Ride with Me (13 page)

She leans up on her tiptoes, her lips at my ear. “I don’t want to tell Coop until we go to the doctor.”

“Why the fuck not?”

Cooper turns at my harsh tone, and I lift my chin at him. He digs back into his food. Fuck, his ears.

“I just want to know a hundred percent.” She’s sheepish, not a trait I associate with my woman at all. “Babe, I think I’m around two months. How many parties have we been to since then?” She pulls back, looking up at me expectantly, but I’m not getting it.

“Lots.”

She sighs and comes back to my ear. “I drank at those parties. I just want to make sure the baby is okay.”

“Okay or not, I don’t give a fuck. He will be just fine.”

Her face turns into a sexy as fuck smile, like me saying that was everything to her.

“I know. We’ll go to the doctor this afternoon. I called when you first left on your run.”

My breathing stops for a moment. “You knew and didn’t tell me?”

She rolls her eyes. “Cruz, you were on a run, and I sure as hell wasn’t telling you something like this over the damn phone. Come on.”

While she’s right, I still can’t help the flame of anger in my gut that starts to burn. I knew something was off when I spoke with her on the phone, but pregnancy didn’t even cross my mind. I should have pieced that shit together before I got home. 

“And Ma knows.”

And that lights my flame to an inferno.

She must see it in my eyes because she hurries on. “It’s her weird, child voodoo thing. She knew it when I picked up Cooper. I told her to keep it to herself, and Ma will until we’re ready.”

The fire starts to simmer down. With this kind of shit, I want to be the first to know, but I get it. I was gone. Whatever. Moving on.

“What time is the doctor appointment?”

“We have to drop Coop off at school, and then the appointment is at nine forty-five.”

I pull my girl into my arms and wrap her up, leaning down to her ear. “I fucking love you, babe.”

“Love you, too.”

***

Fucking doctor’s office. I sit, looking at all the round bellies of the women and the faces of the men who look like they would love to be anywhere but here. I take that back; there are a few who look excited. Me? This is part of it, so I’ll roll with it.

Princess finishes filling out the stack of papers just before the nurse comes out and calls her name. I follow behind, but when the nurse asks Princess to go and piss in a cup, I stay in the room. Then the nurse instructs Princess to get naked and put on this paper gown thing before leaving the room.

Princess warned me that she might have to get an entire checkup since she hasn’t had one in a while, and when she talked to them on the phone, they said she had to.

Even though that pussy is mine, I don’t want to see whatever the hell that doctor does down there. Of course, the good thing is the doctor is a woman, so I won’t have to beat a man’s ass for touching my woman.

Princess said something about this being the same doctor Angel had with little Deacon. I’m sure if GT can handle this shit, I can, too.

The door opens and a small, brown-haired woman with rimmed glasses covering her brown eyes steps into the room. Her smile is wide as she looks at Princess and then me. She holds out her hand to Princess who takes it instantly.

“I’m Dr. Hernandez. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, too. This is Cruz, the baby’s father.”

Dr. Hernandez moves to me, holding that same hand out, which I take. Her hands are so small encased in mine.

“Dr. Hernandez,” I say, lifting my chin. I already know she’s trustworthy because of baby Deke.

“Well, congratulations. You are definitely pregnant,” she says with a smile, pulling up a chair with wheels on it. She scoots over to the counter and opens a file. “Looks here like you haven’t had a check-up in four years. Is that correct, Harlow?”

Princess’ spine stiffens a bit, but I see her breathing regularly. It did sound a bit accusatory, but I will see how Princess plays this out.

“Correct. I was in prison for a while, got out, and coming to the doctor hasn’t been on my list of things to do.”

Dr. Hernandez’s looks up at Princess, her eyes peering over the top of her glasses. I wait for the accusation or belittlement of my woman being in jail.

“Did you get routine care while there?” she asks without a bit of disgust or contempt, and I immediately like the doc.

Princess clears her throat, no doubt thinking of being coerced repeatedly into sex while in there. “Yes.” She says nothing more.

“Good. Do you have any concerns right now?” Dr. Hernandez goes back to her papers, writing something down on them.

“Yes, I don’t know how far I am. I missed a couple of periods.”

“How many?”

“Two, I believe.” Princess twists her fingers, looking nervous.

I reach over from the chair and rest my hand on her back, and her fidgeting stills. This is something else that isn’t like my woman.

“We’ll do an ultrasound, which will give us a very accurate reading.”

Princess clears her throat. “There’s something else.”

The doctor turns to her, giving Princess her full attention.

“I drank. Not a lot, but there were at least three times when I was sloshed.”

“But not drinking every day?”

“No.” Princess shakes her head. “Just at parties. Once or so a weekend. Do you think it hurt the baby?”

I rub the area my hand rests on, feeling Princess’ tension through the fabric.

“It happens sometimes, Harlow. I can see this is really worrying you.” The doctor rolls her stool closer to Princess. “Of course, there’s a risk. There’s a risk in everything. Chances are the baby is fine, but we’ll also run some blood work, and I’ll check to make sure nothing is wrong with those tests. It’ll take a couple of days to get the results, but the ultrasound will give us a good idea about the baby.”

Princess nods and lets out a gush of air. I know she would never do anything to intentionally hurt the baby. She would hurt herself before she let anything happen to her kids. She’s proven that. I hate that she’s carrying this worry, but there isn’t much I can say to take it away.

“If we have to run more tests later, I’ll have to do an amniocentesis and pull fluid from your sack for tests, but that has some serious risks to it, so we won’t do it unless it’s completely necessary.” Fuck, I don’t like the sound of that one at all. “Today, I’ll check you, and I’ll bring in my internal ultrasound so I can see how far along the baby is.”

“Sounds good.” Princess turns to me and smiles, and I give her one back.

We are going to see our baby today.

Dr. Hernandez instructs Princess to lie down then gets to work with whatever in the hell she’s doing. Metal is clanking from beneath the sheet as she uses some wire brush thing on my woman. It’s as if she’s giving her a damn lube job or something. Within ten minutes, Princess is sitting back up.

The doctor snaps off her rubber gloves and tosses them into the trash. “I’m going to get the nurse to bring in the machine,” she says as she steps out of the door.

“It’ll be all right, babe,” I say, trying to give Princess some reassurance.

“It has to be.” She doesn’t make eye contact with me; instead, she looks to the ground.

I rise from my chair and move to her, placing my index finger under her chin and lifting her gaze to mine. “Whatever happens … happens. We deal. If there is something wrong, it’s not like we’re gonna love this kid any differently. Am I right?”

Tears pool in her eyes, but she sucks them back. “Yeah, just being the cause of it is a little too much for me to take.”

The real fear in her eyes has me wrapping my arms around her tightly. “You didn’t know you were pregnant. You can’t be beating yourself up about it. You have too much shit going on for that. You’ve gotta be strong for the baby, Coop, and me.” I kiss the top of her hair.

“I know.” She sucks in a deep breath just as the door opens and a large machine gets rolled into the room. I step out of the way as it’s placed next to Princess’ exam table.

“Hello,” the petite, blonde-haired nurse says, adjusting the machine and turning some knobs. “I’m just setting things up, and then the doctor will be back in.” She does just that and leaves without another glance.

A few moments later, Dr. Hernandez steps into the room along with another woman. This one is tall and built sturdily with light brown hair and a smile on her face.

“All right, this is our sonographer, Jill. She’s going to be performing the ultrasound, and I’m going to be looking at the sonogram on the monitor.”

Princess nods.

“All right, Harlow, I need you to lie back down.” Jill grabs a large wand that looks like a fucking dildo and rolls a condom down it. What the fuck? Then she grabs a bottle from the side of the machine and squirts some goo on it.

“Uh, what are you doing with that?” I ask Jill, my eyes boring into her.

Jill tenses then answers, “This is what I’ll be sticking inside the vagina. It has a camera in the tip that will allow us to see what’s going on inside of Harlow on that screen there.” She points to a television monitor.

Fuck.
I say nothing more.

“Harlow, we’re going to start. She’s going to be moving the wand all around inside there to get the best views. Sometimes, you’ll have to hold your breath for a second, and sometimes, it won’t be the most comfortable, but it won’t hurt.”

“Let’s do it,” Princess says, lying on the table, her eyes glued to the monitor.

I move to the other side of the bed so I can be near Princess and see the screen.

“I’m entering,” Jill says as the fuzziness on the screen pops up.

I see nothing but little lines of black and white. How in the hell Jill or the doctor sees anything in this is beyond me.

“There he or she is,” Jill says, just as the doctor comes to the screen and points at it.

The screen pauses, and the doctor moves up to it. All I see is a black and white blur.

She points then makes a circle with her fingers. “This is the head and this”—she moves her finger to the left a bit—“is the body.”

Holy shit! I can see it, but I can’t. It still looks like a blob of mess, but I can see the outline. I grab Princess’ hand, but her eyes don’t leave the screen that is now in motion again.

“These are the arms and these the legs.”

Jill does some clicking things and then types on the keyboard in front of the screen as she continues to move around inside Princess’ body. She then stills it and says, “This is your baby’s heartbeat.”

A whooshing sound enters the room as little lines on the screen go up and down. I squeeze Princess’ hand, and she reciprocates. That’s our baby. Holy fuck, it’s happening. Excitement burns through me.

“Harlow, from the looks of it, you are more like three months pregnant. Maybe even three and a half. Out of the first trimester.”

The grip on my hand tightens to almost painful.

“Seriously? What does that mean for the baby?” Princess asks.

“It just means that you’re further along than you thought.”

“Uh, doctor?” Jill says, and Princess tenses at the tone.

The doctor looks at the monitor, a smile brimming her face. “Well, look right here.” She points to the screen again where another image shows. “Looks like one baby wasn’t enough. It looks like you have twins in there.”

Twins?
Holy fucking shit. I feel lightheaded and need to shake my head to get it together.

“What!” Princess exclaims, as astonished as I am.

The doctor points to the screen again. “Right here is another baby. You’re going to have twins.”

“Holy fucking shit,” Princess murmurs, her eyes wide when she turns to me. “You and your damn super sperm,” she chastises, and the women in the room laugh.

I chuckle. “Told you I wanted kids.” I shrug with zero remorse.

“But I was on the pill. How can I have not one but two babies?” Princess questions.

“We like to think that birth control is one hundred percent effective, but it never is. You have the possibility of getting pregnant any time you have sex.”

Princess smacks me on the arm, and I feign hurt, but the smile on my face is broad.

“Damn super sperm.” But the smile on her face tells me she’s teasing and happy as hell. She’s happy.

“Having twins puts a different spin on things,” the doctor cuts in. “You’ll start to show in the next week or so and will continue to grow. You have two babies in there wanting space. Most twins are born between thirty-four and thirty-six weeks because there isn’t enough room in there.”

“Will they be okay coming out that early?” Princess asks.

“Most of the time, their lungs are fully developed at thirty-four weeks. If something should happen and they come earlier, we’ll cross that bridge when it happens. We need to get you on prenatal vitamins today.”

“I’ve been taking a multi-vitamin every day,” Princess tells her.

“That’s good. Really good. That means your babies were getting what they needed, even though you didn’t know it. But the ones I’m going to give you are high in folic acid. It helps the babies grow.”

“What do I need to do?” Princess asks.

“Rest, sleep. Those are two big things. The further along in your pregnancy you go, the larger you will get and the more you’ll need to lug around. You’ll want to walk, though, and keep your blood flow going. Then rest.”

The image of Princess round with two of my babies makes me hard as fuck.

“Sex. What about having sex?” I ask quickly.

The doctor laughs. “You know, so many men ask that. Sex is perfectly fine, but when her belly grows, you’ll need to find creative ways to go about it. And then she will be tired a lot, so sex may not be in the cards further down the road as much as it probably is now.”

“Then we need to get home so we can make up for lost time,” I tell the doctor, who blushes. Princess smacks me on the arm. “What? It’s true.”

Princess smiles, shaking her head, and mutters, “Super sperm.”

Jill and the doctor finish up, leaving Princess with a prescription for vitamins.

I watch as she gets dressed, and the minute she does, I envelop her in my arms.