Page 63 of Duke's Baby Deal
I leaned on the side of the incubator and stared at Isolde. It was just after six in the morning—I’d left a note on my door for Duke to find me here.
One of the neo-natal nurses stopped by to check numbers and peer into the incubator. “It’s almost breakfast time for babies. Do you want to take her out to feed her?”
“Yes, please,” I said immediately. Not that I hadn’t been feeding them, but everyone knew that I was having problems making milk. They had us on a schedule—every two hours. And then I would pump at night when I was locked in my hospital room, trying to force my body to step up and do its job. But here I was, three and a half weeks in, and I was hardly making any more than I had the first couple of days. Apparently I sucked at making milk for my babies too, just like I’d sucked at gestating them.
It got so bad, we had to give them formula in between my miserable feedings, or they would have starved. But I still treasured these moments when I got to hold them and rock them and it was just the two of us together. The nurse handed her to me and I walked over to the rocking chair in the corner and opened my nursing shirt for another episode of mediocrity.
I was glad I’d been warned that new babies were really clumsy when it came to nursing. It only stood to reason that premature ones would be even clumsier. But Isolde couldn’t stay on my nipple to save her life, which it was kind of about. She’d get on, suck a few times, then come off and cry. By the end of a nursing session, I was near crying too, though this morning Isolde seemed to have a full belly.
Not that it took much to fill her.
Duke came through the door. His smile lit up the room for me and I quickly dried my tears and put on a brave face. “Hi! You’re right on time!”
“I wouldn’t want to miss this.” He kissed me briefly, and watched while I changed her diaper, still under the observant eye of the nurse. She was friendly enough, but seemed to see me as some kind of idiot. So everything I did with the babies was watched like it was my first time diapering, or cleaning, or dressing.
As soon as I was done, the nurse came over to take her. “We’re just going to weigh your little princess, then she can go back inside the incubator to grow some more. ‘Cause that’s what babies do best, isn’t it darling?” she cooed as she carried our baby over to the scale. She laid Isolde on the tray and checked the display. “She’s gained again. That’s good. If she keeps on like this, she’ll be out of the incubator in a couple of days.”
I watched her put our baby back in the plastic incubator box and attach the wires to the sensors on her body—heart rate, temperature, breathing. Then she went to get Jedrick out for us.
She let Duke hold him for a minute and carry him over to me. I sat back down and held my arms out, hiding my fear and my tears.
But I loved them so much, and when Duke put Jedrick in my arms, my heart overflowed with happiness. I settled him on my un-nursed side and guided his mouth, rubbing his cheek over my nipple so he knew to turn and look for it. He settled quickly but, just like Isolde, he only drank a couple of mouthfuls before he let go and began to cry.
And then I did too, sitting there holding my baby and not knowing what to do to fix this.
“Bram, sweetheart, what’s wrong?”
“I can’t do this,” I sobbed. I tried to set Jedrick on again, but he just flailed around and wouldn’t nurse, crying so I thought my head would break. I knew my heart was. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I handed him off to Duke and stumbled from the room, banging into walls and doors until I got down the flight of stairs to the maternity ward and could barricade myself in my room.
I lay on the bed and cried until my pillow was soaked.
A large warm hand landed in the middle of my back, and then one side of the mattress sank beneath me. Duke’s deep, comforting voice rumbled through the pre-dawn darkness. “Hey, it’s okay. You’re doing fine. This is hard, really hard. I wish there was something I could do to take some of the load off your back.”
“It’s not your responsibility. You’re not omega!” I wanted him to go away because there wasn’t anything he could do, and I wanted him to stay and make it all better.
“No, but I’m your mate. And these are my pups.” He lay down on the bed and pulled me into his arms. “You know what we did when you left? The nurse gave me a bottle to give to Jedrick. And he seemed fine. He didn’t eat much, but he ate, and then she walked me through changing him and you know what?”
I took a few deep, shaky breaths and asked, “What?”
“It’s not the same as the natural method, but they didn’t look any worse for wear. And I know it’s selfish of me, but I enjoyed sitting in that chair and holding my son, feeding him, taking care of him. If you don’t mind, I’d like to do it more.”
“You might have to, since I can’t seem to do anything right for them.” I curled my fists in Duke t-shirt and hung on for dear life.
“You’ve done plenty right. Their doctor came by while you were gone. He says they’re doing really well, that he thinks you’ll be an excellent parent. You’ve never said no, never argued. Everything he asked you to do, you did without complaint. And I know you’ve worn yourself to the bone to do it—we all do. We all see it, except for you. You need to stop beating yourself up. I don’t care if you can’t nurse them. There are tons of humans who use formula. I’d rather have a happy, rested mate and happy, growing pups, than put you through this torture. And them, too. It’s not fair to any of you to expect this, and if you want to stop, I’ll beat anyone who criticizes you into a pulp.” His voice softened. “This isourfamily, and these areourchoices. You can keep trying if you want, but I need you to understand that I’ll be happy and support you with whatever choice you make.” He kissed the top of my head. “The nurse told me that sometimes, when the babies come early, milk is late showing up in human women. It’s probably the same with us. It could be that you just didn’t have time to get ready to make enough. It’s not your fault—shifters don’t have twins. We’re not made for them. You were amazing to keep them going as long as you did, and I couldn’t be prouder or love you more.”
“Really?” I sniffed and burrowed closer into his embrace. “You’re not mad?” Or disappointed. I thought I could handle mad better than disappointed.
“No.” He chuckled. “Not mad. You want to stay here and nap for a while? Then we can go back and maybe we’ll each feed one?”
I could feel my agitation and my despair fading slowly the more he talked, and the more he said, the more I believed that it would be all right. “Which one do you want?” I asked, not because I needed to know, but because I just wanted to listen to his voice rumbling beneath my ear.
“I’ll arm wrestle you for Isolde,” he said, and tightened his arms around me so I couldn’t smack him for his joke.
I lifted my head and begged a kiss. “Thank you,” I said.
“No thanks between us. We’re mates—it’s what we do for each other.”
We lay there quiet for a moment and in the silence of his heartbeat, I made a decision. “I think I should stay home to look after the babies. I mean, omegas were never really meant to go to school. And I think all the focus on me being something I’m not might have caused this. If I hadn’t spent my time studying and worrying about marks and scores, I might have caught this before it got this bad. I don’t want to take the chance.”
