle some sense of urgency into her. “She’s entering the second stage of labor.”

“I’m going to find the obstetrician.” I’m already on my feet.

My shirt is damp with sweat, and the knees of my pants are saturated with water from the pool, but I don’t give a fuck how I look. Ten hours of watching Gianna suffer while the obstetrician and midwives tell me that ‘everything is progressing exactly how it should be’, and my cup of patience has run dry.

Before I cross the room, the door opens and the obstetrician, a young woman with olive skin and jet-black hair slicked back into a tight ponytail comes in. “How are we doing?” Her gaze flits between me and Gianna, her expression neutral even when she hears the howling noise my wife is making.

“She hasn’t made this sound before.” I hesitate between dashing back to Gianna and getting down on my knees and begging this woman to get my babies out and end this torture.

“Gianna?” Dr. Fernandez pulls on a pair of sterile latex gloves from the counter on the wall and prepares the equipment she’ll need to monitor the progress of her patient’s labor. She waits for the contraction to pass and says, “How are you coping?” while she and Valerie ease Gianna around the pool so that she is facing me.

“That one was … tough.” Gianna is still smiling at me, her eyes searching mine to check that I’m doing okay.

“Do you feel like you need to push?” While she talks, Dr. Fernandez angles a tiny mirror in the water so that she can see what’s going on inside Gianna’s cervix.

I go back to the side of the pool and place the cool towel on Gianna’s forehead. I kiss the top of her head. Right now, I have no words.

“No, I don’t think so.” For the first time since we got here, I see the fear in her eyes when she raises them to meet mine. “Should I?”

“Let’s turn you around and sit you down so that I can check on our babies.” The obstetrician’s tone is kind and efficient, but I just wish someone would tell us that the hard part is done and it’s all a doddle from here on in.

She places a strap around Gianna’s swollen belly and connects it to a machine that turns my blood to ice in my veins. It’s several beats before she picks up on the babies’ heartbeats, and I swear I die and come back to life before the rapid blip-blip-blip reaches my ears.

“Is everything okay?”

“The cervix still isn’t fully dilated.” The doctor addresses both of us at the same time. “I would’ve expected it to be by now with the strength of the contractions.”

Before she has even finished, Gianna hauls her body back onto all fours in the water, the eerie unnatural sound issuing from her throat again.

I lean over the side of the pool and stroke her back, letting her know that I’m still there even though the pains are so strong now that she’s sliding into a personal zone of concentration where nothing else exists.

---