“My Teddy, oh my big, strong boy!”
“Since when is he your Teddy, Nonna?”
“Since he saved my Elia and my grandson!”
“It could be a girl, Teresa.”
“Si, Giulia. We should be so lucky as to have another patatina running around. Can you imagine how precious?”
“My vote is still a boy. We can start working on the next generation of the Santori hockey team!”
“Taranov hockey team, Niccolo. Unless she leaves the bastard, then I suppose she might keep Santori.”
“Gabriele! Don’t say that about the man who saved your sister’s life. I know you’re still upset, but now that we know the Taranovs had nothing to do with Leonardo…there’s no reason to stay so mad all the time.”
“Your mama is right, figlio. It’s time for us all to move forward as a family. We can wait and see how your sister feels about Theodore. We’ll follow her lead.”
“I love him.”
My Ellie. The love of my life.She’s here.
“I love him, and I need all of you to leave us alone so I can try to wake him up and tell him I’m sorry and I love him. And that he needs to get better fast because I need my feet rubbed.”
Chairs scrape as the family stands to follow Ellie’s command, and I wonder briefly if she’s gone with them as the silence drags on. Then a soft weight rests on my hand.Fuck,why is it so damn hard to open my eyes?
“Hi.”
My love.
“I’ve thought so much about what I would say to you when I finally got here. I tried to convince them to release me early—”
Release her?
“I was also in the hospital for a little while, just getting checked out and some IV fluids. But our nugget and I are both fine.”
My baby. My woman kept my baby safe.
“I heard that you already know about the baby. I was so mad that I didn’t get to tell you. I had this whole plan A, then plan B, even a plan C…but so much happened and everything was so awful. I’ve missed you so much, Teddy.I’ve been so sick, then losing Leo was almost more than I could bear. I needed you, and to not have you has been awful. You have to wake up so I can show you this sonogram, and I even recorded the heartbeat for you. Please.”
Her plea escapes on a sob, and finally, I open my eyes into the terrible brightness of the room. As I guessed, it is a hospital, but I couldn’t care less. All I can see and feel is my love.My Ellie.
Before I can say anything, she dissolves into tears and presses the call button to summon the nurse, who brings in a steady stream of doctors to assess me and ask me questions until they’re satisfied that I have my wits about me. According to them, the fact that I’m mentally intact after so much blood loss and CPR is nothing short of a miracle, and if the shot had been even an inch over, it would have gone right through my heart and killed me instantly.
Once they’re all gone, I turn to givemy full attention to Ellie, who has her back to me, looking out the window.
“Ellie.” That’s all I can think or say. The beautiful, perfect name of my beautiful, perfect woman. As raspy as my voice is, I can’t stop once I start. Shehasto know, right now, exactly how I feel. “Ellie, please. Please look at me, baby.”
Her face as she turns is devastating. Free of makeup, as gorgeous as I’ve ever seen her because she’s fine and whole andalive.But with tear-streaked cheeks and dark under-eye circles that tell the truth of the ordeal she’s gone through without me.
“I love you.” I can’t let another moment go by in this universe without her hearing it straight from me. I don’t care if she thinks she already knew. Hopefully, I’ll have a lifetime to prove that, however much she thinks I love her, it’s at least an order of magnitude higher, if not more. But she deserves to hear it. “I love you, I love you, I love you.” The tears flow as I finish, and every emotion I’ve been unable to express as I slept rushes forth in a painful wave.
“I love you too, you absolute idiot!” She launches herself at me, luckily landing on my good side that didn’t take a bullet, and buries her hands in my hair before claiming my mouth as voraciously as she’s claimed my soul. We’re both crying too hard to kiss much, though, and when she pulls back to look at me, I drink in the details I couldn’t see from across the room.God,I missed this face.
“Tell me. Please, tell me, baby. Like you wanted to.”
Her watery laugh is music to my ears, although I hope to hear it thousands more times without the tears over the next few years.
“Well,” she huffs and rolls her eyes. “I had a whole thing, but somehow this is better.” She takes my hand and gently places it over her lower stomach. No bigger now, but soon, I hope. “I hope you meant it when you told me you wanted to give me the big family I always wanted. We made a baby, Teddy. We’re going to have a little nugget that’s half me and half you.”
