Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 304(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 304(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Minutes or hours later I wake when Tomas stands with me in his arms. I blink and yawn. “Why are you carrying me?”
“You fell asleep,” he explains. “And it’s time I get you to bed.”
I’m so sleepy now.
My head hits the pillow, and he tucks me into bed.
But there’s something I need to tell him.
As I’m drifting off to sleep, I can’t keep it in any longer. “Tomas?” I end on a yawn.
“Yes, love?”
I roll over with my back to him. “My period is late.
His arm slung around me tightens. “Your what?”
I yawn again. “My period.”
He sits straight up in bed. “My God,” he says. “Are you serious?”
I can’t help but giggle. “Totally.”
He’s walking around the cabin, pacing. “Are you ever late?”
“Not at all.”
“My God,” he repeats. “Where can we get a test?”
I laugh and smile to myself, half asleep. “Nowhere near around here. But that’s okay. We can take one when we get home.”
Maybe it would’ve been smarter to tell him when we were closer to a pharmacy. He reaches a hand to my belly. “Any kicking yet? Are you ill?”
I snort. “God, no. We have to test. And even if I am pregnant, it’s way too early.”
“We have to test,” he mutters. I fall into a deep sleep.
Two months later
“Twins,” the doctor pronounces. Tomas beams, stands, and paces the room, running his hands through his hair.
“Twins?” he asks.
“Twins,” the doctor repeats.
I only swallow hard and watch my husband absorb this information. Two babies instead of one? I bite my lip. I’m overwhelmed and a little awed.
“Don’t you worry, baby,” Tomas says. “I’ll hire a nanny. You already have a cook and cleaners. You’ll see how easy this is.”
Is he crazy? But still, it’s cute how excited he is.
“If you say so, handsome,” I say with a smile. “Can you tell the genders?” I ask the doctor.
“Looks like a boy and a girl.”
I grin at Tomas and he grins back, beaming at me with so much pride, my heart squeezes.
“I love you,” I tell him.
“And I love you.”
Seven years later
“Be careful,” Tomas says. “That’s hot!”
“Honey, she’s been using a skillet for a while now.” I grin. “She learned from the best.”
“From the best?” he says with a teasing scowl. “How many times have we seen the doctor for a burnt hand or a cut with a kitchen knife?”
I wave a hand to brush him off. “Oh, don’t be silly. A chef must learn to use real tools.”
“Real tools my ass,” he mutters.
“Or real tools on my ass,” I mutter back in his ear, so only he hears.
“Darling, not in front of the children,” he says with mock reproach.
“Afraid you’ll get me pregnant again?” I whisper back. “Hard to get a pregnant woman pregnant.”
I rest my hand atop my swollen belly and smile at him. I never dreamed I’d have any children, much less two sets of twins.
“And anyway, I wasn’t talking about me, but Camila.”
Shortly after we came back from our honeymoon, I asked Tomas to hunt down the chef my brother fired. It seems so long ago now. It took some time, but he found her, and to my delight, he hired her for our own kitchen. It makes my heart squeeze to see Camila working alongside my own children.
We’ve long since outgrown the lavish apartment in the compound and have settled down in suburbia just north of Boston. The Boston Bratva is alive and well, though the San Diego brotherhood collapsed after failed leadership about five years ago. The men I knew have scattered to different brotherhoods. I’m grateful. Knowing they’re no longer banded together somehow makes it easier to live my new life. To accept that I have a new family, and I’m the mom in this one.
“This looks delicious,” Tomas says approvingly at the simple meal of grilled cheese and homemade tomato soup. Our daughter, the spitting image of me, shoots him a toothless grin.
“Thank you, daddy,” she says.
“Let’s hope it’s edible,” her brother says.
“Edible?” Tomas repeats. “Behave yourself and be kind to your sister.” But he shoots me a wink. “That’s a pretty big word for a little boy. Must come from all those books your mother reads you.”
“Must be.” We eat while the kids chatter about their friends at school, the playdate at the park, and how they can’t wait for the leaves to change.
“Mom, today I learned about California,” my daughter says. “The teacher showed us pictures. I want to go some day.” I freeze, but Tomas takes it in stride.
“San Diego is a beautiful place to visit,” he says. “What is it that you want to see there.”
“The zoo!”
He lapses into great details about a zoo in Maine, and my daughter claps her hands, San Diego forgotten.
But I’ll never forget it.
And I’m glad that I won’t.
Remembering where I came from, and the pain of my past, gives me reasons to be grateful for the simple blessings of my life.