Page 87 of Accidental Mile High Daddy
“It means,” he said gently, “that she needs to go on strict bedrest. Effective immediately. No work, no errands, no stress, nosex.” His eyes flicked down to mine. “You’re already past five months, and with twins, your body’s going to feel that harder. If we don’t take this seriously, we’re looking at a very real, very high risk of preterm labor.”
My whole world tipped.
“No teaching?” I asked, voice breaking. “I-I have lesson plans, I have?—”
“You have two daughters,” Matt said, his voice a little strained, “who are relying on you to keep them safe.”
A soft knock came on the door as the doctor was packing things up, and then Jules slipped in, her face tense and eyes wide. “Matt texted,” she said, moving straight to my side. “Are you okay? Aretheyokay?”
“They’re girls,” I said weakly, swallowing through the rising dread in my body. “And they’re okay. Me, on the other hand, not so much.”
Matt did most of the talking for me, explaining to Jules what had happened, what it meant for me now. I’d tried not to press my hands to my eyes and sob, but it hadn’t fully worked, and instead I’d ended up stubbornly staring at the ceiling while tears slipped out of my eyes. Jules perched on the windowsill to my left, Matt sat in the chair to my right, and even with both of them here, it felt like everything was falling apart.
“Move in with me.”
I blinked, wiping the tears from my temples as I turned my head to Matt. “What?”
He took a breath, his voice wavering just a hair. “Move in. Now. Tonight. I’ll get the downstairs suite set up for you. Everything you need. You won’t have to lift a finger.”
“Matt—”
“I’ll work from home more,” he went on, like he’d been rehearsing this in his head since the doctor saidbedrest.“I can hire in a nurse, or Margot and I can just swap shifts making sure you’ve got what you need. You’ll rest. You’ll focus on the girls. And more importantly, you won’t be alone.”
Jules raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything.
“I’ll—fuck it, Sienna, I’ll sleep in there with you if it sways you. Iwantto.”
My breath caught in my lungs. “Matt, you don’t?—”
“I want to be there,” he breathed. “Every night. Not just the ones when things are easy. Please.”
“You can’t mean that.”
“I do,” he insisted, squeezing my hand so hard I worried it’d end up bandaged up like his. “We’ll do it properly. Labels and everything, if that’s what you want. No more confusion, no morewaiting for me to catch up. I just—I can’t bear the thought of you at home alone like this.”
I hesitated. I knew how hard this was for him, how much it cost him to say it out loud. He wasn’t someone who just offered pieces of himself lightly.
But still. “I need to hear it, Matt.”
He stilled. “Hear what?”
I almost didn’t want to say it, didn’t want toadmitthat I needed to hear it. “That you love me.”
A wounded, soft, broken noise escaped him. “Sienna,” he said, his voice low, shattered. “It should be obvious.”
Jules cursed behind me and shifted off the windowsill. “Give us a minute, Matt.”
Matt blinked, surprised, glancing between us like he didn’t want to leave. But something about the way Jules was looking at him made him second-guess it, and he stood, reluctantly letting go of my hand and quietly closing the door behind him.
The second it clicked shut, Jules rounded on me.
“You need to give him a break.”
I stared at her. “What?”
“He’s trying, Sienna. Christ, he’sbeentrying. We just talked about this. I don’t know what more you want him to do, bleed on command? Tattoo your name across his forehead?”
I looked away, jaw steeling. “It’s not, like, atest.”
