His face goes pale.
Ivy groans loudly from the table. “See? Weird.”
Hudson ignores her as he steps in front of me, his hands on my stomach. “Are you having contractions?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“You look uncomfortable.”
“I am uncomfortable,” I say dryly. “I’m eight months pregnant.”
His expression turns murderous like he wants to fight pregnancy itself.
I can’t help it; I start laughing.
Hudson looks deeply unimpressed by this reaction. “I don’t see what’s funny.”
“Oh, I do,” I murmur, cupping his jaw. “You’re ridiculous, but I love you anyway.”
“I’m not ridiculous,” he grumbles.
I smile as he leans down to kiss me.
Ivy giggles into her juice, and I’m thrown back to the hospital four years ago. Back to Hudson pacing holes into the labor and delivery room floor while I was in labor with Ivy. Honestly, I’m pretty sure I was calmer than he was.
“Her heart rate went up,” he barked at the nurse at one point.
The poor woman blinked at him. “Sir, that’s normal during labor.”
Hudson looked unconvinced.
“Normal or not, fix it.”
I laughed so hard that I nearly cried.
Then there was the IV incident. Hudson went sheet white watching them put it in my arm. The nurse wasn’t able to find a vein right away, and I kept wincing every time she tried.
“Baby,” he said tightly, kneeling beside the hospital bed. “Why are they stabbing you?”
The nurse looked like she was trying not to laugh. Meanwhile, I was the one in labor and somehow comforting him.
And every single time I winced? Hudson completely unraveled.
“She’s in pain.”
“That contraction looked worse.”
“Can’t you give her something?”
“I don’t like how pale she is.”
The nurses smiled every time he spoke because it was painfully obvious that my grumpy husband was one step away from fighting the entire hospital staff for me.
Then Ivy was born, and Hudson… God. Even now my throat tightens thinking about it.
